Nyree Powell is a Bully with no Brains

‘Turn around!’ Nyree said.

    Summar blinked and looked at the girl who was sitting in front of her. She’d turned around to face her, with her big, blue eyes glaring at her.

    Summar raised an eyebrow. ‘And why must I do that?’ she asked.

    ‘Because you’re ugly!’ Nyree replied. She sneered, displaying a perfect array of teeth.

    Summar bit her lip. She, as always, was at a loss of what to say although she should be used to it by now. Yet, it never got any easier, the words always hurt and she never knew how to answer her tormentor back.

    Nyree continued. ‘Face it Summar, no one likes you. You’re a loser and I bet you can’t even get a date to the spring dance!’

    Summar’s bottom lip trembled. She’d got her there. Not only did she not have a date to the spring dance, at seventeen, she’d never even had a boyfriend. Nyree on the other hand went out with a new boy every weekend, because she bored easily. She was a striking girl, with long, blond hair that curled naturally. Her eyes were a luminous aquamarine that attracted the opposite sex like magnets. And she had the perfect smile unlike Summar’s slightly bucked teeth.

    Summar refused to let the tears that were welling up inside her green eyes fall. She would not let Nyree see her cry and give her the satisfaction of knowing she’d got to her. Luckily, Nyree turned back around and faced the front where their technology teacher was explaining the details of the school’s science fair. Summar took off her owlish glasses and wiped them with a clean tissue. She wiped her eyes before putting them on again and focusing on what the teacher was saying. Technology, science and math interested her and she excelled in these particular subjects. They suited this student who preferred to work alone and enjoyed the pleasure of her own company rather than all young teens who wanted desperately to be popular. She on the other hand didn’t care and didn’t want to be like those clones of Nyree and her two good friends Savannah and Destany.

* * *

    That afternoon, Summar walked home with a backpack full of notes for the science fair and a head full of ideas. She didn’t get far however, before Savannah and Destany fell into step with her and started to imitate the way she walked. Summar had been born with one leg longer than the other, which caused her to walk with a slight limp. She’d never noticed it before but other people did and students like Savannah and Destany wouldn’t let up on it.

    ‘Look!’ Savannah exclaimed. ‘It’s funny walker!’

    ‘Hey there funny walker,’ Destany joined in emphasizing her limp. ‘Nyree told us what happened in tech class! Did you cry, ya big sook?’

    ‘Yeah,’ Savannah chimed in. ‘The way you’re going you’ll never get a boyfriend. No wonder you can’t get a date to the spring dance.’

    This time the tears came and there was nothing Summar could do about it but let the tears fall as she gained pace before bolting and breaking into a gallop.

    Once she arrived home she slammed the door behind her, threw off her bag and leaned against the door breathing heavily. She stood there until she got her breath back and regained her composure.

    When she’d finally settled down Summar headed into the kitchen and opened the fridge. She grabbed a can of soda and sat at the kitchen counter. She pondered over the day’s events and the words the girls had said. She caught her reflection in the tiny TV on the kitchen bench. Nyree was right. She was ugly with frizzy red hair tied back in plaits and a galaxy of freckles. No wonder she couldn’t get a date to the spring dance. Then a thought occurred to her. She couldn’t get a date to the spring dance but perhaps she could make one. She could build a robot who could accompany her to the spring dance and also win her the science fair prize! She doubted that Nyree and her friends could come up with something like that. They didn’t even know their times tables, the periodic chart and thought that “pi” was something you ordered for home delivery from the pizza shop.

    So, that night, Summar went about designing her prototype. Her mother often joked that she was in the “bat cave” designing away “by candlelight.” Once she got started there was nothing stopping her!

* * *

    She woke up the next day to find her father at the kitchen table working on an ignition coil. He often worked on different projects at the kitchen table much to his wife’s dissatisfaction. But Summar was happy because he would often bring home spare parts for her to tinker with.

    ‘Did you bring anything home for me?’ she asked her father as she opened the fridge and took out a bottle of juice.

    Hank Patterson looked up from his new project. ‘As a matter of fact I did!’

    As Summar poured her orange juice into a frosted glass her mother put her hands on her hips and tapped her foot on the floor.

    ‘You’re not bringing that junk inside!’ Maxine exclaimed. ‘I won’t have it! You can work on your project out in the garage!’

    ‘That’s cool,’ Summar said as she looked at the older woman with greying hair. ‘I have a new thing I want to work on in private anyway.

    Summar smiled. That something was going to blow the minds of the kids at school and the judges at the science fair. She had some designs ready. All she had to do was get the spare parts together and make her very own robotic creation.

* * *

    For weeks leading up to the spring dance, Summar worked on her very own creation using her father’s various tools including a welder to create her very own robotic version of some sort of Frankenstein. However, she would treat her creation well so he would certainly not turn on her. Besides, she had two settings on the switch at the back of the robot: “good” and “evil”.

    Finally, one day, she stood back and surveyed her creation. She was clothed in her grubbiest sweats and wearing a bandanna around her forehead to keep her hair out of her face. She lifted it up, wiped the sweat from her forehead and looked at the object of her imagination that had been created and brought to life.

    Her closest thing to a real android was a skeleton of spare mechanic parts with two hubcaps for eyes, a small tyre for a head and other junk that made up the body. A small motor controlled wheels that enabled it to move along the ground. Summar smiled. No one could say she would be without a date for the spring dance!

* * *

    The spring dance was held in the school gym one warm May night. Since the theme was “the ocean,” the gymnasium had been decorated with tacky fish, crabs, seahorses, dolphins and even some mermaids and mermen. As the event was semi-formal the guys were dressed in slacks, shoes and button up shirts rather than suits and ties. The girls too were dressed down in dresses ranging from retro to modern that were a step down from formal gowns. Everyone was dancing cheesy moves to the music pumped out of speakers played by a DJ who was spinning his best cuts.

    Summar was the last one to arrive. She pushed open the door of the gym and let her guest roll in first. Suddenly everyone stopped dancing and there were audible gasps as the pair moved towards the crowd. 365 by Katy Perry, a very apt song for the moment was blaring across the room. The crowd parted like the Red Sea as the odd couple milled their way through and stood at the centre of the gym.

    The lights form above played upon the highlights in Summar’s hair. She had got it done especially for the night. She was wearing it long and loose and her glasses had disappeared. She’d even managed to raid her mother’s make up kit to make the most out of what she had. She was wearing a vintage 1960s psychedelic print dress that looked like it had been designed by someone on LSD for an actress in an “Austin Power’s” movie. Her “date” was wearing a shirt and was now moving around with her on the dance floor.

    All the other kids looked at her with mouths agape. For once, Summar didn’t care that she had two left feet as she held onto her robot and danced to a slow love song. Presently, everyone else did the same and all was quiet on the Western Front for quite a while save for the music and muted chatter.

    That was until Nyree, Savannah and Destany walked up to her. Nyree was standing there with her hands on her hips with the other two standing behind her. Without stopping, Summar looked at her.

    ‘Well, well, well,’ Nyree started with a sneer. ‘Looks like you’ve finally found yourself a friend! Pity he isn’t human.’

    Summar smiled. ‘He’s more human than you think!’

    Nyree tossed her flaxen hair behind her. ‘Oh, really? It looks like a pile of junk to me. A pathetic pile of junk for a loser who can’t get a real date to the spring dance!’

    ‘Want me to show you?’ Summar asked.

    ‘And how exactly will you do that?’ Nyree demanded.

    ‘Bend over and I’ll show you,’ Summar said.

    Nyree’s mouth was wide open. ‘You can’t talk to me like that!’ she cried.

    ‘Allow me to demonstrate!’ Summar declared as she reached over and flicked the switch from “good” to “evil”. At once, the robot turned and moved towards Nyree, ripping off her strapless, black dress, exposing a tan coloured bra and large, white, “Bridget Jones” underpants.

    Instantly the whole room burst out in hysterics, laughing and pointing. The music stopped as Nyree desperately tried to regain her composure and slip the dress back on which had now been ripped to shreds.

    ‘Hey!’ a boy named Liam yelled out. ‘Nice Nana negligee!’

    This got everyone laughing even harder. But Summar’s date wasn’t finished there. He turned on Nyree’s two friends tearing off their hapless, backless dresses as well, revealing even daggier underwear: large, white bras and underpants. By this stage everyone was screaming and were in hysterics with tears streaming down their cheeks.

    ‘Miss Patterson!’ same a voice of Miss Aitken, the school principal. ‘Come here at once!’

* * *

    It was seven-thirty on Sunday morning. Summar was still in bed. She was dreamily re-living the moment her robot boy had lashed out and humiliated Nyree, Savannah and Destany.

    Summar looked at the clock radio and turned over with a sigh of happiness. Her parents were out on their morning stroll and she could stay in bed all morning.

    ‘Ping!’ A stone flicked against the glass of her bedroom window. With a groan, she rolled out of bed and opened the window. Liam was standing in the street below.

    ‘Whatever you’re selling I already have it and I have already found Jesus!’ she said blearily.

    ‘Hey, I was wondering if you wanted to go out with me today.’

    ‘Go out with you? And why would I want to do that?’

    ‘Because I thought what you did was really cool,’ he replied. ‘About time someone showed those hags a thing or two.’

    Suddenly another voice rang out. ‘Will you two people shut up? It’s seven-thirty in the morning!’

    ‘Yeah, look, it’s early. I’m going back to bed!’

    ‘Come on down! Let’s grab some breakfast and discuss the science fair!’

    ‘The science fair? But I’ve been banned from it after what happened and my project was confiscated and destroyed. I can’t enter it now.’

    Liam smiled, exposing a line of slightly crooked teeth – not enough to warrant braces, but enough to give him a charming smile. ‘You can’t but I can!’ He raised his dark eyebrows. ‘I already have some great ideas, come work with me and if I win I’ll share the prize money with you!’

    The neighbour’s voice called out again. ‘Man! Shut up!’

    ‘OK!’ Summar said as she slammed the window on him appearing at the door ten minutes later with some clothes thrown on, blinking warily at the morning sunshine. ‘So, where exactly are we going?’ she asked.

    ‘Follow me!’ he said with a mock bow before looping his hand through her arm. She could feel the strength of his muscles under the thin broadcloth of his shirt. Summar had no regrets about getting her revenge even if it had cost her the science fair. It had been worth it especially with Liam’s smile beaming rays of happiness at her. She was ready for some sunshine, and the future looked bright.