Page 6 of Eight Steps to Alpha

Chapter 2

The science labwas a complete disaster. Not just a disaster, but a hideous one. There were beakers on every surface, globs of slime overfilling the sink and tables, and used equipment strewn over the entire room. Her students, her ungrateful bastards of students, had graciously left the mess for her to deal with.

Well…if she was being technical about it, they were Mrs. King’s students. Fe was only the lab technician hired to assist her. The one who wrote the curriculum, planned out each lesson, and tested each hypothesis to make sure her students had everything they needed for a successful experiment. By default, she also happened to be the one who got to clean up the mess.

Asses.

All of them.

They were allasses!

She didn’t care if they were eleven. By eleven, she was pretty much self-sufficient. These kids didn’t even realize slime belonged in the trashcan and not the laboratory sink.

She grabbed the large barrel trash from the corner of the room and began dragging it across the floor. Back and forth, back and forth, until it settled in as close to the sink as she could manage. Her long yellow gloves were already secure up by her shoulder, and she closed her eyes, diving hand first into the globules sink to fish out chunk after chunk of glue, borax, and food coloring.

“Mija,” she heard from behind her. “Mija, it looks like a unicorn gave birth it here. What happened?”

Fe gagged at the analogy, both grossed out and amused at the same time. “Hey, Mrs. Gomez. Did you come to rescue me?”

She heard the woman chuckle, then tsk her tongue, then glass beakers clinking together as they were removed from the tables. “Aye aye aye, these children,” she muttered. “They act like pigs!”

Mrs. G was her partner in crime, her colleague, and the only person at Hillman Academy she trusted. She was also the one who muttered profanity in Spanish and made Fe almost pee her pants on a daily basis.

“Any plans for the weekend, Mrs. G?” Fe asked, hoping to distract herself with one of Mrs. G’s stories.

“Oh, you know,” Mrs. G answered. “Dis an dat.”

“Go on,” Fe urged, and Mrs. Gomez didn’t disappoint.

For a solid sixty minutes, and with more passion than most display in their whole lives, Mrs. G wove an elaborate tale—about her son George, her two-year-old granddaughter who she loved more than life, and her husband Carlos, who was a lazy piece of shit. Her words.

“On Friday,” Mrs. Gomez continued, “I came home to find my fish-tank clouded like a watered down milkshake. I turned to my granddaughter, and I say “Nieta, what happened to the fish tank?

“’They were hungry,’ she tells me.

“Hungry!” Mrs. G. tsked her tongue, “Do you know what she did?” She muttered something unintelligible under her breath, not waiting for an answer. “She put whipped cream in the fish tank, Mija. Whipped cream!”

Fe laughed so hard, she had to squeeze her legs together so she wouldn’t pee. “Were the fish okay?”

“No,” she said, pursing her lips. “They were all belly up, floating on top of the tank like little orange sausages.” She sighed. “I told her they were sleeping, Mija. Lord forgive me, but I couldn’t bear to tell her the truth.”

“Didn’t she figure it out?”

“Oh no.” She shook her head sternly. “I told Carlos to run out and buy some more.”

Fe grinned. “Did he do it?”

“Si,” Mrs. G said, finally cracking a grin.

Fe laughed. “See, Mrs. G, you complain about him, but he’s not all bad.”

Mrs. G shrugged, but seemed charmed as she continued to wipe down the tables.

When all of the empties were settled on the rolling cart, Mrs. G opened her mouth again. “My granddaughter, she’s like you, Mija. So smart, but doesn’t make the best decisions.”

Fe stopped, her heart skipping a beat as she turned around. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Mrs. G flashed her a knowing glance, but said nothing more.

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