Free Snapper by Felicia Zekauskas, Peter Maloney

and walked in through the front entrance. He walked past the glass case filled with trophies, then headed down the hall toward his locker. Students in the hallways parted as he approached. He felt like Moses walking through the Red Sea. Whenever JJ looked toward anyone, they dropped their eyes to the ground. Even Bobby Savarese looked down when JJ passed.
    JJ opened the door to his biology class. The lesson had already started. Mr. Martinetti was at the blackboard again, this time drawing dendritic cells. He had planned to have a lab class today on paramecia, but he had changed his mind. Paramecia could grow back lost body parts. It seemed the wrong day for a lesson on regeneration.
    “Dendritic means tree-like,” said Mr. Martinetti, looking up suddenly as JJ entered the room.
    “I’m sorry I’m late,” said JJ.
    “Don’t worry about it,” said Mr. Martinetti.
    Mary Robinson fixed her eyes on JJ the moment he entered the room. When their eyes finally met as he walked toward his desk, Mary held his gaze. As he sat down next to her, she reached over and covered his hand with hers.
    “I’m so sorry about what happened, JJ,” she said.
    There were tears in her eyes.
    She gave JJ’s hand a squeeze. Then she pressed a small, folded square of paper into his palm.
    Suddenly, the phone on the wall rang. Mr. Martinetti walked over and answered it.
    “Hello,” he said.
    Then he looked up and glanced over at JJ.
    “Yes,” he said, into the receiver. “He’s here.”
    A moment later, Mr. Martinetti hung up and turned to JJ.
    “That was Dr. Goode, JJ. She’d like to see you in her office.”
    JJ gathered his books back up. He gave Mary a small smile as he stood. Mary looked up at him and silently mouthed something, but JJ couldn’t make out what it was. He was a lousy lip reader.
    Out in the hall, JJ unfolded the square of paper that Mary had passed to him. There was a phone number on it. Beneath the number, Mary had written, “Call me.”
    Now JJ understood what Mary had been silently mouthing.
    “Call me.”

Chapter 11
    PATERSON 1928
    “Do you remember what you said to me when you bought this land?”
    Wilhelmina Andersen was in the middle of excoriating her husband.
    “Do you remember your words, Owen Andersen? Because I do!”
    Wilhelmina had worked herself up to a froth.
    “You said you were going to build a house on it – with your own two hands! Those were your words, Owen. ‘With my own two hands!’ you said. So now what are you going to do? Build a house with one hand?”
    Owen sat at the kitchen table with his wife looming over him. His greatest concern was the rolling pin that she kept pounding into the palm of her left hand. Owen kept one eye on it, just in case. Meanwhile he wondered if her tirade had finally run its course, but he suspected it hadn’t. Once Wilhelmina got started, there was no telling when she would stop.
    “And what about work?” she said, starting up again. “You think a bottling plant needs a man with one hand?”
    “Don’t worry about work,” said Owen. “I’m a supervisor. I’m not a line worker.”
    “We’ll see how long that lasts,” said Wilhelmina. “But for now, I want you to promise me that you’ll get rid of that useless piece of land. When people get wind of what’s in that lake, it won’t be worth a plug nickel.”
    Owen said nothing.
    “Come on, Owen,” Wilhelmina prompted. “I want to hear you say it: ‘I’m going to sell the land.’”
    “I’ll say no such thing,” said Owen. “We’re keeping the land. I’m going to finish the cabin and I’m going to get that beast.”
    “You! The man with one hand! You’re going to chop down trees, split logs, drive nails, and slay a monster?”
    “No, Billy, not me, the man with one hand,” answered Owen. “Me, the man with three hands.”
    “So now what?” sneered Wilhelmina. “Can you no longer even count – or are you planning to grow back extra hands?”
    “I’m growing back