Chapter 10: Chapter 10 - Truth and Cupcakes

The next few weeks went by smoothly. John began to do different exercises every day. He was losing weight, which was something he had never been able to do before. John had always had a layer of flab coating his muscles. He wasn’t sure if it was all the working out or his Gift finally kicking in, but he liked it. He might even have some abs soon.

Even that cute girl in Mr. Franklin’s class seemed to notice. Madelyn Ellis, what a beautiful name. Her dad owned the local mill where many of the other kids’ parents worked. But unlike many rich kids he’d met, Madelyn didn’t flaunt her money. If anything, her clothes were nice but simple: jeans and a baseball t-shirt, and the glasses she wore were more functional than stylish.

She’d even begun to wave and smile at him in the hallways. John always felt flummoxed when a girl showed interest, so he looked back into his locker as fast as he could. Donovan had rolled his eyes when John had told him about it later during American History.

“Dude, you really need to learn how to talk to girls,” Donovan whispered to him. Sam was teaching about the Civil War, and John, unlike Donovan, who was doodling in his notes, was actually trying to pay attention. “She likes you, man. Take a look.”

John glanced across the room at Madelyn. It was difficult because she was in the back near the door while he was in the far front next to a window, but he did his part. True to Donovan’s word, she was peering at him with those beautiful gray eyes. When his eyes met hers, she smiled. His heart fluttered, and he felt it try to fly out the window.

“Mr. Blackstone, I’m pretty sure the information I’m giving is not on Ms. Ellis’ face. Please pay attention, both of you. And no more whispering to your friend, Mr. Durham,” Sam said, hands clasped together behind his back.

“Yes, Mr. Franklin,” Madelyn and John said in unison.

“Yes, Uncle S—” Donovan began, but finished with, “Yes, Mr. Franklin.”

“Good,” Sam said as he returned to his lecture, “Now, as I was saying, John C. Calhoun’s defense of slavery in the South led directly to the Civil War—”

Madelyn raised her hand.

“Yes, Ms. Ellis?” Mr. Franklin asked. “Um, if the United States did all these bad things, like slavery and stuff, why do people say we’re exceptional?”

John waited, wondering how Mr. Franklin would answer. That did seem like a good question. John wouldn’t have had a clue how to answer that.

Mr. Franklin actually seemed pleased. “That’s an excellent question. Some people would say we’re just awesome. Some would say that we aren’t exceptional. We’re just like all the other countries in the world, no better, no worse. I would answer with a question: which would you rather be called, a hypocrite or a monster?”

Madelyn thought for a moment. “A hypocrite, I guess?”

Mr. Franklin smiled. “Great! I mean, not great that you’re a hypocrite. It’s a good answer. I think we would all rather be called a hypocrite as opposed to a monster. What makes someone a hypocrite?”

Jose Serrano, a boy whose family had recently arrived from Puerto Rico, raised his hand. “A hypocrite is someone who says one thing is right, but does the opposite.”

“Correct. Have we all been hypocrites?”

Everyone in the class nodded.

“Which is better? To have ideals and yet fail to follow them perfectly and be called a hypocrite, or to have no ideals and commit horrible acts with no shame and be called a monster?” Sam paused for effect.

“What makes America exceptional is not her perfect keeping of the ideals, but for founding a country with those ideals in the first place. Ideals like freedom of speech, religion, things like that. We’ve even worked hard at following them. Does that make any sense?”

Madelyn, John, Donovan, and the rest of the class nodded.

Mr. Franklin continued, “In order to be better people and a better country, we need to see ourselves as we truly are, the bad and the good, the pimples and the dimples...” Sam went back to his lecture.

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

“Seriously, dude, think about it,” Donovan whispered. “She’s probably into you enough to let you talk to her.”

John didn’t know what to say to that. Madelyn had the reputation for being a bit spacey, and so he didn’t always know quite how she was going to respond. One time, she was eating one of those prepackaged cream-filled cupcakes while walking to class. She was so focused on it that she walked right into a wall. Her classmates had teased her about that for several days. She was probably embarrassed, but she never let on that she was.

After class, John waited at the door. Donovan patted him on the arm, whispered “good luck,” and left to hurry on to his next class. Then, the slight smell of strawberries snagged his nose. He knew that smell. Madelyn was walking past.

“Hey, Madelyn,” John finally dug up the courage to say.

“Hey, what?” Madelyn answered, brushing one of her bangs behind her ear. John hated when girls did that. It always stole the words from his mouth. “Um, how are you?”

“I’m doing okay. I got an ‘A’ on my history test. What did you get?”

John hurriedly tried to think of a suave answer, but all he managed to grunt was, “I got a ‘B.’”

“That’s great. Mr. Franklin’s new this year. The last teacher we had was really easy. People I talked to said they didn’t even have to study. They completed lessons on their tablets while he sat at his desk. It’s okay, I guess. I enjoy studying. It’s like eating for the brain.”

“Oh yeah,” John said, trying to lean on a wall casually. “Me too, except for cupcakes. You have to lay off those,” John said. He grimaced, and an awkward silence filled the hallway. A couple pairs of shoes squeaked on the freshly waxed floor behind them. John wanted to die. Why was talking to girls so hard?

Finally, Madelyn said, “Well, I gotta get to my locker. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Sure, uh, that sounds fine.”

As Madelyn walked toward her locker, John’s right hand hit him in the forehead as if it had a mind of its own. “You idiot!” He scolded himself. He slunk to his locker and got his books for his next few classes.

During the next few hours, he dreaded meeting up with Donovan again. He knew that Donovan would make fun of him for messing up. Unfortunately, the bell rang, mercilessly signaling lunch time. The food court at Battle Axe Central High School was large, and all the walls were slathered in a creamy shade of white. Like the rest of the building, it had only existed for a year, and it showed. Everything was clean and brand new. Donovan waved him over to their usual table.

“So, how did it go?” Donovan asked, placing potato chips on his peanut butter and jelly sandwich. John plopped down across from him. “I told her to stop eating cupcakes.”

Donovan, who had been aggressively chewing his sandwich, almost choked with laughter. “You what?”

“I can’t help it. I froze.”

“Dude, I’m trying not to take offense at the fact you have no problem punching me in the face but can’t say something even sort of intelligent to a girl. Girls don’t usually like it when you remind them of times when they did something stupid.”

“It’s just when I talk to girls, I can’t think of anything to say.”

“I can see that. I’ll take you by Emilee’s window later today so you can see a master at work.”

“You really seem to like her,” John said, glad for the change of subject. He knew he messed up. He didn’t need his best friend reminding him.

“Duh. She’s friendly and beautiful and has curves in all the right places. What’s not to like?”

“Now,” John said, using his best impression of an upper-class British accent, “Is that a chivalrous way to talk about a lady? You know, there’s something unsettling about her, but I can’t put my finger on it.”

Donovan smiled and arched an eyebrow. “Dude, you sound like my grandfather! Anyway, you’re just jealous, John. There’s a girl for you out there somewhere, someone who doesn’t like cupcakes,” Donovan punched his friend in the shoulder. “By the way, do you want a cupcake? I mean, a real one?” He held up two well-made chocolate cupcakes with chocolate frosting.

“Sure, I guess?” John said as he took one. It smelled amazing, so he took a bite. “Hey, this is pretty good! Where are you getting these things, anyway? It just seems kinda random.”

“Emilee bakes them for me. Pretty cool, right? A girl who bakes like this has to be awesome.”

John frowned and set down the half-eaten cupcake. “Oh, okay. Anyway, I just hope I figure out how to talk to a girl before I die of old age.”

“Yeah, or when you die as a world-famous monster Hunter. Oh, speaking of which, are you training this Saturday?”

“No, my dad isn’t on call at the hospital this weekend, so he wants to do some male-bonding.” John bit into an apple, perhaps a little too hard. “We’re going camping, if that’s what you want to call it. Basically, he’s going to get drunk on Friday night, we’ll fish a little on Saturday, and then he’ll drink himself through Sunday.”

“At least you don’t have your sister trying to tag along with everything you do. She’s started training this weekend. Can you believe my parents said that she could be a Chronicler?” Donovan said angrily.

“I don’t know what that means,” John said.

“It means she wants to write down artsy reports of what we do when we Hunt. It means that even though she doesn’t have the Gift, she wants to pretend to be a Hunter. She even gets to critique my Hunting patrols,” Donovan said.

“Well, maybe she just wants to help,” John offered. He never liked it when Donovan talked this way about Corinne. She had never been anything but nice to John, but Donovan seemed to resent everything she did. “What’s your problem with her?”

“She’s never even fought vampires or anything. She never will. She’s got no powers. How would she know how to fight them? She’s always showing off how much smarter she is than everybody.”

“Maybe she’ll be good at it,” John said. “Give her a chance.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Donovan mumbled. The bell rang for class, and they walked to their next class in silence.