Casey Barnes Eponymous - By E.A. Rigg Page 0,13

long time at the sink, using water to smooth unruly hairs as she bit her lips until they turned bright red. By the time she returned to English the class had mercifully been split into project groups.

Mrs. Edwards told Casey to join Sukh and high-strung school newspaper editor Catherine Hightower’s group. This in turn provoked an uncensored look of horror from Catherine. Casey tuned out again once she sat down. Sukh might have said something about the project being a dramatic interpretation of Beowulf, Catherine might have asked Casey what she got on the first essay of the year. Casey did not really know.

The bell rang. Everyone around her hustled to get their stuff together and get out. But Casey found herself moving slowly. She had, all of a sudden, a wave of something that felt like nausea. A moment passed. She fished inside her bag for her iPod.

She considered the Strokes song she listened to that morning. Then another idea hit her. “Your Ex-Lover Is Dead” by Stars. Stars were Canadian indie rock. They also played in Broken Social Scene, but while Broken Social Scene was music to play when you wanted people to think you got French films, Stars was more poppy. The song was about exes running into each other at a party. It had a soaring orchestral middle section and a girl and boy singer and it was one of Casey’s Monday morning standbys. She put it on as she walked to her rendezvous.

He was waiting next to the front door of the school checking his cell phone. They were not supposed to have cell phones in school. But there was Alex Deal, scrolling through messages on his mere feet from the principal’s office. He looked up.

She forced herself to breathe. “I’m starved. The ladies in the lunchroom wouldn’t confirm that the hamburgers don’t contain canine so all I’ve had today’s a bowl of cereal.”

“I haven’t had a hamburger from that place in two years,” he said.

“I knew there was a secret to your youthful glow.”

He smiled. “Let’s go.”

As Casey followed him out the front door she might have seen, out of the corner of her eyes, the figure of one Yull Barnes standing ten feet away. She did not turn to confirm said sighting.

10

As he pulled out of the parking lot he plugged an iPod into the car and fiddled with it. Casey took it from his hands. “I’ll do the honors.” Then she had a better idea. She took her iPod out and cued up “Bustelo” by Ratatat. He nodded. She nodded back. He eyed her at a stop sign.

At a pizza place in downtown Bethesda, he paid for their slices and they sat. Two girls in cheerleading outfits from another school entered. He glanced their way. Casey bit her lip and commanded herself to think of something clever to say. “I’ve seen A Clockwork Orange” was what came out.

He looked from the cheerleaders to her. “What?”

“I said I’ve seen…” It hit her that she had uttered the kind of thing people say when they’re trying to get other people to think they’re cool. “There’s a porn movie called A Cockwork Orange.”

Now she had his full attention. “Is there?”

She had no idea whether or not there was a porn movie called A Cockwork Orange, and it took her no more than a nanosecond to realize that her second statement on things Clockwork Orange-related was ten times worse than the first. He watched her expectantly.

“The guy behind the counter reminds me of the guy with eyeliner in the original. You know, the guy with the stick who wears white.”

Casey had not seen the original either. But once Yull was watching it in the living room and Casey entered for about twenty seconds before Tricia called her back out because her homework was not done.

He cocked his head to one side. “Yeah.” The ‘yeah’ lacked his usual self-assurance. Ah ha. Alex Deal had not seen A Clockwork Orange. Casey felt more confident. He glanced at the cheerleaders again, and then pushed his empty paper plate away. She still had a half a slice on hers. “Wanna get out of here?” he asked.

The Strat and a drum kit were set up in his basement. He picked it up and began to play. Casey sat down on the couch. She debated telling him she played guitar. But what if she did and he asked her to play something and he didn’t like it? Her stomach tightened.

But then again