"I don't know what you mean."
"Oh, please. You all act like she's sex personified or something."
"Jealous?" It comes out nastier and colder than I intended, but then again, I'm on the defensive and in hostile, unknown territory.
Kyra isn't fazed by nasty or cold. "As if! You think I want that kind of attention? You think I want brain-dead jocks following me around like horny puppy dogs?" She sniffs and raises her head high as if insulted by the very idea.
I can't help chuckling. "Not much chance of that, is there?"
Her eyes narrow. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Hey, look, I didn't mean—"
"What did you mean?"
"I just meant that even if you did want guys following you around—"
"What? That they wouldn't? You follow me around fine, fanboy."
That bitch! "We're friends. That's different."
"So it's OK to say your friends are ugly?"
OK, I take back the whole bitch thing. Mental do-over. Jeez, I'm screwing up left and right. "I never said you're ugly. You're not ugly." Don't ask me if you're beautiful. Don't ask me if you're beautiful. Because you're not. You're not ugly, but you're not beautiful, and if I call you pretty or cute, I think you'll probably kill me.
She leans back in the chair, considering, watching. I know how gazelles feel on the Serengeti, how the adults felt when they encountered the lions in that Ray Bradbury movie they made us watch in English last year. "You don't think I'm ugly?"
"No. I'm ugly." It's pandering. It's changing the topic. It's also true.
It works. Her gaze softens. "Why do you say that?"
"Well, it's true. I know it's true." And I do. Let's get real: This isn't a new face for me. I've had it my whole life and I have to look at it at least a couple times a day. I see it. I know. No one besides my mom or my grandmother has ever called me handsome. No girl has ever looked at me like she was interested. I'm not stupid. I know what I look like. I try not to think about it, but I know.
"It's not a big deal," I tell her. "It's not like it's my fault or anything. I can't help the way I look."
"You really think you're ugly?"
"'Think' doesn't enter into it. I'm talking objective, empirical truth." I smile to show that it doesn't bother me, my most successful lie to her yet.
"You're not ugly." She says it softly. I can barely hear her, so I pretend that I didn't hear her at all. It's what I do when I don't want to continue the conversation. It's easier to pretend you didn't hear someone. I don't want to talk about it.
But she won't let me off the hook. "Did you hear me? Did you hear what I said?"
God damn it. God damn her. I want out of this conversation. I want it over. How did we get here? "Fine," I tell her. "Fine."
"No one else matters," she reminds me. "If they aren't helping, they're just in the way. You run over everyone else, right?"
"Sure."
"So what about me?"
"What do you mean?"
"Am I ugly?"
It's the closest thing to insecurity that she's shown me since I met her. I want more than anything to tell her that she's the most beautiful creature on the planet, the hottest girl in school. It would be nice to tell her that. But she can always tell when I'm lying.
"You're not ugly." Which is the truth. She's not. She's not Dina, but she's not ugly.
"Then why couldn't I have guys following me around?"
I let out a breath, exasperated. Back to this again? "Oh, come on, Kyra!"
"What?" Tension evaporates as she blesses me with the ring-grin. We're on an even keel again. "Come on, fanboy. Tell me. Tell me how to get my own pack of drooling idiot-boys."
"You know how."
"No, I don't."
"Sure you do."
"Humor me, fanboy. Pretend I've decided to dye my hair blond and wear pink skirts and—"
"It's not that. "
"Then what is it?"
I glare at her in frustration while she just smiles back at me. She loves making me uncomfortable. What am I supposed to tell her?
"Come on. You know. It's ... It's..." I'm getting cold under her watch. She's torturing me. "Come on, Kyra. Guys are ... You know. Guys like ... Come on, Kyra." I'm perilously close to whining. Hell, if whining were a country, I'd be checking my passport right now, just to make sure my entry visa was in order.
She shakes her head in disappointment. "Yeah, I know all about guys. I know what guys like."
I shrug my shoulders triumphantly, if that's possible. "See? That's all." I catch myself before I say, "You just don't stack up in that department," because it's such a terrible, terrible pun. Instead, I say, "Some people are just born ... You know, just born ... fortunate, I guess. Like Cal is bigger than me and better-looking, and Dina just has—" I'm not going to say it. Forget it.
Kyra throws her hands up in the air as if I'm an eager, stupid dog that keeps peeing on the carpet. "Guys ... You guys are stupid about it. I mean, they can be pushed up. Or padded. Or pushed together."
"I know."
"Or fake. "
"I know."
"So what is it about this?" She points at her chest.
I hold back a snicker. Does she really not get it? She's my friend. I can't tell her this, can I? How would I? I mean, do I write a compare-and-contrast essay? Similarities and Differences Between Dina Jurgens and Kyra Sellers. First paragraph: Size matters.
I didn't say a word, but she's looking at me like I did. "You weren't listening. Weren't you listening to me?" She sounds pissed off.
"I was listening."
"They can be—"
"Pushed together. Or up. Yadda, yadda. I know. I got it."
She shakes her head. "No. You don't get it. God. If you can make them look bigger, you can do the opposite, too."
"What? Come on. What the hell does that have to do with this? What are you talking about? Why—"
I break off because she's just shaking her head, not even looking at me, looking down, shaking her head, and I realize that she's unbuttoning her blouse.
Oh. My. God.
Chapter Thirty-Two
THE DOOR IS OPEN. That's all I can think: The door is open. Mom could come back down. She could see. The door is open.
The door is not the only thing open.
Kyra's shirt is open from neck to waist, black cloth parted over a smooth, dead white stretch of skin, interrupted only by the sterile white of her bra. There's almost no contrast: It's white on white. It's nothing like the Victoria's Secret catalog or the stuff on TV, but it's better somehow. Because she's only a couple steps away.
She's still looking down as she undoes the last button. She doesn't look up at me.
"What are you doing?" someone says. An unfamiliar voice. It's mine, I realize. I don't know why I asked. I don't know what answer I want.
She shrugs her shoulders as if to say, "Beats me," but she's really slipping her blouse down her arms, baring flawless, alabaster shoulders with almost painful bones described under the skin. Something's strange. Something's different. Something's not right. It's my artist's eye. Noticing something for the first time. Something...
She looks up at me, holds my gaze, stares unblinking at me. I can't look away from her eyes, but with my peripheral vision I catch her hands moving, then the bra falling away. I swallow hard, like something solid had been caught in my throat until now. I cannot tear my eyes away from her eyes.
Yes, I can. I'm a guy.
So there they are. And this is what was wrong: proportion. The baggy shirts and blouses, her thin frame ... It's all wrong for this. I mean, it's just all wrong. She's ... they're ... Wow. The door's open, but who cares? I'm burning memories into my brain.
"Not everyone flaunts it," she says, as if she's teaching.
"I understand." But I don't know if I do. I find myself taking a step forward. My fingers itch.
She sighs, and the sigh ... Good Lord, the sigh! Who would ever have thought that such a
simple thing, a simple expulsion of air from the lungs, could be such a ... such a magic thing?
I take it back. She's beautiful. She is.
I take a step closer and she blinks; the bra somehow has come back together, squeezing, compressing, concealing. "You don't get to touch," she says.
"I wasn't going to." Honestly, I don't know if that's a lie or not. She knows, but she's not telling.
Nimble fingers button up the blouse, hiding away her skin. I feel woozy all of a sudden, and I realize that I'm uncomfortable down there and I sit on the bed, leaning forward awkwardly, necessarily.
"So, uh, why do you, uh—"
"Cover up the goodies?" She's sarcastic, caustic as she turns to me, all buttoned up again. "Maybe I don't like guys who are drooling idiots. Maybe I don't like guys acting like I'm in heat or something."
"That's not fair. Not all guys are like that."
"Really? You're a pretty smart guy, right? And your IQ dropped about fifty points a minute ago."
"You surprised me." Lame excuse.
"How? Were you surprised that I have tits? I'm a girl, genius. They come with the ovaries and the monthly visits from Aunt Dot."
"No, I knew you had—" Oh, jeez, I almost said it! And "Aunt Dot"? Oh, man!
"Well, then what surprised you? That they're biiiiiig?" She draws it out like we're talking about King Kong or something. She strikes a pose and a part of me can't help noticing that nothing jiggles or moves, and I offer silent admiration to the bra designer who figured that out. "Oh my God!" she screams in a falsetto, pointing to an imaginary horizon. "Look! It's Kyra's tits! They're blocking out the sun! "
"Stop it."
"Now, I know they're not as big as Dina's, though, so I can just imagine what would happen if you saw them. You'd go into cardiac arrest right there."
"Why are you doing this?"
She ignores me, pacing, angry. "All the same. All the same. It's so stupid. They're tits. Don't tell me you've never seen them before. You've been to a goddamn rated R movie. They're all the same. Why is everyone so obsessed? "
"You're the one who's obsessed. God, you're the one who's all, 'Tits this! Tits that!'"
"You looked!"
"You took off your bra!" Jesus, what was I supposed to do! "I didn't ask you to. I don't care."
"Yeah?" She grabs a page of Schemata. "You sure got Courteney looking nice and healthy here."
"So what? It's just a drawing."
"It's not just a drawing!" She stops and comes closer. Too close. A few minutes ago I wanted to be this close, but now it's like I'm being stalked as prey. She leans in. "It's Dina, isn't it?" She's almost whispering now. "Dina, Dina, Dina."
"Shut up." My cheeks flame, burning up. So what? So what if I like Dina? So what?
"I don't take gym, but I still have to go into the locker room, you know." Whispering. Whispering, but loud. "I've seen them."
"Shut up."
"I've seen them, you know. I could describe them to you. Do you want that? Is that what you want?"
No. Yes. No.
"It's not the real thing, but you've got a good imagination, and then you could draw her, or maybe that's in a later scene, maybe that's on a page you haven't shown me yet?"
"No."
"Are you sure? Are you sure there isn't a shower scene in your little love letter to Dina?"
"It's not a love letter. It's a graphic novel. It's literature. "
"I have my camera phone. I can do better than describe them. I can take pictures."
Why? Why is she doing this to me? "Stop it, OK? Just stop it."
"Does it hurt? Does it hurt to be the big bad artist up here"—she taps my head—"and just another one of Dina's lust-puppies down here?" She reaches for it, but I grab her wrist, grab it too hard. I'm a skinny little nothing, but I'm still a guy, and I have more strength than her. She yelps with pain, and I can't let go. My hand won't work. She tugs, grimacing, but I'm like a lobster or something.
"Let go of me!"
"Fine!" My hand springs open and she falls back, arms pin-wheeling. She crashes into my bookcase.
"You're a goddamn freak!" she yells.
"I'm a freak? I'm a freak? You're the one who flashed me! You're the one who offered to take pictures in the locker room!"
"Oh, please! Don't be such a prude! You've been checking me out every chance you get. You like to pretend you're different, but you're just like the rest of them."
"I am not! I am not like those guys! I'm—"
"What, an artist? "
I'm stumbling over my own words. I'm incoherent with anger and confusion. I don't know how I got here. I don't think she knows, either. "At least I know what I am! At least I'm doing something!"
"Oh, yeah, you're doing something. Comic book wannabe."
"Ha! Wannabe? You want to talk about that? You're a freakin' Goth wannabe. You're a Neil Gaiman wannabe. You're a suicide wannabe."
She freezes. Freezes like death. But I can't stop. I just can't. It's like she stabbed me in the heart and instead of gushing blood, I'm gushing every awful thing I can imagine.
"You and your scars. Please! You don't kill yourself like this!" I gesture, holding a wrist turned up to the ceiling, then pretending to cut across it with my other hand. "That's just a cry for help. That's just attention. Everybody knows that.
Cutting across just gets you to the hospital. That's just from movies and TV shows and stuff like that. You didn't really try to kill yourself. You just wanted attention, but you screwed up. Try harder next time."
The room goes loud with silence. Neither of us talking. Our chests both heaving, but no sound of breath. Did I really just say that? Did I?
"Go to hell," she says. She doesn't say it loud. Or with anger. Or with venom. She says it with exhaustion. And she walks out of the room and up the stairs and out the front door.
A minute later, Mom's standing in my bedroom door, her hair wet. She must have been in the shower.
"What happened?" she asks. "I heard voices. Did you guys have a fight?"
I look around the room. Nothing's really changed, but somehow nothing's the same.
"What happened?" she asks again.
"I don't know," I tell her. And I don't. I really don't. "She got pi—uh, angry about something and left."
Mom fixes me with her tell-me-the-truth look, the one that hasn't worked since fifth grade. "Did you say something? Did you do something?"
"No, Mom! Jeez!" I drop onto the bed and stare at my feet. "Everything was going fine." Kyra's naked torso has burned itself into my brain—I think I can still see it, like an afterimage of a camera flash. "Everything was fine. I think she hates me now."
She joins me on the bed, whuff!-ing as the springs groan at the preggo-weight. She puts an arm around me and makes me lean my head on her shoulder, even though I don't really want to. Her boobs are too big because she's pregnant and it's really weird being close to them.
"I don't know what to tell you," she says, taking on that tone that proclaims her adulthood and her superior wisdom. "But, you know, someone told me once that the opposite of love isn't hate. It's indifference."
"I don't get it." Never mind that love isn't an issue here.
"It just means that if someone hates you, they still have feelings for you. If they really didn't care about you, they'd just forget about you. They wouldn't even waste the time hating you."
Sort of like Mom hating Dad? I think about that for a second—is there a chance? Does she even realize what she's saying?
"I don't know, Mom. Doesn't make much sense to me."
"Well, what can I tell you. Women are complicated."
"Yeah. Hormones." Heard it on a sitcom once.
It doesn't get me a laugh. She just sighs, hugs me tighter, and says, "No. Men."
Chapter Thirty-Three
ONCE THE STEP-FASCIST COMES HOME, Mom disappears upstairs, leaving me in my room, where I indulge in some shocked crying for a little while. Crying is fine, as long as y
ou're alone. It's not a big deal. I do it all the time. poor me.
I shake it off after a little while.
"Other people are just ... there." That's what Kyra said before. "If they aren't helping, they're just in the way. Weave around them, knock them over, do whatever you have to, but get past them. "
Good advice. Best advice I've ever heard. I figure it applies to her, too.
I work into what I once heard described as "the small hours," fixing pages, photoshopping, counting away the moments of my life on computer progress bars that go way too slow. I don't even bother with the Internet, except for a quick log on to check that Bendis is still appearing in a couple of days. All's well on that front. I don't even know the guy, but he hasn't let me down yet.
After midnight, I remember my homework and spend a couple of hours on genotypes and phenotypes, the Middle East, and Poe. I occasionally tap my fingers on the hard drive case for good luck and comfort, but I don't open it. No need. It's right there.
Before my eyes blur to complete uselessness, just before I shut down, I make myself send an e-mail to Kyra. I barely type "I'm sorry" before I have to crawl into bed. I'm not even sure what I'm sorry about. I'm not even sure if I am sorry. But I send the e-mail anyway.
Just to make things perfect, I get an e-mail from eBay, telling me I was outbid on the Giant-Size X-Men #1.
Chapter Thirty-Four
I'M ALONE. NOT LITERALLY, in that there are people around me, but for all intents and purposes, I'm alone. Cal's nowhere to be found and when I see Kyra in the hall, she looks away.
Wednesday. The word comes from "Woden's day." A day to honor the Norse god of wisdom and battle and stuff like that. The Norse always managed to mix violence up with their wisdom. Gaiman's book American Gods is actually all about Woden, which makes me start thinking about Kyra, which just pisses me off all over again.
I thought life at South Brook High was hell before. I was wrong. This is hell. No one to talk to. No one to look at. No one at all. I don't even have my bullet with me. I was up so late that I only woke up when Mom pounded on the door with just minutes to spare until the bus arrived. I never had a chance to grab it from the hard drive case.