Knowing Your Strength Pt. 02

Author's Note: Any and all persons engaging in any sexual activity are at least eighteen years of age.

*****

Chapter 1

Angel Hart tittered as she felt Jason Breaux's eyes on her. Just before entering their home room, she turned and gave him a quick kiss on his lips.

That little kiss would have resulted in the both of them being suspended for three days from St. Thomas Aquinas, the Catholic High School in Bender, Louisiana. As it was, the only ones that saw the intimate kiss were Bailey Chopin and Anthony Horner and neither one would tattle.

Amy Brodt and Dana Duluth looked on in confusion as the attractive blonde took a seat next to the scrawny Jason Breaux; didn't she know Jason was a loser? Didn't Angel know that Irwin Trahan, Bobby Theritot, Steve Guillory and a few other football players wanted her? Didn't she know that they would be much better for her to be seen with rather than some loser that spent his time in the library playing speed chess?

Angel sensed their eyes on her and turned and gave the bone thin red head and full figured African American girls a dazzling smile. Caught off guard, the two cheerleaders returned the smile.

Rachael Thibodeaux entered the classroom, glared at Jason Breaux, glared at Angel Hart, and then flounced to her seat.

"Why'd she give you the look?" Jason asked Angel.

"Why'd she give YOU the look?" Angel asked, shrugging her shoulders.

"Well, because I got her dumb ass boyfriend kicked out of here," Jason explained.

"No you did not," Angel smiled softly, placing a hand on his arm. "He got himself kicked out."

"Okay, but what about you?" Jason pressed.

"Don't know; guess she's still mad because I told her I didn't have time to be a cheerleader," Angel smiled and playfully pinched Jason's scrawny bicep just as Sister Andrea entered the classroom.

Rachael fought down her nausea; she had not eaten breakfast that morning but still her stomach was roiling. She had not eaten breakfast in four days which meant she would be starving by the time Lunch period rolled around.

"Here, Sister," Rachael called out when Sister Andrea called her name.

For Jason, school went by very slowly. The highlight for him was playing speed chess in the library.

"Come on, us girls against these pathetic boys," Angel said, grabbing Bailey's hand.

"Yeah!" Bailey enthused.

She tried briefly to pull her hand from Angel's powerful grip, but Angel refused to let go, so Bailey gritted her teeth and squared off against Anthony while Angel squared off against Jason.

"And go!" Angel laughed, making the first move.

Bailey had never been able to beat either Anthony or Jason, but today, the pieces were falling off the board in a rapid-fire fashion.

"Checkmate!" Bailey whooped, jumping to her feet and dancing around, hands high in the air.

"Holy cow!" Anthony said, baffled at the ease Bailey had managed to beat him.

"Switch sides," Jason demanded.

Bailey smiled sheepishly as Sister Agnes frowned darkly at her and sat down across from Jason.

"Ready?" Angel asked, smiling happily at Bailey.

"Yeah!" Bailey laughed.

Again, Angel took Bailey's hand and again, Bailey blazed through move after move.

"You got to be kidding me!" Jason said as Bailey had his king cornered.

He shook his head as Bailey again did a ridiculous victory dance.

Bailey was short, barely four foot ten, and round. Born to a single mom, Bailey's paternal grandmother raised her. Fussing by the infant Bailey was controlled by Grandma stuffing cookies into the child's mouth. Crying was halted by popsicles. Happiness was rewarded by cakes.

From her mother, Bailey had inherited unruly blonde brown red hair that refused to be tamed, sticking out at all angles, and warm brown eyes. From her father, she inherited compassion and intelligence.

From both her mother and father abandoning her; her mother because she was a crack addict and her father because he was a career military man, Bailey had inherited extremely low self-esteem.

"You are being too loud; there are others trying to study," Sister Agnes hissed to the quartet.

The four friends gathered up their chess boards and left the library.

"Whatever, Chopin," Jason smirked as Bailey continued to taunt the two boys.

At the end of the day, both Jason and Angel walked into their World History class. Rachael again glared at the couple, and then gasped out loud as Jason gave her the finger.

"Don't do that; that's not nice," Angel scolded Jason, slapping his hand.

Rachael actually felt a twinge of gratitude toward Angel but shoved that feeling away and again glared at Jason.

After class, Angel went to her locker and smiled as Amy Brodt waited for her.

"Hey, Amy, what's up?" she smiled at the bone thin red head.

"Hey, um, you um, you know um Steve um, Steve Guillory?" Amy asked. "He um, he wanted me to let you um, let you know he um he wants to go out with you."

"And?" Angel smiled.

She placed a comforting hand on Amy's arm.

"Listen, I know Steve wants to go out with me; I know Irwin Trahan wants to go out with me too."

Angel looked into Amy's crystal green eyes and lost a little of the smile.

"And I know you're having sex with them and a few other football players and you're hoping that one of them will like you," Angel went on.

Amy gasped and tried to pull away from Angel but the hand rested firmly on her forearm, preventing her from moving.

"And you don't need to do that," Angel went on. "None of those boys like you; they laugh at you behind your back, call you 'The Board.'"

"But, but," Amy stammered, tears springing to her eyes.

"Now Anthony Horner?" Angel went on. "He really likes you; thinks you're beautiful."

"But he's an absolute nothing," Amy tried to sneer.

"Would you rather have an absolute nothing that thinks you're everything?? Or be used by people that think you're an absolute nothing?" Angel asked, taking her hand off of Amy's forearm.

Amy jerked away and ran down the hall, tears streaming down her freckled face.

Chapter 2

Jason smiled as Angel came out of the school building. He opened the passenger door of his car and she slid in.

"Go ahead," Angel smiled when Jason started the car.

"Go ahead what?" Jason asked.

"Go ahead and ask; I know you're dying to know what I'm doing here. With you," Angel smiled.

"Well yeah, I mean, look at you," Jason said.

"Quite simple, really," Angel said. "Take me to Clark's; I want a malt."

"You're not with me because you want a malt," Jason said, but drove to the diner.

"In 1995 I was a student at...well, it really doesn't matter," Angel said.

"Wait, what? In 1995? That would make you..." Jason struggled to do the math.

"Two chocolate malts," Jason told the blonde girl that skidded to a stop next to his car.

"And I was one of the cheerleaders, as you can imagine," Angel said as the girl skated away.

"Bet you were," Jason agreed, admiring the waitress's muscular buttocks as they undulated in her snug red short shorts.

It was an unseasonably warm November day and the three waitresses were wearing their usual Clark's Drive-In uniforms of very snug white tee shirt with 'Clark's Drive-In' emblazoned across their chests and snug red shorts that left a goodly portion of their buttocks exposed.

"That is so rude!" Angel said, putting a playful hand over Jason's eyes. "I'm talking to you!"

He smiled sheepishly at her. She shook her head but smiled.

"And there was this girl, Polly," Angel went on as the girl came back with their malts.

"Wait, what was your name back then? Were you still Angel Hart?" Jason asked.

"Doesn't matter," Angel said and Jason shrugged.

"Anyway, Polly wanted to be one of us; God, she wasn't! I mean, she just won't! I mean, yeah, she was pretty and had a really nice body, but she just wasn't," Angel said and gave her malt a good hard suck.

"And I got real tired of that loser following me around everywhere always kissing my ass trying to be my best friend so I decided to shit on her birthday cake," Angel said and looked out the passenger window.

"You?" Jason asked, shocked.

She had been nothing but sweet, loving, compassionate from the moment he'd met her.

"Anyway," Angel said, and dabbed at a tear. "I invited her to my house; man! Should have seen her! She was just about pissing on herself; like she'd just won the lottery or something."

Angel choked back a sob.

"Jason, she just wanted to be my friend, but because she rode a bike to school, instead of having a nice car; because she had bargain brand clothes instead of designer labels, I hated her," Angel admitted.

Jason let Angel sob it out; he didn't know what else to do.

"Anyway, she comes over and she's all happy and stuff and I get her in my room and I tell her that I got this really big secret and I'm so embarrassed but I'm hoping she'll understand and not get all freaked out," Angel mumbled, looking out the passenger window.

Angel brought the straw to her lips, sighed and put the cup into the cup holder of the console.

"Anyway, she's all like 'sure, whatever; we're friends right?'" Angel said and pulled her eyes from the window.

"I mean, no, we weren't friends; if we'd have been friends, I wouldn't have had Erica hiding in the closet; see, my bedroom had these louvered doors on the closet and one of the slats was real loose and you could take it out and Erica's in there with her new camera, her dad got her this brand spanking new Nikon camera; thing cost like a thousand bucks back then," Angel went on

She looked at her hands, folded in her lap then looked back out of the passenger window.

"And I tell Polly I'm in love with her and give her this real big kiss and at first she's all freaked out and so I start like I'm crying and she's trying to tell me it's all right and she's in love with me too," Angel said.

"God, that's mean!" Jason said, a little anger creeping into his voice.

"I know," Angel said softly. "Anyway, we make out for a while, then I start taking off my clothes and I can tell Polly doesn't really want to, but she does and I make her eat me and suck my boobs and..."

Jason put his malt into the second cup holder; his appetite gone.

"And Erica's taking all kinds of pictures and then Polly leaves and Erica and I go to her house and we go in her dad's darkroom and get about five or six real good ones; showed Polly's face but doesn't show mine and shows her being all lezzie and stuff," Angel said.

"We made a bunch of copies and the next day Erica and I put them in all the cheerleaders' all the all the jocks' lockers and it's not even first period and everyone's laughing at Polly and she sees one of the pictures and runs screaming out of there," Angel said.

Jason sat, a rage for this poor Polly's treatment building up in him.

"Believe me, I'm much more angry with me than you could ever be," Angel admitted.

"I don't think so," Jason yelled at her. "You have any idea what it feels like always..."

"Anyway, I didn't care; I'd got her off my ass; that's all I cared about," Angel said.

Jason was ready to explode but Angel put her hand on his arm and he felt an immediate calm wash over him.

"That night, Erica and Jackie and Megan and I, we're all in my room looking at the pictures and laughing and my mom says I've got another friend there and next thing I know, there's Polly standing there and we all just laugh at her.

"'That was a good one,' Polly said to me," Angel said. "'Real funny, but see how you like this,' she said and pulled out this big gun."

Angel looked at Jason.

"She shot me in the head; right above my right eye," Angel pointed to a barely visible white mark.

"Wait, it didn't kill you?" Jason asked.

"It killed me instantly," Angel corrected. "The very instant my life ended, your mother and father were consummating their love for each other and you were conceived."

She kissed him softly on his lips.

"The instant my life ended, yours began; that's why you and I are joined," she explained.

"What happened to Polly?" Jason asked.

"She put the gun in her mouth and killed herself," Angel said. "So, I had two sins on my soul; I made her kill me and I made her kill herself."

"Is she, is she in Hell?" Jason whispered.

"No," Angel smiled.

She put her hands together in her lap and smiled again.

"No; she was but I forgave her," Angel said. "The moment I forgave her, she was washed clean of her sins. She is in Heaven now; where she belongs."

"Oh," Jason breathed in wonder.

"Thanks for the malt," Angel said and disappeared.

Jason looked around in shock; one minute she was sitting there and the next minute she was gone.

He looked at the console and her malt cup was gone too.

Chapter 3

Rachael Thibodeaux numbly took her seat in the rear of the classroom, not acknowledging the happy greetings of her friends.

She had known for a few months now that she was pregnant and that it was Harrison Smith's baby. Of course, Harrison was denying any part of it, pointing out that they'd always used condoms.

And he still blamed her for his expulsion from St. Thomas Aquinas. As if she had made him savagely attack Jason Breaux.

Because of his expulsion, he was ineligible to play football for any other Four-A High School in the state of Louisiana. He could have gone to Flowers Military School, which was a Three-A school and played football with them, but no colleges ever scouted a Three-A school looking to give scholarships.

So Harrison blamed her for his expulsion, for ruining his collegiate goals, for ruining his life.

And when she'd asked him what they should do about the baby, he slapped her and told her it was her problem.

Two months ago, Harrison Smith had sworn an undying love for her. Two months later, Harrison was slapping her and screaming at her and telling her their baby wasn't his problem.

"Abortion," Rachael decided. "I just need to get an abortion."

Sister Andrea called her name twice and finally Rachael responded with "Here, Sister."

Banks Street did not care how far along a woman was; they would perform the abortion. Rachael figured that she was entering her second trimester.

"And now, Thomas has an announcement," Sister Andrea said, clapping her hands to get everyone's attention.

Thomas Sampier got to his feet and faced the class.

"We're holding a Winter Formal," he said, face a hundred shades of red.

"Who's 'We?'" Sister Andrea barked.

"Oh, uh, the Classical Ensemble," Thomas stammered, blush burning even hotter. "It's um, it's a dance, but instead of there being a D.J., it's just going to be us playing you know, like waltzes and rumbas and..."

"Sit down, Sampier," Irwin Trahan razzed the bespectacled boy.

"Do you have an announcement, Mr. Trahan?" Sister Andrea snapped.

"No ma'am," Irwin said.

"Anyway, like I said, it's a formal so you got to get kind of dressed up and uh..." Thomas stammered.

"When is it? How much are the tickets?" Sister Andrea prompted.

"Oh uh, it's like ten bucks apiece and uh it's not this Saturday but next Saturday and it starts at eight o'clock and it ends at midnight," Thomas mumbled.

"Thank you Thomas," Sister Andrea said, glad the uncomfortable discussion was over.

"Oh! And I have the tickets!" Thomas said brightly.

"Want to go?" Jason asked Angel.

She smiled at him then looked pointedly at Bailey.

"Sister Andrea, May I be excused?" Rachael suddenly jumped up.

"Well I..." Sister Andrea said as Rachael dashed for the door.

Rachael raced down the hall to the girls' bathroom and slammed into a stall.

She waited but nothing came up. She sat on the seat and tried to get her nausea under control.

"All gifts are from God," she heard Angel's voice.

Rachael looked under the door but could not see Angel's feet.

"What?" she asked, thinking she might have imagined hearing a voice.

"All gifts are from God," Angel repeated. "Even those which we do not want."

"What? What do you mean?" Rachael asked, peering under the stall's walls to the left and right, but still could not see Angel's legs or feet.

"He only gives His gifts to those He wants to have His gifts. And when we reject His gifts we are rejecting Him," Angel said.

"And just what the fuck..." Rachael spat out bitterly.

"That baby inside of you is a gift from God," Angel said softly.

"What?" Rachael gasped out loud. "How did..."

True, her skirts were becoming quite snug; her cheerleader's skirt was nearly impossible to button, but Rachael did not think anyone could tell. Because of her large chest, her school uniform blouses were cut a little loosely and Rachael had been 'billowing' the blouses out to hide her tummy.

"You will endure much hardship," Angel whispered. "Your friends will abandon you; please do not be angry with them. They are young and afraid."

The buzzer for First Period sounded. Even though she had done nothing, Rachael still flushed the commode out of habit.

Entering her Geology class, Rachael remembered that she had left both purse and backpack in tier Homeroom.

She sighed as she clutched the detention slip that Mr. Cousins had given her for coming to his class late. The detention would keep her there at the school until 4:15 that afternoon and the free clinic stopped taking new patients at 4:30 each afternoon.

Rachael looked over and smirked at Angel's beaming face.

That afternoon, she entered Sister Lucy's classroom to serve the one hour detention. Sister Lucy's idea of detention was to make the student sit, for an entire hour, ramrod straight, not talking, not reading, and just sitting.

Rachael sat for first half hour weighing her options. All possible outcomes were fraught with difficulty; the most logical thing to do would be to terminate the pregnancy. She looked at Sister Lucy as the old nun sat quietly using her rosary beads.

"Sister Lucy, may I have a rosary?" Rachael suddenly asked.

Sister Lucy looked up at the girl. Rachael Thibodeaux was a cheerleader, blessed with bland good looks, long honey blonde hair and quite large chest. Never once had Sister Lucy observed the haughty girl demonstrate any religious inclination at all.

"It is not my norm to do this," Sister Lucy admitted as she got to her feet. "Normally, I would make you sit for the entire hour; you know that. You've been here enough times."

She pressed her personal rosary into the girl's hands.

"This was given to me by my mother when I entered the convent," Sister Lucy said quietly. "She was so proud of her little girl becoming a bride of Christ."

"Thank you, Sister," Rachael said reverently. "I'll return it a the end of the hour; I promise."

She felt the beads, worn smooth by years of use. The crucifix and the face of Mary were tarnished black but Rachael could see the care the craftsman had used to forge the two silver pieces.

Rachael did the sign of the cross and began reciting The Apostles' Creed.

Outside, in Jason's car, Jason cleared his throat as Angel sat in the passenger seat, singing some odd song he'd never heard before.

"I um, I went and got two of them tickets, um, for that Winter Formal," Jason began.

"Oh! I do hope you asked Bailey; you know she's in love..." Angel happily clapped her hands together.

"What? Bailey? No, no, I was planning on..." Jason sputtered.

"Pull over," Angel ordered and Jason did.

Angel knelt on the passenger seat and looked into his eyes.

"Jason, no," she said quietly but firmly.

"But why?" Jason asked.

"Jason, I can't," she said, taking his twisted face into her hands. "I can't interfere in your life."

But, but, you..." he faltered.

"I know; I made love with you," she blushed slightly. "But that..."

"I don't understand; how's that all right, but going to a dance is..." Jason argued.