Signal to Noise(4)

And then, just then, Teofilo slipped. There was no reason why he should slip: no obstacle, nothing at all. But his feet stumbled, as if hitting an invisible barrier. It was just as she had been picturing it all weekend: he simply tumbled down the stairs. Bam! Slipped, fell at a weird angle and suddenly he was splayed on the floor, whining like a baby. A big * like that, just bawling his eyes out.

She watched him, crumpled at the bottom of the stairs, his notebooks lying all around him on the floor, and realized he had broken his arm.

His friends tried to help him up.

Meche stomped over one of the open notebooks, leaving her footprint upon Teofilo’s homework.

She chuckled. A few minutes later as she was walking to Arts and Crafts, she realized it had not been a coincidence. It couldn’t be a coincidence.

It was the record’s fault.





MECHE RUSHED DOWN the hallway, her notebook pressed against her chest. She went into the bathroom and leaned close to a mirror, staring at her reflection, trying to see if there was a visible change. Did magic change you?

The mirror was old and had a thin crack near the bottom. It reflected the pea-green sink which matched the tiles. It revealed a teenager, long hair neatly pulled back in a ponytail and smeared in place with a generous amount of lemon juice and hair gel. It showed her slightly rumpled navy school uniform with the gold buttons. It did not, however, provide proof of any great psychic or magical powers.

She had not sprouted an extra finger or changed her eye colour. She was Meche. The same Meche who had walked the one dozen blocks between home and school that morning, plaid skirt hitting her below the knee, an egg torta tucked in her knapsack for lunch, three yellow pencils and a blue pen tucked in a pencil case.

Meche stared at her reflection for a long time, ignoring the bell which indicated a change of classes.

Three girls walked into the bathroom, chatting and giggling together. Isadora Galván and her two hierophants. They gave her a weird look, like it was some bizarre occurrence to run into her even though they were all in the same grade. School girls went to the bathroom in packs. Meche only had Daniela and Sebastian, and she couldn’t giggle outside the stalls while Sebastian peed, so her pack was immediately nonexistent.

Which reminded her that she needed to find Daniela.

She walked out and headed to the second floor, trying to poke her head through the window and see if Daniela was in Typing.

Daniela was sitting at the other end of the room. The machines went ding-ding clang-clang as the girls bent over the keys. Old Miss Viridiana sat half-asleep behind her desk, her hands folded over her tummy.

Meche waved to her. Daniela did not see her.

“Dani. Psst.”

Daniela was busy looking at what she was typing.

Meche ripped a piece of paper from her notebook, balled it up and tossed it at Daniela. It hit her on the head. Daniela turned around.

“Hey,” Meche said.

Daniela moved towards the window, glancing at Miss Viridiana to make sure she was still half-asleep.

“Why aren’t you in class?” she asked.

“Teofilo just broke his arm.”

“How?”

“He fell down the stairs.”

“Is he with the nurse? Is he alright?”

“Who cares?” Meche said. “I think I just discovered something cool.”

“What?”

“Magic.”

Real magic, the kind grandmother talked about. Her father did not believe grandma’s wild tales of shape-changing witches and amulets which could heal the sick. Meche, however, was fascinated by this stuff.

“Are you and Sebastian talking about weird stuff again?” Daniela asked, wrinkling her nose.

“No. This doesn’t have anything to do with that.”

“I don’t like it when you talk about that devil-worshipper.”

“Oh, my god, Aleister Crowley was not a devil-worshipper.”

“Mercedes Vega.”

Shit. Meche turned, trying to don her most innocent expression.

Principal Estrada was a thin, unpleasant woman. She dyed her hair blonde and wore a grey, buttoned up sweater every day of the week. She enjoyed patrolling the hallways, ordering the girls who had folded their skirt in order to show more leg to pull the skirts down, ordering others to wipe the lipstick from their faces, telling the boys to tuck their shirts and cut their hair. When she couldn’t catch you committing an infraction, she’d make one up. Like, “Don’t stare at me so oddly, Vega,” or, “Why are you walking funny, Vega?”

Sebastian called her Frankenstrada behind her back and she did kind of have a resemblance to Boris Karloff, what with the square-shaped head and the general stiffness.

Estrada glared at Meche, her thin eyebrows arched with contempt.

“What class are you supposed to be in?”

“Arts and Crafts.”

“And why aren’t you in Arts and Crafts?”

“I had to pee.”

“What, do you have the bladder of a two-year-old? You were hanging out by the bathrooms an hour ago.”

Meche did not understand how Estrada knew the comings and goings of all students but she did. And, indeed, Meche had been hanging out by the bathrooms just an hour ago.

“Get yourself to your classroom this instant.”

“Yes, Miss Estrada,” she muttered.