"Right. I'm sure that's all that is keeping me from the sash and crown."

The lunch lady dropped a glop of mystery ca.s.serole onto my tray. It was gray. I could think of no food product that was gray. The second lady put a spoonful of canned peaches in another section of the tray, topped it off with a slice of b.u.t.tered Wonder bread, and pa.s.sed it back to me. Ah, the lunch of champions.

I sat down at our table, but Joann was still standing, holding her tray.

"What's up?"

"Why don't we go over there?" Joann motioned toward a table near the window. Darci and her posse were sitting there, waving madly at Joann, as if this was wartime and Joann was their long-lost relative. I had my suspicions about who had nominated Todd and me.

"You go on ahead. I think I'm going to just grab a candy bar out of the vending machine or something."

"You sure?" Joann was already walking in their direction. She paused briefly to look back at me. I wanted her to sit with me without me having to ask her. I tried sending mental best friend psychic waves.

"Yeah. I'm not really hungry."

"Okay then-catch you later."

I watched her walk away. Darci and her friends all moved to the side to make room for her at the table and then closed ranks around her. No one else had gotten sick since Joann, or since Todd was suspended. Of course, no one was left to pa.s.s out anymore either. Well, no one except us losers.

I walked over to the garbage cans and dumped the tray over, watching my lunch slide into the trash.

23.

G.o.d, people have been talking about the end of the world forever. There are tons of theories about when you're going to bring about the "big finish." Everything could be taken as a sign you're right around the corner and getting ready to kick a.s.s and take names...but nothing happens. Times like now I almost wish you would come. Senior year isn't exactly panning out the way I had in mind, and it's possible the apocalypse might actually pick things up for me. I know that doesn't say much for my life.

It was only the third afternoon I had spent helping Reverend Evers and yet it felt like it had been, give or take, a thousand years. Todd hadn't called me, and since my mother had declared a fatwa on any social connection to Todd and was monitoring my every move, I couldn't reach him. Maybe Todd was mad that I'd run out after our kiss, without any explanation. I wanted to explain, but I wasn't sure how. Then again it's possible that Todd wasn't thinking about me at all, and that's why he didn't call. I wasn't sure which was worse; that it didn't matter to him or that he was p.i.s.sed.

Spending afternoons at the church was like a time black hole where nothing changed and nothing moved forward. One afternoon I swear I saw the clocks running ever so slightly backward. Figures, the first real miracle in my life, and it's one that makes my life worse. The sad thing was that being at the church was the only real social interaction I was getting these days. Colin and I were back to acting like we hardly knew each other, and he was pulling the silent treatment on the whole Todd issue. He was the only one being silent; everyone else in school couldn't stop talking about Todd. Despite Officer Ryan's promise to Todd's family to keep the whole thing under wraps, everyone seemed to know every detail of his suspension and the details they didn't know they just made up. Never let truth get in the way of a really good story.

The tasks I had been given to do at church that, in theory, were going to make me a better person included all of the following: picking gum off the church steps, polishing the church pews, making copies of the song sheets for service, and weeding the front flower beds. It was not made clear how menial labor was supposed to shape my character. I could almost bear it except for the fact that Reverend Evers loved to sit in the church and discuss scripture while I did my ch.o.r.es. Actually, "discuss" is going too far. It implies he wanted any input from me. "Lecture" might be closer to what was happening. Although I have no proof, I strongly suspect that Reverend Evers makes Bible flash cards. He appears to have memorized the complete text. He could pull out a relevant quote for any subject, even subjects I'm pretty sure aren't covered in the Bible.

Today I was a.s.sembling baskets for the food bank in Van Wert. If poverty wasn't bad enough, I was noticing another problem. The baskets were full of c.r.a.ppy food: plain oatmeal, brown rice, cans of no-name tuna, and generic-brand bran flakes. The no-name tuna looked particularly shifty, like it might be made from regular-brand tuna leftovers, fins, scales, and eyeb.a.l.l.s. Way too much fiber, way too little food with flavor. I would not have been shocked to see industrial-size containers of gruel.

"Maybe we should put some cookies or something in here," I said.

"These baskets are for the poor, Emma. They don't need dessert, they need sustenance. 'Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up.' First Corinthians. This isn't about doing things that would make you feel better, this is about doing what needs to be done."

"Cookies are sustenance, and they aren't puffed up. I mean, I get that we shouldn't make up baskets full of junk food, but there isn't anything tasty in here."

I picked up another can of lima beans and put it in the basket. Lima beans? Does anyone actually eat those things? Maybe I could write it up: the canned lima bean poverty diet.

"The Lord helps those who help themselves. If we give people cookies, then they have no reason to work for them. It might seem as if it is nice, but remember the Lord wants us to teach people to fish, not give them fish."

"Giving the poor lima beans will inspire them to work harder?" This seemed like a dodgy theory to me. I have to think if it was that easy to wipe out poverty, someone else would have thought of it. Don't they have entire think tanks in Washington focused on solving these kinds of problems?

"In a way, yes. By giving people lima beans it inspires them to want for more and then to work for it. People need to learn values. Now, it's not a one-way street. We learn from the poor too. The poor provide us a chance to show charity."

"So you're saying G.o.d made some people poor so that those of us who aren't poor will learn to be kind?"

"Yes."

"That's sort of a rotten deal for the people born poor, isn't it?"

"The Lord works in very mysterious ways."

I was considering telling him there was mysterious and then there was downright twisted, when the phone rang.

Reverend Evers leaned back with a sigh. He likes his wife to answer the phone, and she was out for the day. I have the sense he feels the church should pay for a secretary. Answering the phone is beneath him. Unfortunately for him, Trinity Evangelical is not one of those giant churches seating a few thousand, with giant collection plates to match. There is no money in the church budget for a support staff. Perhaps the Lord was using this as an opportunity for those who had clerical support to learn charity, but I was pretty sure that Reverend Evers wouldn't appreciate this insight. I continued to pack the baskets, but pretty quickly it was becoming clear that something exciting was going on.

Reverend Evers had been seated behind his desk. It was huge, at least six feet long with carved legs and a million drawers. Entire rain forests may have been slaughtered to create this desk. If you ask me, no one needs a desk that big unless they have something to prove. The chair was just as fancy, burgundy leather, like a wingback chair on casters. I heard Reverend Evers make a surprised noise and I looked over to see him stand up as if he was at attention. He wasn't saluting, but he looked like he was ready to give it a try.

"Well, sir, I am very pleased to hear from you," Reverend Evers said.

He didn't look pleased, he looked ecstatic. He looked like how I imagine I would look if Prince William gave me a quick ring to see how I was doing and ask if I was interested in a trip to England. His one hand was holding the receiver and the other was fluttering at his side as if he might lift off, a giant six-foot hummingbird with a comb-over. I stopped even making a pretense of packing the baskets and listened.

"Indeed, it was disturbing. These children are our future." He nodded madly at whatever the person was saying on the line. "Why, I hadn't considered that.... No, I see the benefits, of course.... We would be most humbled, sir.... Why, when the ladies at the church council hear about this, they'll be just as pleased as punch. Tickled pink...Of course, Trinity Evangelical is my flock, not that I would want to glorify myself, of course, but I would want...really?" His face broke into a huge smile, as if the Publishers Clearing House folks had just pulled up and were hauling a giant cardboard check with his name on it up the front stoop. "And you have a name for the event?...Faith Forward? Why, I think that is lovely. The governor? Well...You know what the Bible says, 'And by thy sword shalt thou live, and shalt serve thy brother.' We'll begin preparations right away. My wife and I would of course welcome you to stay in our home.... No, of course I understand. We'll talk to you soon."

Reverend Evers placed the receiver down carefully as if it might explode. He stood still for a second and then began to pace back and forth behind his desk. He wrung his hands together.

"Everything all right?" I asked.

Reverend Evers turned to face me. His face had this wide smile, as if he had just had a religious vision. He threw his arms wide, and I feared for a second that he might fall to his knees.

This is how I came to be the second person in Wheaton to know that Born-Again Today, the TV show, was coming to town.

24.

G.o.d, who am I to cast stones? But if you want a piece of advice, you might want to take a look down here and see who's talking about you. You've got quite a few people, in pretty much every far corner of the world, who proclaim they are tight friends with you and have the okay to speak on your behalf. Then they say some pretty foul things, and some of the things they do would curl that giant white beard you've got going. Trust me on this-when your own so-called friends start talking about you, you really develop a reputation.

Born-Again Today is hosted by Reverend Maxwell Teaks, also known as Miracle Max. My grandmother loves this show. I fully expect that when she dies we'll discover that she's signed over the family farm to him. Reverend Teaks is from the fire-and-brimstone revival style of preaching. The kind you see on cable channels early on Sunday mornings, with choirs singing away behind him and hordes of people swaying back and forth. He works himself up into a lather and cries out "Jee-zus." Heavy on the z sound. Then various people wander down the aisle to be healed. He places his hand on their heads and then sort of shoves them back. They either get better, in which case it's due to the good reverend (with help from the Lord, of course), or they don't, in which case the afflicted person's faith is found wanting. The world according to Reverend Teaks is pretty black and white. He doesn't view many issues as falling into a morally gray zone. The way he sees it, either it is right (thus sanctioned by G.o.d and the good reverend) or wrong (thus dooming the person in question to an eternity of twisting and burning like a kebob on a Weber grill).

Teaks has gotten himself into trouble here and there. His views aren't always popular. When there was a hurricane a few years ago, Reverend Teaks gave his opinion that the cities that took the hardest hit had to pay a price because of their loose morals. He said the cities wouldn't have been harmed if they hadn't condoned abortion, gays, and premarital s.e.x. You would think if G.o.d wanted to take out some nudie bars and a pride parade he could be a bit more pointed in his destruction and not have to take out the whole city.

Now Born-Again Today was going to do a live show from right here in Wheaton. It was going to be a special called "Faith Forward" and would highlight how, with the help of faith, we were fighting "terror in the heartland." How exactly faith would stop the reign of terror wasn't exactly clear to me, but the details didn't appear to matter to anyone else. The cable channel was running ads that flashed shots of the Columbine killers, then Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, the twin towers, and then a picture of the good reverend in front of a waving American flag. The event was growing too big to fit in the church, and it quickly became clear that it wouldn't work in the school gym, either. People from all over the state were signing up to come. A giant white tent was shipped up from Indianapolis, and the Hansen family donated one of their fields for the site. There were rumors that news agencies were going to come to town to cover the event. The governor of Indiana had already indicated that he was coming, and one of the ladies at Sheer Beauty told everyone that she had it on good authority that Larry King might show up.

The school band would supply the music for the event, and the TES church choir was practicing in overdrive. It was determined that with high-def TV, new choir robes would need to be ordered. Imagine the shame if Trinity Evangelical was on the national stage and people saw frayed cuffs, faded colors, and nappy velvet. Oh, the inhumanity.

This was the biggest thing to ever happen in Wheaton, and it was all anyone could talk about, including all the students in the TES cafeteria. All around me I could hear people oohing and aahing over the possibility of appearing on TV. It was like they expected Angelina Jolie to show up and adopt a Wheaton kid. I tried to eat my salad in peace and block out the craziness. Besides, I had bigger things to obsess about, like track. I had faith that if I kept my nose clean, my mom would buckle. She knew how much track meant to me. I had missed a meet on Wednesday, but I was hoping not to have to miss any others. She was making a point, and I was attempting to show I got it. While I waited for her to see the error of her ways, I was keeping up with my training regime so I would be ready when she caved. I tried to focus on visualizing the feeling of crossing the finish line.

Darci and her gang sat a table over, gushing over Reverend Teaks and his show, which I strongly suspected none of them even liked until they heard it was coming to town. Of course, now that being poisoned was yesterday's news, they needed something else to focus on, so why not media celebrity? Joann was sitting with them. She'd waved for me to join them, but I had held up my biology book, indicating I had to study. It seemed more polite than implying that close proximity to Darci would make my gag reflex kick in. I tried to focus on the exciting life of cell structure, but I could still hear them.

"My mother says I might have to take Friday off. She's going to take me into Fort Wayne to get my hair and nails done for the show," Darci said. She was sitting in the center of a cl.u.s.ter of girls, and I couldn't help but notice there were more around her than usual.

"At a salon?" a freshman said in awe, as if that was equal to the Promised Land.

"I'm going to have to sleep sitting up so I don't ruin my hair." Darci laughed. "A woman's hair is her crowning glory, you know."

I tried not to gag on a crouton.

"I can't believe you're going to be on national TV!"

"I know. My dad says the choir will do at least two or three songs during the show. Plus, since Kimberly and I were the first victims of the attack, Reverend Teaks will likely want to pray over us. Give us his blessing."

"Maybe you'll be discovered."

I gave a snort. Darci turned to face me.

"Is there a problem?" she said with a hair flip.

"It's Born-Again Today, not American Idol."

"Envy is a sin, you know," said Darci.

"Envy?" I rolled my eyes and started to pack my lunch away. Suddenly I wasn't hungry anymore. "The whole thing is a joke."

Darci stood up and blocked my path, crossing her arms in front of her. She looked over at the group to make sure she had the maximum audience.

"I'm not surprised you would think so. You've always stuck out here, and if you didn't have Joann keeping you company out of the kindness of her heart, you wouldn't have any friends at all."

Joann didn't meet my eyes. Instead she stared down at her square of pizza and tub of applesauce as if she had never seen them before.

"I don't like to be friends with people who are fake. So I might not have a ton of friends, but at least the ones I have are real."

"How interesting. All this talk about real, it makes me wonder what kind of friend you really are."

I looked at her. I felt the salad in my stomach do a roll-over. Self-tossing salad, not a good thing. I had the feeling she and Joann had discussed more than the spring dance when Darci was over. I had the feeling she knew about the infamous Christmas kiss. Joann had begged her mom not to tell anyone, and up until now I thought we had managed to keep the whole thing a secret. I shot another look at Joann, who was still pondering the mystery of her hot lunch with the kind of concentration shown by biohazard engineers.

"You shouldn't talk about things you know nothing about," I said.

"I know you were the only person I ever saw Todd talk to. I heard the two of you went for long drives out to the abandoned theater. We all know what he was capable of. I guess the only question is, what are you capable of?"

"Todd had nothing to do with any of this. Everyone seems to forget there haven't been any charges."

"The school hasn't charged him yet because they have to make sure the case is solid and that they have all his accomplices."

"Solid? There are no charges because there's no evidence. Despite what your dad would have people believe, video games are not really the tool of Satan."

"How sweet. Are you protecting your lover?" Darci drew out the last word, and a few of the younger girls gave a gasp. The accusation of fornication hung in the air. Anyone who hadn't been paying attention was turning around to see what was going on.

"You better watch your mouth, Darci Evers," I said. She sneered and turned back to her friends. "You get out to the Barn much these days?" I asked, matching her sneer.

Darci turned back slowly to face me. Her face was flushed red, and she was breathing in deep puffs like a dragon ready to go off into spouts of flame and smoke.

"What did you say?"

"I asked if you got out to the Barn." I snapped my fingers as if I had just remembered something. "Oh, that's right, you wouldn't go out to the Barn, what with all the things that go on out there. The parties, the drinking, I hear even drugs. Why, people could get themselves into real trouble out there. Lucky for us we have you to act as TES's personal role model."

As for what happened next, you could argue it was my own fault. I turned my back on an angry Darci.

25.

G.o.d, I would like to argue that humility as a virtue is over-rated and should not be confused with humiliation. I don't think that I'm better than other people. I really don't. Perhaps you could lay off on lessons designed to teach me humility. For example, the time I sat on those raspberries in my white capri pants and then walked around all day with a giant red target on my a.s.s. There was no point to that. It was just cruel.

I've known Darci Evers since first grade. I thought I knew a lot about her.

She has the world's largest hair scrunchie ribbon collection in the school, one to match every outfit. (And h.e.l.lo? Who wears scrunchies anymore?) She has underwear with the days of the week sewn on the b.u.t.t. (She's not the kind of person to get all wild and crazy and wear a Wednesday on a Thursday.) She thinks she sings like an angel, but the truth is she should stick with lip-synching. (What can you expect from someone who considers Britney Spears her vocal mentor?) The one thing I didn't expect was that Darci Evers was a dirty fighter. I didn't see her as the type to fight at all. Plunge a figurative dagger in someone's back, sure. Hire a hit man, possibly. But a fighter? I never saw it coming. I turned my back on her for a fraction of a second, and she sprang on me like a crazed, rabid weasel. Her pink nails wound their way in my hair, and she jumped onto my back with a squeal that would shatter gla.s.s. We hit the floor, my lunch went flying, and the cafeteria chairs spun out of our way.

"CATFIGHT!" someone yelled out.

Darci had ahold of my hair and she seemed intent on yanking it out in one big hunk. We rolled around on the floor amid the cheering and screaming. My face rolled past what I am pretty sure was a dollop of dropped sauerkraut, and I felt it end up in my ear. Darci's hand-scratch that, talon-came out and raked across my face.

"Let go of me," I yelled as I kicked, trying to take her shins out or at least roll over so that she wouldn't have me pinned down.

For someone who is supposed to be full of Christian love, Darci was quite the sc.r.a.pper. She was doing her best to pound my head against the floor in some kind of deranged WWF move when the fight was broken up. I like to believe that if I hadn't been surprised, or if the fight had lasted longer, I would have come out on top in the end. However, I had been surprised, and the fight hadn't gone on very long, so Darci was the one who drew the most blood. I could tell my nose was bleeding, and there was a huge sc.r.a.pe on my knee. The crowd gave an appreciative gasp. I had the sense that if my fellow students had lived in earlier times they would have enjoyed such wholesome sports as bearbaiting or watching gladiators fight to the death.

The group around us parted. It was like the Red Sea on speed, only instead of Moses, Mr. Reilly was standing over us. He bent down and pulled Darci up and off of me by her skirt waistband. He stood her up and looked her over. Her hair was pulled out of her ponytail holder, there was a smear of blood across her upper lip, and a shiny string of spit hung from her lower lip. Her eyes had a wild and crazy Lindsay-Lohan-on-a-bender look to them. I noticed that Mr. Reilly did not help me to my feet. I scrambled to stand up by myself. I stuck my pinkie in my ear to try to dislodge the hunk of sauerkraut.

The sleeve of my shirt was torn, and my uniform skirt was twisted around. My head hurt, and I was afraid that when I looked in the mirror I would discover a giant b.l.o.o.d.y bald spot.

"Ladies. I am astonished and disgusted," Mr. Reilly said.

Darci promptly burst into tears. Mr. Reilly reached over and grabbed a stack of paper napkins from the table and gently pa.s.sed them to her. He looked at me and shook his head. I wiped my nose with my sleeve and tried to straighten my skirt. I'm sure he would have handed me a napkin if he hadn't given all of them to Darci. Ha ha ha.

"Emma, I want you to go down to Mr. Karp's office."

"Me?" I looked around to see if anyone else was appalled. "She hit me. She attacked me."

Darci didn't disagree, but instead wailed louder. Kimberly stuck to her side like a tick. She led Darci away down the hall as if Darci was a tragic victim of random violence. Everyone in the cafeteria was doing their best to act as if they hadn't noticed a thing, suddenly very interested in the contents of their lunches. I looked at Joann, waiting for her to say something. She stood there staring at me like she had never seen me before.

"I am not going to have this discussion with you. I want you to go right now." Mr. Reilly pointed dramatically down the hall toward Mr. Karp's office. He looked like he was G.o.d pointing Adam and Eve out of the garden. Banished. I looked around, seeing if there were any friendly faces, but when no one met my eyes, I shuffled down the hall.