Boring Girls(7)

“Because it looks awesome.” I didn’t want to get frustrated with a nine-year-old.

“I don’t know any boys with hair like that,” Melissa said, studying the picture.

“That’s because you’re a kid.”

“I wish mine was that long,” she said, absently tugging on her short brown hair. “Can we hear the music?”

“Yes we can.” I put the disc in my stereo and pressed play. The first track was “Cut Gut.”

Immediately the guitars began to grind, fast and menacing. The drums sped. I couldn’t imagine a drummer playing that fast. The bass line was menacing and creepy. And then the voice came in. It was indecipherable. I could not understand a word he said, and there was no melody to it, but it dripped with an absolutely poisonous, cruel sound. I was transfixed.

Melissa pulled me out of my concentration. “I don’t like it,” she said, covering her ears. “He sounds like a monster. It sounds bad, Rachel. I don’t like it!” She shook her head. “Please turn it off.”

As the music stopped, my mother came in. She hadn’t even knocked.

“Melissa, go to your room for a little while, please,” she said. “I would like to talk to Rachel.”

My sister left immediately, and Mom closed the door behind her. “I want you to listen to me very carefully. I understand you’re upset.”

“Okay,” I replied.

“I understand that you’re going through something and you’re exploring different things, and your father and I are going to support you as long as we feel it’s healthy for you and that you’re expanding yourself. But I really must insist that you not . . . expose your sister to this kind of music. She’s too little to understand.” She sat down on the edge of my bed. “She gets nightmares. Please try to respect that what you find appealing might not be appropriate for someone who’s still little.”

“Yeah, I get that,” I said. “Sorry. I won’t show it to her again.”

“Thank you for understanding that, honey.” She paused. “Now, I guess I have a question for you. Did something happen? Anything you want to talk to me about? I have to admit I’m having a bit of difficulty understanding you right now.”

Part of me wanted to tell her about Brandi, about the confrontation, about how stupid and helpless I had felt. That would make her feel better. That would give her an explanation. It might even have made me feel better too. “No. Nothing happened.”

“It’s just that all year you wanted to write, be alone in your room, which is fine. I would have liked it if you’d met a friend or two, but we didn’t let it worry us because you’ve always just been so happy doing your own creative thing. We support that. But . . . I guess I’m just trying to say that if you want to talk about anything with me, or with your dad, you can.”

“Mom. It’s just a CD. Please don’t worry.” I appreciated that my mother was concerned. I wanted to reassure her that everything was fine. Because everything was fine. In fact, I had hope that everything was going to be much better than before.





THREE


I spent that summer in transition. I devoured that Die Every Death CD and investigated other bands, getting into Bloodvomit and Goreceps next. I didn’t hide my purchases from my parents, and they tried to be good natured about it. When I brought home the Goreceps album Excrement from Birth, my dad even tried to have a laugh about it.

“Goreceps? That’s like ‘forceps,’ right? That’s sort of clever,” he said. My mother said nothing. I knew she was disgusted. But to me, it was funny. It didn’t speak to them on any level other than how scary and inappropriate it was. But to me, it was power. It was anger. It was creative. And it was tongue-in-cheek in some ways. I mean, you can’t name your band Goreceps without acknowledging it’s kind of a funny name.

I started really focusing on the lyrics of the songs, which thankfully were included in the CD jackets. I was grateful that you could rarely make out what the vocalists sang; my parents definitely didn’t need to know.

One of the DED songs really stood out to me. “I Ignore Your Screams” painted a picture of where I wanted to be.

Standing on your face

Crushing all your dreams

Put you in your place

I ignore your screams

Who’s the big shot now

On the winning team?