Author's Note:
For a long time, I've wanted to (loosely) base a story on Wheatus's song "Teenage Dirtbag" because a) it's a glorious piece of nostalgia for millennials like me and b) like the song's narrator, I love Iron Maiden. There's something kind of fun about the whole misfit-with-a-crush-on-the-popular-girl trope, and I wanted to explore it in the setting of high school in the 2000s while diving into themes of how people can surprise you if you take the time to get to know them. Luckily, coincidentally, or whatever you want to call it, I realized that the name of the girl in the song (Noelle) is the same name I used for Father Tom's wife in my story "Seven Days in Shenandoah," so the inspiration bug got in my head to make this story a prequel of sorts. It can stand on its own, though, and you don't need to have read SDIS to enjoy it. Since Tom and Noelle are my age (34) in SDIS, it also afforded me the opportunity to set their love story in 2008, the year I graduated from high school, so writing it has been a fun little walk down memory lane. As always, all characters engaging in sexual activity are 18 or older.
***
Teenage Dirtbag
"Fuck you, Demon Boy!"
Tom Hall raised the history textbook he'd been reading to block the incoming apple core and sighed.
"Super funny, Brett. Hilarious," he called over to the ringleader of the table full of laughing doofuses that had launched the projectile at him.
They sniggered, thinking themselves the kings of comedy.
Tom's best friend Ryan Reinstein, a fellow misfit, rolled his eyes. "It's 2008. Satanic Panic went out of fashion twenty years ago."
Tom shrugged and went back to his reading. This wasn't the first time he'd had random garbage thrown at him, and he suspected it wouldn't be the last. As for the "Demon Boy" nonsense, he'd pretty much gotten used to that, too, though he despised the moniker.
It had all started in the fall of his sophomore year. His English class had been assigned a paper discussing an example of a classic poem that had been adapted into a modern context. He'd been excited about the project - he loved poetry and literature, and he had a perfect adaptation to share that also happened to be one of his favorite songs. His presentation to the class explaining how Iron Maiden's "Number of the Beast" was essentially a twentieth century retelling of Robert Burns's 1791 poem "Tam O'Shanter" had been well researched and delivered with great enthusiasm. He'd even brought in his boombox and played the song to drive home his point that the plot mirrored the poem, and therein lay his grave miscalculation.
Like the poem, the song told the story of an unsuspecting person stumbling across a coven of witches and demons performing a ritual. When the final power chords had died away, it had become evident to Tom that some of his classmates hadn't listened all that carefully to the lyrics and had mistaken a song
about
demons for one
endorsing
demons. Brett Thompson, a popular boy on the baseball team, had accused him of being a devil-worshipper and started calling him "Demon Boy." The more Tom protested, the more the label stuck.
It didn't matter that he went out of his way to be kind and helpful to everyone. It didn't matter that he was an active member of his Episcopal parish. It didn't even matter that he was considering going to seminary after college. None of it mattered at all. Brett Thompson had called him "Demon Boy" and that was good enough for the rest of the popular kids. Eventually, Tom gave up trying to argue and just did his best to ignore them. It had largely worked for him - his grades were excellent, he had a solid if small group of friends, and he only had five months to go before he graduated. He could hold out that long.
A soft voice pulled him from his musings.
"I'm sorry about that, Tom."
Tom's heart skipped a beat as he looked up at the vision of loveliness standing before him.
Noelle McHale was one of the only popular kids who would give him the time of day. Tom figured that was because her popularity stemmed from the fact that she was genuinely kind and friendly to everyone rather than from athletic abilities or anything like that. She'd never once called him "Demon Boy" and always asked him how he was when she saw him in the halls or in class. She was also smart, gorgeous, and an incredibly talented pianist. Tom had been harboring a crush on her for well over a year.
Unfortunately, she was also Brett's girlfriend.
Noelle smiled apologetically at Tom. "Brett's just... well, you know how he is."
Tom nodded. He did indeed know how Brett was. "No worries, Noelle. It's not your fault. I appreciate the thought, though."
He watched her surreptitiously as she walked back to her own table and lightly scolded her boyfriend for his behavior.
Ryan scoffed. "She's way too nice for the likes of Brett Thompson. What does she see in that asshat anyway?"
Tom shrugged. It would have been easy for him to pretend he didn't get their relationship given his crush on Noelle and dislike of Brett, but he wasn't blind. Brett was handsome, athletic, and for all his douchebagery toward Tom, seemed to treat Noelle with the respect and devotion she deserved. He wasn't some teen movie archetype of a bully who treated his girlfriend like property, and that nuance prevented Tom from concluding that Noelle was blind or crazy.
As the lunch period ended, Tom gathered his things and headed off to his next class: history. They were a week into winter semester and would be receiving their term paper assignment that afternoon. He had just gotten settled at his desk when by far the best aspect of the class walked into the room.
Noelle smiled around at their classmates and Tom felt like a silly schoolgirl when his insides fluttered. He tried not to stare too obviously as she took her seat two desks up and one row over from him. As far as he was concerned, she was absolute perfection: Her pin-straight black hair, inherited from her Singaporean mother, flowed like silk to the middle of her back. Her eyes couldn't seem to decide whether they wanted to be deep brown or hazel like her British-American father's, and they lit up like the noonday whenever she smiled. When she laughed, everyone around her was hard-pressed not to join in on the joyful sound. Tom had seen plenty of paintings of angels (or at least what Italian Renaissance artists thought angels looked like) and he was only marginally sure that Noelle wouldn't just sprout wings and fly off into the heavens to join her kin.
"Alright, class. Let's settle down."
Tom managed to tear his gaze away from Noelle to focus on Mr. Barnaby as he stood at the front of the room.
The middle-aged teacher smiled at his students. "For those of you who have been looking closely at your syllabus, you've probably noticed that your term paper assignment starts today. The topic for this project is... Can I get a drumroll please?"
Tom rolled his eyes as another student tapped rapidly on her desk. Mr. Barnaby certainly had a flair for the dramatic.
"...World War II battles!" he exclaimed.
Some students looked intrigued, others groaned, and at least one kid way in the back seemed to be in a post-lunch food coma.
Mr. Barnaby clapped his hands together enthusiastically. "Now, you'll be working in pairs for this project and picking a particular battle to focus on. I want your reports to discuss why that battle was important, both to the course of the war and the history and development of warfare in general. And please, don't all just pick the Normandy landings. I don't want to read twelve different papers that just summarize the opening scene of
Saving Private Ryan
. You can also pick a battle that the US wasn't part of, which should broaden your options."
Members of the class immediately started whispering to their nearby friends, presumably about who would work with whom and what they'd cover. Mr. Barnaby cut their plotting short, however.
"Before you all get too excited, I've already picked out pairs." He handed small stacks of paper to the first person in each row to pass back. "They're all written down here along with instructions and the rubric I'll be using to grade the final papers. I want you all to use our class time today to start talking with your partner and, ideally, decide on a battle to research. Once you have your instruction sheet, feel free to grab your partner and get cracking. I'll be up front if you have any questions."
Tom took the stack of papers from the person sitting in front of him, pulled one out for himself, and passed the rest back. He scanned the list of pairs for his name, and his eyes widened when he found it.
Tom Hall - Noelle McHale
He'd be working with Noelle. One on one. Alone.
No sooner had he processed this piece of information than the girl in question appeared at his desk like a ray of sunshine bursting forth from a cloud.
"Hey, Tom!" she greeted him, smiling warmly. "Ready to get started?"
Willing his brain to start working again, he nodded. "Uh, yeah. Have a seat." He gestured to the newly-vacated desk next to him.
She scooted it closer to his. "So, I have an idea for a battle we could write about. If you're okay with it, that is."
"Which battle?" he asked, intrigued.
"The Battle of Britain," she told him.
