Chapter 5
Madeline
When school ended and the bulk of the students had left, one of the school’s security guards collected Cooper and me to serve our time and pay off our debt to society.
The security guard was a middle-aged man with a crew cut, potbelly, and a put-upon attitude like we’d just ruined his day.
His name tag read, “William.” I doubted he went by William. He looked more like a Billy-Bob to me.
The paw prints trailed down the middle of the walkway that stretched from the football practice field to the parking lot.
His security cart waited outside the front doors, the back of the cart loaded with paint supplies.
He pulled out two large paint cans—one blue, one white—a couple of jars of water, a bunch of rags, a roll of tape, some paintbrushes, and a stack of paw-print stencils.
“Have either of you ever painted anything?” he asked.
“I have,” I said. “I paint scenery for school plays.”
Beside me, Cooper muttered, “Show-off.”
Uh, no. Helping with the sets was teamwork, something that Mr. Football Star ought to appreciate.
“What about you?” the security guard asked Cooper.
Cooper shrugged. “I took an art class in junior high.”
“That’s a no, then.” This was clearly one more hardship in William/Billy-Bob’s day. He demonstrated the difficult skill of lining up the stencil with the already-existing paw print, taping it in place, and painting a new blue paw print on top.
“By the time you’ve painted all the stencils in the stack I gave you, the first one should be dry. You’ll pull up that stencil and use it for the next paw print. Got it?”
We nodded.
“If one of the prints smudges,” he continued, “let it dry and paint over the smudge with the white paint. I’ve blocked off the walkway. If anyone disregards the barriers, tell them to get off the sidewalk. I’ll check back on you later. Don’t leave until the job is finished.”
The security guard returned to his golf cart, leaving us to our fate. As he drove off, he added, “Don’t let your brushes dry out! That’s what the jars of water are for!”
“Thank you, Security Bill,” Cooper muttered. “They didn’t teach that in junior high art class.”
I snickered and sat on the sidewalk with Cooper to tape down the stencils. Even though I’d given him back his clothes, he still wore his gym outfit. “I guess you weren’t so eager to have your clothes back after all,” I said.
“I don’t want to get paint on them.”
“Oh. I just planned on being careful.” It was probably a stupid thing to say. I didn’t know how to have a normal conversation with Cooper. I’d never spoken to him one-on-one unless you counted the time in sophomore algebra when I wore a Green Bay Packers sweatshirt and he told me the team sucked.
I couldn’t even argue with him about that. I don’t watch football. The sweatshirt had been a present from one of Peyton’s boyfriends that I’d inherited when they broke up.
Cooper and I worked silently for a while. I was surprised at the number of students who left school late and passed by on the street or on the strip of grass next to the school. A lot of them stopped to talk to Cooper and see what he was doing.
Cooper, of course, was friends with every person in the senior class and half the junior class as well. My group of friends, acquaintances, and curious onlookers was much smaller. The only time people noticed me was when I was on the stage.
All the stragglers finally left. Despite the fact that the principal wanted us to have some sort of heart-to-heart, Cooper still didn’t say anything to me. The only sound was the swipe of our paintbrushes and the tape being ripped from the roll.
A stray cat that always hung around the school appeared to survey our progress and see if we’d left any ham lying about.
I brightened. “It’s Mascot.” The name I’d given him would’ve been more fitting if he was an orange tabby and looked more like a tiger.
He was white and orange spotted. I felt it was close enough. “Do you have any food on you?”
Cooper glanced at the cat. “You actually feed that thing?”
“Only if I’m eating lunch outside and see him. He won’t come near you, but if you toss cheese chunks, he’ll eat them.”
Cooper shook his head with contempt. “Girls like you are the reason we have a stray cat problem at school.”
“Is there more than one?” I scanned the area as though I might spot a litter of kittens playing somewhere. I’d only ever seen Mascot. “What kind?”
Cooper made a grumbling sound in the back of his throat, letting me know I was missing the point. “Stray cats are a nuisance. They poop on the practice field and pee on the bleachers. You need to stop feeding it.”
Selena had a cat, an aloof Siamese who, as far as I could tell, hated everyone and everything, but I had learned certain cat facts from his care.
“Cats cover their poop, so if you find anything on the field, it’s from a dog.
Also, it doesn’t matter if I occasionally toss cheese to Mascot.
He gets plenty of food from the garbage.
” That’s where I usually saw him, hanging around the big dumpster next to the school cafeteria, waiting for breakfast or lunch leftovers.
Cooper jabbed his paintbrush into the paint can. “His gravy days are over. Coach complained about him, so the school put a lock on the dumpster lid.”
“Oh.” I pulled my phone out of my back pocket. “Note to self. Tomorrow, bring a lock cutter to school.” I smiled serenely. “Thanks for the heads-up.”
Cooper scowled in Mascot’s direction. “If the cat wants someone to toss something at him, I can oblige.”
I almost said, “You wouldn’t,” but I knew that response would only make him more likely to throw something just to spite me.
I slipped my phone back into my jeans and picked up my brush again.
“We’re supposed to be working out our differences.
So far, all you’ve done is wave to passing friends and convince me you’re a soulless cat hater. ”
Cooper finished painting the last of the stencils. “What’s there to say? We’ll leave each other alone from now on.” He stood up like the matter was settled and moved to the first stencil so we could start reusing them.
I should’ve been happy with his pronouncement and let him go back to giving me the silent treatment.
It bothered me, though. That’s what jocks like Cooper were good at—-ignoring the rest of us.
He wasn’t getting off that easily this time.
“Mrs. Tsuru will ask us what we talked about. It would be helpful to tell her we actually said words to each other.”
He ripped the stencil from the sidewalk. “This one’s smudged. The paint bled underneath.”
“Those aren’t quite the words I was thinking of.”
He pulled off the next stencil. “This one is smudged too. I bet they all are.” He ran a hand through his hair, tousling his curls. “We’re going to have to touch up all of them, and if we don’t do it perfectly, the toes will look weird, and we’ll have to repaint them. This will take forever.”
The problem was the tape. Since the sidewalk was dirty and had bits of gravel on it, the stencils didn’t stick well to the ground. “Maybe if one of us holds the stencil in place it will work better.”
“You want to go from two painters to one? That will also take forever.”
“But we’ll gain time by not having to put tape on and off.”
“Fine,” he said. “I’ll hold. You paint. You’re the expert.”
He slapped the stencil on the ground. While I painted, Mascot wandered off in the direction of the parking lot. I wondered if he was hungry and looking for food there. Poor thing. I would bring something extra to feed him tomorrow.
After I finished painting, Cooper lifted the stencil to see how it turned out. A perfect paw print met our eyes. Without another word, he placed the stencil on the next paw print in the line. I ran my brush over that one too. Also perfect. This would work.
Maybe Mrs. Tsuru knew we needed to work together to do the job right, and this was some sort of object lesson on cooperation.
Cooper moved the stencil to the next spot, and I began painting it. Our heads were close together. I could smell his—was it cologne? Deodorant? Guy-scented shampoo? I didn’t know what boys did in the bathroom.
It had been a while since I’d looked closely at a guy’s hand, but since I was staring at Cooper’s on the stencil, I couldn’t help comparing our fingers.
Mine were pale and slender with a manicure that was getting ruined by paint splatters.
His hand was huge, tanned, and his fingernails were a little ragged. I wondered if he bit them.
We moved to the next paw print. He still didn’t say anything.
He didn’t care about our follow-up meeting with Mrs. Tsuru.
I would have to get the ball rolling on my own.
“Since we’re supposed to be settling our differences, I think we should start by agreeing on how this began, you know, get to the root of the problem.
We could approach this like it was a court case and—”
“It started when you made that video.”
“No, I made the video because you spread rumors about me.”
He blew a curl away from his eyes. “It’s not a rumor if it’s true. Besides, everyone already knows why Mrs. Russel gives you the leads, so I can’t be guilty of telling people that.”
I bristled. “Hearsay. Unsubstantiated and untrue. Without proof—which you don’t have—what you’ve done is slander me. Mrs. Russel will be less likely to cast me as the lead in future plays if she thinks people believe she’s taking bribes.”
“Good. It’s time someone else gets a turn.”
I ran the paintbrush across the back of his hand. “Oops. How clumsy of me.”
He swore and grabbed one of the rags to wipe off the paint. “Don’t do that again.”
“I’ve taken five years of singing lessons.” I pointed the paintbrush at him for emphasis. “I’ve gone to theater camp the last four summers while the rest of you fortunates chilled by the pool. That’s why I get the leads.”