The Unfortunate Story of Roddy Mayhem, Julie Steimle [i can read book club TXT] 📗

something. Impalement by forks. I was panting hard, sweat rolling down my face and neck. My hands were hurting.

I uncurled my fingers and stared at my red hands. Lifting my eyes to Spastic, I began to breathe easier. He had said exactly what Wispy had said. “Why do you all think I will go full demon?”

He tapped my horns sympathetically. “We love you, man. But you are a horned imp.”

“So’s Wispy,” I murmured.

Spastic nodded. “Yeah. But we’ve watched Mutton’s horns grow from nubs like yours to what he’s got now. It was why Dervish wanted you so bad. He wanted to make another Mutton out of you.”

I paled, pulling back. Mutton had these huge uneven curling horns—like ram’s horns. He was a thickheaded evil dude who did not care whom he hurt. I just hadn’t known that he had started off with horns like mine. It made me wonder whom he had killed.

After I calmed down, Spastic and I both went back to our dorm room with Quinn. Officer Johnson left when we did, as if he felt he had put me into good hands. Quinn didn’t talk much, avoiding having to fall into backward speak as it made others uncomfortable—but when he did he said rather profound things. One of them surprised Roddy. “Mountains high their from down taken be to want don’t here things run of sort that kids the but, school this to came four you that good is it.”

It took me a bit to comprehend what he meant, thought Spastic interpreted. “He thinks it was good we came to this school—mostly shake things up. But the jerks that run this place don’t want to lose their power. Some are kind of mafia like, you know.”

I nodded at that, watching Quinn nod in approval at Spastic. Yet I said to Quinn, “What changed this place? That cop and all the other people we met who had graduated from here had honestly good things to say about this school.”

Quinn cringed, nodding painfully. “Up shaken was power of balance the, well… school this left—Deacon Rick and Spade Randon, Meecham Troy, Calamori Matthew, Brown Tom—five freaky the when. Seen had school this ghoulies of gang decent most the of some were five freaky the. Fair things kept they. Unimpeded way their things ran and power seized of kind kids the of some, graduated rest the and Tom with and, hometown his to back gone son boss’s the with but. Out it straighten can you as, here are you glad am I why that’s.”

Spastic translated word for word: “When the freaky five—Tom Brown, Matthew Calamori, Troy Meecham, Randon Spade and Rick Deacon—left this school… well, the balance of power was shaken up. The freaky five were some of the most decent gang of ghoulies this school had seen. They kept things fair. But with the boss’s son gone back to his hometown, and with Tom and the rest graduated, some of the kids kind of seized power and ran things their way unimpeded. That’s why I am glad you are here, as you can straighten it out.”

“Then kid little a was I.” Quinn smiled at me. His imps were shouting for him to grab by horns to feel them. Chills ran through me in that moment. I looked to Spastic who grinned back. I think I liked Quinn.

But that brief ‘cheery’ moment broke with a girl shrieking at the top of her lungs. I heard her shout, “See! There they are! In his bed!”

Spastic, Quinn, and I popped out of Spastic’s room.

Standing in the open doorway of my bedroom was Leah Fail with Ms. Arntz and Ms. Amherst. Moyra was also there with a huge black eye along with several other staring friends of theirs along for the show. Piranha really had gone to town on her. They were pulling out from under my bedsheets—the bedsheets and blankets I never slept in as I had stuck to my hammock above the bed since day one—taking out frilly lacy pink and red bras and nearly pornographic underwear.

Leah saw me and pointed her finger. “I told you!

Lorelei was also in the hall, but shrinking back. Her eyes were inflamed, red from crying. She had a huge bruise on her cheek and a scratch across her forehead where it looked like Piranha had grabbed her by the hair to rip it off from her scalp. Moyra was clutching Lorelei’s wrist, keeping her from running, her eyes wild on me with loathing.

“What are you doing in my room?” I demanded, my eyes mostly on Ms. Arntz.

“This is my proof!” Leah screamed then recoiled from me. She then pulled down the edge of her shirt where there were more scratches—more of Piranha’s handiwork. “I told you he was stalking me! He tried to tear my clothes off in the hallway during lunch hour. I was lucky to get away.”

Lying By Degrees

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thirteen

 

 

It was the worst constructed lie she had ever told. I gazed darkly on her as I replied, “Liar.”

“A woman would never lie about this!” Moyra cried out to Ms. Arntz through a flood of tears. “He harassed me too.” She then pointed to the scratches across her stomach from the tussle with Piranha. I wondered how much skin she must have gotten off of them. “He did that!”

“Another lie,” I said dryly.

Spastic nodded his head, as did Quinn.

“Their bras were found in your drawer and under your bed,” Ms. Arntz’s brittle voice bit out, her psychic vibes already giving me a headache, making it difficult to think.

“Planted by them,” I snapped. “I would never stash stuff in such easy to reach places! I’d put them in the ceiling or—”

“Some were also found in the ceiling, on top of the tiles,” Ms. Arntz shot back quickly, looking triumphant.

I bristled, shaking off her mental intrusion into my brain. “Which any normie could remove! I didn’t take their stuff!”

“But you admit to hiding things in the ceiling!” Ms. Arntz shot in with a resonating echo into my head also, causing my skull to pound more.

“The wall space would have been better!” I shot back, entirely red in the face. My skull was killing me.

“Are there some in the walls too!?” The lady teachers marched out with their frilly ‘evidence’ in hand, looking inclined to pound my face with it.

“I would never be that stinking obvious!” I screeched, not quite getting to the part where I wasn’t even at the school during the time those girls accused me of attacking them.

Spastic’s mouth opened in protest also, but Quinn hissed into his ear and he nodded back saying, “I’ll go.” He sank directly through the floor.

“But you would do it!” Ms. Amherst declared with vindictive triumph, flinching at Spastic’s unorthodox departure.

“Never! I don’t wear bras!” I felt entirely winded, wishing to change the subject. I didn’t want to be there. I felt my mind pulling at the seams with Ms. Arntz’s mental nagging. “And I—”

“I never said you wore them!” the teacher huffed at me. Her imps were urging her to call me an imbecil.

“Why would I steal clothes I can’t wear?” I gestured around myself, exasperated. “It entirely defeats the purpose of—”

Ms. Arntz sounded just as exasperated as she snapped back, “Because you are a horny pervert.”

“What?” I nearly exploded. Rising off the ground, bristling with a resurgence of anger for being accused of the very thing that was done to Wispy, I screamed, “I may have horns, but that does not make me a pervert you pinch nosed hag! It’s you people who mess with others like that! And it is all your bloody fault Wispy attempted suicide!”

Lorelei let out a yelp, looking like I had kicked her in the gut. “What?”

I rounded on her. “Yeah! You and your big mouth! Wispy trusted you with her secrets! Secrets that she hadn’t even told me! AND SOMEONE MESSED WITH HER!”

My horns itched.

But the next second Sgt. Kreiner charged into the hallway and tackled me, hissing in to my ear, “No, Roddy. Settle down.”

“THEY’RE ACCUSING ME OF DOING TO THEM WHAT THEY DID TO WISPY!” I tried to throw him off but he was waaaay too huge and strong.

Lorelei let out a heavy sob, yanking out from Moyra’s grip. She ran down the hall out of there, hands over face and tears flying. Good riddance. She was a lousy friend. Wispy didn’t deserve a jerk like her hanging about.

“See? I told you he was dangerous!” Ms. Arntz shouted over my head as the sergeant wrestled me to the ground. My ears were ringing, my horns and wings aching.

“Stop provoking him,” Col. Jefferson said darkly to her.

I hadn’t even heard his imps coming.

The air seemed to feel thick then, as if there were a huge thunder-storming argument between the colonel and Ms. Arntz. I couldn’t hear it, though their imps were shrieking for them to shoot the other one. Was Col. Jefferson also a psychic? He had never let on to be one.

“No bullets,” I muttered.

Spastic hopped up and down chanting it at the imps. And they cheerily complied. The tinkling of bullets dropped down on the tile, sounding in our ears like brief rain.

Col. Jefferson groaned with a dirty look to us. “That wasn’t necessary.”

Ms. Arntz sneered, folding her arms—as really it was the colonel who was disarmed. I guess he wasn’t psychic after all. But she was still a blasted nasty psychic who could give headaches. She said, “I am just here to confirm the accusations against him. Miss Fail claims he attacked her at around lunch today.”

“A lie!” I screamed.

“The truth,” Moyra said, snarling. “And he went after me too.”

But Col. Jefferson shook his head with a low glare at the girls. “No. I can confirm where Roddy was during lunch.”

The girls paled. They snuck looks between them.

“He was with me at the hospital,” he said with deliberate care. “He was with Wispy whom you harmed. He’s been there all afternoon.”

Ms. Arntz turned her eyes on the girls as if her gaze would slice them in half. Her imps cursed and swore and told her to shout at the girls—but not for lying to her. For screwing it up. Their scheme. My face burned in swelling anger. Ms. Arntz was—

“She’s in on it!” Spastic shrieked, pointing at the teacher. He then screamed in his fury, “Pants her! Dump ink on her! Put glue in her—”

Col. Jefferson slapped a hand over Spastic’s mouth—but the imps were already running off to get the tools of mischief. “That’s enough out of you! Detention!”

It didn’t think it was enough, though I watched all that stuff dump on the teacher, her tripping to get away while her pants were pulled to her knees, her pink underwear showing. But Sgt. Kreiner put a hand over my mouth before I could chime in a worse punishment. Both Spastic and I were quickly dragged to detention.

The two men were soon hastily aided by Dr. Pierce who was shaking his head at us while binding our wings. Piranha was already there in detention when we were hauled inside. Her mouth was sealed with spell tape, just like ours—the red ribbon concoction that was used to bind our wings so that we could not use our imp abilities to escape the room. Her