Story: Desk Thirteen   
      
   by bobandcarole   
      
     Chapter 1: Christina Goes to School   
      
         Christina Rose Akin lived with her father after her mother died.   
   He didn't like children, and as a young lawyer who preferred the company   
   of ladies, he hated having a daughter underfoot all the time, taking up   
   his valuable time and interfering with his social life.  Several months   
   before her sixth birthday, he decided to send her to a boarding school.   
   When he heard of a previously all-boys boarding school, he couldn't pass   
   up the opportunity to make a name for himself as a lawyer.  He just had   
   to sue the school to get her admitted.   
      
         She hadn't wanted to go to that school, but like most adults, and   
   especially lawyers, he had no respect whatsoever for what children want,   
   so her desires didn't count.  "It's a matter of principle," he had told   
   her.  "They have no right to keep you out of that school, so that's the   
   school you're going to go to, if I have to force them to let you in."   
      
         He had won the lawsuit, his smug smile as he left court contrasting   
   sharply with the scowls of the ranch owner and manager, and the sullen   
   demeanor of Christina herself.  Her sixth birthday had been during the   
   trial, but of course he had been too busy with his work to have a party   
   for her.   
      
         The school consisted of a ranch in Montana with nothing but vast   
   wilderness for thirty miles in any direction, except a small rutted dirt   
   road.  The boys (amend that now: the students) were required to help   
   with the ranch chores.  The school limited students to 25, so there were   
   25 desks in the classroom, arranged in five rows of five desks.  All the   
   students lived in five bunkhouses, between the stables and the milking   
   shed, and each bunkhouse had five cots.  Except for the ranch manager's   
   home, none of the buildings had any plumbing.   
      
         Christina's new classmates were all aged 7 to 16, and of course all   
   of them were boys.  Most of them had lived at the ranch for many years   
   without ever seeing a girl.  The older boys were sometimes allowed to   
   drive to town in their pick-up truck to buy supplies, but the younger   
   boys were kept on the ranch with essentially no recreation except what   
   they could make for themselves.   
      
         The teacher was an old woman who drove out to the ranch to teach   
   the boys (the students) five days a week, because it was a living, even   
   though she could hardly tolerate the job.  She did as little as she had   
   to do, then left for home and put the place out of her mind.   
      
         At the start of the school year, her father took Christina to the   
   school and left her, without even saying goodbye.  She stood there in   
   her pretty pink and white short knit dress, lacy white socks, and shiny   
   black leather shoes.  Her long brown hair hung nearly to her waist.  She   
   held her suitcases which her father had packed for her, with all of her   
   clothes and a few toys.  She had begged him to let her take her fluffy   
   kitty-cat doll, Mew, but that was the only doll she had.   
      
         The ranch manager found her standing at the door wondering what she   
   was supposed to do.  He took one of her suitcases and told her to follow   
   him, and walked off without looking back.  She followed him to the third   
   bunkroom where he threw her luggage on the middle cot.  The cots were   
   cheap and crude metal frames, but strong and solidly welded together.   
   The head and foot of each cot formed a plain metal "H" with the crossbar   
   just below the height of the thin mattress.  The metal rods running the   
   length of the bed were welded to remnants of a wire fence, supporting   
   the mattress.  The four rough metal posts on the corners of each bed   
   were crudely sawed off, and left unpainted.  Most of them showed signs   
   of rust.   
      
         The beds were of different sizes.  Christina's bed, the only unused   
   one, was the smallest.  The mattress exceeded the frame in size, and had   
   to bend to fit in, forming a hump in the middle.   
      
         "Where are the pillows?" she asked.   
      
         "No pillows," the manager answered gruffly.  "This ain't no hotel.   
   As for sheets, you'll get some after laundry day."   
      
         Dismayed, Christina looked around at the rest of the bunkroom.  The   
   walls were unpainted boards, showing the outer shingles through large   
   cracks, with bare wall studs, and no inner boards or insulation.  A few   
   shelves had been nailed up between the studs, but they were all out of   
   her reach, let alone her view.  Four other cots surrounded her own, two   
   on each side, covered with rumpled sheets and blankets.  A thin wire ran   
   upward from a cheap light switch by the door, along a roof stud, and   
   hung down, suspending a bare light bulb as the room's only light source,   
   directly over her cot.  This was obviously not an establishment that   
   cared much about its image.   
      
         With class due to start in ten minutes, the manager led her to the   
   classroom.  He told her to sit in a certain chair, and pointed to the   
   middle chair of the middle row.  Christina obediently sat, and began   
   drawing on the papers with the crayons on the desk before her.  Turning   
   abruptly, he left without another word, having more important things to   
   deal with.   
      
         No matter how you numbered them, left to right, right to left, back   
   to front or front to back, Christina's desk, the very center, was always   
   Desk 13.   
      
         She was sitting there quietly drawing when two boys about ten years   
   old entered the classroom.  They took one glance at her and their faces   
   lit up.  "Wow!  Are you the new student!?" one asked her.  She looked   
   over at them and silently nodded.   
      
         "Youuu're prehhtty!" the other boy exclaimed, drawling out the   
   words for emphasis.   
      
         Christina smiled shyly.  "Thank you," she replied, remembering her   
   manners.   
      
         "Yeah, you have pretty hair!"  "And a pretty face!"  "And pretty   
   arms!"  "And pretty hands!"  The boys took turns praising her.  Christina   
   smiled and answered each compliment with a shy "thank you" to one or the   
   other of the boys, but she wanted to get back to her coloring.  One boy   
   walked around and stood on her left, the other stood on her right, and   
   both kept looking at her.   
      
         "You have pretty legs!" one boy added, kneeling.   
      
         Christina began to feel uneasy.   
      
         "I like your dress, too," the other boy said.   
      
         "Me too, we like your dress," the other boy confirmed.  "It's so   
   pretty, with the lace and everything, and besides, it's so short."   
      
         "Oh!  Pretty panties!" said the boy on her left, while peering up   
   her dress.  Christina quickly held her legs together and pushed her dress   
   down with her hand.  She wasn't smiling any more.   
      
         "Let me see too!" demanded the other boy, but Christina resisted   
   his pull on her arm, keeping her hand between her thighs.  "Come on, let   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)