The Diamonds (12 page)

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

—
The Eighth Amendment
to the United States Constitution

On Monday, for the first time ever, I didn't eat lunch with the Diamonds. I would see them all later at mock trial, and I needed some time alone. To think.

At the beginning of school, Mrs. Donaldson had informed members of the AP class that if we ever wanted a quiet place to do some sketching during our off periods, we should feel free to use the art room and the materials. (The only perk of being in AP Visual Art, I suppose.) Before I knew it, I found myself standing outside the door to the art room.

I was sketching within minutes. Because Anderson was on my mind, and also because our project was due in the near future, I started recreating his face from memory; once I started, I couldn't stop. I stared back at a crude version of the boy I was currently obsessed with. It didn't really look like him at all. It had eyes, a
nose, and a mouth, but they could have belonged to anyone. The only thing that remotely resembled Anderson St. James was his name written across the top of the page in fancy script.

•
EXHIBIT H
•

Then I began doodling funny things across the border; on his face, I drew thick glasses and a top hat. I was chuckling out loud when I heard footsteps behind me. I turned around, expecting to see my crazy art teacher, but there he was: Anderson. In the flesh.

“Hey.”

I threw my arm over the picture but it was too late. I could tell by his expression that he'd seen
ANDERSON & MARNI 4 EVA
written across the page.

“Listen,” I said, arching my back to show off my lady lumps (Black Eyed Peas, 2005), “about Saturday—”

Anderson put his fingers to his lips, motioning for me to be quiet. The room was empty for now, but he was right—anyone could walk right in.

Anderson sat down next to me. “What are you doing tomorrow?”

“Night?”

“Day.”

“I'll be at school.…”

“Wrong!” he said, X-ing his arms and making the noise of a game show buzzer. “Try again.”

“In class?”

“Nope. One more try.”

I had no idea what he wanted me to say. “I'll be … with you?”

“Ding ding ding!” Anderson threw his arms around me.

There has never been anyone in the history of the world more beautiful than you
, I thought.

“Come with me? I have to go into the city to buy a new guitar,” he said.

I had never skipped school. Not once.

“You want me to go with you?”

“Never cut class before?”

I gave a faint smile. “Something like that.”

“You're not
actually
cutting class,” Anderson said playfully. “You're ditching a day of school, which is totally different.”

“Oh? Is that how it works?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Just have your parents write you a sick note.”

I could hear my mother's nasal voice in my head: “There's no way on God's green earth I'm letting you run off into Manhattan with a boy, Marni,” she would say, taking a drag of her cigarette. (My actual mother didn't smoke, but Daydream Mom smoked like a chimney.) “Think of all the homeless people.
And the terrorists
. Do you want to get blown up for one measly day of pleasure?”

“Marni?”

“If you pick me up,” I said, formulating a plan, “will you call the school and pretend to be my dad? That way the attendance office won't call my house looking for me, and my mom won't get suspicious.”

“Totally,” Anderson said. There wasn't the slightest hint of anxiety or hesitation in his voice. “That'd be awesome.”

“Okay,” I said. What the hell? “Let's do it.”

Anderson got up from the stool and leaned his arms on the table. “Then we can talk about… every-thing.”

“Yeah,” I said. “That would be cool.”

The bell rang, and the hallway was suddenly bursting with energy.

“See you tomorrow, Marni.”

“Where have you been?” Clarissa asked me after school. I was waiting by her locker, as usual, my bag slung over one shoulder.

“What do you mean?”

“Lunch, Marni. You know what? I got my nails done yesterday. Do you mind?” She glanced toward her locker and recited her combination.

“I was working on my art project,” I said, opening the locker for her. Inside, everything was stacked neatly, with a different-colored binder for every subject. A picture of the Diamonds was taped to the back of the door. “Sorry.”

“Well, you missed a
whole
lotta shit.”

“Like what?”

“I don't know if I should tell you.”

“Oh, come
on,”
I said. “Tell me.”

“Let's just say that Nicole Reynolds threw apple juice in Stephanie Grier's face and called her a back-stabbing, heartless wench.”

“No way!” Nicole and Stephanie were best friends, but they were on the periphery of the Bennington social sphere. “I wonder what happened.”

“Oh,” Clarissa said, nudging her locker closed with her elbow. “I'm sure we'll find out.”

Once we reached the cafeteria, Clarissa handed me one of her binders and withdrew a key from her pocket. She used it to open the mock trial application box, removing a dozen or so folded scraps of paper and perusing them briefly until she stopped on one.

“Look
at
this,”
she said.

I grabbed the paper; it was filled out in black pen, the ink still wet.

•
EXHIBIT I
•
(text replaced for legal purposes)

“Is Nicole's cell phone number on there?” Clarissa asked. I nodded, and she motioned to my bag with her free hand. “Call her, will you?”

The last time I'd spoken to Nicole Reynolds was freshman year, honors English, when she came back from the bathroom with a pee trail running down her pants.

“I don't want to call her,” I said.
“You
call her.”

Clarissa gave me a you're-being-annoying look and said, “Fine. I'll do it myself.”

T
HE
B
ENNINGTON
P
RESS

Diamonds Become a Bennington Staple

By: TOMMY PAYNE

October 20
—In what has become the shocker of the school year so far, the Diamond Court (formerly known as the mock trial team) has maintained its grasp on student life at Bennington. If anything, over the weeks, the court has grown stronger, dropping many of the original mock trial members and enhancing the reputations of the judges (aka the Diamonds—you all know who they are) each passing day.

“It's hard to be so fair and look so good while doing it,” says one anonymous freshman. “You don't want to cross them or you'll be, like, socially eliminated.”

What started out as an interesting experiment has quickly morphed into the most intense extracurricular activity at Bennington. “We hold trials nearly every day after school,” says Lili Chan-Mohego (see “Chan-Mohego Officially Takes Over Presidency,” Oct. 10), “and the chorus room is always filled with onlookers.” Since the trials have been open to the Bennington public, there has been an outstanding drop in attendance at many other activities. “We used to have around twenty-five members,” says Sharon Wu, president of the Key Club, “but now we're lucky if two or three show up to a meeting.”

Even this reporter has seen a drop in staff at the
Bennington Press
over the past few weeks. “People are interested, I think, to see what happens,” says Clarissa von Dyke, judge. “It's like watching a car wreck; you don't want to see the
damage, but it's impossible to look away.”

Damage is certainly the right word. The students on the receiving end of the Diamonds’ negative rulings are finding themselves more or less ostracized from the Bennington community.

“It's not anything official, really,” says one anonymous senior on the football team. “There's no teacher being like, ‘Don't like this person,’ or ‘This person's a loser, so don't talk to them,’ but, like, the Diamonds know what they're doing. If you did something wrong, you need to be punished. It's just like in the real world.”

So, readers, beware: Be nice to your friends. You never know who's gonna take you to court these days.

•
EXHIBIT J
•

“What about this one?”

“Nah,” Anderson said, shaking his head.

I scanned the long, cluttered wall of Sam Ash on Forty-eighth Street and pointed to another guitar a few feet away. It was light-colored and had a pearl rosette around the center. “That one looks nice.”

It was just before noon, and the store was practically empty. I should have been in calculus, but instead, Anderson had picked me up, parked his Jeep at the train station, and taken the LIRR with me into the city. Other than during the few seconds it took to hand the conductor our tickets, he'd held my hand the entire time.

“You can't choose a guitar just because it looks
nice,” he said, lifting the one I had pointed to and strumming a chord. He made a face. “It has to feel just right in your hands. Like an extension of your body.”

“That's creepy.”

He laughed. “Yeah, you're right. But it's true.”

I had never seen so many guitars in one place. Acoustic ones hanging from the walls. Electric ones propped up in the corners. Special ones on display in the middle of the room.

After an hour or so, Anderson had narrowed his search down to two: a dark mahogany one from Martin & Co. and a sea green Takamine. Dressed in a tight pair of corduroys and a black sweater, he sat on a stool, playing them both. “These are like the designer jeans of guitars,” he told me.

I tried to imagine what Jed would do if he ever stumbled into a music store, and laughed. I picked up the mahogany guitar, letting the strap fall around my neck, and dragged my thumb across the strings.

“How do I sound?”

“Great,” Anderson said, even though he frowned.

I sighed. “I wish I could play.”

Anderson studied me as if I were the Eliza Doolittle to his Henry Higgins
(My Fair Lady
, 1956). “Here,” he said, standing up and motioning to the stool. “Sit.” Anderson brought his arms around my shoulders. “Your hands go like this. And this. Then take your arm and bring your two fingers together—good—and then strum.”

This time, when I played, it made me smile.

“Do it again,” he said, only I couldn't make one continuous sound.

“Sorry.”

“It's okay. You just have to find your rhythm.” He leaned forward. “Put your hands on top of mine.”

I moved slowly, lining up our fingers so that they matched perfectly. His hands were warm, as if he had just taken them out of the oven, and so was his breath. I felt his cheek press against mine; the scratchiness of his stubble grazed my ear.

“See how this feels.”

Anderson started playing, and my arm moved back and forth with his. After a few moments, he began changing chords; my fingers followed, shifting across the strings. It felt as if I were actually playing.