saying something ridiculous.
JANET RUTH YOUNG
“Like when we’re rehearsing and Mr. Gabler is standing there teaching us our parts and jabbering on about something, do you ever get the urge to reach out and grab his testicles?”
“Ew! EEEEEEW!” Shelley nearly spits her potatoes. She stares at Dani with her mouth open, the way someone looks hanging over the toilet after throwing up. Then she yells again.
“Ew! Ew! Mr. Gabler’s?”
“Mr. Gabler’s testicles,” Dani says. She still hopes that this can go her way.
“Don’t say that! Don’t say that! Don’t say that!”
“Somehow I didn’t expect such a strong reaction.” Dani can barely hear herself through the yelling.
“Ew! Ew!” Shelley drops the can of potatoes on the ground and shakes her hands around her head in a shivery way, like she’s touched something contaminated.
“Please don’t scream just because I mentioned Mr. Gabler’s testicles.”
“Aaaah! You keep saying it. Do not say ‘Mr. Gabler’ and ‘testicles’ in the same sentence. Not even in the same conversation!
In the same life! In the same world!”
“But I mean, you know how he wears those pants that are that shiny material, nylon or polyester or something, and in some places they’re really worn out, and you can see the outline of . . .”
“I know, Dani. I know. I’ve seen it. And I don’t want to think about it! Now shut up. That is nasty.”
“Okay, it is nasty. I agree with you.”
Dani lays down her food and squeezes her hands together.
64
T H E B A B Y S I T T E R M U R D E R S
Other kids in the yard have stopped talking and are watching Dani and Shelley. Malcolm Pinto leans against the wall by the plants, picking tobacco from his teeth.
“That’s right,” Shelley says. “Now look around. Everyone’s staring at us.”
“No, they’re just staring at you. Could you please keep your voice down?”
“Ew! Ew! Now I can’t eat.” Shelley jams the potatoes and tuna into her backpack. She purses her lips and stares at Dani for a minute, sizing her up. “So, now that the cat’s out of the bag, have you had weird thoughts about any of our other teachers? Ms. Martin, for example, or Dr. Chang? Do you want to grab any part of them?”
“Not really.” Dani laughs.
“’Cause I sure don’t!”
“But now that you put the idea in my head, maybe I will.”
“Well, if you’re going to subject them to an undies critique, why don’t you hit Ms. Martin next? I sometimes find myself trans-fixed by that, you know, uniboob of hers.”
“I think I know what you mean,” Dani says. “One, where there should be two. Can you open those potatoes again?”
Shelley makes a face like she’s been hypnotized. “Maybe you could get a weird thought or urge, before she walks into the classroom, to write on the board ‘Buy a new bra.’”
“Or what about over on the side where she writes the vocabu-lary words for the day? I could get an urge to add ‘lift’ and ‘separate’.” Dani plays along, even though Shelley’s making fun of her.
“Mr. Gabler, huh?” Shelley muses. “You have the hots for him.”
65
JANET RUTH YOUNG
Dani notices that the other kids stopped paying attention when she joined the joking. They seemed to have a sixth sense for the truth, a focus on the moment when Dani was most uncomfortable. So she backed off the subject. But she has gotten nowhere, and now she’ll have to start over.
“No, I don’t have the hots for him.” She holds the potatoes far from Shelley until Shelley looks apologetic.
“Oh God, Dani. Now I have this totally unwanted image of Mr. Gabler in my mind, thanks to you. I don’t know how I can get through rehearsal next time. I’ll keep thinking about . . . what you said.”
“I’m sorry,” Dani says. “I know it’s weird, but I thought . . . I thought you might relate.”
“Well, I honestly don’t relate. I don’t at all.”
Dani finishes the tuna while Shelley watches the other kids.
“Peanut butter cookie?” Dani asks, taking a foil-wrapped package from her knapsack. “With chocolate pudding? They’re home-made by Beth.”
“Maybe later. Save one for me.”
“Okay,” Dani says. “I’ll surprise you and put one in your locker.
Hey, let me ask you something else. Do you ever find yourself thinking, for no particular reason, about hurting another person?”
She squeezes her hands again. She doesn’t know whether to adopt a light tone or to sound serious.
Shelley positions her pack as a pillow. “Someone you’re mad at? Do what we did in summer camp. Covertly