Some people groan. My stomach flutters. Can he really let us do this? It sounds like too much fun. He stops at my table. I plunge my hand into the bottom of the globe and fish out my paper. “Tree.” Tree? It’s too easy. I learned how to draw a tree in second grade. I reach in for another piece of paper. Mr. Freeman shakes his head. “Ah-ah-ah,” he says. “You just chose your destiny, you can’t change that.”
He pulls a bucket of clay from under the pottery wheel, breaks off fist-sized balls, and tosses one to each of us. Then he turns up the radio and laughs. “Welcome to the journey.”
ESPAÑOL
My Spanish teacher is going to try to get through the entire year without speaking English to us. This is both amusing and useful—makes it much easier to ignore her. She communicates through exaggerated gestures and playacting. It’s like taking a class in charades. She says a sentence in Spanish and puts the back of her hand to her forehead. “You have a fever!” someone from class calls out. She shakes her head no, and repeats the gesture. “You feel faint!” No. She goes out to the hall, then bursts through the door, looking busy and distracted. She turns to us, acts surprised to see us, then does the bit with the back of the hand to the forehead. “You’re lost!” “You’re angry!” “You’re in the wrong school!” “You’re in the wrong country!” “You’re on the wrong planet!”
She tries one more time and smacks herself so hard on the forehead she staggers a bit. Her forehead is as pink as her lipstick. The guesses continue. “You can’t believe how many kids are in this class!” “You forgot how to speak Spanish!” “You have a migraine!” “You’re going to have a migraine if we don’t figure it out!”
In desperation, she writes a sentence in Spanish on the board: Me sorprende que estoy tan cansada hoy. No one knows what it says. We don’t understand Spanish—that’s why we’re here. Finally, some brain gets out the Spanish–English dictionary. We spend the rest of the period trying to translate the sentence. When the bell rings, we have gotten as far as “To exhaust the day to surprise.”
HOME. WORK.
I make it through the first two weeks of school without a nuclear meltdown. Heather from Ohio sits with me at lunch and calls to talk about English homework. She can talk for hours. All I have to do is prop the phone against my ear and “uhhuh” occasionally while I surf the cable. Rachel and every other person I’ve known for nine years continue to ignore me. I’m getting bumped a lot in the halls. A few times my books were accidentally ripped from my arms and pitched to the floor. I try not to dwell on it. It has to go away eventually.
At first, Mom was pretty good about preparing dinners in the morning and sticking them in the fridge, but I knew it would end. I come home to a note that says, “Pizza. 555-4892. Small tip this time.” Clipped to the note is a twenty-dollar bill. My family has a good system. We communicate with notes on the kitchen counter. I write when I need school supplies or a ride to the mall. They write what time they’ll be home from work and if I should thaw anything. What else is there to say?
Mom is having staff problems again. My mother manages Effert’s, a clothing store downtown. Her boss offered her the branch at the mall, but she didn’t want it. I think she likes watching the reaction when she says she works in the city. “Aren’t you afraid?” people ask. “I would never work there in a million years.” Mom loves doing the things that other people are afraid of. She could have been a snake handler.
But the downtown location makes it hard to find people to work for her. Daily shoplifters, bums peeing on the front door, and the occasional armed robbery discourage job seekers. Go figure. We are now two weeks into September and she’s already thinking Christmas. She has plastic snowflakes and red-felt-wearing Santas on the brain. If she can’t find enough employees for September, she’ll be in deep doo-doo when the holiday season hits.
I order my dinner at 3:10 and eat it on the white couch. I don’t know which parent was having seizures when they bought that couch. The trick to eating on it is to turn the messy side of the cushions up. The couch has two personalities: “Melinda inhaling pepperoni and mushroom” and “No one ever eats in the family room, no ma’am.” I chow and watch TV until I hear Dad’s Jeep in the driveway. Flip, flip, flip—cushions reversed to show their pretty white cheeks, then bolt upstairs. By the time Dad unlocks the door, everything looks the way he wants to see it, and I have vanished.
My room belongs to an alien. It is a postcard of who I was in fifth grade. I went through a demented phase when I thought that roses should cover everything and pink was a great color. It was all Rachel’s fault. She begged her mom to let her do her room over, so we all ended up with new rooms. Nicole refused to put the stupid little skirt around her nightstand and Ivy had gone way over the top, as usual. Jessica did hers in a desert ’n’ cowdudes theme. My room was stuck in the middle, a bit stolen from everyone else. The only things that were really mine were my stuffed-rabbit collection from when I was a little kid and my canopy bed. No matter how much Nicole teased me, I wouldn’t take the canopy down. I’m thinking about changing the rose wallpaper, but then Mom would get involved and Dad would measure the walls and they would argue about paint color. I don’t know what I want it to look like, anyway.
Homework is not an option. My bed is sending out serious nap rays. I can’t help myself. The fluffy pillows and warm comforter are more powerful than I am. I have no choice but to snuggle under the covers.
I hear Dad turn on the television. Clink, clink, clink—he drops ice cubes in a heavy-bottomed glass and pours in some booze. He opens the microwave—for the pizza, I guess—slams it closed, then beep-beeps the timer. I turn on my radio so he’ll know I’m home. I won’t take a real nap. I have this halfway place, a rest stop on the road to sleep, where I can stay for hours. I don’t even need to close my eyes, just stay safe under the covers and breathe.
Dad turns up the volume on the TV. The news-team anchordude bellows, “Five dead in house fire! Young girl attacked! Teens suspected in gas station holdup!” I nibble on a scab on my lower lip. Dad hops from channel to channel, watching the same stories play over and over.
I watch myself in the mirror across the room. Ugh. My hair is completely hidden under the comforter. I look for the shapes in my face. Could I put a face in my tree, like a dryad from Greek mythology? Two muddy-circle eyes under black-dash eyebrows, piggy-nose nostrils, and a chewed-up horror of a mouth. Definitely not a dryad face. I can’t stop biting my lips. It looks like my mouth belongs to someone else, someone I don’t even know.
I get out of bed and take down the mirror. I put it in the back of my closet, facing the wall.
OUR FEARLESS LEADER
I’m hiding in the bathroom, waiting for the coast to clear. I peek out the door. Principal Principal spots another errant student in the hall.
Principal Principal: “Where’s your late pass, mister?”
Errant Student: “I’m on my way to get one now.”
PP: “But you can’t be in the hall without a pass.”
ES: “I know, I’m so upset. That’s why I need to hurry, so I can get a pass.”
Principal Principal pauses with a look on his face like Daffy Duck’s when Bugs is pulling a fast one.
PP: “Well, hurry up, then, and get that pass.”
Errant Student races down hall, waving and smiling. Principal Principal walks the other way, replaying the conversation in his mind, trying to figure out what went wrong. I ponder this and laugh.
FIZZ ED
Gym should be illegal. It is humiliating.
My gym locker is closest to the door, which means I have to change my clothes in a bathroom stall. Heather from Ohio has the locker next to mine. She wears her gym clothes under her regular clothes. After gym she changes out of her shorts but always leaves an undershirt on. It makes me worry about the girls in Ohio. Do they all have to wear undershirts?
The only other girl I know in gym is Nicole. In our old clan, we had never been very close. She almost said s
omething to me when school started, but instead looked down and retied her Nikes. Nicole has a full-length locker in a discreet, fresh-smelling alcove because she’s on the soccer team. She doesn’t mind changing her clothes in public. She even changes bras, wearing one sports bra to regular class and another to gym class. Never blushes or turns around to hide herself, just changes her clothes. Must be a jock thing. If you’re that strong, you don’t care if people make comments about your boobs or rear end.
It’s late September and we’re starting our field hockey unit. Field hockey is a mud sport, played only on wet, cloudy days when it feels like snow. Who dreamed up this one? Nicole is unstoppable at field hockey. She motors downfield so fast she creates a wake of flowing mud that washes over anyone who gets in her way. She does something with her wrist, then the ball is in the goal. She smiles and jogs back to the center circle.
Nicole can do anything that involves a ball and a whistle. Basketball, softball, lacrosse, football, soccer, rugby. Anything. And she makes it look easy. Boys watch her to learn how to play better. It doesn’t hurt that she’s cute. She chipped her tooth this past summer at some kind of jock camp. Makes her look even cuter.
The gym teachers have a special place in their hearts for Nicole. She shows Potential. They look at her and see future State Championships. Pay raises. One day she scored 35 goals before my team threatened to walk off the field. The gym teacher made her the referee. Not only did my team lose, but four girls went to the nurse with injuries. Nicole doesn’t believe in the concept of fouling. She comes from the “play till death or maiming” school of athletics.
If it weren’t for her attitude, it would be easier to deal with all this. The crappy locker I have, Heather geeking around me like a moth, cold mornings in the mud watching Nicole, Warrior Princess, listening to the coaches praise her—I could just accept it and move on. But Nicole is so friendly. She even talks to Heather from Ohio. She told Heather where to buy a mouth guard so her braces wouldn’t cut up her lips if she got hit with a ball. Heather now wants to buy a sports bra. Nicole is just not a bitch. It would be so much easier to hate her if she were.
FRIENDS
Rachel is with me in the bathroom. Edit that. Rachelle is with me in the bathroom. She has changed her name. Rachelle is reclaiming her European heritage by hanging out with the foreign-exchange students. After five weeks in school, she can swear in French. She wears black stockings with runs and doesn’t shave under her arms. She waves her hand in the air and you find yourself thinking of young chimpanzees.
I can’t believe she was my best friend.
I’m in the bathroom trying to put my right contact lens back in. She’s smudging mascara under her eyes to look exhausted and wan. I think about running out so she can’t pull the evil eye on me again, but Hairwoman, my English teacher, is patrolling the hall and I forgot to go to her class.
Me: “Hi.”
Rachelle: “Mmm.”
Now what? I’m going to be completely, totally cool, like nothing has happened. Think ice. Think snow.
Me: “How’s it going.” I try to put in my contact, and poke myself in the eye. Very cool.
Rachelle: “Eehn.” She gets mascara in her eye and rubs it, smearing mascara across her face.
I don’t want to be cool. I want to grab her by the neck and shake her and scream at her to stop treating me like dirt. She didn’t even bother to find out the truth—what kind of friend is that? My contact folds in half under my eyelid. Tears well in my right eye.
Me: “Ouch.”
Rachelle: [Snorts. Stands back from mirror, turns head from side to side to admire the black mess that looks like goose poop across her cheekbones] “Pas mal.”
She puts a candy cigarette between her lips. Rachelle wants desperately to smoke, but she has asthma. She has started a new Thing, unheard of in a ninth-grader. Candy cigarettes. The exchange students love it. Next thing you know, she’ll be drinking black coffee and reading books without pictures.
An exchange student flushes and comes out of the stall. This one looks like a supermodel with a name like Greta or Ingrid. Is America the only country with dumpy teenagers? She says something foreign and Rachelle laughs. Right, like she understood.
Me:
Rachelle blows a candy cigarette smoke ring at my face. Blows me off. I have been dropped like a hot Pop Tart on a cold kitchen floor. Rachelle and Greta–Ingrid glide out of the bathroom. Neither one of them has toilet paper stuck to her boots. Where is the justice?
I need a new friend. I need a friend, period. Not a true friend, nothing close or share clothes or sleepover giggle giggle yak yak. Just a pseudo-friend, disposable friend. Friend as accessory. Just so I don’t feel and look so stupid.
My journal entry for the day: “Exchange students are ruining our country.”
HEATHERING
As we ride home on Heather’s bus, she tries to bully me into joining a club. She has a Plan. She wants us to join five clubs, one for every day of the week. The tricky part is choosing the clubs that have the Right People. Latin Club is out of the question, as is Bowling. Heather actually likes bowling—it was a big thing in her old school—but she has seen our bowling lanes and she could tell that no Right Person would set foot in there.
When we get to Heather’s house, her mother meets us at the door. She wants to hear all about our day, how long I’ve lived in town, and asks little sideways questions about my parents, so she can figure out if I’m the kind of friend she wants for her daughter. I don’t mind. I think it’s nice that she cares.
We can’t go in Heather’s room because the decorators aren’t finished. Armed with a bowl of orange popcorn and diet sodas, we retreat to the basement. The decorators finished that first. You can hardly tell it’s a basement. It’s covered in carpeting nicer than we have in our living room. A monster TV glows in a corner, and there’s a pool table and exercise equipment. It doesn’t even smell like a basement.
Heather hops on the treadmill and resumes scheming. She isn’t finished with her survey of Merryweather’s social scene, but she thinks the International Club and the Select Chorus will be a good place to start. Maybe we can try out for the musical. I turn on the television and eat her popcorn.
Heather: “What should we do? What do you want to join? Maybe we should tutor at the elementary school.” She increases the speed of the treadmill. “What about your friends from last year? Don’t you know Nicole? But she does all those sports, doesn’t she? I could never do sports. I fall down too easy. What do you want to do?”
Me: “Nothing. The clubs are stupid. Want some popcorn?”
She edges up the treadmill speed and breaks into a sprint. The treadmill is so loud I can hardly hear the television. Heather wags her finger at me. Hanging back is a common mistake most ninth-graders make, she says. I shouldn’t be intimidated. I have to get involved, become a part of the school. That’s what all the popular people do. She turns down the treadmill and wipes her brow with a thick towel that hangs off the side of the machine. After a few minutes of cooling down, she hops off. “A hundred calories,” she crows. “Want to try?”
I shudder and hold out the popcorn bowl to her. She reaches right past me and takes a pen topped with a Merryweather Purple ball of fluff off the coffee table. “We must make plans,” she says solemnly. She draws four boxes, one for each marking period, then writes “GOALS” in each box. “We won’t get anywhere without knowing our goals. Everyone always says that and it is so true.” She opens her soda. “What are your goals, Mel?”
I used to be like Heather. Have I changed that much in two months? She is happy, driven, aerobically fit. She has a nice mom and an awesome television. But she’s like a dog that keeps jumping into your lap. She always walks with me down the halls chattering a million miles a minute.
My goal is to go home and take a nap.
BURROW
Yesterday Hairwoman yanked me from study hall and forced me to make up my “missing” homework in her room.
(She made fluttering noises of concern and mentioned a meeting with my parents. Not good.) Nobody bothered to tell me that study hall was being held in the library today. By the time I find it, the period is almost over. I’m dead. I try to explain to the librarian, but I keep stuttering and nothing comes out right.