Justice [Chapter One]

Justice1

Chapter One2

“Gimme your milk money!” Mickey ordered, seizing a little girl by the collar of her polka dotted blouse and shook her hard. The child wailed, crying for Ms. Lee, the only teacher, that’d stepped outside for a moment to smoke a cigarette. “Shut up!” she snapped, and the girl violently shook her head.3

“Lemme alone!” she whimpered.4

Mickey snapped her fingers. “Kat!” she barked, throwing her glance towards the young girl seated on the kindergarten classroom’s carpet. She was small and quiet, with long blonde hair hanging around her face, clothed in a flowery yellow dress, who was contentedly twisting the head of a doll around and around on its plastic body.5

“Hmn?”6

Mickey relinquished her victim, who fell onto her knees between the two. She whined softly as she tossed two quarters at her tormentor’s feet and quickly scrambled away, fleeing to the playhouse. Her friends hastily shut the little door after her and pushed a chair against the knob, peeking out at Mickey from behind brightly colored curtains. Mickey shoved the coins into the pocket of her black hoodie, an outsized, tattered thing that fell to her knees with “Iron Maiden” printed against the material in large red lettering. Directly below the text was a graphic of a monstrous, abomination of a human being with coarse white hair sprouting from his scalp and red eyes, pale, shriveled flesh, and his jaw hanging open to reveal drawn out, jagged teeth and long threads of saliva dripping from his lips, as he played an electric guitar with yellowed fingertips. And, if her attire wasn’t enough to scare the other kindergarten students away, her behavior certainly guaranteed it.7

On the first day of school, Mickey’s Uncle Derek—who’d actually been much too high that morning to be driving—delivered her cousin Jeremy and she to the school, without bothering to so much as step out of the beat up vehicle to even meet with the teacher. Jeremy disappeared to the first grade classroom, while Mickey sat alone drawing with Crayola crayons pictures of what she wanted to be when she grew up.8

“And what do you want to be when you grow up, Mickey?” Mrs. Michaels asked, taking up the sheet of notebook paper to observe the masterpiece.9

“A serial killer.” Mickey answered sweetly, grinning at the teacher with such a honey smile that it sent a chill cold down her spine.10

“O-oh, well… that’s—that’s… a lovely thing, Mickey.” stammered Mrs. Michaels. She was later fired for illegal possession of Ecstasy, and imprisoned for trying to deal it out as candy to the second grade class. So, once it was determined that Ms. Lee had no criminal record, they ignored that she was a manic-depressive twenty-seven year old woman that’d just recently divorced her husband, and handed her Mrs. Michaels’s old position.11

At the lunch hour, Mickey was— once again— unaccompanied, seated by herself at one of the round tables that occupied what served as the cafeteria, where a bright, smiling sun was painted against the wall and coat hanger mobiles were suspended from the ceiling. Mrs. Michaels had left the room to take a phone call from the administrator about a child throwing a tantrum, and a short girl with crimson-colored hair called Erin began teasing another student, and shoved her into a bookcase jam-packed with ramshackle copies of Dr. Seuss works. 12

Mickey pushed her chair back as she stood, and clutched Erin by the arm, wrenching her away from her bullying of the cornered girl, and threw her into a table that immediately tipped over. Mrs. Michaels, of course, returned at the sound of the commotion, and Erin’s team of friends didn’t hesitate to tattle. Mickey was forced to have a long talk with the principal for her behavior, and, after promising not to do it again with her fingers secretly crossed behind her back, received a Dum-Dum and was dismissed back to lunch. She hid her treat in her pocket and slid into her chair. The student that’d been harassed earlier seated herself next to her, tearing her peanut butter-and-banana sandwich in half to share with her.13

“Hi.” She said. “I’m Kat.”14

“Hi Kat.” Mickey replied, and in return, handed the girl her sucker. “I’m Mickey.”15

“Sorry I can’t share my drink with you.” Kat apologized. “She took my milk money away.”16

“I’ll get it back for you.” She promised.17

They’d been best friends ever since, and every day afterwards, Mickey demanded Erin’s milk money.18

“Class,” Ms. Lee began. “It’s story time, now. Circle up!”19

The kindergarten class sat in an arc around a big white rocking chair, cushioned by an orange pillow with a starry design printed against the fabric. A little African American girl raised her hand in a volunteer to begin.20

“Maya, you may go first.” Ms. Lee said, and the student hopped up from her place in the circle and dropped herself into the chair. She rocked gently back and forth as she read her story out loud from a piece of white computer paper, where she’d written out her tale in a big blue marker that bled through the page.21

“Once upon a time,” Maya started. “There was a beautiful princess. But she was very sick. She fell in love with a handsome knight. Then she died. And the handsome knight fighted in a war and he died. The king and queen were so sad that they cried and cried and cried and died ‘cause they were so sad.22

“The prince was the only one that didn’t die. His whole family was gone though, so he was sad and jumped off of the tippy top of the castle and he died too.” The girl grinned. “The end.” She finished, and turned her paper around to show the class the picture she drew in accompaniment to the piece, of a stick doodle wearing a yellow crown plummeting to his death by a nasty-looking pit of spikes at the bottom of a tall, brick tower. On the back was a second drawing, of the stick-scribble prince skewered by the spears and splashed with red marker.23

Kat whooped loudly, while Mickey, another boy, and a pretty little Spanish girl (neither of which the two girls recognized) clapped. What remained of the class of kindergarten students gaped with wide-eyed awe at Maya. “Why did they all die?” a student asked.24

“Because they did.” Maya answered, and slid out of the rocking chair to return to her place flanked by the boy and the girl that had also applauded her brilliant work.25

After story time came to an end, Maya busily began writing the sequel to her tale, about how the royal family returned to life as ghosts and haunted the servants in the castle, when Erin snatched the girl’s work away from her and tore it in half, taunting about how her story was stupid and didn’t make sense. Mickey glanced at Kat as Erin took away Maya’s markers and raised an eyebrow. With a nod and only a nod, a plan was formed. The moment the bratty red-headed girl escaped to the bathroom, Kat gathered the markers and removed all of their caps, which she tossed out of the open window and into the shrubs that bordered the playground.26

Mickey followed Erin to the restroom, and glanced underneath the stalls for the girl’s bright pink Converse All-stars. She drove Ms. Lee’s favorite ballpoint pen into the too-small opening between the door and the stall’s wall, jamming it to keep Erin locked up inside. She retreated back to the classroom to find that their little serving of justice against the girl had joined the two groups together, as Kat comforted the sniveling Maya.27

Of course, as the school day wrapped up, Ms. Lee noticed it was far too peaceful, and that, for once, Mickey was actually behaving. She and her newly united group of friends proved to be quite a bunch. Maya created new tales while Mickey and Connor searched through a chest of play clothes for the costumes required to play the roles. Ana was always the first to read over Maya’s work, and contributed ideas, as she and Kat discussed books, while Kat illustrated the scenes that played out.28

Mickey had thrown a leather vest on over her hoodie and pushed a pirate hat onto her head, holding a telescope in one hand and a plastic sword in the other. She was facing off with Connor, who’d pulled a long gown on over his head and tucked a fake tiara in his hair. He was acting as a betraying and fake damsel in distress, who’d deceived the pirate. The pirate threatened the beautiful (yet boyish) maiden with death, when Ms. Lee called,29

“Has anyone seen Erin?”30

The girl could be heard sobbing loudly for help from the girl’s restroom. Ms. Lee rushed to her, only to find her pen wedged between the stall’s door and its wall. She braced herself with her foot against it and with both hands, freed the ballpoint from its prison in the wood, and returned it to its place down her bra. Erin shoved the door open and ran to her, crying and afraid from being stuck for so many hours.31

“Oh, Ms. Lee! Ms. Lee, Mickey locked me in there!” she cried.32

Ms. Lee didn’t doubt it, but had no proof to support the accusation. Therefore, Mickey avoided yet another long discussion with the principal. Kat, however, had a note sent home with her, informing her parents of her little achievement of ruining a pack of markers by not replacing their caps. The next day, another note was sent home with her, informing her parents of her achievement of ruining another pack of markers by gluing their caps on.33

Who the hell was Ms. Lee anyway, Goldilocks? It’s too hot, it’s too cold… Kat couldn’t win!