LOT'S MOUNTAIN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN: The Cold of Stone

When I walk into the office, I know something's really, really wrong. The secretary, the one that gets really bored and counts paper clips all the time, stares at me. That's all she's doing. Just watching me.

"Hello, Dylan Caid," she says. It's like she's looking through me and not at me. That's when I notice the guy sitting next to her. It's the Stone Man from last night.

He's not alone. Four more of them are sitting on the floor.

"She'll see you now," the secretary says, but I know the Stone Man's putting those words in her mouth. And the she that the secretary's talking about isn't the principal because the principal's a guy.

This is what I've been waiting for. I'm going to meet the leader of the Stone Men. I should be happy, right? Then why do I want to take off and run in the other direction?

When I walk into the principal's office, there's this lady sitting at Mr. Langston's desk. She's wearing a blue silk shirt and charcoal dress slacks. Her hair's pretty short so that it doesn't even touch her shoulders. She's sipping tea out of a fancy teacup, you know, the kind people get from their grandmother and never use.

"Dylan, come in," the woman says, like it's her office. Mr. Langston is in a corner. It's him, but it's not him. He's not himself, if that makes any sense.

There are a lot of different types of principals. There's the buddy type, the kind that claps you on the shoulder all the time like they're your best friend (...until you mess up), and then there's the scared kind that hides in their office praying that nothing goes wrong. But Mr. Langston is neither of those. He's the shark kind. He prowls around the halls, hoping to catch you at something. Then he glares at you like fire's going to leap out of his eyes and blast you right where you stand. He's a loomer, too, towering over you even when you haven't done anything wrong, like he thinks it's only a matter of time before you screw up.

All the tea lady says is, "How are things at school, Dylan?"

"Okay, I guess."

The whole time she's been talking to me she's not even looking at me, like I'm not worth her time. Instead, she's inspecting the little white teacup, tracing the thin blue vine-work on the sides with her finger.

Sighing real loud, I say, "At some point are we going to talk about that psychotic preacher? Anytime soon would be great."

"Diane." The tea lady says the name real stern like a warning. Diane isn't here. Or maybe she's thinking about reading Diane the riot act later. This isn't her fault. Then she adds, "I have spoken to Diane about aiding you in adjusting. I shall speak to her again."

"Leave her alone and talk to me. That's why I'm here, right? If you wanted to talk to her, then you could've come after me at her place tonight."

But why would they? Last night, Diane showed that she's willing to help me out, so they want me here, where I have no place to hide and nobody to take up for me.

With her eyes still on the teacup, the lady in Langston's office says, "Diane has told me that you have friends, Dylan. Mindy seems ...Well, she does seem ... very enthusiastic, doesn't she?"

Yeah, Mindy's a hamster on coffee.

"Pretending isn't difficult. Pretending will keep us happy," the woman keeps going. "And that is what you want."

Uh-huh. I live to make the Stone Men happy. They're the damn center of my freaking universe.

"Look, I'm not here to hear all this crap about how I need to act right." I start to pull up a chair, but a Stone thug pulls me away from it, to make sure I stay standing.