Hailey Gardner was not the sort of girl who sat around like a disenchanted damsel waiting for her cell phone to chime, but then again, a desirable boy had yet to challenge her impetuousness. On most occasions she initiated the privilege of screening callers and fending off persistent suitors with a glibness that bordered on arrogance. It seemed remote for any boy of seventeen to calculatedly forfeit an opportunity to date the prettiest girl in Belle Falls. And although Hailey may have reiterated her desire to be recognized for more than her physical appearance, some reputations were harder to overcome than others.
By early morning of the next day, Hailey’s patience had expired in regard to waiting for Ryan to contact her. She did not lose sight of the possibility that Victor had neglected to give Ryan her number, which was the reason for her arrival in the science wing of the high school at this hour. It was common knowledge to understand that Victor was the first student in the biology laboratory everyday. Hailey had not guessed incorrectly on this occasion. A full ten minutes before first period commenced, Victor had already started to set up his electronic microscope and slides for class.
Victor was only partially surprised to see the classroom’s door swing open. He expected his teacher to stroll in with a list of duties, but Hailey’s arrival at least struck him as a tad bit more enticing than a balding, middle-aged man. Her demeanor, however, was not as inviting as he hoped. Before Hailey even crossed the floor toward his workstation, he sensed that she was upset with something he had a hand in orchestrating. It did not take Victor long to figure out exactly why she had come to see him.
If Hailey came across as too easygoing the first time she spoke to Victor, she wanted to make certain her motives translated accurately on this occasion. Today, the pitch of her voice matched her standoffish posture when she said, “So what’s going on with your friend?”
Victor, who was rarely prone to overreact in any situation, simply shrugged his shoulders with a childlike innocence. His immediate reply seemed appropriately timed to counteract with Hailey’s mannerisms. “What do you mean?”
“Your friend never called me,” she fumed. “Did you give him my number?”
“I did,” answered Victor candidly.
The bewilderment expanded on Hailey’s bubbly features like ripples fanning out across a pond’s surface. She fastened her hands squarely to her hips before she opened her mouth again. “When did you give it to him?”
“Just last night.”
“Oh,” Hailey thought, somewhat embarrassed by her accusatory tone. “Did he say anything?”
Victor smirked at Hailey’s inquisitiveness, partly because it was uncharacteristic of her to devote so much effort to any guy in school, particularly to a boy with the anemic social status of his best friend. Even with his friend’s welfare in mind, Victor relished every fleeting moment of his exclusive interaction with the girl.
“He was kind of busy last night, Hailey. Give him a day or so and I’m sure he’ll get the nerve to call you.”
“Did he say he would?”
Victor recollected his friend’s exact words before stating, “He didn’t say he wouldn’t.”
Hailey’s agitation became increasingly apparent as she paced closer to Victor’s workstation. She was also somewhat repulsed by a tray of dead fetal pigs being readied for dissection on the counter adjacent to him. A faint odor of formaldehyde lingered with a scent of disinfectant sprayed around the sinks and tables. Despite being subjected to an environment far akin to her liking, she bit her bottom lip and became determined to finish this conversation to her satisfaction.
“He must’ve said something about me,” Hailey probed Victor’s interior thoughts with the precision of a surgical instrument. “I don’t want you to think I’m being pushy, Victor. I’m just trying to get in touch with him.”
At the risk of making Ryan out to be a less than adequate choice for her, Victor felt it necessary to investigate the girl’s ulterior motives, if in fact there were any to take into account.
“I know this might not be any of my business,” said Victor politely, “but it’s pretty obvious to me that you can go out with any guy in this school. So I guess I’m just wondering why you have such a sudden fascination with Ryan?”
“I don’t know how to answer that,” Hailey remarked, perhaps feigning her bemusement in order to restore her confidence. “You can’t help who you like, right?”
There was no easy way for Victor to express his feelings without sounding envious or insecure, but he prepared himself to end this dialogue with a reprimand if necessary. “Look, Hailey, Ryan has been my best friend for a long time. I don’t want to see his head get messed around with—you know what I mean?”
“Is that what you honestly think I’m trying to do?”
When Victor did not instantaneously respond, Hailey almost became defensive. But she reconsidered her initial temptation after assessing the situation. After all, she had not demonstrated a single compassionate act to an incalculable band of hapless souls. In fact, she trampled upon as many as possible during her ascension toward the stratosphere of high school popularity. In truth, she had cast aside a host of would-be suitors with all the delicacy of a wielded sledgehammer.
“It’s sweet that you’re trying to protect your friend,” Hailey admitted to Victor. “I don’t think any of my so-called friends would ever do that for me.”
“Us geeks got to stick together,” Victor countered with the charisma of a wounded duck.
“You don’t have to worry about my intentions. I like Ryan, or at least I like what I imagine him to be.”
The earnestness beaming from Hailey’s doe-like eyes had tamed the ferocity from much sterner boys than Victor. It was only a matter of seconds before he became as malleable as soft clay under the spell of her feminine guile. “I know you think it’s weird that I’m here,” said Hailey. “Maybe that’s why I didn’t want to go directly to Ryan. But I think once he realizes that I’m serious, he’ll be willing to talk to me.”
Under typical circumstances Victor would have been inclined to believe Hailey’s prediction. He of course did not want to expose his friend’s current problems at home as an excuse for his aloofness. Before any more conversation volleyed between them, Ryan made his own hasty entrance into the classroom. Ryan’s arrival this morning was as unforeseen as Hailey’s, and his face immediately revealed a state of awkwardness.
Victor sighed with relief at the prospect of not being lodged between whatever was about to transpire between his friend and Hailey. “Now’s your chance to tell him how you feel,” Victor whispered in Hailey’s direction.
Despite possessing a degree of confidence that rarely left her with a sense of inadequacy, Hailey was not thrilled with the notion of confronting Ryan so abruptly. Besides, Ryan seemed initially oblivious to her flirtations up until this moment. She forwarded a closed-mouth smile with the faint hope that he might maintain some type of significant eye contact, but the boy’s face was more petrified than pleased by her endeavor. After it was apparently clear that Ryan refused to submit to Hailey’s advances, she found it too strenuous to suppress her irritability any longer.
“Okay,” Hailey simmered. She then paced over to Ryan and folded her arms in front of her body. “I guess you’ve noticed by now that I’m trying to get your attention,” she said to Ryan.
By now Victor had resumed his duties in front of his microscope. Dealing with a tray full of dead pigs seemed like an appealing activity compared to Ryan’s present dilemma. Ryan could not even get his friend to acknowledge the awkwardness of the situation at this point.
Hailey remained resolute with her intentions by saying, “Your friend Victor told me he gave you my number.” She tried to keep her voice pitched to a level of sweetness that had not failed her in the past. “I was just wondering if you planned on calling me or not?”
Ryan’s nervousness was so obvious at this stage that it must have been impossible for Hailey to overlook his quivering limbs. His eyes refused to st
ay attached to Hailey’s gaze; they shifted from her to Victor, and then hopelessly back to Hailey.
“He did give me your number,” Ryan confessed to her, but his thoughts strayed from where she wanted them fixated. He did not feel as though he was lying to her when he declared, “I was going to call you, but I haven’t had much free time lately.”
Hailey’s saccharine tone subsided considerably when she said, “Oh, I see.” But of course Hailey really did not understand why Ryan was not pouncing all over her like every other depraved boy in school. “I’m not trying to be a nuisance,” she smirked impishly. “You may not believe this, Ryan, but I’m just as nervous about all this as you are.”
“Yeah,” huffed Ryan. Although he achingly sought to stare into Hailey’s sea-green eyes, his limitations of self-confidence prevented such a blatant display of affection. “Look, Hailey, whatever it is that you’d like to talk about, can we do it in a few minutes? I really need to speak to Victor—alone.”
Normally Hailey would have stormed away and never turned back to glance over her shoulder at Ryan. But not many boys harnessed the wherewithal to thwart her ploys of seduction so convincingly. She could not help but to suspect that Ryan had some experience at tinkering with a girl’s emotions, which she found peculiarly enticing.
“I’ll wait outside for five minutes,” Hailey decided in a voice designed to tempt even the numbest man into submission. She then mischievously jabbed her finger into the center of Ryan’s chest and admonished, “Don’t make me come back in here looking for you.”
The candy-sweet smile she forwarded prompted Ryan’s cheeks to change to crimson. He simply was not accustomed to this sort of attention from any female. Had it been another time, he might have explored the possibilities more vigorously, but a weightier issue caused his head to droop and most of his premeditated thoughts to go unuttered.
Hailey exited the classroom exactly as she had entered, and the two males’ eyes did not squander an opportunity to watch her gyrating hips until she shut the classroom door behind herself. Once she was out of sight, Ryan exhaled a breath that suggested he had just sprinted a marathon. He perspired profusely as he approached the table, where Victor pretended to ignore the situation.
“Take it easy,” Victor advised his friend. He then tossed him a hand towel from the counter closest to the sink. “She’s not going to bite you,” he snickered, “unless you ask her to.”
Ryan caught the towel and repeatedly dabbed his forehead and neck. After a few more exaggerated breaths, he positioned himself on a stool beside the table where Victor had set up an entire row of microscopes.
“Things are getting pretty strange,” Ryan uttered aloud, hoping that Victor dissected his consternation as adeptly as he did the fetal pigs. Victor was too preoccupied on Hailey’s suggestive behavior to concentrate on anything but her antics.
“You should look at this as an opportunity that will never happen again,” Victor enunciated to his friend with all the pageantry of a ringmaster at a circus.
“Forget about that girl for a minute,” Ryan advised. By the pitch of his voice, it was fairly obvious to Victor that his friend was exasperated. After a few seconds of observing Ryan’s languishing body language, Victor’s enthusiasm deflated instantaneously.
Victor was almost reluctant to ask, “So what’s bothering you now?”
“Maybe it’s all in my head,” Ryan shuddered, “but I keep getting a feeling that something is wrong.”
“Wrong with what?”
“Me or something connected to me,” answered Ryan. He sheepishly cast a gaze at the elemental chart posted on the wall behind Victor.
Victor tried to contain his sarcasm when he quipped, “Let me guess—more backyard UFO sightings?” Victor then offered a laugh meant to lighten the mood, but his humor was swiftly tempered by Ryan’s menacing stare. Once Victor realized his friend’s expression of emotion was not a contrived gesture to generate sympathy, he became almost as equally somber.
Victor did not typically resort to using a harsh tone of voice with his friend, but Ryan’s behavior of late merited a reprimand in his mind. He was more generally worried about Ryan’s health than anything else. “I don’t know what’s going on with you lately, but it’s starting to freak me out.”
Ryan attempted to relax himself by inhaling a series of deep breaths, but this exercise proved fruitless in remedying his overall discomfort. “I realize I haven’t been myself lately,” Ryan stated. “I’m sorry for being on edge.”
“Just tell me what’s bothering you.”
Since Victor acknowledged the situation so bluntly, Ryan saw no reason to postpone the purpose of his visit any longer. He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a clear plastic bag. Ryan had filled its contents with the silvery dust that he had brushed from his body on the previous evening. After holding the bag in his palm momentarily, Ryan tossed it on the table in front of his friend. He then waited for his reaction.
“What is that?” Victor questioned as he examined the bag’s contents without immediately touching it.
“I’m not sure,” replied Ryan passively.
Victor leaned forward and grabbed the bag. He at first assumed it contained some type of drug, but after considering the source, it seemed like a farfetched notion. Victor did not open the bag’s seal yet, but he did pinch a portion of it with his fingers. It felt unusually dense to him.
“Okay,” said Victor, “I give up. What is this stuff?”
“I was hoping to get your expert opinion.”
“Feels like a heavy metal,” Victor deliberated aloud, while still touching the material through its plastic sheath. “Almost feels like lead shavings.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Well, how about giving me a clue on where you found it?”
“That’s not important right now, Victor. I thought it might be a good idea to check it out under a microscope. Maybe you’ll see something that I don’t.”
“Sure,” Victor agreed tentatively, “but is there any reason you don’t want to tell me where you found this stuff?”
Ryan pondered his friend’s words intensely before he said, “I don’t know exactly where it came from yet—that’s why I’m here.”
Rather than debate the veracity of his friend’s words, Victor squeezed his hands into a pair of latex gloves and opened the bag’s sealed end. He then poured a tiny portion of the dust into his palm. The material had a gritty texture, and the bulk of it was as finely graded as beach sand. Under the glow of the room’s fluorescent lights, the dust appeared almost bluish-silver in coloration and had a peculiar sheen that Victor had never encountered before. He found these aspects particularly fascinating.
Based on Victor’s scrunched facial expression, Ryan surmised that Victor discovered something that he failed to recognize. “Do you see anything weird about it?” he asked apprehensively.
Victor meticulously sprinkled a stamp-sized portion of the material on a slide beneath the lens of a microscope nearest to him on the table. “Let me get a closer look,” Victor answered as he focused the scope’s eyepiece. “I’m thinking that it might consist of fluorescent minerals.”
“Why? Does it glow?”
“That’s right,” Victor confirmed as he turned on the microscope’s power switch. Once the dust on the slide was focused beneath the microscope’s lens, Victor examined it under magnification. He adjusted the eyepiece several times before lifting his head with a perplexed stare cast in his friend’s direction.
“Any ideas?” Ryan asked, trying to contain his anticipation.
“Nothing concrete, and I don’t mean that as a pun,” replied Victor. “It could be a number of things. Calcite is a common fluorescent, but its tint isn’t characteristic in this type of mineral.”
“Can’t calcite illuminate with a silvery glow?”
“Maybe, but this isn’t just a silvery glow. There’s a blue fluorescent mixed in with it too. A very uncharacteristic combination.”
“And you’ve never seen anything like it before?”
“You’re putting me on the spot here,” said Victor, scratching his temple in concentration. He checked the particles another time before saying, “There’s something else here….”
Ryan leaned closer to the scope so that his face nearly touched the eyepiece alongside where Victor was positioned. “What else?” Ryan asked.
“These individual particles all appear to be the same size and shape—sphere-shaped to be exact.” Victor pulled his face back from the scope before making his last observation. “It must be a pure mineral of some kind.”
“What does that mean?”
“Just very unusual,” Victor remarked. “Most rock particles, even in minute portions, contain a variety of minerals.”
“So you can’t tell what it is just by looking at it?”
Victor sensed that Ryan was not willing to divulge the source from which the dust originated, and this lack of information hindered his ability to even venture an educated guess. Besides, Victor did not like to make projections about anything that he stood a better than average chance of being wrong about.
“You have me at a disadvantage here,” Victor told his friend. “Without knowing where you found this stuff, it would be nearly impossible for me to identify it.”
“I want to tell you, Victor, but the fact is I’m not sure where it came from.”
Victor leaned back on the stool he sat upon and crossed his arms in frustration. He did not deliberately attempt to be insolent toward his friend’s supposed ignorance, but he also saw no benefit in prolonging the concealment of his emotions.
‘Obviously, Ryan, this stuff just didn’t appear out of thin air.”
“I’m not sure what’s so obvious anymore,” said Ryan. “If I told you I found it in my bedroom, would you believe me?”
“Where in your room?”
Before Ryan had an opportunity to divulge anything more essential, the classroom door swung open. After checking the wall clock, Ryan realized that his five minutes alone with his friend had expired. Hailey stood at the entrance of the classroom again, this time with her hands grappled at her hips and looking somewhat miffed.
“We’ll have to talk more about this later,” Ryan whispered to his friend. He acknowledged Hailey with a wave of his hand, but it was not delivered with the enthusiasm she normally was accustomed to receiving. The majority of Ryan’s concentration still resided with Victor and the unknown substance in question.
“I hate to ask anymore favors from you, Victor,” Ryan stated, “but I’m going to need your help.”
Victor was reluctant to agree to anything that Ryan suggested at this stage, but he then recalled how few friends he managed to accumulate over the years. He nodded his chin in agreement to at least listen to Ryan’s request.
“I was hoping that maybe you could get your dad to analyze this stuff at his lab. He’s still working for that pharmaceutical company as a chemist, right?”
“Of course,” said Victor, “I can ask him, but I can’t make you any promises.”
“I appreciate this, Victor. And I promise you, I’ll explain everything to you when the time is right.”
Victor’s eyes shifted from the bag of material to Ryan’s pleading eyes. He did not really expect his friend to clarify the situation. He had not known Ryan to be anything but evasive in regard to certain aspects of his life. Before Ryan conveyed any further thoughts, he started toward the front of the classroom, where Hailey waited for him. In an attempt to disguise his eavesdropping, Victor busied himself by examining the particles under the microscope.
Hailey was only partially interested in the boys’ conversation. She had nearly exhausted all of her ploys of subtle enticement, but now adamantly refused to walk away without some sort of confirmation from Ryan. At his best and most alert, Ryan found it challenging to conjure up a dialogue that stimulated Hailey’s interest. He realized that approaching her when he felt uptight about other issues was a formula for disaster, but he proceeded to take that risk.
Hailey’s peevish stare immediately forecasted her mood before she uttered a word. She had never been made to wait a minute for a boy’s attention, but Ryan had already used up that quota. He expected her to remind him of this point, but she remained refreshingly reserved as Ryan approached her. She even managed to correct her posture so she seemed less intimidating.
When Hailey finally spoke, her voice chimed with an innocent awkwardness that supplied Ryan’s ears with a short-lived security. “I didn’t mean to interrupt before,” she said, twirling the ends of her raven-black hair around her fingers and dipping her chin slightly so that her eyes peered up into Ryan’s face.
“It’s okay,” Ryan sighed as he glanced behind himself to detect Victor’s conspicuous gaze.
“You guys really start early in the lab, huh?” Hailey remarked.
“Is it okay for us to talk in the hall?” Ryan suggested, assuming that he would have been potentially relaxed outside of earshot from his friend.
Ryan did not wait long enough for a reply from Hailey. He marched forward and managed to open the classroom’s door without fumbling with the handle too badly. Hailey followed, but she began to sense that this boy had not harbored the faintest interest in anything she offered.
After Ryan relocated next to a stretch of lockers in the empty hallway, he felt more at ease. He combed his fingers through his slick hair and exhaled deeply. A fine layer of sweat covered his scalp and forehead; it trickled down through his bushy eyebrows and caused the lenses on his eyeglasses to fog over in a mist.
“Are you okay?” Hailey sounded generally concerned as she directed Ryan’s attention to a water cooler in a recess in the wall. “Do you need a drink or water or something?”
Ryan shook his head and continued to breathe in a purposeful manner in order to stabilize his demeanor. “I’ll be fine,” he said, shifting his body back against the lockers. “I’m just having a rough morning,” he declared, hoping that his confession persuaded Hailey to search elsewhere for companionship. But Hailey never attained a high status among her peers by being deterred so easily, and this certainly was not the occasion where she planned to exhibit a blemish on her perfect reputation.
“I guess you’ve probably been wondering why I’ve been trying to get your attention for the past couple weeks,” she announced while inching closer to Ryan.
She positioned herself only twelve inches from Ryan, but that distance was as near as any girl had ever strayed to him without hurling an insult. Ryan found his breathing intensifying as he smelled the lavender flavor of her shampoo.
“The thought had crossed my mind once or twice,” he answered her.
“Boys don’t usually make me try so hard,” Hailey gushed. “But maybe that’s what I like about you, Ryan. You don’t feel the need to call me every five minutes.”
“I—I planned to call you, Hailey,” Ryan stammered. “I was just busy with a few things.”
Hailey shuffled even closer to Ryan now. The fragrance of her gardenia-scented body lotion filled his nostrils and tantalized his mind in ways he had only recently learned to envision. At this range, Ryan detected the frenzied pitch of her eyes swelling like the tides on an emerald-colored sea. Without whispering another syllable, Hailey had nearly reduced her prey to a bona fide imbecile.
“People think they know me,” Hailey murmured in his ear. Her tepid breath created a thicker mist on the lenses of Ryan’s glasses. Her fingertips simultaneously dabbled against his chest, almost testing his frame’s sturdiness with each delicate stroke. “I bet you already have an idea about the kind of girl I am,” she cooed. “But you’d most likely be wrong.”
Before Ryan had a chance to fully fantasize over such possibilities, the hallways became congested with a parade of lethargic students. Their curiosity over Ryan’s business with Hailey quickly ruled out any hopes of privacy. Perhaps their encounter would not have been so engrossing if Hailey had
not elected to nearly pin Ryan against the lockers. Hailey, however, did not seem fazed by the audience that had assembled in a crescent-shape around them. She was tempted to press her raspberry-colored lips against the pale face in front of her, but decided not to cause Ryan any more excitement than necessary.
“Look at them all,” Hailey giggled. “This will give them something to talk about for the rest of the week.”
Ryan was not so sure if this sort of unsolicited attention amounted to a favorable circumstance, but Hailey certainly had not overestimated the intrigue gossip created. The fact that she stood anywhere in proximity to him while in the company of others, however, suggested that her motivations were marginally deeper than he initially deduced.
“I’m still don’t get it,” Ryan muttered as he watched Hailey’s fingers meander in a circular motion over the buttons on his shirt.
Hailey smiled with an ingenuousness that dripped with sugary charm. “What’s to get?” she said playfully. “I think it’s rather obvious what I want.”
Ryan was almost too mortified to admit that nothing of this nature registered as being anywhere close to him understanding completely. The intrusive stares from his peers, who had never quite noticed him before, did not help his anxiety either. Perhaps Ryan was simply too accustomed to being the brunt of so many jokes that he had difficulty adjusting to this newfound recognition. Even so, he could not deny the satisfaction it provided him with to observe the contours of Hailey’s svelte figure.
After all his previous thoughts failed to transform into coherent syllables, Ryan shrugged his shoulders and said, “I don’t know what to say about all this, Hailey.”
“Then let me talk,” insisted Hailey. “I’d like to go out with you some night—nowhere special, just somewhere we can talk and get to know each other.”
Ryan waited impatiently for the punch line, but in this case at least, Hailey was genuine. Her eyes exuded a sincerity that he or anyone within range detected like a beacon in a darkened night.
“I think I’d like that,” said Ryan. He felt proud of himself for maintaining enough composure to not stutter his next question. “What night are you available?”
“You pick.”
Hailey apparently wanted to test the boy to see if he was capable of making a decision on his own. Ryan considered his schedule before stating, “It’ll have to be later in the week.” Hailey then smiled at his seemingly elusive nature. She had not yet adjusted to the notion of being treated as a secondary option, but Ryan’s indifference worked on her like an intoxicating spell.
“You’re still playing hard to get, huh?” she simpered while navigating her fingertips over his clothing and even on the fringes of his belt loops. “You don’t like to tease a girl, do you, Ryan?”
“Of course not,” Ryan answered in a sonorous monotone. “I’m just busy—and maybe not use to this kind of attention.”
Hailey demonstrated her boldest move thus far by leaning forward and kissing Ryan softly on his cheek. She parted her lips just far enough so that he sensed the tip of her tongue brushing against his skin. His legs almost buckled on the spot, and his face turned as scarlet as the girl’s puckered lips. In the aftermath of this display of affection, the other teenagers huddled around in open-mouthed wonder. Rather than contemplate an encore, Hailey decided she had provided Ryan (not to mention the gawking masses) with enough stimulation for one day. She left him to stew in his thoughts and dare to fathom the tantalizing mysteries yet to come.
She departed so quickly into the crowd of students that Ryan almost felt as if he imagined the entire scenario. But the chattering banter of the crowd reminded him that it was all delightfully real. But he should have savored the moment more than he did. After all, no girl had ever even blown a kiss in his general direction. If Hailey had an unseen motive, Ryan was too preoccupied with other matters to care. He only had the ability to handle one life-changing moment at a time. And at this stage, courting the fairest girl in Belle Falls rated woefully beneath the storm of uncertainty churning within his mind.