Among Friends

But the teacher says, “Emily, Jennie always reaches for the stars. It’s a joy for a teacher to have a student like Jennie. Nobody else would have come up with this experiment.” Emily’s mouth forms a little o of rage and the teacher, who clearly thinks she has made us all feel better, turns to me, smiles gladly, and says, “Jennie, I’m truly impressed.”

  Emily rolled her eyes, yawned, looked out the window, and never glanced my way again.

  I remember once when The Awesome Threesome all took clarinet lessons. I don’t know why we picked the clarinet. Anyway, I was good, and Em and Hill were crummy. Hillary quit early on but Em played for years. She was never good, and she never much cared. “I like band,” she would say, shrugging when she sat in the back with the beginners year after year.

  “How can you stand it?” I said once. “Being ordinary at it?”

  Emily was amazed. “Who cares?” she said.

  Oh, why can’t I feel that way? Why can’t I just do something because I like it? Why do I have to be a winner at everything? How I envy the kids who don’t even remember to study! What would it be like to live inside a body that’s careless about things?

  So after school today I went home alone because Em and Hill wouldn’t wait for me.

  I don’t have much experience at being alone: not after a lifetime of The Awesome Threesome.

  Piano practice, horseback riding, copying over my English paper—okay, you can do those alone. But Christmas shopping, alone? And try a phone call alone. There’s another fun activity.

  In the evening I had my harmony lesson. Music is like math, but it has more shape on the page. I love harmony. Tomorrow another test, an interview with the paper about being a young composer, jazz dancing class, and an evening rehearsal for The Messiah production.

  We’re going to visit Aunt Catherine on Saturday and on Sunday we’re having a party for another set of people. Mother’s theme isn’t even Christmas: she’s using pink. Pink? In December? I can’t stand it when Mother gets trendy. I like tradition, nothing but tradition.

  Mrs. Lang came over to lend Mother her large coffeepot. I don’t think she knows that Hillary doesn’t speak to me anymore. I miss Hill so much I was all but clinging to Mrs. Lang.

  My mother began to get nervous about all the things I still had to get done that day. “You mustn’t hang about, Dunstan!” she cried. “Here’s your list! Let’s get cracking.”

  Mrs. Lang laughed. “There is only one thing you have to do,” she told me, tossing my full-page list aside. “You have to take the garbage out.”

  It was my turn to laugh. Only one thing I had to do? There were four hundred things I had to do. And I had to do them all well, too.

  “Darling,” said Mrs. Lang. “Spare time is the best time of all.”

  I’ve never even seen spare time. There is nothing my mother and father despise more. Starting with nursery school, they packed my life full, and since junior high, I’ve done my own packing.

  In gym we had athletic event tests: 400-yard dash, long jump, that kind of thing. Coach asked me again to go out for sports. God, how I’d like to! I feel so much better when I’m racing, or pulling, or even doing push-ups, or something. I’m all muscle, no thought: I don’t worry, I don’t remember, I don’t even care: I just exist.

  I didn’t even answer him.

  Someday it’s going to start spilling out of me. I have this terrible fear it’s going to be someplace public, with dozens of kids listening, and I’ll be partly insane, and it’ll pour out of me, every sordid detail, and I’ll be this piece of public property, they’ll all know every ounce of me.

  I used to just stay quiet.

  Now I try not to look at anybody, either. Meet their eyes and I feel myself starting to go.

  Rumors spread so fast in this school. And somehow in the cafeteria Paul Classified got cornered. Really, it reminded me of animals: it was so primitive! It was exciting, like a hunt—and horrid, horrid. We should all have been shot ourselves.

  Jared’s been gossiping with some boys in gym (although Jared claims only girls “gossip”—boys “talk”) and these guys have decided that Paul’s family are spies: CIA, or something, and they cornered Paul and demanded to know what his parents do for a living. I mean, here’s Paul having cream of tomato and a toasted cheese sandwich with four chocolate milks (all the boys drink these unbelievable amounts of milk) and there are six guys hunkering down around him, saying, “So, Paul R. Smith. So what exactly are all these secrets, anyway?”

  And everybody is fascinated, and they start to get closer, so they can hear, and the cafeteria turns into a mob, half chanting, “So, Paul R. Smith. So who are you, Paul R. Smith?”

  Paul stands up.

  There isn’t room for him to stand, so he shoves the whole table forward, catching three of the boys below the belt with the table rim. They yell, and Paul shoves the table harder, turning it over and spilling a bunch of lunches. Instantly we’re all taking sides, shrieking for the side we like to fight, to win.

  Even me.

  Today I was part of a mob. I loved the wildness of it: the push and shove of it.

  This is why the ancient Romans liked gladiators.

  Fighting.

  Animals. The animals you watch … and the animals you become.

  When it was all over, and both the principals were in there, dragging Paul off his attackers, the people who were hardest to control were us—the ones staring and gaping and pushing up closer.

  My skin was crawling.

  Me. Ansley Augusta. Paul was attacked and I was a cheerleader to keep the violence going. I’m no different from any other creep.

  Perhaps it’s worth keeping a diary just to find that out.

  Now I have to find Paul R.

  And apologize.

  Home: Dad is finally back from L.A. and the addition is started. They’ve decided to go to Colorado for a week over Christmas, but we’ll be home in time for the New Year’s party Ansley and I want to give. Mother isn’t too thrilled about forty guests, but Ansley’s parents agreed to help chaperone. Now I’m the one who isn’t too thrilled. Oh, well.

  Car: Got a speeding ticket. Makes it very hard to argue about chaperones at parties. I couldn’t help driving fast. That Porsche engine roars under my foot and I go all crazy. Dad said maybe an old rusted four-cylinder beat-up olive green Plymouth is what I should be driving. Great, I said, I can trade cars with Paul Classified.

  Weather: Winter. First snow didn’t last. Second snow turned to rain.

  School: Emily got a haircut. Very short. I like it. You see more of her face. Paul Classified got a three-day suspension for fighting. I swear to God Paul jerked up the table at exactly the angle to spill everybody’s soup on my shirt. The whole thing was my fault, and I knew it and Ansley knew it and Paul Classified knew it. Ansley made me telephone him to apologize but thank God the guy has an unlisted phone number and I was saved from that little duty. The things a girl asks of you. Now she wants to celebrate a “Janiversary.”

  Paul Classified: Who would believe that some guy I don’t even like would rate an entire diary category? But then who would believe that I am still trying to follow him? Billy Torello found out two facts. One, he has a little sister named Candy. Two, the little sister used to go to Talcott Hill Elementary School but she stopped going. Torello made this sound like a state secret.

  “She probably just transferred to Country Day School,” I said. Ansley would kill me if even more gossip got going and the guys had another fight with Paul.

  “Party pooper,” Hillary accused me. “I bet his sister Candy was kidnapped. Paul’s parents are CIA agents, and they’re being blackmailed by the KGB, who are holding Candy hostage until Mr. and Mrs. Smith obey their orders.”

  Great. That’s the kind of rumor that started the cafeteria fight.

  “Taken by the other parent in some vicious custody fight,” guessed Keith, who has been there.

  “Eaten by alligators,” I said wearily. Anything to change the subj
ect.

  Misc.: Saw Jennie’s pageant closing night. Her parents threw a magnificent party afterward. Everybody was there. Everybody except Paul. Of course Paul never goes anywhere except into hiding. I didn’t see much of Hillary and Emily—they checked in and left. They must have a term paper due or something. But Mrs. Weinstein made the punch, and Hill’s parents were there, and all seven kings and their families, and Miss Clinton, etc., etc., etc. Em’s little brother Trip got a Polaroid camera for his birthday last week—he specialized in catching people chewing. Got a great shot of me choking on a celery stick—cream cheese all over my cheek. Ansley’s going to frame it. I love you, too, I said to her.

  I had my hair cut. It’s very short, and where it used to be limp now it’s soft and wispy. I like it. It made me feel all excited to look in the mirror and see it: fluff instead of draperies. People are saying nice things. Maybe they’re just being polite. But even Paul Classified commented on it, and I know Paul C. well enough by now to know he wouldn’t rouse himself from silence just to lie about somebody’s hair. So it must look good.

  Hillary and I went to Jennie’s gala event because it would have been very hard to explain to our parents why we weren’t there. A hundred people all hugging and congratulating Jennie. I took it for about ten minutes and left. It’s a rerun: Jennie’s a hit, Hill and I get jealous, Jennie goes on being a hit, so Hill and I walk out on her.

  My little brother Trip’s birthday party was the other day. He had his four best friends over and Mom took them skating and then they came home for cake. This four-layer cake she made herself, which she hasn’t done in years, not since she went back to work, and immediately there is the problem of how do you cut a cake for five kids?

  I think that’s what Jennie is.

  A birthday cake cut by an unfair mother.

  I, Emily, got a sliver of cake and none of the really good icing. Hillary got a reasonable-sized piece, but nothing to write home about. Jennie got all the rest of the cake: the good flowers on top, the icing ribbons on the sides, and the thickest filling.

  Oh, it’s so unfair!

  And the worst of it is, I’m a worse person. I’m not as nice as I was last year!

  Closing night.

  Awesome.

  Applause.

  Flowers from the cast.

  A huge party at our house afterward: cast, orchestra, stagehands, teachers, and all their families and dates. Food, rock music, dancing, Christmas carols, and more food.

  Mother bought me a splendid skirt: slippery shiny Christmas plaid to the floor, with a sexy, clingy black top and a wild crazy necklace, like a tree of silver and gold, and my earrings falling down to meet it—stars for me and my tree.

  But what good is a perfect dress if Paul Classified doesn’t see me in it?

  What good is the best pageant and the greatest party if Emily and Hillary don’t come?

  You would think that joy could be shared more easily than anything else. After all, joy is the loveliest emotion. But joy is very difficult to hand around. You can’t fling joy into the air like confetti and expect your friends to toss it with you when they don’t have any of their own.

  How did Mary the Mother of Jesus manage not to cry?

  Or maybe she did cry. The Bible leaves out all the interesting parts. Did Mary cry forever? Did all the brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews of Jesus cry forever? Or did they bury him and get on with it, making supper and being carpenters?

  I’m not even religious. I think the whole thing is a bunch of hooey. I have Christmas pageants on the brain.

  I need more money! I’m going to work a few evenings a week at McDonald’s again.

  An article about Jennie was in the paper Sunday. A full page of photographs of the pageant. Jennie taking a bow. Quotes from Miss Clinton saying Jennie is the most exciting student to go through Westerly High. The reporter obviously felt Jennie was the most wonderful possible example of young people today. A girl of absolute perfection, he wrote, what we all want our children to strive to be like.

  Ugh.

  Paul Classified won’t have anything to do with her.

  Everybody is getting sort of a kick out of it.

  Here’s Jennie, absolutely in love with him, her eyes all wide and starry whenever she sees him—and Paul Classified just stands there looking the other way and looking bored. Paul Classified is thinner. He used to have the perfect body. He doesn’t now.

  Catching Paul alone is impossible, he doesn’t do alone.

  But there are only a few days of school left before vacation and I’m really worried about him.

  So I passed him a note in English class. Dear Paul, I heard about the fight and I’m terribly sorry it happened. Listen, I’m not interfering or anything, but do you have anywhere to go on Christmas? I don’t celebrate Christmas myself, but my mother and my little brother and I always go out for Christmas dinner anyhow, to keep from getting lonely on everybody else’s holiday, and we would be happy to have you come with us. Love, Emily.

  He picked up his pen to write an answer but he didn’t.

  All through English class he stared down at my note. Jennie was very aware of the note and who it was from. Paul’s face was different from usual: not closed off (Hillary says he has military security measures for his own face) but sad and open.

  When class ended he drifted in the halls and let me drift up to him. I said, “We’d love to have you, Paul.”

  He said, “Thanks, Emily. It was nice of you to think about me. But my family needs me at home.” He touched me—my cheek—and I looked up at him, but he was already going down the hall full speed. I never really thought about it until now, but I don’t think Paul ever touched anybody before.

  Just now, writing my diary, I realized something about that sentence. He didn’t say his family would celebrate Christmas. Just that they needed him.

  I can’t believe that of all the people in the world, I talked to Ansley Morgan. I don’t even like Ansley. I don’t like her world or her attitudes or her figure. But she apologized to me. She walked right up and said she was sorry about the fight, and that it was her fault and Jared’s, and she would go with me to the principal if I wanted and get it straightened out. She said they had been playing games with my secrets and it was wrong.

  “Yes,” I said, “it was wrong.”

  “My journal for English has turned into a confessional,” said Ansley. “You know what I mostly write down? The things I shouldn’t have done.” She slid her yellow hair out of her eyes and gave me a funny look. “I’ve got a really fat entry for you, Paul.”

  I shrugged. But I didn’t walk away from her. It’s funny. Ansley is honest. What you see is what you get. There aren’t that many people in the world you can say that about. All of a sudden I envied Jared.

  Ansley changed the subject to school sports, and then to weather, and I said suddenly, “You’re the only one who has never quizzed me, Ansley.”

  “Because I will never let anybody quiz me, either,” she said, her eyes sparkling so that for one moment she looked like Jennie. “I’m going to keep my smile and my preppy clothes and my money between me and curiosity. You’ve got a right to your privacy, Paul.”

  I almost fell off my chair at that one. Maybe she didn’t know Jared was following me.

  Then she leaned way forward, really sparkling now, and said in a very teasing voice, “Although there is one thing I’m truly dying to know, Paul.”

  “What’s that?”

  “What does the ‘R.’ stand for?”

  He actually told me. But it was sweet, not horrid. “Revere.” He was named by his real mother—that’s the phrase he used—his “real” mother—for Paul Revere. For the midnight ride of Paul Revere. “She was a real mother,” he said. “She wanted her son to have a midnight ride of his own. Cure cancer or bring peace in the Middle East or discover a nuclear deterrent.”

  His mother is dead, I thought, absolutely shaken. It’s grief and despair keeping him so solita
ry and so hidden. And to think we’ve teased him about all this when he just buried his own mother! I said quickly, “I’m sure you’ll do one of those things, Paul.”

  He laughed, choking on his own laugh, and looked away from me, and then I realized it’s not his mother who’s the problem—it’s him! He’s got leukemia or something and he won’t do something immortal because he won’t have time! I grabbed his arm and I said, “Paul, you’re not sick, are you? You aren’t dying or something, are you? You’re all right, aren’t you?”

  He gave me a sweet smile, and said, “No, thanks, Ansley. I’m fine.”

  Of course now I really do want Jared to follow him everywhere and find out what’s going on. Has somebody died? Is somebody dying? What is the midnight ride of this particular Paul Revere supposed to be, anyhow?

  O, Ansley Augusta Morgan.

  You are bad, bad, bad.

  And curious, curious, curious.

  And determined, determined, determined.

  All day I have thought about stars: real stars—sky stars.

  I am so lonely I am the reverse of a star: I am a black hole in space.

  In English today I leaned over to Hillary and Emily and whispered, “I just can’t wait for vacation, can you? I can’t wait to go skiing. I heard on the radio they just got seven more inches of snow at Killington.”

  Hill was wearing a new sweatshirt with weird little reindeer running after a disappearing Santa Claus. It was not in Christmas colors, but in yellow and lime green and turquoise. You kept staring at it, wondering whether you loved it or hated it. I remember when the Awesome Threesome did all their shopping together: we were never the same sizes, but we could always exchange tops. Last year I would have said, “Hill! It’s crazy! When do I get to wear it?” This year I didn’t even know what stores she liked. I certainly hadn’t gone with her. Killington, I thought, somehow, some way, we’ll put it back together on the ski slopes.