[8:]
“Excuse me, Mr. Lunch Lady, there’s a person in my soup.”
It was Friday now, and Yuki was standing once again in front of the large burly woman who served them food in the cafeteria. After a week of nothing but beets and homemade mud pies, Yuki was happy even to eat school food, but she was a bit disappointed when Tai’s entire body ended up in her soup bowl.
Mrs. Harry Mole gave Yuki a look that said “I don’t give a flying fucking rat’s ass” and shooed her away. Yuki rolled her eyes and slumped back towards her seat. Her entire body was sore. Having returned to her old ways, Chelsea took to ordering everyone around with a renewed vigor, and made them all rebuild the house in four days. Yuki had blisters on her blisters.
She threw her Tai-filled bowl of runny orange tomato soup in the garbage can and slinked back to her table, which was busy with noise. After getting drunk on whiskey during a trist with a group of prostitutes the night before, Principal Reno decided it would be “fun” to run all the students’ schedules backwards, meaning they all had their last class first and homeroom last. Yuki’s roommates were busy discussing the many misadventures that they were forced to endure due to their reversed schedules.
“And then, she’s all like ‘Miss Kuro, put that explosive down!’ But by then it was too late. Ha! Like I’d listen to some lowly peasant science teacher. So yeah, I fired the bitch,” Rika rambled, concluding her story about how she fired her third Biology teacher in one month while successfully ridding the school of several members of the debate team.
“Oh Rika, you’re so free-spirited,” Stacie giggled dumbly. She was spooning soup into Alfredo’s still dead face. “Poor Alfredo. He’s sick. He’s been so quiet lately…”
Karen rolled her eyes. Her face had finally returned to normal after her reaction to the make-up.
“Who’s subbing for Mai Dam Weasel?” Shiro asked.
“No one,” Chelsea answered, “She broke out of the “happy place” again last night. I saw it on the news.”
“Wait. The news?” Yuki snapped, “Where the hell did you find a TV?”
“What does or does not go in or out of my skirt is of no concern to you,” Chelsea replied curtly.
“Man, I am not looking forward to presenting those papers to Mai Dam Weasel next period,” Karen said to no one in particular. The entire table shuddered in agreement.
“Poor Yusuke still can’t move his fingers,” Stacie said. She motioned over to Tsurugi, whose right hand was in a bucket of ice. Having not slept in a week, he looked like a corpse.
“That dumb idiot actually wrote a 200-page book on the meaning of life,” Yuki snickered, stealing Tsurugi’s soup from under his nose.
“Yuki, it’s not nice to call people idiots,” Stacie chided, “To their faces.”
“Oh, he can’t understand us by now anyway,” Yuki answered in a huff, “Can you stinky?”
Tsurugi drooled a little on himself in response. He hadn’t spoken at all, had been wearing the same clothes all week, and had barely moved except to write.
“How does he go to the bathroom?” Karen wondered out loud.
“The same way I do,” Chelsea said simply, patting Karen on the arm. “Speaking of which, it’s that time again. Oh, no need to get up. I put on fresh underwear today. It’ll take a little while for it to sink all the way through; You still have a few more minutes of fresh air.”
“Guys! Benito and I are going to get married!” Rika announced suddenly.
“Rika, you can’t marry your own adopted children!” Yuki growled through her soup. “Wait a minute. You can’t marry a fucking plant either!”
“Actually, my Aunt Maggie married a tree once,” Shiro piped in. He was silence by the fork Yuki threw at his face.
“Your aunt is a COW. Literally,” she sneered.
Rika began making out with Benito the plant.
“Man, Yukei and Puu have been gone all week,” Karen said absent-mindedly, “I’m worried about my Puu. I hope they’re alright…”
“Me too,” Yuki sighed, “She still has my favorite sunglasses.”
“Maybe they gotten eaten,” Stacie suggested, pouring more soup into Alfredo’s mouth with a funnel, “That’s what I always figure every time Alfredo goes missing.”
“Oh my gosh!” Chelsea interrupted loudly, “Speaking of wildebeests, the strangest thing happened the other day to my va--”
RIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNGG.
The bell rang.
**********
The students slowly filed into Mai Dam Weasel’s classroom and took their seats, each dreading handing in their papers. Mai Dam Weasel was not her usual insanely happy self. Her usually neat pink hair was yellowed and tangled, and there were bags beneath her eyes. She was shaking far more than usual and was busy nursing a tall bottle of vodka.
“Alright,” she grumbled, “Give ‘em to me. Lemme see them stupid papers or whatever.”
Stacie slowly raised her hand.
“Um, Miss Weasel, your pupils are far too dilated to really coherently read anything,” she pointed out, “Perhaps we should present our papers to the class?”
Mai Dam Weasel let out a wretched drunken cough and nodded. “Who wants to go first?”
Karen raised her hand and began bouncing up and down excitedly.
“Oh! Oh! Pick me! Pick me! Pick meeeeeeeeeeee!!!!” she begged.
“Alright. Red, go ahead,” Mai Dam Weasel wheezed.
“Yay!” Karen squeal, jumping up from her seat.
“Not you,” Mai Dam Weasel grumbled, “The one with breasts.”
Karen sank back down into her seat disappointedly. Rika rose triumphantly to the front of the classroom. She cleared her throat and began reading from her palm.
“Horse.
Accordion.
Milk.
Shoe.
“
With that, Rika sat down and returned to making out with Benito the plant. There was an awkward pause.
“Meh. It rhymed,” Mai dam Weasel croaked, taking another swig from her bottle, “A- for the big-breasted broad.”
“I’ll go next,” Yuki said quietly. She rose from her seat and went to the front of the room. She seemed, for the first time in her life, nervous. Then she slowly pulled a crumpled-up sheet of notebook paper from her pocket and unfolded it.
“Ok. Um…
There’s a boy in my class.
He always makes me smile.
And even when I kick his ass,
I’m happy all the while.
He’s really nice, I guess,
He makes my mind race.
But what I like best,
Is when I kick him in the face.
He buys me flowers,
He write me notes,
But I’d rather spend the hours,
With my hands around his throat.
He’s got a handsome face,
That looks best when covered in mud.
He’s got a sort of grace,
When I knee him in the gut.
He’s my best friend, I think
He’s a pretty cool guy,
But only when I get to sink,
A pencil in his eye.”
Yuki blushed and hurried back to her seat. Stacie clapped. Chelsea was snoring. Tsurugi was blissfully unaware that Yuki had recited a poem about him, and that a kick in the face was the closest thing to holding hands he’d ever get from her.
“Yuki, that was very nice…I think,” Karen said.
“Yeah, well. Don’t get use to it or anything,” Yuki huffed in reply. She crossed her arms defiantly and refused to look anyone in the face.
“Big risk you took there, pretending to have a heart and all,” Mai Dam Weasel critiqued, lighting up a cigarette, “I give it a C+. Next victim?”
Chelsea hastily stood up and leapt to the podium. She cleared her throat loudly to capture everyone’s attention.
“I’d like to present this glorious work of creative genius in the form of a song.”
She pulled a ukulele from her blouse and began to strum a little jingle.
“This ballad is dedicated to my beloved opponent in all things, who shall remain nameless for the sake of protecting the stupid.
Ahem…
“Fatty legs, oh fatty legs
How doth thou walk?
Fatty legs, oh fatty legs,
What is thy name?
Fatty legs, DEAR fatty legs,
Have thee the taste of the beards?
Fatty legs, sweet fatty legs,
Touch not my tra la la.”
Chelsea’s song ended and she took a deep bow and returned to her seat, waving to the rest of the class.
“Thank you! Thank you all! You are too kind.”
“Chelsea, you’re stupid,” Rika said blatantly as she brushed Benito’s single leaf with a comb, “One, I walk with my feet, oh deforméd one. B, my name is Rika Garbanzo Fortula Venus Maria Kuro. Fourthly, I do in fact have the taste of the beards, after making out with your mom last night--”
“GASP!” Chelsea shrieked in shock, “You did not just go there!”
“Oh yeah, I did,” Rika replied, standing up to defy Chelsea, “What? You gonna do something about it, Bessie?! Bring it!”
“Oh, it’s BRUNG, bitch!”
With that, a slap-fest of epic proportions began.
“Ladies! Please,” Mai Dam Weasel croaked through her hangover, “If you’re going to have a cat fight, please do so in the pool downstairs, so that at least you are wet and dripping for all to see. There is no need to rip one another’s clothing off unless you’re going to make a good show of it. Here, I’ll write you a pass.”
And thus Rika and Chelsea were sent away to the gymnasium, to duke it out and please the basketball team. There screaming was heard throughout the school.
Tsurugi fell over and slammed his head into the desk, landing in a large puddle of his own drool.; He groaned a little as his nose began bleeding.
“Ah, Mr. Yusuke, thank you for volunteering,” Mai Dam Weasel breathed hoarsely. She withdrew a very large bottle of pills from her unbuttoned blouse and downed half of them.
Tsurugi only twitched little, but didn’t get up. Stacie raised her hand.
“Um…Ms. Weasel, since Yusuke is kinda sorta dead at the moment, would it be ok if I read his paper for him?” she asked. Mai Dam Weasel coughed, which Stacie took to mean “yes.”
She took to the podium and read from Tsurugi’s very big stack of papers.
“Ok, so here goes:
I like chickens.
I like rabbits.
I like soup.
I like pudding.
I like rain.
I like mud.
I like boobs.
I like feet.
Yeah…that’s pretty much it. There is a drawing of a lady wearing only high heals at the bottom though, if you want me to copy it on the board,” Stacie finished.
“No, I think we’re fine,” Mai dam Weasel said, “I’ll be taking that paper though…for safe keeping. Yusuke, when you decide to stop being unconscious, you got a B.”
Yuki leapt up from her seat.
“Wait! You mean that’s it?“ she yelled at Tsurugi, “That was your 200-page paper on the meaning of life?! You’re kidding me! And he got a fucking B+ for that crap! I wrote mine last period, and at least it had more than ten freaking syllables! That took you all freaking week?!”
“Yuki, you have to understand, it must take a terrible strain on Yusuke to actually use all of his brain at once,” Stacie said in another vain attempt to calm Yuki down. Karen raised her hadn before anything else could be said.
“Miss Weasel, ma’am, I think Yusuke copied me,” she said, “His paper is almost exactly the same as mine.”
“You’re all crazy!” Yuki screamed, “That wasn’t even a poem! That was…shit! SHIT! I’ve wiped my ass with higher quality paper than that!”
“She has,” Shiro added, “I’ve watched.”
The room fell silent as all eyes turned to Shiro.
“Now, before you rip this pathetic little worm to pieces,” Mai Dam Weasel barked, “You best sit down and cool off. No one references their anus in my classroom but me, got it? Now, you’re all going to--”
She was cut off as something very large, very heavy, and very shiny fell through the ceiling. It landed on top of Mai Dam Weasel, crushing her instantly. It was a UFO.
There was a loud mechanical humming heard throughout the room as the hatch of the ship slowly opened up. The class gasped simultaneously as Yukei and Puu emerged from the craft. They were both wearing sombreros, sunglasses, and Mardi Gras beads. Puu squealed with delight and automatically ran up to Karen,. Jumping into her arms and burring his face in her chest.
Yukei turned and waved fondly at the spaceship as it took off through the hole in the ceiling.
“Goodbye, Arreregaithu! Have fun! And watch out for those power lines this time!” she called.
Once the UFO had disappeared into the sky, the class regarded Yukei with a jealous glare.
“Where have you been?” Yuki asked her in a huff.
“Cancun,” her twin replied, “They have awesome smoothies there, you know.”
“I hate you,” Yuki growled.
“Well then, it‘s great to have you back,” Stacie said cheerily, jumping up and clapping her hands together, “And, seeing as our teacher has been turned to mashed potatoes, I think it’s safe to say that we’re free to go. Who wants ice cream?”
“Wait!” Karen protested, “I haven’t presented my paper yet!”
“Me neither,” Shiro said. Yuki snatched his already torn paper from his hand.
“Shiro, this is just a crudely drawn stick figure orgy with your name on it…which is spelled wrong, by the way,” she said accusingly before throwing the paper back at him.
“Dammit! I always forget the second H,” Shiro mumbled shamefully. Just then, the door burst open. A young sophomore boy poked his head through the door.
“Hey everybody,” he announced breathlessly, “Rika and Chelsea are mud-wrestling naked in the courtyard! Everyone’s gathering together to watch. Just thought I’d spread the word.”
Upon hearing the words “mud-wrestling” and “naked” Tsurugi’s head shot up from his desk. He sprang fully to life and bolted out the door after the boy to go watch Rika and Chelsea duke it out in the nude.
“Well, at least one of his heads still works,” Yuki sneered.
“Well, ice cream sounds good to me,” Yukei added cheerfully, “Let’s go!”
“Puuuu!” Puu agreed.
And thus did the housemates leave school early to join together in the eating of ice cream.
Epilogue-->