Then they both turned to look at me. No, not at me. At Hayden.
Hayden
All thoughts of the tiny, cinnamon-colored freckle just below the glossy black of Tarah's hairline slid right out of my mind as Mr. Sherman took a step in my direction, his face set into a pale scowl that promised nothing but trouble for me.
My body froze while my mind raced.
Whatever it was, I didn't do it. Not this time.
My next thought was that Dad was going to kill me if I'd somehow created another mess for him to have to clean up.
Had Kyle and the other guys from the basketball team finally made good on their plans to steal the Raiders statue from the school's roof? I told them it was a dumb idea.
Knowing them, they'd probably gotten caught then lied and said I was the mastermind behind the whole idiotic plan.
If I got busted for their stupidity, I would seriously make Kyle wish he was dead. If I survived my father's fury first.
I turned to my left to look at the most likely suspect for clues, raising my eyebrows in silent question. But Kyle shrugged and shook his head, apparently as in the dark as I was.
Principal Thomas stopped Mr. Sherman with a hand on his shoulder. “Jim, you might as well show everyone at once.”
Mr. Sherman hesitated then changed direction towards the classroom's flatscreen TV mounted in the upper corner by the dry erase board. He turned it on, found a news channel and hesitated again.
Looking back over his shoulder at us, he said, “Class, I've got some bad news. Something's happening in Washington, D.C. We're about to see history being made.”
I had one last second to feel relief as I realized I wasn't in trouble here.
Then Mr. Sherman turned up the volume so we could hear the news station's anchorwoman, who was in the middle of a breaking news alert.
“...if you are just now joining us, to recap, about ten minutes ago there was some type of massive explosion outside the northwest side of the White House, where President McFadden was scheduled to give a speech that would address the rising anger and frustrations over the long continuing high unemployment rate and the ever widening financial gap between the top one percenters and the rest of the country.”
The view on the screen changed to show a huge black cloud of smoke blocking almost the entire west wing of the White House. The cloud extended across the lawn and out into the street, where fire trucks and ambulances were parked and emergency workers led sobbing, soot-covered people away from the area. Every few seconds, the wind shifted the cloud enough to reveal glimpses of the White House lawn, which looked like a giant meteor had crashed into it.
The anchorwoman continued. “The explosion occurred just minutes after the start of today's scheduled press conference in the Rose Garden which, as you can see from the live footage, is now covered in smoke and flames. We're still not sure exactly what caused the explosion. We have heard from witnesses at the scene that it did not appear to be an airplane or other type of aerial attack, but we have received no official report yet to confirm or deny this. We're taking you live now to Jennifer Armstrang, a witness who saw the explosion. Jennifer, are you there?”
“Yes, I'm here!” the witness gasped. There was a loud crackle, probably from interference in the satellite signal to her cell phone.
“Can you tell us what you saw?”
“I was down the street a couple of blocks from the White House, and at first there was just the sound of the protesters outside yelling in the street. And then out of nowhere there was this loud boom that shook the whole street, and people screaming everywhere, and thick smoke started pouring in all directions.”
“Jennifer, did you see any kind of airplane or helicopter in the area before the explosion?” the anchorwoman asked.
“No! There was nothing in the sky, no sounds of jet engines or anything like that. Just the sound of the protesters yelling outside the White House fence.”
There was a pause before the anchorwoman replied. “Okay, thank you, Jennifer. Please stay on the line if you can and we'll check back with you in a minute. Viewers, we have just received some video from a surveillance camera that had a view of the explosion. We're going to play it for you now. If you have small children watching with you, please be advised that the following could be disturbing to them.”
Apparently Principal Thomas and Mr. Sherman both felt our class was old enough to handle it, because neither of them made a move towards the TV as if to turn it off or change the channel.
The live view was shifted to the left side of the TV screen so a new, smoke-free view could be displayed on the right. The new video footage showed the White House in the distance and how before the blast the street in front of it had been filled with a huge crowd that had gathered outside the White House's wrought iron fence with signs protesting the super rich top one percent. Keeping the protesters away from the White House fence was a double line of police dressed all in black, each one holding a huge plastic shield in one hand and a black baton in the other.
The constant movement of the protesters made the single unmoving man at the center of that crowd stand out like an island in the middle of a storm-whipped lake. Also unlike everyone surrounding him, this protester was silent. He held no sign, his arms down by his sides instead of waving a fist or banner in the air. He simply stared with narrowed eyes set within a red face aimed towards the Rose Garden and the president, who was a tiny figure still speaking from behind a podium in the far off distance. The protester's perfect stillness made it hard to look away from him.
Then he broke that stillness by raising both his hands straight up into the air like a preacher praying to the heavens above. The video filled with red, followed by two seconds of static.
It took me a second to remember the anchorwoman had said it was a video of the White House explosion. Which meant most of those people I'd just watched were more than likely either hurt or dead.
The split screen switched back to a single live view of the smoke outside the White House, and the anchorwoman continued speaking. “As previously stated, we do not yet have any official reports, nor do we have any idea of the total number of injuries or fatalities. We will of course keep you posted with any and all updates as we receive them from White House officials as well as the area hospitals. Until then, we can only speculate as to what might have caused this terrible tragedy. While it seems that an aerial attack might be ruled out, some witnesses at the scene have suggested that the explosion sounded like a bomb going off. Witnesses are also reporting that the blast appeared to extend all the way to the garden of the White House, where it is unknown if the president and others at the press conference were injured—”