Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls(25)

It is important to this story to know that Beth is beautiful. Beth is Latina, whip-smart, a salsa dancer, the first poet you’ve ever met. But most important, she is beautiful. She is almost one full year older, the oldest of the seventh graders, while you are the youngest. She has always been kind to you and Clarissa, and you’re both as jealous as you are grateful. Beth has friends, admiring teachers, and parents. Most of all, she has boys. You and Clarissa watch it happen in the hallways at school—a boy’s arms wrapped around her, his little metal mouth going in for a kiss. I put lotion on as soon as I get out of the shower, Beth says. In every place. The best way in is smelling good. The next day, you and Clarissa go to the mall and buy the same Juniper Breeze lotion as Beth. You smudge it on your wrists, rub it through your hair to grease down the flyaways; you slick it between your legs even though it stings there. One weekend, Beth offers to do your makeup like her own. You and Clarissa sit still as figurines while Beth paints on the glitter powders, the goopy gloss. She traces black lines around your eyes and inside the rims of your eyelids. You can tell she cares, that she wants you to feel more sophisticated, older. When she is this close to your face, you almost kiss her.

Chad does instant message you. Every night, in fact, like clockwork.

Hey Cherry Top, he says, because seventh grade is the grade you dyed your hair Mars red, to offset the braces.

Hey you is what you always say. You sounds adult, closer than friends.

I think ur so cute, he says. The first thing I noticed about you was ur red hair. Very punk! I luv it.

Cute? ROFLMAO. Look who’s talking lol, you say.

You gnaw at your cuticles and wait for him to respond, for the bloop sound of his messages.

You have abandoned all your other chatroom boyfriends. Ashley Flowers is DEAD, you tell the men. This is her mother speaking and she is gone! My sadness is uncontrollable! I can’t bear it!

She was murdered, she had leukemia but didn’t want to tell you, she slipped on a ski slope in Lake Tahoe—such a tragic vacation! It changes every day. You and Clarissa receive wonderful e-mails from Ashley’s suitors—how much she meant to them, how she was the bright light of their days, how they’ve written ballads in her honor, how they would each marry her, they would. Clarissa takes on the role of Ashley’s grieving best friend so she can continue chatting with those who show the most sensitivity.

But you don’t need any of them anymore. All you need is Chad, a person in the real world, a real man who drives a real car. Chad, who knows what you look like, who noticed you, who even knows your school schedule and where you take your study hall. You and Chad chat all night about your favorite movies and Bill Clinton and the science teacher you’ve both had. I think she might be an actual LESBO, you say, and he agrees, SUCH a dyke LOL.

I think U might be the only person to understand me, you say.

Same here! says Chad.

Why aren’t we real friends @ school then? U dun even say hi.

People would judge lol. They wouldn’t understand us.

I guess.

Baby just consider us special friends, he says. Our own little secret.

Baby. You repeat the word aloud to yourself, read and reread it on your screen to be sure. Your heart thumps between your legs. Baby.

Secrets can b the most fun, he says.



Fifteen years later, you are twenty-seven years old, and your father has just died. You’re in an isolated artist colony in New Hampshire in the frozen snap of winter, here to finish another project you have failed to finish, and you sob yourself to sleep every night thinking about how much you miss your father—his big sweeping arms, your smallness. You go so long without talking to other people that you begin having conversations with a rocking chair, convinced the chair is haunted by your father. He rocks it sometimes, on his own, and you try to decipher the code. While browsing through old e-mails one night, you find a message in your spam box.

It’s Chad.

It’s dated one year ago, almost to the day.

It says, I need you to forgive me for the things that have happened. It is my one wish.

You recognize this message. You have received similar messages from him over the years—delete, block, vomit, repeat. Each time you block one, Chad creates a new account and name, sends another.

You have never once considered responding to his pleas. The few people you have ever told have said, Don’t. Don’t you dare. Forget you ever saw that. It is satisfying to delete his words, to watch them disappear, but here’s the thing: you can’t forget you ever saw that.

Now, though, you are the saddest you have ever been in your life. Your father is dead. Your mother is off the wagon again. You can’t finish anything. Just last week, your childhood house burned down with everything in it. You wonder when the world will stop hurting you.

You respond.



Chad is my boyfriend, Beth tells you on the phone. I didn’t want to tell you, because I didn’t want your hopes and dreams to be, like, totally crushed. I liked that you liked that he liked you, she says. It was cute.

But Chad is my secret boyfriend, and it’s serious, she says. Maybe even love, she says.

She says, You need to move on.

Clarissa can’t believe it. You’re sitting in the school locker room, straddling a bench, snapping Bubblicious gum. Yesterday, you decided to dye your hair back to black, your natural color. You want to look sad all the time, and you think this will help. Your ears are stained gray from the dripping chemicals.