aren’t women supposed to take care of the family so this
kind of thing doesn’t happen—
—always rocking the boat, never happy with
what I provide—
—when we get home she’ll listen to me or I’ll—
Uncle Randall. I almost trip on my long skirt getting up, but I manage to choke out a quick “excuse me” and then I run. I barge into the empty one-person bathroom, lock the door, and hunch over the toilet, my stomach churning, but nothing comes out.
I stay there for a moment waiting for the dry heaves to subside, for the emotions that aren’t mine to untangle themselves from my own fear and panic. My nails dig into my palms and I feel a jabbing pain, but I don’t care. I’m shaking, and all I can feel in my mind is dizzying darkness and anger, like a whirling tornado. I felt it coming from Uncle Randall when I underheard his horrible, selfish thoughts. But even more frightening is that I can feel a terrible darkness in myself, welling up from some deep part of me that I don’t even want to look at.
The Monday after Thanksgiving the weather is windy again, scouring the sky to a raw blue. I have to put my Gatorade bottle on my lunch bag so it doesn’t blow away. Cody has been talking to me more, being friendlier in his own abrasive way; today he razzes me about my choice of beverage, my mom’s oatmeal cookies, my tuna sandwich, and my “trendoid mall wear.”
“Seriously, it’s like an A&F barfed on you.” He and Becca look at each other and laugh.
“Sorry,” Becca says, smiling, “but he has a point.”
“Of course I have a point,” Cody says loftily. “I always have a point.”
“Whatever. Shut up.” I flick cookie crumbs at him and force my beige Banana Republic cap over his head, grinning, until he finally cracks a smile.
“You’re an honorary mall rat,” I say.
“Great.” Cody gives up and just sits there, glowering, but the smile fighting to emerge from one corner of his mouth ruins the effect. So does the girly cap smushing down the black tendrils of hair he’d so artfully arranged.
“Hey,” Mikaela says, reaching for her purse. “We could put my lipstick on him. And that hoodie of yours. Then he’d really be a mall rat.”
“No!” Cody hastily pulls my cap off and scrambles down from his perch on the edge of the orange picnic table. “God, no.” He composes his face and then saunters over to me with his usual scowl plastered over his face, bushy eyebrows a hard line. “I shouldn’t even give this hat back to you. You look better without it. Much less like a droid.”
“Fine. Keep it,” I say, feigning indifference. I guess he just gave me his version of a compliment, but I’m not sure how to react. I blink my eyes innocently at him.
“Maybe I will,” he says. “I’d be doing you a favor.”
Mikaela walks over and interposes herself between me and Cody, hands on her hips, and tilts her head at him flirtatiously.
“Are you dissing my friend here? ’Cause if you are, I might have to punish you.” She pulls the blood-red lipstick out of her purse. Cody backs away, forcing a laugh, and turns to talk to David. Mikaela follows, brandishing the lipstick at him threateningly.
For some reason this annoys me a little. I can handle Cody myself. I don’t need Mikaela to convince him to like me, as if it’s some kind of favor.
And I set out to prove it. All week I find excuses to talk to him: making him eat one of my oatmeal cookies, trying to elicit a coherent explanation for his fervent adoration of Black Sabbath, listening to his surprisingly convincing rant against the destructive conformist culture of high school athletics.
On Thursday, I come up to him in the hallway between classes and shove the hated Banana Republic hat on his head. He whirls around in surprise. When he glares at me and says “What the fuck?” I just give him my most innocent look.
“Aww, what happened? Did an A&F barf on you?” I can’t help smirking a little.
He rolls his eyes, snatches off the hat, and shoves it in his backpack, taking a quick look around to make sure nobody saw his abject humiliation. When the hat is stashed out of sight, he turns away and stalks off, leaving me unsure whether to laugh or be furious. Ten feet away he turns his head and flashes me a quick, impish grin. His teeth are perfectly straight and white, and his blue eyes squint just a tiny bit as he smiles.
For some reason, the incident leaves me in a blissful mood the rest of the day. I finally cracked Cody’s obnoxious exterior, and it feels like an accomplishment. If I’m honest with myself, it’s a relief, too; it’s a relief that his jerk act is just that—an act. Armor, like his black clothes and oh-so-superior smirk. And underneath the armor is someone I can actually be friends with, maybe. I drive home with music going full blast, singing loudly to whatever comes on the radio and not caring what I look like doing it. I haven’t been happy like this in a long time. I park the car in the driveway with a slight jerking of the brakes and let myself into the house.
It’s nice to have the living room to myself, just me and Pixie with a bag of pretzels, a few hours of sitcom reruns, and, less fortunately, my pre-calculus book.
By the time my mom gets home from her case manager job at Citrus Valley Community Outreach, I’m ready for a break. I head into the kitchen. Mom is already puttering around trying to scrounge dinner ingredients. There’s a random assortment of vegetables already on the cutting board: three carrots, a potato with a small root starting to protrude from one end, half a bag of spinach leaves, and an onion. I open the fridge, humming a little to myself, and grab a sugar-free soda.
“You’re cheerful today,” Mom says, beaming at me. “I’m glad to see you in such a good mood. I’ve been worried about you.”
“Me? I’m fine,” I say. “Never better.” Feeling unusually magnanimous, I pull out the vegetable peeler and start scraping the carrots. “What’s for dinner?”
Mom’s head is half-inside one of the cabinets as she rummages around, pulling spices off the rack.
“Oh, just trying a little creative cooking with leftover ingredients,” she says, emerging from the cupboard. “Cut those carrots into strips, would you please? I think I’ll sauté all the vegetables together and … do you think it would be too weird if I cut the leftover roasted chicken into pieces and put it in? Like a stir-fry?”
I roll my eyes. “It sounds fine, Mom.” It actually does sound pretty good, unlike some of her experiments with leftovers. Like the time she tried making shepherd’s pie with two-day-old lamb korma as the base. Dad liked it, but it sat in my stomach like a spicy brick. Today’s concoction might work out, though.
I don’t realize I’m singing to myself until Mom mentions it.
“Good day at school today?” She turns to me, her expression curious and eager. Her long hair is falling halfway out of its bun. “You haven’t brought home much news lately. How are Cassie and Spike doing? I don’t think I’ve seen them in weeks. Not since you quit the swim team,” she adds pointedly.
I wince. “I … haven’t been hanging out with them much lately. They, uh—” I try to think of something that sounds innocuous, that won’t put her into interrogation mode. I’m positive the grief counselor gave her a spiel about “warning signs” and “troubled teens” because it seems like whenever I catch her looking at me lately, she’s got little lines of worry between her eyebrows. Even now, when she’s smiling.
“I’ve been making some new friends.” It surprises me a little as it comes out, but I realize it’s true. “But Spike’s fine. His usual self.”
“Oh! Good.” Mom pretends to be scrubbing the potato, but she’s looking at me sideways. There’s a long silence. “So tell me about these new friends. How did you meet them?”