Regina,
I know this is a shot in the dark, but I really don’t think it’s that much of a shot in the dark, because we seemed to really click and I think you’re cool. I don’t care about being Anna’s friend. Really, I don’t. But I’d like to stay yours. I know she doesn’t want you to talk to me, but hear me out: Can you talk to her for me? I can’t figure out what I did. So if you could find out and let me know how to fix it, that’d be great. If you could put in a good word for me, that’d be even better. I really want to sort this out before it gets really bad, and I really want to stay friends with you. Let me know.
Liz
I have this memory of Liz. We froze her out, sabotaged her, finished up the rumor campaign, and she had no reputation and no friends, and Anna was bored with it, uninspired, but she wasn’t done, because she wanted to make sure I got the message.
So this one day, Anna got Bruce to play keep-away with Liz’s books. Everyone stopped to watch. It wasn’t a big deal. Nelson intervened really quickly, and the crowd dissipated, but Liz just stood there and looked so lost, like she didn’t want to be there anymore. I imagine her sitting on her bed, in her bedroom with a bottle of pills.
I look at the note too long, running my fingers over the old stale dried ink.
Josh and Anna flit by my locker. Laughing and talking .
It’s weird hearing their voices, animated, playing off each other—a scarily vibrant conversation. At first I think I’m dreaming, but I turn in time to see them walking down the hall side by side. Anna tosses her hair over her shoulder. She’s flirting with him and he’s flirting back. How could he resist a Siren? How could anyone? Anna doesn’t like being single for lengthy periods at a time. She likes being taken and unattainable. Josh was probably in her sights as soon as he dumped me.
They’re totally perfect for each other.
But in math class, I start thinking about it, and it’s not okay. In ten days, I have not held his hand in the hall. He hasn’t waited for me at my locker between classes. He hasn’t given me a kiss on the cheek when the bell separates us. I carve myself out of all these memories and put Anna in my place, and my chest aches, not because I’m romantic or sentimental—I hate Josh—but because these were things that belonged to me and now they don’t belong to me anymore.
When the bell rings, I’m cemented to my seat by this thought. The room empties, and Brenner looks up from his papers.
“Don’t you have a class to be in, Afton?”
I do, but I skip it for the library. I can’t wait until my parents see my report card for this term, but I wouldn’t trade that moment for this one, in the library, where it’s nice and quiet. I move in and out of shelves, trying to act normal, like this isn’t, me hiding, but it’s always, always me hiding. I really want to sort this out before it gets really bad, and I really want to stay friends with you. This is the only reason I miss Anna: She used to tell me it was okay, no matter what. “Don’t you have a class to be in?”
That’s not Brenner’s voice. That’s not any teacher. I turn. Michael’s at the computer terminal. I hesitate before edging over. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think he looked happy to see me.
“Don’t you?” I ask.
“Free period,” he says. He gestures to the computer beside him, and I sit down. He’s got a game of solitaire drawn up. I don’t know what to do. I watch him shift red cards onto black and black cards onto red before I turn to my monitor, sign in with my user name, and connect to the Internet. I type the IH8RA URL into the address bar and watch the page load slowly on the school’s crappy connection. The red background comes up first, and next, that horrible picture of me. The members and comment count have both jumped, and I think I’m sitting next to the only person in this school who hasn’t joined up.
“Report abuse,” Michael says, startling me.
I shake my head. He puts his hand over mine and guides my mouse to the Report Abuse link. The cursor hovers over the bold lettering, but I can’t bring myself to click it. His index finger presses down on mine slightly, and the weight of his hand against my hand is so strange. He’s waiting for me to give him the go-ahead.
“Don’t,” I breathe, and his hand comes off mine. He stares at me like I’m an idiot. “Anna would love it if I reported it. If I do, they’ll just bring out something worse.”
He nods at the screen. “Nice picture.”
“Yeah, tell me about it.”
“Were you stoned?”
I close the browser. “I was half asleep.”
He studies me and then turns back to his game. After a few minutes, he’s in total solitaire mode. It’s just him and these pixelated cards on-screen and nothing else. This must be how he spends all of his free periods. He must sit in front of the computer and play games that only require one player. His face is intent. It’s like I’m not here.
I turn back to the computer and then, impulsively, Google his name. The seventh result is an obituary. I click it.
HAYDEN, NATALIE JUNE
Suddenly on September 30th. Natalie Hayden (nee Adams) of Hallowell, Connecticut, in her 41st year…
It’s like looking at porn. I rub the back of my neck and try not to look like I’m looking at porn and read through it, learning more about Michael in a few paragraphs than he’d ever tell me himself. His maternal grandparents are dead, which is something we have in common. He has no aunts or uncles. It’s just him and his dad. I wonder what his dad is like. When I glean all the information I can, I x out of the page and Google the accident. The overpass collapse. It’s morbidly fascinating to find the earliest reports of it—the ones with guesstimated body counts—and click forward from guesses to actual numbers to actual names. Entire families under concrete.
It’s hard to think of Dr. Hayden that way. I can feel Michael next to me, really next to me, and I know I should stop before he sees me, but I can’t.
“Why are you looking at that?” Michael asks. His voice is flat. I make the browser disappear, but it’s too late.
“I don’t know. I was just—” And then I say something really stupid: “My grandparents are dead too.”
“Let’s see what happens when we Google you,” he says. He shuts down the game of solitaire, pulls up Google, and types in my name. The first result is some woman on a high-school-reunion site. The second is the YourSpace page. He smiles. “Funny how the last thing we want the world to see is almost the first thing to show.”
“At least your future employers aren’t going to think you’re a slut.”
I log off the computer for lack of anything better to do, and Michael does the same, and then we just sit there, staring at the blank screens.
“Do you usually do this with your free period? Come in here and play solitaire?”
“Mostly,” Michael says. “Lately, I’ve been writing.”
“That’s right. I haven’t seen you scribbling in the cafeteria lately.”
“Well, there was this hostile alien takeover at my lunch table….”
“I don’t know how you can even bring your journal into this school. If I did, it’d be gone in a second.”
“Nobody’s interested in my secrets,” he reminds me. “They’re afraid of them.”
“Blueprints for murder.” I smile. “The next great school shooting. That’s what people think of you.” Pause. “Because of me.”
“Because of you,” he agrees.
He looks at me. The moment closes in, and I feel so bad about it that I laugh. It’s not funny, but the tension is killing me. I stop laughing, and my whole chest is pins and needles, and I really feel like I’m going to cry or throw up, so I get up and I just leave him there, when what I really want to do is tell him I’m sorry and that I mean it, except it wouldn’t mean anything to him. I don’t know how it could.
“I think he’s into me,” Anna says, and then she raises her voice so
I can hear. “Josh.”
I take the bait. I look up. Postgym. Changing in the changing rooms. I’m sitting on a bench wedged in the corner, glimpsing Anna’s pink push-up bra as she changes into a soft, blush-pink sweater. They’re all in pink today.
Jeanette catches me staring and nudges Marta.
“Dyke,” Jeanette spits in my direction. Anna yanks her shirt down quickly, like I’m sitting here and I really give a damn about her breasts. I zip up my jeans.
“I need to get him like, alone-alone, because we only ever talk at school, right? It doesn’t matter what you say in a building full of people; what you say when you’re alone, that matters.” She straightens her sweater. “But I don’t want to look desperate.”
“You’re chasing after my castoffs,” I say. I shouldn’t, but I can’t resist. “I think it’s already too late.”
“Do you hear something?” Anna asks loudly. “Hey guys, listen to this: Did you know Donnie totally tried to rape Regina?”
They laugh. I grip the edges of the bench, riding out a wave of anger that gives me such a head rush, the room momentarily tilts. They’re laughing.
They think it’s funny.
Kara studies her reflection in the mirror hanging on the wall, a pink sweater clutched in one hand. Spidery, silvery lines snake up the sides of her flat, undefined stomach. Stretch marks.
“We’ll do a group thing,” she murmurs, and her voice sounds tinny, far away. I am glued to the bench in this rage, torn between getting up and leaving or attacking her. I can’t figure out how to move and be this angry. “This weekend, we’ll do some group thing and then, at some point, we’ll disappear. You’ll have him alone.”
“Kara, you’re a fucking genius,” Anna says. “But I can’t wait that long.” She pauses. “Maybe I’ll drive to his place tonight.”