Evie Krauss looked out of the bus window that sunny Monday morning. She counted every sign in every yard about the stupid benefit Spaghetti dinner for Maggie Smeal’s daddy. There were five. They all read, HELP COACH SMEAL. Evie wondered why they hadn’t taken them down. The dinner was over on Saturday, and Evie longed for one less daily reminder of what happened. Yes. Evie’s ma was on drugs when she crashed into Maggie Smeal’s daddy and hurt him. Bad. It was all everyone in town talked about. Let’s get on with life, Evie thought. It had been three months since the accident. But still, the other kids on the bus turned their heads away just at the sight of Evie. It was like she was the one who’d done something wrong. Only Bruce from her class had the balls to ask about Evie’s ma.
“She’s really like my older sister. We weren’t close. I was raised by my grandma, Meme,” Evie told Bruce. And all that was true.
The bus pulled up to the school just as Maggie got dropped off by her dad in his shiny, new, red Mustang. Maggie got out of the car. Looked like she had on a new paint-splash, denim jumper dress with lace leggings and a new Lisa Frank backpack. Evie’s dad waved her off from the driver seat of their car. There was talk of pins and rods in bones, but Evie couldn’t help but notice, the man still drove just fine.
Evie looked down at her old jeans. They were threadbare at the knees. They had marker scribbles all over them from the last time Evie was bored in class. She tugged at the dragon logo on her yard sale polo. Then, she yanked the small fitting shirt down to her waistband. This was the first time she’d given her wardrobe, all things she grabbed from the laundry basket, a thought.
In homeroom, Maggie showed off her new super deluxe Lisa Frank art kit with coloring pages, stickers, and markers to Tracy McBride. Before the accident Evie and Maggie were close friends, but Maggie hadn’t talked to Evie since. Then, Tracy horned in.
Evie stood on her tiptoes to get a good look at the kit.
Evie had asked for the Lisa Frank set just this past weekend, but Meme looked it over at K-Mart and said that it cost too much. Meme said Evie could get just-as-nice coloring books and stickers at the Dollar Store instead. Evie moved towards Maggie and Tracey to see the kit up close. She got near enough the back of them to smell the fabric softener of their clothes. But Tracy looked back sharply at Evie with a scowl. She put her arm around Maggie and blocked Evie out.
Mrs. Morgan, whose desk was just a few feet away from Maggie’s at the front of the class, looked up from marking papers.
“Evie Krauss,” she said. “Leave Maggie alone.”
Evie folded her arms, walked to her desk in the back of the room, and quietly cried.
Later, during recess, Evie asked to go inside to the bathroom. Instead, she went into the empty third grade classroom. She opened the top of Maggie Smeal’s desk and set her eyes on the super-deluxe Lisa Frank activity set. It didn’t even have a finger smudge on the glossy cover. The big Pegasus with rainbow wings on the kit looked alive. Evie imagined it would bat its big, long lashes, come to life, and carry her to other worlds. Unfortunately, it was Maggie’s Pegasus though. The thought of Maggie on the horse! It made Evie’s eyes tear again. Then thoughts of the benefit dinner signs and Mrs. Morgan’s scolding that morning washed over Evie.
Evie reached for a black Sharpie from the cup holder on Mrs. Morgan’s desk. She scribbled over every cute, big-eyed, pink leopard and every purple wolf floating in the starry Lisa Frank universe. And that big Pegasus? Evie exed out its eyes. Then she riffled through the rest of the case. She tore every coloring page (the really nice ones with the black, velvety stuff outlining every form). She shredded every brightly colored sticker sheet. She crumbled them in her fists and scattered them like snowflakes into Maggie’s desk. She dropped the top of the desk and ran back outside.
When the class returned from recess, Mrs. Morgan started the Physical Science Lesson.
“Before you get out your workbooks, without looking,” Mrs. Morgan said, “...Does anyone remember the definition of the cosmos?”
When no one raised their hand to answer, Mrs. Morgan put hers on her hips. Her eyes widened at the quiet class.
“No one?” she said. “Was no one listening to yesterday’s lesson? Perfect order. Remember. Though the universe looks like chaos—remember that word, the ancient Greeks believed that the stars, and the planets, and the galaxies are there by no accident. They are ordered in perfect harmony. ”
Then Mrs. Morgan told the class to get out their Science workbooks with the picture of the earth on the cover.
Evie watched Maggie from the back of the class. Maggie’s blond pigtails were tied with yellow yarn ribbon and hung long down her back. When Maggie opened her desktop, she stopped mid-lift. Her shoulders quivered. Then, she dropped the desktop and cradled her head in her arms.
Mrs. Morgan stopped the lesson. She leaned over Maggie and pulled at her arm. “What’s wrong?” Mrs. Morgan asked.
Maggie lifted her head and opened her desk.
Evie would never forget the look on Mrs. Morgan’s face. Mrs. Morgan’s mouth fell open. Her cheeks grew flush. She placed her hand in the center of her chest.
“Evie Krauss. Ms. Oletta’s office. Now!” Mrs. Morgan said.
The other kids reared-up in their seats to see Maggie’s desk, and they all let out a gasp. This was followed by the trouble aww of the class when someone was sent to the principal’s office.
Evie walked the aisle from her seat with her eyes to the floor. She suddenly felt awful for what she had done. Just the way the other kids looked at her, put her near tears. What on earth was she thinking?
Mrs. Morgan stashed the stuff back in the Lisa Frank case and stood with it at the front of the class. She handed it to Evie. The torn edges of the coloring sheets and the sticker pages stuck out the edges, like something coming from a wound. Evie took the case in her arms. She walked slowly with it up to her elbows, careful not to spill anything out as she walked. She imagined the shame of picking the things up from the floor while her classmates looked on.
The school principal’s office was just down the hall. When Evie arrived there, the secretary was on the phone with Mrs. Morgan, who called from the classroom when a student was in that big of trouble. The secretary was a fat woman with done-up red cheeks and gray poofy hair. She was taking notes. Her pen stalled on the page, and she looked up at Evie with big eyes.
Evie sat in the waiting area near the secretary’s desk, the Lisa Frank case flat in her arms. It felt like the time she found her old cat Snuffy dead next to the porch. He was stiff and odd, once the life had gone out of him. Evie recalled how she got Meme to come look at the cat. Meme fetched an empty shoebox for Snuffy’s burial. She said, “Honey, these things just happen.” Meme said the same thing about the car accident.
Ms. Oletta’s office door was closed. The secretary knocked softly on it and said, "Sorry to disturb you." Evie caught a glimpse of Ms. Oletta, a tall, tan woman with can-curler hair. Ms. Oletta put the phone into her chest and raised her finger in the air. The secretary handed her the note and backed out the door.
Evie imagined Ms. Oletta would say, After everything that’s happened between you and Maggie, why would you do such a thing?
Evie thought about her response. She figured she’d tell Ms. Oletta about the spaghetti dinner signs still all over town. She’d tell her about Maggie’s daddy’s new car, Maggie’s new clothes. She’d tell Ms. Oletta how badly she wanted a Lisa Frank set. “So, certainly, you must understand,” Evie imagined saying. “Oh, that is a lot,” she imagined Ms. Oletta would reply.
None of that was even the worst part. Every fourth Saturday of every month since the car wreck, Evie and Meme would drive to the Galleria Mall. However, Evie never got to go inside. Instead, she and Meme would catch the Greyhound in the parking lot to visit her ma at the prison in some place called Munsy, PA. This was a two-hour bus ride. Once they got to the visitor’s center at the prison, Evie, Meme and her ma sat awkwardly together on hard benches in a gray cafeteria. They were all desperate to come up with things to say to one another. Meme would break the silence by asking about the prison food. Then Evie’s ma would talk about what she ate that week. She’d explain the food as either awful or not that bad. “Oh, eggbeaters,” Meme would say with her nose scrunched up. Then Meme would put quarters in the vending machine to get them all Combos and Reese Cups. “A little stale,” Meme would say taking a bite with the orange Reese package in her hand. “Oh, I’m not complaining,” Evie’s ma would say. Meme would ask Evie, “How bout yours?” “Little stale,” Evie’d say and shrug her shoulders. The hour-long visit was super awkward for Evie, who just thought at the sight of her ma, What on earth have you done, woman, gone and ruined the perfectly good Saturday off from school? Then, there was the goodbye hug. Evie would stiffen up with her arms tight to her sides when her ma put her arms around Evie. Evie had to turn her head when her ma kissed her cheeks. She could feel her ma’s tears against her skin. To boot, after all that, it was another two-hour ride on the dark bus back home. At night. With nothing to do. Evie turned in her seat and watched the teenage girl behind her with the light of a handheld Nintendo shining in her face. The girl completely ignored her. Meme said, “Would it kill you to sit on your arse, Evie? Take a sleep, why don’t you?”
This particular Saturday, when Evie and Meme got back to the house, Meme flicked on the TV. Maggie’s daddy was on the news…again. He stood with his arms in those weird crutches of his. The bottom of the screen read: Community Comes Together for Former High School Football Hero and Beloved Coach Injured in Crash. Seemed every time Maggie’s dad was on the news, the bit ended with how Maggie’s daddy was the quarterback who won state championships in ‘84. Then they’d say Evie’s ma, the meth-addicted driver who crashed into his car, was now serving five years. Evie figured she’d tell Ms. Oletta how this made Meme cry. She’d tell her Meme stood in front of the TV and said, “My daughter is a person too. People make mistakes.” Then, Meme said if she had the money she’d get out of this god-forsaken, podunk town. Evie agreed with Meme and said it with her, “Yeah, my mom’s a person too.” She sneered at Maggie’s daddy on the screen and folded her arms while he said how much he thanked the great people of this fine, little community for helping him through this terrible time. Then, at the end of the news clip, there was a shot of Maggie giving her daddy a hug. And when Evie said it wasn’t fair, that she ought to—
Meme said, “Just keep hella’ far from that Maggie Smeal girl.”
Another thing Evie thought she might mention to Ms. Oletta was that Mrs. Morgan redid the seating chart in class. She put Evie and Maggie on the far, opposite corners of the room. Maggie, in the front. Evie, way in the back. Evie noticed the way Mrs. Morgan looked at Maggie, like poor, pretty little Maggie. Oh, and After Mrs. Morgan scolded Evie to stay away from Maggie, Evie heard her tell Maggie how much she enjoyed the benefit spaghetti dinner. She said it was nice to see her daddy getting along after all he’d been through. This made Evie feel like she was nothing more than Maggie’s daddy’s near-killer’s daughter.
After all that time waiting and thinking what she would say, Ms. Oletta called Evie into her office. Just as expected, Ms. Oletta looked up from the secretary’s note and asked how Evie could do such a thing. Evie wanted to scream that Ms. Oletta, like everyone else in this god-forsaken town, already knew. However, Evie could not quite find the words. In fact, she just stood there, didn’t have the good sense to take the seat at Ms. Oletta’s desk. Instead, Evie put her head down. She cried into the ruins of the Lisa Frank cosmos and said, "I do not know."
---
Ms. Oletta had the secretary walk Evie outside to wait for Meme to pick her up. Evie overheard Meme on the phone tell Ms. Oletta she wasn’t about to set foot in that school, not what with what she expected all those teacher friends of Coach Smeal thought of her.
Meme pulled up in her rust-red Buick. A cloud of blue smoke rolled from the muffler. Meme’s big old car looked like a monster, and Meme sat at the driver’s seat like some raging queen on her throne.
Evie didn’t say a word when she settled onto the crazed pleather seat with the marred Lisa Frank case by her side. Neither did Meme.
Meme drove straight to K-Mart off of Route 80. She parked and got out of the car. Evie guessed she should follow, so she did. She could barely keep pace with Meme through the automatic doors, straight back to the kid's stationery aisle. Meme had misty eyes and her fists were all balled-up, like if she weren’t in public she’d whop Evie upside the head.
“It’s this one, right?” Meme asked. “Who has the nine ninety nine to waste, I’d like to know? What’s in there, gold?”
Evie walked down the aisle toward Meme, half scared to say a word. She nodded yes at the sight of the pristine Lisa Frank deluxe art case. All its creatures were perfectly intact, smiling from their cosmos, just as they were before Evie’d set her hands on Maggie’s desk. Evie sobbed. One of those jags that grew heavier in her chest the more she tried to stifle it.
Meme riffled through her purse. She yanked out a wad of cash and took the Lisa Frank case from the clip on the shelf. She handed the kit and the money to Evie. Then Meme hightailed out of the aisle. Evie stood, wondering what she was to do. She thought maybe Meme headed to the Ladies Clothes. She’d come back and walk Evie to the check-out. But when Evie stepped from the aisle, she saw Meme storm past Customer Service and out the door.
Evie headed to the register alone.
“You’re awfully sad, for getting such a nice thing,” the cashier said to Evie.
Evie worked at her composure, but she was too upset for words. She just nodded.
“Can’t be that bad,” the cashier said. She handed Evie the case in a plastic K-mart bag and a handful of change.
The cashier had a cool punk rock look, like one of Lisa Frank’s critters come to life. Her hair was shaved on one side. Her long rainbow-colored Mohawk hung long down the other. She had purple, thick-rimmed glasses with little stars on the corners. Her eyeshadow was bright blue. Her cheeks were pink. Her lips were bright red. Her jean jacket with cut off sleeves and cool, sewn-on patches stuck out of her K-Mart smock.
Sure, Evie thought, as she left the store. That’s what Lisa Frank would do. Send a spy, who was cool-looking and really nice, to make her feel really, super-duper, double deluxe bad.
It was a quiet ride home. When Meme parked the car in the driveway at their trailer, she said “I asked you one thing, to stay away from Maggie.” Meme shook her head.
“I’m sorry,'' Evie said. “I know.”
“You want to end up like your ma?” Meme asked. “Hell, what your mother caused was an accident. What you did, Evie, was down-right cruel.”
Meme got out of the car and slammed the door. Evie never felt so alone. The word accident made Evie think of what Mrs. Morgan said about the cosmos. Everything happened in perfect order. Evie’d never say it to Meme, not any time soon, but if that were true, there were no accidents. Like the stars in the galaxy, that car wreck was already set perfectly in time.
That night, Evie sat through a stone-cold supper of Spaghetti-Os. Meme acted like Evie wasn’t even in the room. Meme looked through her glasses at her crossword puzzle on the table. She took the occasional bite of her Os.
After supper, Evie went straight to her room. She laid in her bed, staring up at the ceiling, until night fell outside her window. Through her sheers, she could see a few stars, sprinkled through the navy sky. She couldn't shake the thought of the vast cosmos.
Evie heard the creek of the door.
Meme peeked her head in the room.
“You up?” Meme asked.
Evie thought of pretending she was asleep, but she really wanted the smooth it over after the good talking to in the car.
“Yes,” Evie said.
Meme’s figure moved toward the bed.
“You had a rough one. We both did. It’s just a tough time. For Maggie too,” Meme said. Just the mention of Maggie’s name. Evie thought, Why’d you have to bring her up?
Then, Meme said, “None of us can change what happened. We just need to move on.”
“I know,” Evie said, thinking really, it was all the talk she expected from Meme. If anything, it was worth hearing for the touch of Meme’s warm hand on her forehead.
Meme brushed away Evie’s bangs.
“You can take two month’s allowance for the kit,” Evie said.
“Oh, I will,” Meme said.
“I was thinking, Meme. You mind if I don’t go to the prison next month,” Evie said. “I don’t like it there.”
“You really think it’s that bad?” Meme asked. “I was thinking we’d try the Lance peanut butter crackers in the vending machine next month. Well, maybe we should leave ‘em for aliens to find after the end of the world...Maybe, I’ll consider it, if you draw your ma a picture. You know, so we have something to talk about...besides lousy food. Now, get to sleep,” Meme said.
Then Meme went out.
Evie had one of those nights where her thoughts drifted to dreams. She dreamed her ma wrecked a speeding meteor into a planet of Lisa Frank leopards, the Pegasus, and wolves. They were strewn through the cosmos, all maimed in the aftermath. Evie went about picking them up in her arms and nursing them. However, the more she frantically picked up, the more she found. Her arms became so full she couldn’t hold onto them anymore.
Evie awoke sweaty and anxious. It took her a moment to realize it was all just a bad dream. She looked through the sheers at the stars in the endless navy sky outside her window until she fell back asleep.
That Tuesday morning, Evie picked out a nice tie-dyed T-shirt. She paired it with black leggings and a bright pink ruffled skirt. She got on the school bus with the new Lisa Frank folder in her lap. Evie counted only three spaghetti dinner signs still left out in yards.
The more Evie looked over the Lisa Frank folder, she thought it absurd. There was no such thing as a Pegasus with rainbow wings. Purple foxes and multi-colored leopards weren’t real. Then, there was what she’d learned in Physical Science. Space was black. Not pink, purple and green. There were no Lisa Frank rainbows passing by like meteors. Furthermore, Lisa Frank creatures would need spacesuits to survive. There was little oxygen in the universe, after all.
Evi decided she’d make the best of things. She’d walk into homeroom and hand Maggie the Lisa Frank kit. She’d apologize, if Maggie even spoke to her.
Yet, at school, before the bell rang, while most of the students were still in the hall, Evie walked into class with the Lisa Frank set pressed tightly against her chest.
Maybe it would be best to just sit it on Maggie’s desk before she got there, Evie thought.
However, Evie stopped short in the door of the classroom. There stood Maggie at Mrs. Morgan’s desk. Maggie was holding her book bag open in front of her. Mrs. Morgan was sliding what looked to be a Lisa Frank kit inside it.
Mrs. Morgan locked eyes with Evie for a moment. Maggie turned to Evie and just as quickly looked away. Mrs. Morgan hurriedly zipped Maggie’s bag shut.
Evie went to her seat, as though she hadn’t seen a thing. She put her replacement Lisa Frank set inside her desk. She wasn’t sure what to do. Still give it to Maggie? Take it home? Argue with Meme she wasn’t lying, that Mrs. Morgan already got Maggie another set?
Evie stashed her set inside her desk. She figured she’d shove it under books and worksheets. She’d pile her desk so full of papers she could barely close the top and hope, underneath it all, the Lisa Frank kit would disappear. She imagined a black hole would form in the bottom of her desk to suck all those colorful creatures into oblivion.
Evie went about her day of classwork, lunch, and recess. Then she remembered desk cleaning days. These were days Mrs. Morgan would drag the wastebasket through the class from student to student. She’d go through the mess in each kid’s desk, un-ball wrinkled paper. Mrs. Morgan would say, “These were to go home. You need to get organized. What grade are you in? Do you need to go back to kindergarten?” What would Mrs. Morgan do at the sight of the Lisa Frank kit? And the chances of forming a black hole were slim. Evie decided she had to take the kit home to Meme. Let Meme decide what to do with it. So at the end of the day, when the kids got their jackets from the cubby and waited for the bus call, Evie stashed the kit in her backpack.
Nothing seemed off about the dim early spring day, fit for a light jacket. The sky was gray, like it would rain. The bus ride home was ordinary. The brakes hissed and the driver pulled the big lever to open the doors as she dropped the kids off at their stops. Evie was well ready for hers.
Off the bus, it was a short walk down the dirt road of the trailer court, since Meme and Evie lived in the back. In sight of their trailer, Evie could see Meme hang the wash on the line. Evie felt all the worse. Meme must have used her laundromat money on the Lisa Frank kit.
The wind picked up something fierce. The sheets blew around Meme. The sky rumbled and sharply turned dark. Oh, how strange. The sky broke loose. Pellets of hail like little glass beads pelted little Evie in the face. They rolled like pearls over Eavie’s jacket.
Evie hurried along to Meme.
Meme dash onto the porch, waving Evie on, as the bits of hail bounced off the grass.
“Don’t see that every day,” Meme said. She guided Evie up the steps by her shoulders. As Evie turned on the porch, Meme unzipped Evie’s backpack, while it was still on her back. This was something Meme often did.
“What on earth!” Meme said.
Evie realized Meme saw the Lisa Frank set.
“Mrs. Morgan got Maggie another one. I didn’t know what to do, so I brought it back,” Evie said.
“Well, we’ll have to figure something out to make it right,” Meme said.
Evie slipped her arms out of the straps of her book bag. She glanced back at Meme. Meme had her eyes fixed on the Lisa Frank folder, which was halfway out the top of the bag.
Another round of hail clunked hard against the tin roof of the trailer.
“Lisa Frank,” Meme said, reading out the logo. “If she only knew what she let loose on the world.”
Evie knew Meme was talking about Evie’s scuffle with Maggie, but she thought Meme, just the same, could have been talking about the hail.
Evie turned back to the hail that spit like bullets. She stepped to the banister of the porch. Oh, what a splendid thing the hail was! It would have Evie raising her hand, nearly out of her seat during science the next day, to tell Mrs. Morgan what she saw.
“I saw it too,” Mrs. Morgan said.
Mrs. Morgan talked about the hail as a weather anomaly as Evie pondered the image of the earth on the physical science workbook cover.
"An anomaly is something out of the ordinary," Mrs. Morgan said.
Evie repeated the word to herself. Anomaly.
“There were exceptions to the order of the cosmos,” Mrs Morgan said.
To Evie, this was more interesting than Lisa Frank ever was.
Michael Lockett holds a B.A. in Communication from Clarion University and an MFA in Creative Writing from Carlow University, where he was mentored by American and Irish writers. He’s a former Peace Corps volunteer who served in Mauritania, West Africa. Originally from Central PA, he currently resides in the Northside of Pittsburgh with his partner, cats, and birds. He works as a Mental Health professional. His short stories are published in the Northern Appalachian Review, Prometheus Dreaming, Twisted Vine, and Hive Avenue.
