Devilish. Maureen Johnson

unholy on me at any moment.

      Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that there was a strange girl at Allison’s desk. My brain played a bit of a trick on me because though I could see the girl was in a St. Teresa’s uniform, I first assumed she was a visiting student, sitting in on a class. Over the next few seconds, my brain re-scanned the image and told me something stranger.

      That girl was Allison. In a wig.

      At least, my brain said, that’s what it had to be because whatever was on her head was not the Ally fro I knew and loved. Instead of her somewhat washy red blond, her hair was a blitz of cascading deep red, with a blond streak coming right out of the front. Plus, most of it was gone. It had been chopped into a pert little bob, right at the point where her hair usually bent and started to look awkward. Now it looked like a little red helmet.

      It was adorable. It even made her forehead look perfectly proportioned.

      ‘Miss Jarvis,’ Sister said, ‘as you’ve developed a very becoming slack jaw, perhaps you’d like to tell us about the kinds of rhetorical appeals that we may utilize in composition?’

      I searched around in my head for an answer, but a tiny red-helmeted cartoon figure of Allison was running around, scrambling the normally well-ordered facts.

      ‘There are three basic kinds of appeals,’ I said. ‘There’s…’

      All I could think about was that shiny red bob.

      ‘… logos. That’s the appeal to…’

      The shiny redness of it. That was my best friend’s head. The head of the girl who had had the exact same hairstyle since the sixth grade. A kind of… lumpy thing.

      ‘…reason. There’s also…’

      Nothing. White noise. I looked at Sister, but her image was hazy to me. My face fell soft and dumb and blank.

      ‘I see,’ she said. ‘The great Miss Jarvis does not know. Are you too warm, Miss Jarvis?’

      I didn’t reply. Sister shifted her gaze to Allison.

      ‘Miss Concord,’ she said. ‘I see you have recovered. And it looks like you’ve spent the evening at the hairdresser. I think you might have spent it better sitting at home and reading your book. But perhaps you can contribute something to this conversation?’

      The voice that came from the redheaded girl was calm and clear, not the dry stuttering that was so soothing and familiar.

      ‘There’s also pathos,’ it said. ‘The appeal to emotion, and ethos, which is when you try to convince the audience that they should listen to you because you have a good character and you are knowledgeable.’

      Sister stood very still and took a good look at Allison. It seemed like she was seeing her for the first time.

      ‘Oh?’ she said. ‘This is certainly interesting. Can you elaborate?’

      ‘Well, Sister,’ Allison said, ‘Cicero, maybe the most famous of Roman orators, said the last method, ethos, is really kind of conceited, but it works. He used it a lot himself. He felt that it should only be used in the exordium, the introduction.’

      This was enough of an unusual occurrence to get the attention of everyone in the room. They were all looking at Allison now.

      ‘Could it be,’ Sister said, ‘that a St. Teresa’s girl had actually read her book and taken note of its contents? My prayers have not gone unanswered.’

      I didn’t have to turn and look to know that the redheaded girl smiled. I could feel it in my spine.

      I cornered Ally the second the bell rang.

      ‘Your hair,’ I said. ‘What did you do to it?’

      She reached up and touched her head gently, as if she was petting a baby bunny I had just informed her was squatting there.

      ‘I just decided I needed a change,’ she said. ‘So I went out last night and got my hair done. Do you like it?’

      ‘It’s nice,’ I said uncertainly. ‘I’m just getting used to it. I wish you had told me.’

      ‘I don’t actually need permission from you to get my hair done,’ she snapped.

      Ally had never snapped at me before.

      ‘I didn’t say that,’ I said. ‘I was just worried.’

      ‘I think you’re pissed off that I knew something you didn’t,’ she said. ‘Feeling stupid sucks, huh?’

      And with that, she walked away.

      I’d never argued with Allison before. Allison was my best friend. A fight between us was so unfamiliar and unexpected — something unthinkable, like someone in their first earthquake, unable to accept the fact that the earth is wiggling like jelly under their feet. Literally. I felt a little unsteady as I went down the hall.

      That’s when I noticed that all of those flyers were gone. Not even a piece of tape remained to show where they had been.

      At the end of the day, all I really wanted to do was go home. I still had no keys, though. That meant I had to go all the way across town to The Pink Peppercorn to borrow my mom’s. I snagged a chunk of apricot cheesecake on the way out and ate it with my fingers right out of the bag.

      As I was leaving, a little sports car approached. It was small and tight in an autobahn-ready kind of way and was a steely shade of silver. The back of it was swollen and curvy, and the front was very small, with the two front wheels set off from the body of the car. It pulled along the curb. A man in a very neat pin-striped suit stepped out and came over to the menu case, near where I was standing with my hand in a gloopy mess of cheesecake.

      ‘Can you tell me,’ he said, ‘what time this restaurant opens? I have heard some very good things about it.’

      ‘I think… five, maybe?’ I said.

      ‘Don’t you work here?’

      ‘No.’

      He stepped back and looked me up and down, then nodded in satisfaction.

      ‘That is a school uniform you’re wearing,’ he said. ‘Not the uniform of a waitress. My apologies.’

      ‘Don’t worry about it. But it is a good restaurant. My mom works here.’

      ‘Does she?’ He seemed delighted by this. He leaned over me to examine the menu in its little glass box, mumbling some appreciation under his breath.

      ‘A pumpkin risotto. How apropos for this time of year. And a lovely lamb chop with sauté of baby vegetables. Oh yes. Delectable. I do like my food young. But what would you recommend?’

      This was unpleasant and affected but not entirely unexpected. Providence does attract a lot of freaky foodies.