All the Rage(12)

Because teenage girls don’t pray to God, they pray to each other. They clasp their hands over a keyboard and then they let it all out, a (stupid) girl’s heart tucked into another girl’s heart. Penny, I want him. I dream about him. I needed someone to hear my prayers and did Penny ever make sure of that when she forwarded my f*cking e-mail to everyone in school.

“Tina,” Penny says. The way she says it makes the room still. Her voice has this admonishing tinge to it, like she’s defending me with inflection alone.

But that can’t be right.

“What?” Tina must hear it too, for the edge it puts in her own voice.

“Stop talking and help me get my necklace untangled from my hair.”

That I deflate is the only way I know I wanted it—for her to defend me. And then I’m ashamed of the part of me that still wants that.

“You’re supposed to take your jewelry off before we run…”

“Yeah, well, I forgot. Help me.”

I push out of the locker room on wasted legs. They’re bleeding again. There’s a name in my head and I want it out of my head. It’s amazing what a certain combination of letters can do, how it can string itself around your heart and squeeze.

Nurse DeWitt takes one look at my knees and says to me what he says to everyone: I’m old enough to take care of myself now. So that’s what I do. I sit in the corner of the room and pick at my wounds, painting my nails even redder before finally slapping a Band-Aid on every part of me that needs it.

When I’m done, I turn my phone on. A missed text from Leon, asking if I know whether I can come to his sister’s yet. I debate texting him back just to tell him parts of me are covered in blood because maybe he’d forget about the part of him that likes me. But I don’t. Instead, I text I DON’T WANT TO IMPOSE, which feels weirdly formal but I can’t think of another way to put it. It only takes a minute for him to reply.

CAN I CALL YOU NOW?

SURE.

Why did I say that? I run my thumb lightly over the side of my phone until it buzzes. I glance at DeWitt. He doesn’t care. I’m not breaking any rules, but I wish I was, so this could be stopped. I bring the phone to my ear. “Hi.”

“I keep telling my sister, Caro, about this girl I like at Swan’s and how I think maybe she likes me too.” I twist, hunching my shoulders. If DeWitt looks, I don’t want him to see what Leon’s voice does to me. “Anyway, she doesn’t believe it.”

“Is it that hard for her to believe?” I sound steadier than I feel.

“Yeah. So even if you don’t come … you like me too, right?” He pauses. “Because then I could at least go with that in my head.”

“Maybe,” I say and I can almost hear him smile.

“If you did come, I asked her before I asked you and it doesn’t bother her. You wouldn’t be imposing. You’d be welcome. It’s a party. We’d have fun.”

I close my eyes and I see a quiet house waiting at the end of a long stretch of driveway and soft, golden lights shining through every window, a hint of music behind their glass. A pickup truck parked in the driveway and it’s so clear and ugly in my head, I forget who I’m talking to and I wonder who Leon thinks he’s talking to.

“What do you say?” he asks.

I open my eyes. I need Leon to tell me who he is in a different kind of language because really, if he’s safe, there’s only one way to find out. It’s not through talking.





i find the pink-and-black lace push-up bra on my bed like it’s meant to be there, a natural part of the landscape. I pick it up. Mom. She thinks she’s doing a nice thing for me.

I push my fingers into the padding. Soft as it is pretty. I rip the tag off the bra and unhook the clasp. It’s okay to try on here, alone. I take off my shirt and the bra I’m already wearing and toss them on the floor. I turn my back to the mirror on my bureau and start sliding my arms through the straps, but they need some adjusting. I fight with them for a minute, almost ruin my manicure trying to slide the little piece of plastic down. I adjust the cups, feel what little breasts I have settle inside. I do the clasp up. It’s a little tight.

I face the mirror.

My heart races in a weird way, like I’m doing something I’m not supposed to be doing, but I’m allowed to do this. I turn to the side and I like my profile even more, the way the bra holds me. I’m so used to being flat but the bra lifts and brings my breasts closer, forcing a kind of curve between them that resembles cleavage. It looks—good.

But I can’t wear it.

If something happens—I don’t want to be wearing it.

I put the pink bra away and pick up the other from the floor, slide it back on. I put on a skirt and then I make it cargo pants. I add a long-sleeve shirt and I’m sweating. I switch out the sleeves for an off-the-shoulder tee and the cargo pants for a pair of shorts. I did my nails earlier, so all that’s left is to reapply my lipstick and then I’m ready.

I sit on the step and breathe the stale air while everything that’s ahead of me turns my empty stomach. Mom is at her job—she cleans an office building every other night—and Todd is at the hardware store buying storage containers for leftovers from the move. They both think I’ll be at Swan’s because I didn’t tell them otherwise. Me on a date with a boy. I didn’t want to see what that looked like on their faces because however they gave it back to me would come from some place I don’t want any part of.