Casey Barnes Eponymous - By E.A. Rigg Page 0,1
a patriot you support an artist’s right to exercise his or her first amendment rights.”
He looked from the scissors to Casey. She did not feel unafraid. Yet she continued. “I’m stirred you know N.W.A. wrote ‘Fuck Tha’ Police’! How’d you know that, Mr. Cole?”
She really was impressed. But the compliment did not accomplish its intended task. Mr. Cole got steamed all over again. “Watch your language, young lady.”
“But you’re the one who said ‘Fuck Tha’ Police’--”
“I said--”
“--in the first place.”
“Don’t you have work to do?”
She cocked her head to one side. Of course she had work to do. That was the whole reason she was in the library in the first place. Students at her school had to do a semester’s worth of volunteer credit at one point in their four-year career. Most got it out of the way by helping with school plays or setting up for sports games. But not Casey, whose mother Tricia was an attorney from whom high marks in school had flown like water from a tap. Tricia could not fathom why Casey’s report cards contained numbers beginning with 6 and 7, occasionally 8, and never 9. She insisted that Casey get her credit by being library assistant, an über-geek volunteer gig if ever there was one. Old Lady Barnes’ theory was that it would provide her with enforced studying time. Did Casey have work to do? She had a quiz in biology the following day and a history paper due in two.
She looked at Mr. Cole. “No I don’t have any work to do. And I’m guessing I’m not gonna get a straight answer from you about how it was you knew N.W.A. wrote ‘Fuck Tha’ Police’?”
At any rate it was at that moment, on the fifth day of school, that communication between Casey and Mr. Cole broke down. After she shot him the hang ten sign she looked back to the blonde. The girl’s eyes had returned to the list.
2. A rock song - “Blues from Down Here” by TV On the Radio. Something edgy for lunchtime. For when the promise of the a.m. sugar high did not quite pan out. Something to say okay maybe you’re not going to become a queen bee today but disappointment does not have to be as bad as it seems. It can even make you edgy. And edgy sounds good.
The skinny blonde did not have anything by TV On the Radio either. That Casey knew. But maybe, not right away, but in a few hours, a few days perhaps, that song would make the girl realize that some sweaters are best donated to the Salvation Army sooner rather than later.
Leigh walked through the door. Leigh and Casey were best friends, even if neither was the kind of girl inclined to label each other as such. They had been since the beginning of junior high, when they bonded in English class over their shared observation that girls in the popular clique dressed alike. They did too, even if it was in the way they did not dress.
Leigh wore baggy jeans and shirts with paint stains from her art classes. Casey wore T-shirts featuring punk rockers, mini jeans skirts that barely passed the school dress code, and Converse sneakers. On her favorite T, Sid Vicious’ right middle finger was in the air and his left hand held a bottle of whiskey. Most kids at her school in Bethesda, Maryland, a suburb of Washington D.C., did not know who Sid Vicious was. She liked that. The shirt got her sent home when she forgot to wear a sweater over it in front of the principal. She liked that even more.
Casey had long dark hair that, more often than not, needed a shampoo and good combing. Kids sometimes asked her if she was growing dreads. She had big dark eyes and was not unattractive. Some might even say she was pretty. In a scruffy, girl-skate-rat-who-doesn’t-actually-skate kind of way.
Leigh’s skin was pale and freckled, eyes blue, and hair stick-straight and strawberry blonde. Except for when she was in art class, Leigh was shy. In art class, however, where she created vibrant paintings that quickly won admiration, she was confident.
As opposed to Casey, who pissed off teachers and got into trouble an average of four days a week, Leigh did not tend to break rules or speak back to authority figures. But every once in a while she rebelled, and rebelled hard. During the last week of junior high she broke into