Vegan Virgin Valentine

  “Aren’t you supposed to be at play practice?”

  As V shook her head, her ponytail swung from side to side. “Canceled because of the blizzard.”

  “What about my parents? Have you heard from them?”

  “They’ve been calling all morning. The Rochester airport is closed, so they’re stuck in New York City. They can’t get a flight out until tomorrow, and they can’t even find an available hotel room.”

  “What are they doing?”

  “Your mom said they were staying with Mike and Phyllis.”

  “Oh … the Shreves.” We see them every few years. My mom and Mike grew up in the same town outside of Boston. Their families were friends and my mom used to baby-sit for Mike when she was a teenager.

  “Your mom said that Aimee and I went to the zoo with their daughter, Virginia, when I was little, but I don’t remember.”

  I didn’t say anything. My throat hurt so badly, I felt like I’d swallowed shattered glass.

  “Can I get you anything?” V asked after a moment. “Juice or water?”

  I shook my head.

  “I guess I’ll let you get back to sleep.”

  V pulled the door closed but didn’t shut it the whole way.

  I must have fallen asleep again because the next time V came into my room, I was having a stress dream. I don’t even remember what it was about, but I could tell I’d been grinding my teeth.

  “I’m sorry to wake you up,” she said. “I told your parents you were sick, and your dad said you should drink echinacea tea, so I made you a cup of it.” V set a mug on the coaster on my bedside table. “I didn’t put honey in because I wasn’t sure if vegans eat honey.”

  “Thanks,” I said. I was surprised she knew about that, how some vegans think eating honey is exploiting bees’ labor. I don’t happen to be one of those vegans, but I appreciated the gesture.

  V chewed her thumbnail. “I thought you’d like to know that I fixed the smoke detector. I even tested it with a match and it still works.”

  I wasn’t sure what to say. I pulled my blanket up to my shoulders.

  V glanced around my room. “Mara?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry for what I said last night … the whole domestic-violence thing. Sometimes I have a big mouth. It was a dumb thing to say.”

  “You were just joking. Sometimes I can get too sensitive.” I paused before saying, “I’m sorry I shoved you.”

  “I’m sorry I shoved you, too.”

  I felt choked up. V had this pinched look on her face, like she was going to cry. She started out of my room. As she reached the doorway, I said, “V?”

  She turned around. “Yeah?”

  “Thanks again for the tea.”

  “No problem.”

  I dozed for the rest of the day. A few times I got up to pee or eat applesauce, but all I wanted to do was crawl back into bed.

  In the early evening, I was propped up with some pillows reading High Fidelity when the phone rang. A moment later, V peeked into my room.

  “It’s James from Common Grounds,” she said. “Do you want to pick up?”

  My stomach lurched. I’d been trying not to think about what had happened with James, but when V said his name, I wanted to hide under my covers and never come out.

  “No,” I said quietly. “Tell him I can’t talk. Tell him I’m sleeping.”

  I was sick for most of the week. We had a snow day on Monday, so I didn’t miss school. When my parents got home from the airport that afternoon, they made me drink two cups of echinacea tea and take about a gazillion milligrams of vitamin C. Even so, I felt like hell on Tuesday, so my dad drove V over to the high school. My mom called the main office and asked Rosemary to tell my teachers to send my assignments home with V.

  I slept on and off all day, waking only to blow my nose. When V got home, she dropped off a pile of homework on my desk, but I didn’t even look at it. My head was drowning in so much mucus, I could barely think.

  By Wednesday, I still felt crappy, but I got up to e-mail the teacher who coordinates tutoring sixth graders and told him I wouldn’t be able to make it. Then I sent an e-mail to my statistics professor at the college and explained why I missed class yesterday and said I would probably miss again tomorrow. I knew I should e-mail Dr. Hendrick. I had now missed three dance classes in a row, not counting the one I had bolted out of, but I just didn’t want to deal with it.

  I was about to get up from my desk when an IM from TravisRox188 appeared on my screen.

  Haven’t seen u in a few days, he wrote. R u sick?

  Yep.

  Excellent. Now I’ll be able to catch my GPA back up w / yours. Ha-ha-ha-ha.

  U r a merciless jerk, I wrote back to him.

  Thanx 4 the compliment. Get better … but not 2 soon. ;)

  I didn’t even write back. Instead, I blew my nose and sipped some water and flipped through the assignments that V had brought home for me. If Travis thinks he’ll catch up with me that easily, he’s got another thing coming. I stayed at my desk for two hours and even read a chapter ahead in my government textbook, until finally I collapsed in an exhausted heap on my bed.

  On Thursday morning, I finished High Fidelity and wanted to call James to tell him how much I loved it. But I couldn’t. I still hadn’t talked to him since Saturday night. I’d been scheduled to work a few shifts throughout the week, but on Monday I’d left a message on the voice mail at Common Grounds saying I’d be out sick indefinitely. I left it early in the morning, when I knew no one would be there. Not James. Definitely not Claudia.

  James had left two messages on my cell phone. I had seen both of them come in on caller ID, so I didn’t pick up. Of course, I listened to the messages as soon as he left them. They were brief, just asking if I was feeling better and saying to please call him at home if I wanted to talk.

  No, I did not want to talk. Could not talk. Didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t even sure I could ever see him again. The temptation might be too strong. And the guilt would definitely be too overwhelming.

  I wouldn’t allow myself to think any good thoughts about James. Whenever he came into my mind, which was a lot, I’d tell myself that James is Hands-off. Private Property. No Trespassing. I’d remind myself that James is twenty-two. That he was a café owner when I was in ninth grade. I’d think about how James didn’t even go to college. How James lived in Brockport. How all I wanted to do right now was fast-forward out of this town, not make new connections here.

  But when I fell asleep, the good thoughts wended their way in. I’d dream about James’s laugh and the feel of his lips. I’d dream about his shoulders and the shape of his fingernails and the way his butt fit into his worn jeans. One time, I even dreamed about touching my finger inside that hole in his jeans.

  I woke up from that dream with my heart racing so fast I couldn’t fall back asleep for over an hour.

  In my dreams, I’d also expanded my cheese repertoire. On a nightly basis, I was dreaming about the mozzarella sticks they serve at Friendly’s. I was dreaming about greasily delicious Pizza Hut pizzas with green peppers and olives on top. I was dreaming about quesadillas smothered in guacamole.

  In the morning, I would tell myself I couldn’t go on this way, that something had to give. I would tell myself that I’d made choices in my life, good choices, and now I had to live with them. I told myself these things so many times throughout the day, I almost believed it.

  But then, every night, the dreams came back.

  Chapter Twelve

  Sometime before dawn on Friday, I reached over to my bedside table for a tissue and got that weightless yank that comes with the last one. I’d been so congested all week, I’d gone through an entire box. I blew my nose, but as I dropped the tissue in the trash basket next to my bed, I sneezed again. So I pushed back my covers and headed to the laundry room to get a new box.

  As I was walking back to bed, I paused in front of the dining-room window. The grayish l
ight was just burning through the night sky. The snowdrifts that had been plowed to either side of our driveway were still shadowy and dark. The birds hadn’t yet arrived at our feeder for their morning seedfest. But looking out the window, there was this sense that everything was about to happen.

  A random thought drifted into my mind. So maybe I am repressed. Maybe I hold the reins too tightly and don’t know how to let loose. But I can’t imagine it’s a terminal condition. With the right person, maybe I could learn to give up some control.

  There’s no way it could have happened with Travis, who prodded and coaxed me until being with him was more of a battle of the wills than anything intimate or romantic. And it’s not going to happen in Dr. Hendrick’s dance class, where he badgers me to let loose, forces me to be someone I’m not. Because the bottom line is that I don’t want to be a gazelle or an apple dangling off a tree or whatever other idiotic things he thinks will bring out my inner free spirit.

  I sneezed three times in a row and headed back to my room, where I slept until my alarm went off forty-five minutes later.

  Despite my water-faucet nose, I felt better enough to go back to school that day. I made it through all my classes with a mini-pack of Kleenex on my desk. After fourth period, I headed to my locker to retrieve my coat and bag. But rather than going straight to my car, I paid a quick visit to my guidance counselor.

  Her name is Roberta Kerr, but among seniors she’s the Gateway to College. She’s the one who helps compile your transcripts and test scores and recommendation letters for college applications. She’s the one who will put in a call to the Office of Admissions at your top choice if she thinks you’re an extra-special candidate. It’s crucially important to be on Ms. Kerr’s VIP list. Thankfully, I am.

  We small-talked for a minute and then Ms. Kerr said, “So what’s up?”

  “I’m going to drop the improv dance class I’m taking through 3-1-3. I just wanted to make sure it won’t affect my final GPA or show up on my college transcripts.”

  “Mara, I’m surprised to hear you say this. What’s wrong with the class?”

  I shook my head. “I just don’t like it.”

  Ms. Kerr rotated her chair around to the wall of filing cabinets. She pulled out my folder and thumbed through the contents until she came to SUNY Brockport letterhead.

  “It’s too late in the semester to switch to another class,” she said after scanning the paper. “You have enough credits to graduate, so it’ll be no problem there. And if you officially drop the class, it won’t show up on any transcripts. But the problem is that since you’ll only be taking one college class this semester and you took two last semester, you’ll just have three college classes when you go to Yale. As you know, the goal of 3-1-3 is to have taken four.”

  “I’ll be taking two more courses at Johns Hopkins this summer,” I said. “Remember that precollege program I applied for?”

  “Oh, yes.” Ms. Kerr quickly flipped through more pages of my file. “Yes, of course.”

  “So that means I’ll enter Yale with five college courses.”

  Ms. Kerr pressed her lips together. “Are you sure about this? When we admit people to the 3-1-3 program, they are representatives of Brockport High School. Anything they do reflects on us, so therefore we do not encourage or condone dropping a class.” She paused before adding, “Even if you don’t like it.”

  How could she say this to me? I have been a freaking ambassador for this high school for nearly four years! At Model UN, yearbook conventions, leadership conferences. I raised the mean SAT score for my class by several points. I got into Yale, which not only reflects positively on the high school but on her job as well. How is it that I can perform with flying colors a thousand times, but then I stumble once and I’m vacuumed off the red carpet?

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m sure about this.”

  “I assume you’ve discussed this with your parents?”

  No, I had not discussed this with my parents. If I had, they would have talked me out of it for sure.

  “Yes … they said it’s okay.”

  “Well, then.” Ms. Kerr cast a disappointed look at me. “If you’re certain about this, I’ll send an e-mail over to the college registrar and let them know you’re dropping.”

  After I left her office, I stopped in the bathroom across the hall. My nose had gotten so clogged I needed to give it an all-out honking blow. As I was throwing a wad of tissues into the trash, I saw those square black letters:

  V VALENTINE IS AN STD! THAT MEANS SLUTTY TRAMPY DEGENERATE!!!

  I’d actually seen this one before. It had appeared that first week the graffiti showed up and, according to Ash Robinson, it was hands down the cruelest. I remember being amused that whoever wrote it was smart enough to spell degenerate correctly. But now it hit me how awful it was that someone trashed V all over the bathroom walls. Sure, she got off to a less-than-savory start, but why couldn’t people cut her a little slack?

  I headed up to my locker, where I rummaged through my pen basket until I found the permanent marker that I used for making the sign above the candygram table. I walked back to the bathroom and quickly scribbled over the graffiti until I couldn’t read a single word. Then I dashed down to the basement bathroom and up to the second-floor bathroom and into every other bathroom that Ash had told me about, scribbling and scribbling until there was nothing left but long black rectangles and smudges of ink all over my fingers.

  My mom came into my room on Sunday afternoon. “How about a drive to Letchworth?”

  “Letchworth?” I asked.

  That’s this state park about forty miles south of Brockport. They call it the Grand Canyon of the East because it’s a dramatically deep gorge with gushing waterfalls. We usually go hiking there in the fall when the foliage is blazing.

  My mom nodded. “I thought it would be nice to get out of the house for a while. It’s sunny, the roads are clear, and I’ve finished my work.”

  I hadn’t been doing much, just going through my CDs and weeding out the ones I never listen to anymore. My mom had been working on a fundraising letter in her room, and my dad and V had just left for Rochester, where V had a marathon five-hour SAT review course.

  “Okay,” I said. “Why not?”

  Twenty minutes later, we were heading south on Route 19. My sniffle was considerably better, but I’d stuffed several tissues in my coat pocket. My mom put some music on. I stared out my window as the flat landscape gave way to more and more hills. It was early March, a few weeks before the start of spring, but the trees were still skeletally bare and the corn fields were blanketed with snow.

  We’d been driving for about thirty minutes when my mom turned the volume down. “You’ve been quiet,” she said. “Anything on your mind?”

  “Not really.”

  “Can you believe you have less than six months until Yale?”

  I shook my head.

  “We should plan a trip to the mall soon, get some sheets and towels for your dorm room. You’ll need them this summer, too, in Baltimore.”

  I shrugged. I didn’t feel like talking about college or summer academic plans, even though it’s the number-one way my parents and I relate.

  “Have you figured out what courses you’re registering for at Johns Hopkins?” my mom asked. “I was flipping through the catalog the other night and everything looks so fascinating.”

  I shook my head again. When I first got accepted, I’d read the course catalog from cover to cover and dog-eared pages about international affairs and neuroscience and bioethics, but I hadn’t picked it up for several weeks.

  “It’s so amazing to think that between SUNY Brockport and Johns Hopkins, you’ll have six college classes under your belt by the time you get to Yale. And then factor in your AP classes. I hope they accept all the credits and advance you to second-year status.”

  I got this anxious feeling in my stomach. I still hadn’t told my parents about dropping improv dance. I’d been planning to deton
ate the bomb all weekend, but every time I came close, I thoroughly chickened out.

  “Are you sure there’s nothing on your mind?” my mom asked.

  I shrugged again and looked out my window.

  We didn’t say much for the rest of the drive. I continued staring at the snowy fields and the blink-and-they’re-gone towns along Route 19. We finally reached Letchworth and drove along the main road until we got to the parking lot where we usually start our hikes.

  We pulled our hats down over our ears and our scarves up over our noses and started toward the trailhead. But thirty steps later, a stinging wind blasted across the parking lot. We grabbed each other’s hands and mad-dashed back to the car, careful not to slip on any ice.

  My mom turned up the heat and we pressed our fingers in front of the vents. As we were warming up, we got kind of giddy. It all began when we joked about what my dad would do if the state troopers called him to say we’d been discovered, frozen solid, in a Letchworth parking lot. Of all my dad’s paranoid fears about harm that could be brought upon his family, Parking Lot Danger ranks near the top. He’s constantly reminding us to watch out for drivers who zigzag across empty spaces and runaway shopping carts and, of course, predators who hide behind parked cars.

  We were still laughing when my mom gasped, “Oh my God!”

  “What?”

  She pointed her finger across the nearly empty parking lot, where a silver SUV was two rows up and three spaces over. I stared at it for a second before noticing that prominently displayed on the bumper was a sticker that proclaimed MY CHILD BEAT UP YOUR HONOR STUDENT. It was in the exact same colors and font as the bumper sticker on my mom’s car, which of course says MY CHILD IS AN HONOR STUDENT.

  I cracked up. “Do you think I’m in imminent danger?”

  “If we see them, I’ll take off. Let’s just hope they don’t notice the Yale sticker on the way out!”

  Neither of us said anything for a moment. I blew my nose and then glanced at my mom. “Remember before, when you were talking about college classes?”