Companions in Ruin Read online

  one month prior to the shootings

  “Hey Twerp, where you going in such a hurry?”

  Ned pretended he hadn’t heard. He tucked his head down like a turtle, clasped his books to his chest, and hurried down the hall. He’d stopped by the bathroom after Algebra, and the bell had rung while he was washing up. He’d expected the halls to be deserted, but he’d spotted Tyler Ferguson and his Neanderthal buddies as soon as he stepped out of the bathroom. And they’d spotted him. Ned was already late for Spanish; he certainly didn’t have time to deal with a bunch of brain-dead jocks out for a game of Kick-the-Ned. He’d hoped he could make it to the end of the hall before they caught up with him.

  No such luck.

  “Hey Twerp, I’m talking to you,” Tyler said, reaching out a meaty hand and grabbing Ned by the shoulder, spinning him around. “What, don’t you want to talk to us?”

  Ned pressed his back against a row of lockers, trying to melt into them. There were four of them altogether, Tyler being the ringleader. They surrounded Ned in a loose semi-circle, and they all had the smirks of predators who liked to toy with their prey before going in for the kill. Ned hugged his books closer to his body.

  “You know,” Tyler said, “only girls carry their books that way. Are you a girl? You must be, that would actually explain a lot.”

  Ned looked up from beneath his tangle of too-long bangs, took a deep breath, and said, “I’m not a girl.” His voice came out weaker and more high-pitched than he would have liked.

  “Oh, I beg to differ,” Tyler said, eliciting cruel laughter from his posse. “Like I’ve already pointed out, only girls carry their books up against their chests like that. Guys carry their books down by their sides. I bet you sit with your legs crossed one over the other too, don’t you? Guys cross their legs with one foot on the knee, but girls cross them one over the other. Since you’re a girl, I’m betting you cross one over the other.”

  “I have to get to class,” Ned mumbled, trying to slink off to the side.

  Tyler reached out and placed a hand on Ned’s chest, shoving hard. The back of Ned’s head slammed into the locker and the combination lock dug into his back.

  “Why you keep trying to run off?” Tyler said, and the semi-circle around Ned began to constrict. “I’m trying to help you, Twerp. It makes me very angry when you don’t take the help I’m offering.”

  Ned flinched, instinctively tensing his muscles as if expecting a hit.

  Noticing this, Tyler laughed and said, “Don’t worry, Twerp, I’m not going to punch you. My Mamma taught me never to hit girls.”

  Tyler reached out and, with a quick swipe of his hand, knocked Ned’s books from his arms. They tumbled to the floor, papers falling loose and scuttling down the hall like autumn leaves. Tyler stepped on one, leaving a large footprint on the page.

  “See ya around, Twerp,” Tyler said, wagging his fingers daintily at Ned. He and his three buddies walked off, one of them kicking Ned’s Spanish textbook down the hall. Nasty laughter trailed behind them.

  Ned knelt down and began gathering his books and papers. Tears threatened to fall, but he held them in and allowed the red-hot anger inside to boil them away.

  Interview transcript. Subject: Rebecca Leanne Martin, junior at Corinth High School. Age: 16.

  I still can’t believe it. I mean, I know it happened because I was there and it happened right in front of my eyes, but I still can’t believe it. I had her blood on my arms and even my face. I just can’t believe it. Well, me and my best friend, Darla, were spending the lunch period in the library. We had this big paper due in Mrs. Weathers’ English Composition class, and we needed to do some more research. It was hard for us to find time for that kind of thing what with cheerleading practice and the Student Council and all, so we decided to skip lunch and just go to the library. I guess we’d been there about twenty minutes when we heard these pops from down near the cafeteria. I thought someone had set off firecrackers in a trashcan like Ricky Scarsdale did last year. But then I heard all this screaming and we could hear people running down the halls. Someone was yelling, “Call 911! He’s killing everybody!” I was holding on to the belief that it was just a prank or something. I turned to Darla, and I saw nothing but fear in her eyes. Ms. Gosnell, the librarian, was heading toward to door, I guess to check things out, when Ned Terp busted in. Without even pausing, he shot Ms. Gosnell right in the gut. She practically flew off her feet, sliding across the reference desk and tumbling over. Darla and I started screaming and making our way toward the back of the library. Past the stacks is an emergency fire exit, and we turned to run for it. I heard another blast and then felt Darla fall onto my back, knocking me to the floor. I rolled over and saw Darla staring into my eyes, only she wasn’t. She wasn’t seeing anything anymore, I could see that right away. There was a chunk missing from the back of her head, and I could feel her blood on my skin, and it was hot. I almost felt like it was acid, burning into my flesh or something. I could still hear gunshots and kids screaming, so I just lay still with Darla’s body on top of me. I played dead, hoping he’d leave me alone. I still can’t believe it. I can’t believe that Darla’s gone. I’ve known her since I was five years old. Why did Ned do that? Why’d he kill her? Darla was such a sweet girl, how could he just shoot her in the back of the head like that? I just can’t believe it.

  three weeks prior to the shootings

  Ned was eating lunch by himself, as usual. He sat on the pavement on the far side of the quad, his back against the brick wall of the band room. He had made a sandwich this morning, but it was soggy and unappetizing. Still, he didn’t have the money for the school lunch. He was chewing, staring off across the quad, when he noticed Darla Granger headed his way.

  He was immediately on his guard. He didn’t know Darla personally, but everyone knew of Darla. She was on the cheerleading squad and was dating Brock Jennings, quarterback of the school football team. She was pretty much the object of lust for every boy in school and the envy of every girl. Surely she couldn’t be coming over to talk to Ned.

  And yet she continued his way, her blonde ponytail bobbing behind her. She stopped next to Ned, smiling down at him. Her dimples were like craters in the moon. “Hi Ned,” she said in a pleasant voice.

  She knows my name, Ned thought, trying to form words but finding that in Darla’s presence he had forgotten the English language.

  “Mind if I sit down?” she asked, taking a seat next to Ned without waiting for an answer. “What are you doing over here all by yourself?”

  Ned just stared at her, mesmerized by her beauty while at the same time wary of her intentions. He had learned long ago that when one of the popular kids was nice to him, it usually did not bode well for him.

  “Are you mute?” Darla asked with a giggle.

  “Sorry,” Ned said, his voice cracking like he was thirteen years old. “Can I do something for you?”

  “Do you know Becky Martin?”

  “I’m not sure,” Ned said, though he knew exactly who Becky Martin was.

  “She’s a friend of mine. That’s her over there.”

  Ned’s eyes followed Darla’s pointing finger to the flagpole in the center of the quad. It was where all the coolest kids hung out at lunch during the warm weather. Becky Martin was there, tall and slender with dark eyes and black hair that fell down her back in natural waves. She was wearing a knee-length shirt that was riding up on her thighs at the moment. She was a vision.

  “Would you ask her to the homecoming dance?” Darla said.

  “What?”

  “The homecoming dance, would you ask her to go with you?”

  Now Ned’s suspicions were confirmed. This had to be a joke, just another attempt to humiliate Ned. “Why would she want to go to the dance with me?”

  Darla sighed, her expression becoming shrewd. “I’m going to level with you, Ned. She doesn’t want to go with you. She wants to go with Tim Blanton. The only problem is her parents found out that Tim h
as been using a fake ID to get into bars and she isn’t allowed to go out with him. However, if you asked her to the dance, she could go with you then hook up with Tim once there.”

  “So I’d pretty much be her cover.”

  “Exactly.”

  “And why would I do this? What’s in it for me?”

  “Look, Ned,” Darla said, leaning forward to display her cleavage in what Ned was sure was a calculated move, but he appreciated it nonetheless. “I know the crowd I run with treats you pretty shitty. If you do this, you have my word that we’ll back off. I’m not saying we’ll all be best buds or anything, but we’ll cut you some slack.”

  Ned thought about this for a minute. This could be a good deal for him. The assholes who tormented him daily would lay off, and he’d get to go to the homecoming dance with Becky Martin on his arm. Even if she was going to ditch him as soon as they got there.

  “Okay, I’ll do it,” he said.

  “Great,” Darla said, clapping her hands. “Let’s go.”

  “You mean right now?”

  “Well, the dance is this Friday night.”

  Ned stood and followed Darla across the quad to the flagpole. Even though he knew this wasn’t going to be a real date, that he was just being used as a means to an end, he was still nervous. His stomach was fluttering, and he felt sweat trickling down his sides. As they neared the group at the flagpole, Darla stepped aside. Ned stopped a few feet from Becky, shifted from foot to foot, then cleared his throat.

  The group went silent. Not a gradual tapering of voices, just a sudden cessation, as if their volume had been turned off. They stared at him, and he felt small and pathetic under their scrutiny.

  “Uhm, Becky, hi,” he stammered, staring at her shoes instead of her face. “I was just wondering, uh, if you might want to go to the homecoming dance with me?”

  What followed was a silence so deep it was as if the world itself was holding its breath. Ned risked a glance up at Becky. She said nothing, her face a blank mask. Then Ned noticed a twitch in her right eye, and she was suddenly spewing laughter at him. Loud and raucous and mean. Everyone around the flagpole soon joined in, their laughter deafening, an Armageddon of mockery.

  “Did you guys hear that?” Becky said between guffaws. “The Twerp just asked me to the homecoming dance.”

  “That is rich,” Tim Blanton said, placing a possessive arm around Becky’s waist. “Want to fight me for her hand?”

  "Oh goodness, I can’t breathe,” Becky said, taking in air in big hiccuping swallows, tears leaking from her eyes. “Oh Twerp, I’d rather eat my mother’s used tampons than go to the dance with you.”

  Ned turned to Darla, but she was laughing along with everyone else, pointing a finger at Ned and braying like a donkey. Ned turned and ran for the building, the hard-edged laughter following him inside. He was angry, at Darla and her friends but mostly at himself. He was angry at himself for falling for their lame trick. He should have known better.

  He ran into the boy’s restroom near the science lab and locked himself in the far stall. He sat on the toilet lid, rocking back and forth, for the rest of the lunch period, slapping himself repeatedly in the face until his jaw ached.

  Interview transcript. Subject: Reginald Ernest Wallace, basketball coach at Corinth High School. Age: 37.

  The doctors say they tried to save my leg, but there was just too much damage. Cut it off right below the knee. So for the rest of my life I’m going to be a gimp all because of that little piss-ant. He better be glad he turned the gun on himself, because if I’d had the chance to get my hands on him, he’d have been in for a world of hurt before I finally finished the bastard off. I was in the gym, coaching the intramural basketball games during lunch. It was so loud in there that I hadn’t heard any of the commotion from the school. I didn’t know anything was wrong until Terp came walking in like he was some outlaw in a cowboy movie, holding that damn rifle. He must’ve known that I would have pounded his ass if I’d got to him, because the first thing he did was take a shot at me. Hit me in the lower left leg, and I was down for the count. Hurt like a sonofabitch, but I still tried to crawl across the gym to get to Terp. But I wasn’t fast enough. He took out three kids in the gym, including Bobby Stevens, my best player. I was still several feet from Terp when he shot himself. I tell you, that bastard just epitomizes all that’s wrong with kids today. They got no respect for anything. Authority, adults, life—they just got no respect for any of it.

  one week prior to the shootings

  Ned was sitting on a bench in the locker room, tying his shoes, when Coach Wallace walked up to him. Ned acted as if he didn’t notice, spending an inordinate amount of time on a knot in his laces.

  “Terp!” Coach Wallace said sharply. “Did you shower?”

  Heat suffused Ned’s cheeks as he felt every eye in the room turn toward him. “No, sir,” he said in a whisper.

  “You think your sweat don’t stink?” Coach Wallace said in a booming voice that echoed off the locker room walls. “Is that it? You think you smell like a bed of roses after phys ed?”

  “I don’t sweat that much, sir.”

  “Well, I can believe that coming from you, Terp. It’s not like you were doing anything out on the field today. You just stood out there in left field picking your nose. Find anything good in there?”

  The laughter from around him stung Ned like pebbles. He felt tears close to the surface, but he fought to keep his emotions in check. Crying in front of Coach Wallace would only make it worse.

  “Get in the shower, Terp,” Coach Wallace said, slapping Ned in the back of the head with his clipboard.

  “Sir, please…” Ned said miserably, unable to articulate what he dreaded about the communal shower. He was scrawny and had acne on his back and buttocks. He could too easily imagine the boys pointing and laughing, drawing attention to all his shortcomings.

  Coach Wallace squatted down next to him, his voice full of faux-compassion as he said, “What’s the matter, Terp? You afraid you’ll get a boner looking at all the other boys’ hard bodies? Afraid you won’t be able to control yourself and everybody will see what a big old queer you are?”

  Ned gritted his teeth, balling his hands into tight fists in his lap. Rage rolled inside him like tidal waves, but what could he do about it? If he talked back to Coach Wallace, he’d just get suspended. He could do nothing but endure it.

  “Well, I’ll tell you what,” Coach Wallace said. “If you don’t want to get naked in front of the other guys, I think I got a solution for you.”

  Coach Wallace suddenly grabbed Ned by the arm and pulled him off the bench. Ned landed hard on his side, his arm twisted at a painful angle as Coach Wallace began to drag him across the locker room. “Bobby, get the showers,” Coach Wallace shouted.

  Ned bucked on the floor like a dying fish, trying to tug his arm free of Coach Wallace’s hold, but it did no good. Coach Wallace hauled him over to the communal shower stall. It was empty at the moment, but all six showerheads were turned on and spraying hot water onto the tiled floor. Steam rose like fog and wafted throughout the room. Coach Wallace yanked Ned to his feet and pushed him into the shower stall. The hot water hit him, soaking into his clothes and running down his skin, scalding him. He tried to turn back, but several of the boys were there, blocking his way.

  “How’s that, Terp?” Coach Wallace asked, watching Ned get drenched under the searing water with a self-satisfied smirk. “You feel good and clean yet?”

  Ned curled up on the floor of the shower stall, the hot water pelting him until he no longer felt it anymore. He felt cold, inside and out.

  Interview transcript. Subject: Peter Eugene Terp, father of shooter. Age: 43.

  I always knew that boy would come to no good. I don’t want you to think this was a reflection on me. I did the best I could raising him. His mother up and died when the boy was just six years old, and I had to bring him up all by my lonesome. I tried to instill him with the proper values an
d such, but it was like teaching a brick wall new tricks. There’s only so much a parent can do; I don’t want you thinking this was my fault. No, I didn’t notice anything unusual about him that morning. To be honest, I didn’t even see him that morning. I was out late with some buddies of mine the night before, and so I slept in. In fact, didn’t wake up until the police were knocking on my door. Turns out the little sonofawhore stole my rifle and my pickup. If I had suspected something, I swear I’d have put a stop to it. He didn’t seem to be acting no different far as I could tell. Still, I always knew he’d come to a bad end, despite how hard I tried to raise him right.