daisy2

Daisy tosses and turns on her dormitory cot, rubbing the bruises on her
buttocks and thighs through her cotton nightgown. All around her she hears
the snores and sighs of sleeping girls, but she's too keyed up to nod off.
It isn't her throbbing bottom that has her wide awake, either. It's fury,
pure and simple--gallons of red-hot rage--flowing through her veins like
molten lava.

Daisy earned the spanking she got in math class yesterday, she'll admit
that. She was copying answers from brainy Shanna Collins, and she knew
better than to get caught like a third grader who was new to cheating. But
Mrs. Rice could have had a shred of decency and waited till the other girls
left for study hall to bare her target for the ruler. And Shanna, the
redheaded snot, had looked way too thrilled as she tore up Daisy's
half-finished test and threw it in the wastebasket. If Daisy sees to
nothing else while she rots in reform school, the math teacher and her
precious little pet will pay. Nobody jacks with Daisy Lane and gets away
with it.

But what can she do? She's kicked the crap out of Shanna twice already, and
if she gets in any more fights, it'll mean another trip to see the judge and
maybe an extra month in the lockup. Not worth it, there must be a better
way. God, Daisy hates problems she can't solve with her fists.

Then, suddenly, she hatches a plan. She goes over every detail in her mind,
carefully and calmly. If she pulls the scheme off right, nobody will be
able to pin anything on her.

Daisy listens. The room is quiet except for the soft breathing of a dozen
slumbering girls. She slips out of bed, taking care not to gasp as her bare
feet touch the cold linoleum floor. She sneaks across the room and peeks
out into the hallway.

The TV in the staff lounge is glowing dimly. Good, Darlene is on night
duty. She'll be glued to the tube till sunup, sobbing and sniffling through
one sappy old movie after another. Daisy hurries down the hall to the
bathroom, moving as silently as a shadow. Stealth and speed are two skills
a girl picks up quickly when she all but raises herself in the slums down by
the train depot.

In the bathroom, Daisy tries the door to the cleaning closet. Locked.
Figures. But wait--yes. She snags a wire hook off the top of the shower
curtain, straightens it, and pokes the makeshift pick into the hole on the
doorknob. Click! Easy enough.

The closet smells like cheap soap and damp rags. Daisy feels around in the
darkness till she finds a small plastic bucket with a few toilet brushes in
it. She empties the bucket, setting each brush gently on the floor. Then
she picks up the bucket and eases the closet door shut. The hinges squeak a
little, and Daisy freezes, holding her breath. But the silence is unbroken
around her.

She tiptoes to the sink and turns on the water. She puts the bucket in the
sink to fill, then darts over and flushes a toilet. Nobody will think twice
about the swishing sound. By the time the toilet gets done running, the
pail is half full of tepid water. Daisy grabs a paper towel from the roll
above the sink and dries off the outside of the pail so it won't drip as she
carries it back to her dorm room.

Now for the tricky part. Daisy creeps over to the bed by the window where
Shanna is snoozing. She sets the bucket of water on the floor next to the
cot. Shanna is lying on her stomach with her right arm flung out to one
side. In one quick movement, Daisy nudges the hand of the sleeping girl off
the mattress. She guides it into the pail of water, taking care not to let
it splash.

Shanna stirs, then mumbles something Daisy can't quite make out. Daisy
feels her heart do a somersault in her chest. But the redhead sinks back
into sleep right away. Daisy steals over to her own cot. Still moving
silently, she digs a flashlight and a magazine out of her locker. She has
to stay awake so she can get rid of the pail before morning.

She can't help snickering to herself. Mom had shipped her off to church
camp last summer, saying she was bound to learn a thing or two from the
trip. Daisy had hated the camp, but the awful week she had spent there was
paying off now. By morning, Shanna and her bedding would be soaked in pee.

"How does it work?" Daisy had asked when she woke up and saw one of the camp
counselors slipping into the cabin with a basin in the dead of night. "Why
does warm water make someone wet herself?"

"Who knows?" the counselor had giggled. "It's the oldest prank in the book.
By morning, Cindy will be drenched in her own juices."

Sure enough, Daisy had cracked an eye open at dawn and seen Cindy slipping
out of the cabin, mad as hell, clutching a bundle of sheets.

Daisy lounges on her reform school cot, flipping back and forth through her
magazine. After a while she knows every page by heart. She fights hard
against the waves of drowsiness that wash over her. She lets her eyes drift
closed, just for a few seconds.

She jerks awake. Thin bars of light are piercing through the blinds at the
window by Shanna's bed. Holy crap! The morning alarm will sound off any
minute! Daisy bounces up from her cot.

"Jesus Christ!" she gulps as her feet hit the cold linoleum. She claps a
hand over her mouth. She hears nothing but the thumping of her own heart.

Grabbing the spare pillowcase off the shelf above her bed, Daisy scuttles
over to the sleeping Shanna. She lifts the girl's wrinkled hand gingerly
out of the pail of water. She dries the hand quickly with the pillowcase
and lets it drop onto the mattress. Shanna never moves.

Daisy picks up the pail, being careful not to slosh any water onto the
floor. She glides over to the open door of the dorm room and peers into the
hallway.

Why hadn't she stayed awake? Darlene, the night counselor, is pacing back
and forth in the staff lounge with her eyes on the clock. Daisy can't risk
a dash to the bathroom to put the pail away, not with Darlene on the prowl.
She swears under her breath. She shifts her feet impatiently. Damn it all,
she shouldn't have dozed off!

Finally, after it feels like a week has dragged by, the heavy metal door at
the entrance of the dormitory opens. The daytime counselor trots in with
her hair still wet and her makeup half on.

"Sorry I'm late." The counselor tosses her jacket on a chair. "I got a
slow start this morning."

"Get real, Margie. You get a slow start every morning," Darlene grumbles on
her way to the door. "The girls are supposed to be up in ten minutes."

"Chill out, Dar. Wanna see the new mascara I got at the mall last night?"
Margie starts digging in her purse. "I never saw such a pretty shade
before."

Darlene turns toward Margie to take a peek at the mascara, and Daisy sees
her chance. She zips across the hall with the pail, empties it in the
shower, and unlocks the cleaning closet. She stuffs the bucket into the
closet and shuts the door. She barely gets her hand off the doorknob before
Margie hustles into the bathroom.

"The alarm hasn't sounded yet," the counselor snaps. "What are you doing
up?"

"When you gotta go, you gotta go," Daisy says cheerfully, ducking into the
nearest toilet stall and cursing herself in a mumble for her near miss.

The counselor touches up her rouge and lipstick at the mirror. Then she
steps out into the hallway and flips the switch that sets off the morning
alarm. Daisy rushes back to the dorm room to watch the fun.

The alarm bell is greeted with a chorus of groans and swearwords. Girls sit
up, push their hair out of their faces, rub their eyes. Daisy yawns and
ambles over to her locker. Shanna stays in bed, lying as still as a corpse.

Daisy throws on a fresh uniform. Plain cotton briefs, panty hose, blue
skirt, white shirt. She slides into her loafers and starts making her bed.

"Are you okay, Shanna?" she says. "Get up, you'll be late for breakfast."

Shanna doesn't answer. She doesn't sit up or even open her eyes.

"Should I go for the nurse?" Daisy asks, trying to sound like she gives a
damn. "Are you sick?"

"No nurse!" Shanna snarls. "Leave me alone!"

"Well, bite my head off!" Daisy turns away and runs a brush through her
long brown hair. Every girl in the room is looking at Shanna now.

"What's wrong with her?" one of them asks.

"Shanna, are you sure you don't need the nurse?" another presses.

"No nurse! Go to hell!" Shanna's voice is thick in her throat, like she
might burst out crying.

"It smells funny in here this morning," Daisy says, sniffing. "Don't they
ever air this joint out?"

"Probably not." A girl with honey-colored curls walks over to the window
and opens it wide. A cool breeze comes through the iron bars on the other
side of the glass.

"Hop to it, everybody!" Margie calls from the doorway. "Breakfast is in
five minutes. Shanna, why are you still in bed? Hurry up."

"Bite me!" Shanna growls.

"What did you say?" The counselor marches over to the bed, leans down, and
listens as Shanna whispers something in her ear.

"Clear out, girls." Margie turns away from Shanna and starts herding
everybody toward the door. "Shanna will catch up with you in the dining
hall."

The girls straggle out of the room and join the line at the dormitory
entrance.

"I wonder what's up with Shanna," says a tall chick who has a face full of
zits. "Nobody ever gets to sleep in around here."

"She could have started her period in the night," suggests A girl with thick
glasses.

"Either that or she pissed her pants," Daisy chimes in. "Wouldn't that be a
trip?"

"Maybe she was playing with herself and got her finger stuck where it don't
belong!" someone else scoffs. "That's probably what happened!"

"Shut up, all of you!" Margie storms out of the dorm room. "Shanna is in
there crying because of your stupid gossip. Are you all proud of that?"

"What a baby!" Daisy mutters as the counselor opens the door to the
dormitory and motions the girls out for breakfast.

"What's on the menu today, road kill and eggs?" Daisy gripes as she makes
her way to the mess hall. "God, just the cooking smells in this joint could
knock a dog off a gut wagon."

Daisy takes her place in the chow line. She pours herself a bowl of cereal
and grabs a carton of milk from the cooler on the counter.

"Look, there's Shanna," the girl behind Daisy says, reaching for a set of
silverware.

Daisy glances out the door of the mess hall. Shanna, with her head hanging,
is carrying a bundle of sheets toward the laundry room.

"Hey, Shanna, glad to see you up and around," Daisy calls out. A hush falls
over the dining hall. Dozens of girls look up to see the redhead with her
load of linens.

Daisy smiles to herself. The bruises on her backside are old news now, the
blabbermouths in the school have someone else to whisper about. Paybacks
are hell. And next on the hit list is Mrs. Rice, the math teacher with the
evil ruler.

Daisy Lane, 10-2000