Forever for a Year(7)

Maybe that’s why I was obsessing about him. Which was so against my rules to NEVER OBSESS ABOUT BOYS and so unlike me. But, see, he was new, you know? He didn’t know anyone from eighth grade. He didn’t know that all the boys didn’t like me or talk to me. He didn’t know there was, like, this secret rule that you couldn’t like Carolina Fisher.

But I totally messed that up.

Which was fine. Yes, Carolina, it’s fine. It’s better this way. School. Soccer. Peggy. No distractions. I was fine. It was fine. Everything was amazing. Always. Definitely.





4

Trevor follows orders

“What up, Trev,” my cousin Henry said as I sat next to him and some other freshman football players at lunch. Henry is my uncle Hank’s son. He’s a year younger and always looked up to me when we were kids, even though we’d only see each other once a year. But now we were in the same grade. At his school. Where he knew everyone. Was friends with everyone. And I was this new, strange kid who everyone probably labeled as the boy with the mom who tried to kill herself. My dad said Henry promised his parents he wouldn’t tell anyone, but who knows. You know? The two times I had seen Henry since we’d moved to Riverbend, he’d acted strange. Like I didn’t really belong there. Which I didn’t. I don’t belong anywhere.

Henry turned to his friends and said, “Guys, this is my cousin Trevor. But his last name is Santos, not McCarthy. My dad and his mom are brother and sister. So that’s why his last name is Mexican and not American.” What Henry said was true. I still wanted to beat his face in. In Los Angeles, I was half white and nobody cared. Here, I’d be half Mexican and everyone would care even if they pretended they didn’t. What nobody knew unless they met my dad was that he acts whiter than most white people. His name is Robert Santos. He was born Roberto but dropped the “o.” He’s a sellout like that.

“So why aren’t you on the team? Are you not a good athlete like Henry?” one of the kids asked.

“I’m okay,” I said. Truth was, I was better. Henry knew it but just sat silently. “My dad said he might call the coach and see if I can play even though you started practice already.” Why was I saying crap I didn’t want to say?

“No way Coach Pollina would go for that, Trev. First game is Friday. Sorry,” Henry said, not looking at me.

“No worries.” Whatever. I wished this day was over. Just wanted to go home and sleep.

“Have any hot girls in your classes?” another kid asked. His name was Jake. He was over six feet tall. Maybe six feet wide too. But baby-faced like a fifth grader.

“Yeah, I suppose,” I said back.

“You like one already?” Jake said. “Who? Who? Who? Tell us and we’ll let you know if it’s okay.”

Don’t say anything, Trevor. But I couldn’t listen to my own self. I suck. “She’s brunette. Really pretty.”

“What’s her name?” Jake asked. Now all twelve freshman football players were looking at me.

“I don’t know her name. She’s cool.” Though she ignored me in history. Probably knows how beautiful she is and doesn’t want to be nice to every guy who tries to talk to her. Girls are always playing games like that.

“What class do you have with her?”

“Why’s it matter?” I asked.

“Because how else are we supposed to know who she is?”

“Biology and history, but that probably won’t help—”

“Carrie Fisher,” another kid said. He was wearing a white hoodie, and I think people called him Licker. He was in my history class. Figured that out too late. He added, “I heard she wants to be called Carolina now.”

“The Princess!” Jake screeched, cackling like some gremlin jumping in gold coins.

“Carrie Fisher’s a loser, Trev,” Henry said. Matter-of-fact. “You can’t like her.”

“Oh. Okay,” I said. Just accepting Henry’s order as if he were my goddamn lord and master. What was my problem? This was my idiot younger cousin who used to throw crybaby hissy fits when his parents put vegetables on his plate at Thanksgiving. This was why I hated school! Makes you think crap matters when it doesn’t! Makes you listen to idiots! Makes you act like someone you aren’t! Get me out of here!

But I didn’t say anything. I didn’t go anywhere. Just sat there nodding, or maybe I didn’t move at all. My brain was turning dark. Hot. Ready to explode and blow up the entire school. But my body must have been still. So still. I must have seemed so calm. Nobody can tell anything about anyone. We are all a big mystery to one another.

Jake kept saying stuff like, “He thought the Princess was cute! She’s so ugly! So ugly!”

Then another kid said, “Carrie and Peggy Darry are lesbians. Everyone knows that.”

So Licker added, “Yeah, I know a girl who saw them making out in the bathroom last year.”

Jake felt it was a good time to say, “Has anyone seen Peggy Darry this year? Her tits got huge!” And the whole table leaned in and smirked, whispering just how huge.

Henry then said, “I might pretend to like Peggy just so I can feel her up.”

And that’s when I decided I hated my little cousin. But I didn’t say anything. Because he was the only person I knew at this crappy new school in this crappy new town. Him and Carolina Fisher. But I didn’t really know her. Just that she was cool to me. But not cool enough for me.