Bearded Boy: Episode 2, The Battle

Paper flies from the bearded boy’s backpack. It’s as if he never took out his old assignments. Math homework, vocab tests, lab analyses, even last year’s book report on To Kill a Mockingbird fly from the vortex, papering the bus. As long as we stay clear we’re safe. But then Jimmy throws an apple at him, and somehow the vortex tilts on its axis, wobbling wildly, then careening about the bus until it comes to a halt atop Allison’s lap. She shifts her history book, props it up against the window to read. The bearded boy’s hair twists and tangles about his body until it cocoons him. Only the tip of his nose sticks out. We wait. Allison studies the revolutionary war, how only half the colonists supported the rebellion. She is so concerned about the fact that anyone could remain neutral during such a tempestuous time in American history that she doesn’t notice the two-headed snake emerging from the bearded boy’s nostrils—one head from each nostril. Once out, they eat the flesh of the septum so the body can emerge. Allison’s hair withers, and still she keeps reading. The snake swells with poison, tongues darting through double rows of teeth. Twisting its scaling coils, it rises to the top of the bus, lashing out at Jesse and Jill, who have now fainted. We cower as the serpent towers above us. He lifts himself erect, bobs once, twice, then strikes at Jesse, swallowing her whole. Still, Allison reads how the American patriots fought at Lexington. Jimmy screams. We know he hearts Jesse. We’ve seen it written on all the desks. And now the time has come to prove it. He pulls his biology book from his pack, unfurls it like a shield. For a weapon, he takes three of his finest pencils and lashes them together with rubber bands. A lance with thrice blackened point. He enters the dark aisle, knees shaking, and shouts that he will avenge Jesse or die with her. And so speaking, he launches at the serpent, driving his weapon into its iron scales. The serpent bites at the lance shaft, snaps it. Shards scatter across the rows. Still, the weapon’s tip bites deep into the serpent’s belly. The monster coils. Green poison drips from its mouth, burning holes in the gum-hardened floor. One last time, it lashes with its tail, then collapses at Allison’s feet. Still, she reads on about how France secretly provided supplies to the American rebels. Jimmy stands tall in bloodstained Converse. He holds the serpent by the neck with one hand, and with the other, he takes a broken shard from his lance and rips open the belly. It appears empty, but Jimmy sticks his hands in, searching through the gore. At last, he grabs hold of Jesse and yanks her out. She turns from him, barely acknowledges him as she asks for something with which to clean herself off. We give her towels from our swim bags, napkins from our lunches, happy to help clear the viscous blood from her golden hair, her porcelain face. Bob is the first to get her a towel, a great beach towel with a palm tree in the middle. Jesse smiles at him, tosses her hair. For of course, Jesse never really cared for Jimmy. She’d teased him, led him on, but in reality she hearted Bob. Jimmy turns away, swearing he no longer loves her, and marches back to the serpent, digging his hands deep in its throat and yanking free the same dagger-like teeth that nearly unmanned him. One by one, he takes them and tosses them about the bus where they sink beneath the floor, taking root in his rage.