My Best Friend's Exorcism(46)

“You’re evil,” Glee said.

And hung up.





Total Eclipse of the Heart


Spirit Week was the school’s annual festival of misrule.

Faculty hated it because they got through less material in class, the administration hated it because handbook violations increased, parents hated it because it threw carpool schedules out of whack—but Spirit Week was impossible to stop. It was Christmas in October. It was the carnival of chaos.

It was the worst week of Abby’s life.

Monday was Twins Day. Last year, Abby and Gretchen showed up in matching outfits. This year Glee and Margaret were dressed alike and they refused to speak to Abby when she tried to apologize. Gretchen didn’t show up at all.

Tuesday was Dress-Down Day, when everyone wore jeans and attended the Battle of the Bands at lunch. Last year, Abby and Gretchen had sat on the Lawn and watched Parish Helms play, bending over his bass, the sun burning his blond hair white. This year, Gretchen wasn’t in school and Abby was wandering through the auditorium garden, looking for a place to have lunch, when a carton of milk exploded on the sidewalk at her feet. She looked up. Standing in front of her was Wallace Stoney, wearing his football jersey, face blank, breathing hard through his nose.

“You want to get stomped?” Wallace asked.

Abby looked around to see if anyone was nearby, but everyone was on the other side of the Lawn watching a Wallace-less Dukes of Neon play “Brown-Eyed Girl.” She looked back at Wallace. His pupils were pinpricks, his nostrils were flaring.

She tried to walk around him. Wallace blocked her way.

“You think I would piss on Gretchen Lang if she was on fire?” he asked. “You think I’d stick my dick in that cooze if she begged me?”

Abby held very, very still. When she spoke, she chose her words carefully.

“I don’t think anything, Wallace,” she said, making sure to keep her eyes down.

Because she wasn’t watching, she didn’t see his hand swing until it was too late. He didn’t hit her hard, but it took her by surprise and she stumbled to one side, dropping her books.

“No one spreads lies about me, bitch,” he said, stepping up close.

Abby flinched and Wallace smiled, then he shoulder-checked her and walked away.

Abby needed to speak to Gretchen so bad. It wasn’t just Wallace, it was everything. All the pent-up things she had to say clouded her brain, made her drunk, slowed her thinking, thickened her tongue. She said them to herself when she drove home from school, she tried to write them down, she told them to Geoffrey the Giraffe. Finally her fingers picked up the phone and dialed Gretchen’s number by themselves.

“Hello?” Mr. Lang said. “Hello?”

Abby slammed down the receiver. It buzzed beneath her hand.

“Hi, I’m Mickey!” the phone said. “Hi, I’m Mickey!”

Slowly, Abby lifted the receiver.

“Abby,” Mr. Lang said, “if you call our house one more time, I’m telephoning the police. You are not wanted here.”

That night, she snuck out her window and drove to the Old Village and parked at Alhambra Hall. She walked the block down Middle Street to Pierates Cruze, and in the darkness she stood beneath Gretchen’s bedroom window and threw rocks at the glass. They were tiny, but the sound echoed around the block.

“Gretchen!” Abby hissed. “Gretchen!”

When she finally gave up and turned to go, something swooped down out of the darkness. Abby threw herself to the ground, skinning her palms on the dirt road, barely holding back a scream. Looking up, she saw a great horned owl glaring at her from the branch of a live oak across the street. Abby picked herself up and got the hell out of there.

Wednesday was Nerd Day, when everyone pulled their pants up high, wore rainbow suspenders, and buttoned their top buttons. Everyone except Abby. She just kept her head down.

Thursday was Slave Day.





Five years later, Slave Day was gone as if it had never existed, but in 1988 no one dreamed that it could possibly be offensive. It was a tradition.

A clot of students was clustered around the front office window, where the Slave Market was posted. It was a giant piece of white butcher’s paper, and the idea was that students could buy a slave for a set price. If the slave didn’t beat the bid by one dollar, then they were “owned” by their master, who would make them do whatever she wanted during the lunchtime Slave Parade. The master might make the slave wear an ugly sweatshirt, or if she was feeling really evil, the slave would have to wear her bra on the outside of her clothes. Some guys would make a girl wear a leash and walk the Lawn on all fours like a dog. All the money raised went to the Alumni Fund, so that made it okay.

Miss Toné was out front with a marker writing down names of slaves and owners. Abby gave the list a glance and then froze. It was right there in Miss Toné’s rushed block letters.

owner: Gretchen Lang

slave: Abigail Rivers

Gretchen was at school. She had to be to participate. It used to be that Abby always knew where Gretchen was and vice versa. They had memorized each other’s class schedules; they each knew which bathroom the other preferred, which hidey-holes they’d retreat to when stressed (Abby: behind the chapel; Gretchen: rear carrel at the library). They planned what they were doing the next day on the phone every night. But all that was gone now. Mrs. Lang had insisted that Abby’s class schedule be swapped so that she and Gretchen didn’t share any classes, and Gretchen no longer talked to Abby on the phone. The part of her brain that kept track of Gretchen was broken.