UnCatholic Conduct Page 4

  The big clock in the atrium chimed nine thirty. Time for the true test of her acting abilities. If anyone could smoke out a fraud, it had to be a senior student—and a class full of them waited upstairs for her. She’d already scoped out her classroom, two floors up, and she headed there now, her heart hammering in her chest as she clutched keys, the course outlines, and a binder full of “break the ice” ideas.

  Jil stood in front of her would-be classroom, preparing to meet the incredulous eyes of twenty-nine senior students, none of whom, she was sure, had elected this course.

  When the bell rang, the first period class exited in record time, anxious for their eight minutes of unfettered smoking time in the school parking lot.

  The classroom smelled of stale donuts and body odor. Worse, the window at the back didn’t appear to open any farther than the crack someone had already managed. She set the course outlines down in a pile on the desk and took a few shallow breaths—trying to stop her hands from shaking and avoid the air passing through her sense of smell.

  When she went to find a piece of chalk, she noticed white boards and dry-erase markers instead of blackboards and chalk. Grimacing, she uncapped a particularly potent blue and held her breath again while she scrawled her name and the course title on the board.

  She heard the bell only seconds before a stampede of feet thundered through the door, and droves of teenagers, hats askew and iPods turned on full-blast, appeared before her, launching themselves into seats, smacking each other in strange and vaguely provocative ways, laughing and making strange noises reminiscent of mating time at the petting zoo. Consciously processing, she knew there must be a test in here somewhere, but for the moment, a strategy completely escaped her.

  “Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen,” a deep voice hailed them from the corner.

  Jil looked up to see Buck Weekly hovering in the doorway.

  “I’d like to remind you that there are no electronic devices or hats allowed in the school. You’ll need to put them away before coming to class in the future. For now, just take your hats off. Hey—excuse me, what’s your name?”

  “Uh, Jordan.”

  “Well, Jordan, I’d appreciate it if you’d look at me when I’m speaking to you. When you look away and talk to your neighbor, what kind of impression do you think I get?”

  Jordan looked around, as if he weren’t sure he had to answer. Buck’s eyes bored into him, and he squirmed in his seat.

  “Uh…not good?”

  “Not good? In what way, ‘not good’?”

  “Uh…like, disrespectful?”

  “Yes. That’s right. It’s disrespectful to talk when someone else is speaking. It gives the impression that you’re not interested. You might as well say ‘shut up—you’re not worth listening to.’ That’s the impression I get when I’m talking to you, and you’re looking the other way, talking to your buddy. So next time someone’s standing here—myself, or Ms. Kinness—we’d appreciate it if you’d keep your eyes at the front. Now, this is Grade Twelve World Religions. Is there anybody here who isn’t supposed to be in this class? Maybe you thought you were coming to Chemistry or English, and you ended up here? Is there anybody who would like to leave now?”

  A slender girl in the back eyed Buck coldly. She had short brown hair and a boyish figure, her tight black T-shirt coming just to the waist of her low-riding jeans, which were secured with an alarmingly large belt buckle. She looked from Jil to Buck and raised her hand. “Are you teaching this class, sir?” she asked.

  “No, Rebecca, I’m not. Ms Kinness will be teaching this class.”

  Jil wondered when he would stop talking so she could start.

  The girl seemed to decide something and settled back down in her seat.

  Just then, Jil noticed a bulky young woman in a baggy sweatshirt gathering up her things. She had a bull’s ring in her nose and black hair that had obviously been dyed.

  “Now I know you’re supposed to be in this class,” Buck said. “Please sit back down.”

  “I don’t need a fucking lecture,” the girl said. “I signed up for Ms. Barnes, not this. I’m getting the hell out of this fucking class.”

  She stormed past Buck through the door. They heard her heavy footsteps retreating down the hall.

  Silence fell.

  “On that note, perhaps we should begin,” Jil said before Buck could start up again.

  He stood there, glaring at no one in particular, beefy hands on beefier hips—waiting, it seemed, for an opportunity to jump in again.

  Jil ignored him and turned to her class. “Good morning, everyone. My name is Ms. Kinness, and I will be your World Religions teacher this term.”

  “Uh…don’t you mean semester?” asked a smirking boy in the front.

  “I believe it’s the same thing?” Jil looked him directly in the eye.

  He shrugged and looked away.

  Jil stared at him for a minute longer. Like hell she would be intimidated by a bunch of high school students. Something she knew without having to go to teacher’s college was not to give them an inch. No personal information. No age. No middle name. No social media access. And no revelations. Some things held true across every profession in which there were delinquents involved.

  “The first thing I’d like to do is take attendance and get to know all of you.” She took out a class list and went down alphabetically. The students all confirmed their presence with variations on “yeah,” and Jil made a mental note of where each student was sitting.

  “Rebecca—”

  “It’s Bex,” the girl interrupted.

  “Okay. Thanks for letting me know, Bex.”

  A small, mousy-looking girl sat at the back, in the row between Bex and the bullringed girl who’d left. She shrank into her desk, chin down, almost trembling with anxiety.

  “Alyssa Marco,” Jil called. No one answered. “Hon, is that you?” she addressed the shrinking violet. “Are you Alyssa?”

  The wallflower stared back, her eyes huge.

  Bex shot her a strange glance—at once sympathetic and exasperated.

  Suddenly, she seemed to come to her senses. “Yes, Miss,” she croaked. “Yes, I’m Alyssa.”

  “Okay. Are you planning to stay in this course?”

  “Yes, Miss.”

  “Thank you. Theo Ranieri?”

  “Yeah, Miss. Here.” A tall, muscular boy with quick eyes and a flashy smile raised his hand. A gold chain dangled around his neck.

  “Good. Thank you. And lastly, Jeremy Yin?”

  “Present.”

  “Good. You’re all here. Minus one. So…I’m going to ask you to retain your seats for the rest of this course. Wherever you’re sitting today, that’s where you’ll sit tomorrow. “

  A chorus of groans erupted, and a student named Kyle swore out loud.

  Jil glared at him, and he grinned sheepishly.

  “Sorry, Miss. Having trouble adjusting…”

  “To what? Modern manners?”

  He actually smiled. “School, Miss.”

  Jil picked up her syllabus. “Welcome to the first day of the rest of your life.”

  She mentally congratulated herself for getting so fully involved in her role. The students seemed to be buying the routine. She wondered how long she could keep this up.

  “If you’ll all take a look at this outline I’m going to pass around, I think you’ll see we’re going to have a very full course load this semester.” She looked pointedly at the boy in front—Tyler, it turned out—as she began passing around papers.

  Buck finally took a seat, and Jil rolled her eyes. Obviously, he wasn’t going to leave anytime soon. Pointedly avoiding looking in his direction, she began going over the syllabus, having each student in turn read a paragraph, as educational an experience for her as for them. She began to see why Jess had thought to give her a prep period. With this many kids struggling with basic reading skills, it would take her half a year to mark each assignment.

  As student
s read, she looked around the room. Minus the girl who didn’t want a “fucking lecture,” she had twenty-eight students.

  Bex chewed her bottom lip and stared at the door, as if she expected someone to come through at any second. Jordan, the disrespectful kid, pored over his outline anxiously. Kyle, who was reading, made so many mistakes that Jil wondered how he’d made it to grade twelve at all. She rescued him early and asked the next student to read. Alyssa whispered so softly that Theo stood up from his seat in the back.

  “Speak up, yo!” he thundered.

  Alyssa cowered.

  “That will do.” Jil glared at Theo and he sat down.

  “Miss, you can barely hear her,” he complained.

  “Do you not have the information in front of you? Can you not read it?”

  Theo hunched back over his desk, sending a hostile glance first at Jil, then at Alyssa.

  “Keep going, Alyssa. A little louder.”

  The girl read the last two sentences at barely a whisper, and Bex promptly took over.

  In total, there were ten girls and eighteen boys. According to the information she’d heard in the staff room that morning, at least six of them would drop the course by midterm. She’d just let Buck keep talking next time. Half of them would walk out the door without a second glance.

  When the final bell rang, the students sprang up from their seats and stampeded to the door. Lunchtime.

  Jil slipped in between the last few retreating backpacks and headed down the stairs, lost in the shuffle. She tried not to think about what Buck would say when he realized she’d given him the slip.

  *

  Jil got home late after spending the afternoon in her office at O’Hanagan’s, wrapping up details from her last case. She still had a report to write and some loose ends to tie up from the investigation. It felt good to get it off her desk. She could now focus all her attention on St. Marguerite’s for the next few months. Tomorrow, she would start digging into the targets’ lives—the part she liked best.

  She poured herself a glass of wine and took her charting paper from the coffee table. Teacher list in hand, she went upstairs to her office, spread the chart out on the desk, and took a sip of wine. She’d been thinking about how to keep all the information straight during this investigation. There would be a fairly lengthy report to write at the end of this assignment, and a lot of people included.

  On the way home, she’d stopped and bought an oversized Bristol board. And now she took out a marker and began creating a chart for St. Marguerite’s—a graph, with teachers’ names listed alphabetically. Symbols indicated uncatholic transgressions.

  First, the Ten Commandments:

  -Worshiping another God.

  -Worshiping false idols.

  -Taking the Lord’s name in vain

  -Failing to keep the Sabbath day Holy

  -Failing to honor one’s father and mother

  -Committing murder

  -Committing adultery

  -Stealing

  -Bearing False Witness (lying)

  -Coveting

  And the seven deadly sins:

  -Lust

  -Gluttony

  -Greed

  -Sloth

  -Wrath

  -Envy

  -Pride

  And the interpreted rules:

  -Living in Sin

  -Divorce

  -Abortion

  -Homosexuality

  -Birth Control

  -Eating Meat on Fridays during Lent

  She rolled her eyes. If only she’d been there in the spring. She would be able to eliminate ninety-five percent of the personnel on that last one alone. Investigation over!

  She wouldn’t be working too hard to find out the gay teachers either.

  She stood back to examine her handiwork. Complicated, but beautiful. Obviously, she couldn’t keep this chart at work, but every night, she could bring home her notebook and copy the information from there onto the master chart. Her report would be a breeze.

  She checked the list against the chart, making sure she hadn’t left anyone out. She hesitated over one name for a long minute—Jess Blake. The principal had an intense magnetism that Jil found hard to ignore, a push-pull that drew Jil in while simultaneously keeping her on the other side of a professional boundary.

  How and when could she ever investigate her?

  *

  Nicole Adamson, the first person on her list, had three social media accounts, all of which were private. “Smart girl,” Jil muttered. “But something tells me your friends aren’t quite as smart.”

  She picked the most popular site and clicked through to find Nicole’s friends. As she suspected, pictures and status updates were plastered all over the Internet. In ten minutes, Jil ascertained that Nicole, a twenty-four-year-old ninth grade teacher, was a party girl, loved lemon drop shots, and spent most weekends at the bar. She also had an affinity for dancing on tables. One picture caught her eye in particular: her dancing up close and personal in the arms of a shirtless man with rippled abs, unbuttoned jeans, and a cowboy hat . He nuzzled her neck from behind while she threw her head back and downed a long, pink drink.

  She saved the photo to her new file on Nicole Adamson and continued down the list. When the clock clicked to two, she turned off the computer, having done a basic search on ten of the staff. Most of the teachers were smart enough not to have any social media accounts at all, but the younger ones were easier.

  Chapter Four

  On Monday, Jil managed to arrive a full hour early. Time spent in bed was a precious commodity these days—with the investigation, the night stalking, and the teaching during the day, she hadn’t been out once. Not that she usually partied hard on the weekend, anyway. Her last relationship hadn’t exactly ended well, and she was enjoying a break. Tara would probably be cozying up to her new boyfriend, and it was unlikely she’d see her at any of their usual clubs, but the thought of it made her want to dive under her covers and stay there until Christmas.

  Better to focus on the investigating for now and leave the romance for another year.

  Investigating in a Catholic school meant sitting unoccupied in the staff room for ten minutes. Rife with gossip.

  She had her day planned, beginning with a cup of coffee, a marking binder, and an open ear.

  So when she pulled into the parking lot at seven ten, the small group of students already gathered at the door surprised her. She wondered if the custodians had forgotten to unlock the student entrance when they’d come in at six. They usually parked at the side and came in through the service doors, then did a check of the school, and unlocked all the doors from the inside around seven.

  Teachers arriving early for clubs knew to use the service doors at the side. Students weren’t allowed to use that door, and therefore had to wait for their entrance to be opened. Which, apparently, it hadn’t been.

  She looked up to see Jessica Blake pulling into the lot beside her.

  When Jess saw the crowd, she didn’t bother to go around the building to her designated parking space; she just pulled her navy Jeep Liberty next to Jil’s black X-Trail and threw it into park.

  Jess’s face held a wary expression. Students shouldn’t be at school this early unless they had a club to get to. They certainly didn’t stand at the door like men at the mission, waiting for their lunch. They went to the library, to band, to smoke in the pit by the football field…anything but this.

  Jil and Jess opened their doors in synch, their feet hitting the ground, their doors slamming together. “Miss!” a student called—encompassing them both. “Miss, c’mere quick!”

  Jil and Jess exchanged the briefest of looks. Something was very wrong. As one, they took off at a run through the parking lot and up the walk to the students’ entrance. Despite Jil’s training and stamina, Jess matched her pace well. They arrived at the door, and the students parted to let them through.

  “Oh my God,” Jess breathed, her face blanching as she knelt down.
“What happened?”

  Lying on the ground, arms outstretched like Jesus on the cross, was a student. Jil immediately recognized Alyssa Marco, the shy girl from her class.

  “Call nine one one,” Jess ordered a boy standing with a cell phone.

  “They’re already on their way,” he said. “We got here, like, five minutes ago, on the 157 bus. For the band practice. And she was just lying here. We called an ambulance and everything, but she’s like, not waking up.”

  Jil knelt next to Jess. “Get the students away from here,” she whispered.

  Jil gently guided Jess away from the young girl. Alyssa’s lips were blue, and her glassy eyes had been vacant for too many hours to hope they would ever blink again.

  “She’s dead, Jess. There’s no saving her. We have to step away. This is going to be a crime scene.”

  Jess closed her eyes briefly, then opened them to study Alyssa’s ashen face, her rigid limbs.

  “Oh my God,” she whispered. “Not again.”

  *

  The ambulance roared into the parking lot, and the attendants unloaded the gurney through the sea of students. As more staff arrived, Jil directed them to restrain the kids—who were gluing themselves to every available window and doorway to watch.

  When the medics pulled up to the body, one grumbled, “Nobody told us she was stiff. We need a coroner, not an ambulance. We can’t do anything here.” He went back to his radio and called it in while the other medic stared down at the body.

  “We’re going to need some pylons,” he said. “Somebody get me something to rope off this area.”

  Mark Genovese, the vice-principal, brought out pylons from the gym and staked them out around the site, his imposing form doing more to keep the students away than the bright orange cones. Blinking lights hailed the arrival of the police. An officer alighted from a cruiser and wasted no time putting up a barrier of yellow police tape.

  “We’ll have to wait for Forensics,” the officer said.

  Genovese frowned. “All students to their homerooms,” he commanded, his deep voice resonating through the semi-circular entrance. A pack of younger students scuttled away, leaving Jil standing with Jess by the body.