Be the Girl(78)

And now I think Cassie may be scarred for life. Iris came by after school with her molasses cookies and Cassie asked her if there were drugs in them. You should’ve seen the look on Iris’s wrinkled face. God knows how long it will be before that gets back to Heather or Mark. Holly has ruined cookies for Cassie for God knows how long.

AND don’t forget what she did to me at the cross-country mini-meet.

I know Holly deserved it.

And yet, it’s eating away at me.

~AJ





“Can I ask you something?” I peer at Jen over my tray of mac ’n’ cheese. It’s rainy and cold outside, and when I saw another student walk by with the cheesy, hot bowl, I quickly abandoned my bagel from home. “As your friend.”

Her owlish eyes regard me a moment before she shrugs. “Sure.”

How do I put this … “You have an interesting wardrobe.” I give her orange jack-o’-lantern sweatshirt a pointed look.

Jen grins. “I prefer to call it festive.”

“It’s definitely that.” Yesterday’s sweatshirt was all black with the word “Boo!” across the chest. “But what gives? I mean, why do you dress the way you do, which is … not exactly like a nor—like other teenagers.”

She stabs at her macaroni noodles with a fork. “They’re my mom’s shirts,” she admits, biting her bottom lip. “Remember when I said we moved to Eastmonte when I was twelve? It was because she had cancer, so my parents decided it’d be a good idea to be closer to my grandparents while she was going through treatment. We moved in with them. It made things easier.” She smiles at her plate of food. “She died two years ago, when I started tenth grade.”

“Oh.” I swallow. “I’m sorry. I had no idea.” I’ve been so focused on my own life, I don’t know much of anything about Jen at all, other than that Holly was her nemesis.

What would it have been like for Jen, to lose her mother at fifteen?

For years, my mother seemed absent—she was gone all day, and when she was home, her head was buried in work. But it’s not the same. I knew she’d come back eventually.

For Jen, all she has left are memories.

And tacky shirts.

“So, you wear your mom’s clothes?”

She rolls her eyes. “My mom had a thing for loud, fun shirts. She always used to say, ‘I might not be the most handsome woman there ever was but I’ll be the most fun.’ And she was. She turned heads wherever she went. Not necessarily in a good way, mind you, but she didn’t care what other people thought of her. It all slid off her shoulders, because she liked who she was.” Jen smiles. “She told me that the sooner you figure out how to like yourself through your own eyes, the sooner you’ll stop trying to see yourself through everyone else’s.” She shifts her pasta around with her spoon. “I miss her. A lot. After she died, I decided to wear one of her shirts to school. It was Valentine’s Day and the shirt had a giant Be Mine heart across the front. It felt good. I felt like she was still with me. And so I started wearing more of her shirts. This was her favorite one for Halloween.” She peers down at her chest and laughs. “I used to think it was so ugly but now all I see when I look at it is her.”

“That’s …” I swallow against the lump in my throat. “She sounds like she would have been a fun mom to have.” And suddenly the tacky shirts don’t seem so tacky anymore.

“She was.” Jen studies her lunch intently before shoveling in a mouthful. She nods behind me and a moment later, Josie slides into her chair, setting her red lunch bag on the table in front of her.

“Hi.” Her eyes shift to me, partially hidden behind her heavy, dark bangs. She worries her thin lips, as if wanting to say something but holding herself back.

“What’s going on?”

“I’m not sure if you want me to tell you this,” she says in that near-whisper.

“Well, now you have to.” Wariness slides down my spine. I already know this isn’t going to be good.

Josie purses her mouth. “Okay, so I heard people talking in class about this Instagram account that someone started for Emmett Hartford’s new girlfriend.”

My stomach sinks like a rock in a lake.

“The handle is SWF Eats.” Josie’s cute face is apologetic. “And there are pictures—”

I leave my lunch where it is, barely touched—my appetite vanished—and, grabbing my purse, dash for the nearest girls’ bathroom. Ducking into the last stall, I dig out my phone.

It doesn’t take long to find the account.

My chest burns as I study the profile picture. It’s a zoomed-in candid shot of me—my face contorted as I open my mouth to take a bite from a sandwich. Holly must’ve taken it during lunch when the lunch monitors weren’t watching.

There are five pictures loaded in the feed and they’re of equally unflattering shots of me eating, three taken in the last week.

And two taken … today.

I look down at my red shirt—a shirt we bought on the weekend shopping trip. Holly hasn’t come to the cafeteria yet. Which means other people are taking pictures of me, and she’s posting them right away. They heard about the account, thought it was funny, and joined in. That’s how these things start: a funny joke at someone’s expense. It might only last a few days or a few weeks, but the damage will be done.