The Scarlet Sweater

4. The Confrontation

Before she could speak with Mr. Schwartz, Jeni had to wait in the office waiting area for him to finish with another student. As she sat there, her surroundings became abnormally vivid. The slight ruffle of the papers in the shelving unit caused by the air conditioning, the *glub glub* of the water cooler, the beeping of the telephone, and (most obnoxious of all) the constant *tick tick ticking* of the clock (even though it’s a digital and not an analogue - not that it matters… she can’t tell time anyway). She had just begun to think that she would never leave the confined space of the waiting area when (all of a sudden) Mr. Schwartz burst out of his office. The offender he had just been reprimanding stood behind him, cloaked in his shadow. When Jeni saw who it was that slowly exited the office, she let out an involuntary gasp. The offender was none other than Melody Niemoth. “What could SHE have possibly done to end up in the office of Mr. Schwartz?” Jeni wondered. As Melody shuffled from the office, her face tearstained, she glanced solemnly at Jeni. As soon as she was out of sight, Jeni glanced up at the glaring visage of Mr. Schwartz.

In a gruff voice, Mr. Schwartz beckoned Jeni into his office. Shaking, she stood and entered the cramped room. Jeni stood in the doorway as Mr. Schwartz made his way over to the desk and took his place, staring up at her. Jeni took her seat in the chair across from him after he acknowledged her with a threatening, “Sit.”

She took her place in the chair directly across from Mr. Schwartz. There was an extremely awkward silence - the tension was so thick, you could cut through it with a butter knife. After what seemed like decades of no one talking, Mr. Schwartz said, “Would you like to explain to me why you did what you did?” Jeni slowly looked up and made uncomfortable eye contact with the man (it was more than a little unnerving),

“Why? Why? I’ll tell you why! God, my holy father (for I know no earthly one) spoke to me and said, ‘Jeni, sometimes people (like you) forget to do their homework and they need a little help. This is why I am telling you that it is perfectly okay to steal a paper that somebody already wrote. That person would probably feel really special knowing that their homework was used to cheat.’ So, Mr. Schwartz that is why I did what I did.”

He stared at her, his mouth agape. This was the most preposterous thing he had ever heard. In all his years of teaching, never had anyone replied to one of his questions with such a bold-faced lie. Slowly the expression changed from shock to furiosity. He shouted at Jeni to turn in her laptop and opened his bottom desk drawer. Within that drawer (a drawer which had never been opened by any of the previous principals of Louisville HIgh School - except for that one guy that one time, like 2,000 years ago [before Mr. Bausch taught at Louisville, he was just a student then]) … Anyway, within that drawer there was a sweater, but not a normal sweater… a Scarlet Sweater.

As he pulled it out, Mr. Schwartz began to cough (it was a nasty sweater). He slowly handed it across the desk to Jeni. She was afraid to touch it so she said, “That is a gross sweater, I don’t want to catch Cyclic Vomiting Syndrome!” Mr. Schwartz glared at her and she was suddenly encouraged to take the sweater from his hands.

“Put it on.”

She pulled it over her head and was engulfed in the nasty mustiness of a sweater thousands of years old. She vomited. “See!” she shouted, “I caught the syndrome.” Mr. Schwartz rolled his eyes and explained that she could never remove the sweater for as long as she lived - she would die and would be buried in the sweater. Upon finishing the explanation, he walked her out to the lunch table and had her stand on it.

“Come hither! Lay your eyes upon the PLAGIARIzer! Throw your lunch at her! Have FUN!” Then he left, with Jeni still standing upon the tabletop.