He looked uneasy. “Ella said you were obsessed with her, and with the Group, and with me. And that you’d do anything to get me to hate her. I mean, I realize now it was a crock. Ella’s one crayon short of a box. She said you had a shrine to me, but I didn’t believe it. It’s almost cute, if you don’t let her bother you too much.”
“She made you think I was poison and insane. That bothers me.”
Julian smiled. Not his dazzle-the-masses smile. It was unhappier than that. “What’s between us has got nothing to do with Ella. But I should set the record straight. It’s partly why I wanted to meet up. ’Cause I guess I gave you the wrong impression when we met. I didn’t mean to. The thing is, I don’t want to get serious with anyone this year.”
“Right.” A hundred arrows were hitting target. “I probably knew that.” Although I hadn’t wanted to hear it. “And this doesn’t have anything to do with what Ella put up on her blog?”
“What blog?” Julian’s poker face would almost have been hilarious, if I’d been in the mood to laugh.
“Because,” I continued, as if he hadn’t spoken, “considering you’ve seen the pictures, I think it’s got everything to do with it.”
He shook his head. “No, I never—”
“Kilgarry, dude, are you blind?”
“Didn’t you see us, you tosser? Clear some space.”
My head snapped around. Henry and another, taller guy were strolling over. Both with damp hair and, as they got closer, a whiff of chlorine in their skin.
“Can we sit?” The tall guy plunked next to Julian as Henry’s lopsided grin gave me a more sincere apology.
“Do I have a choice?” But Julian looked relieved.
“Bump?” Henry gestured.
I bumped in. He settled next to me. “Thanks.”
“Raye, this is Chapin and that’s Henry. I think I’ve mentioned these jokers before. Guys, Raye.”
“Raye and I go way back to a month ago,” said Henry.
“Hi.” The information spun in my brain. Chapin went out with Faulkner. I knew him only by name and random Facebook tags. In person, he looked bigger and meaner, and also sort of misshapen. As in, his head was too small for his broad, sloped shoulders and gangly arms. He reminded me of a giant squid.
I could tell that Chapin didn’t think much of me either, though he gave me a long, searching look that made me squirm. They both ordered milk shakes and burgers. Talk turned to sports practice, sports meets, exams, more sports. I began to feel my precious chunk of time with Julian eroding.
But I still wanted to ask Julian if he could do something about Ella. In this campaign Ella had waged, Julian’s power was all the power I had. Meantime, the minutes were ticking. Now Chapin’s squid arms were gesturing madly as he related an account of last weekend’s swimming competition. Followed by a full report on who got wasted at his house, after.
My dad was coming to pick me up in half an hour. I had to be out front. It was, after all, a school night.
“Here, Raye, share? Let’s make Jules the jealous one for once.” As Henry stuck in a second straw, so we could share his milk shake. “The problem is all the boys are madly in love with our Jules,” he said with a wink. “Same as the girls. It’s a bit like being a superhero, I’d reckon.”
“Lucky him.” As I sipped obligingly. Equally obliging, Julian acted casually “jealous” by blowing the wrapper from his own straw so that it shot into Henry’s face.
“Not at all. It’s a full-time job deflecting all these soppy boy crushes,” Henry went on. “Especially Chapin’s, because he’s so disastrously closeted.”
The Squid gave him the finger. “Go bugger someone who cares, Henry.”
“I would, you wanker, but you’ve had quite enough exercise for tonight.”
I laughed. Suddenly, the Squid’s eyes were on me. “I knew I recognized you.” His blunt finger stabbed the air in front of my face. “You’re the girl in the blue wig.”
“No,” I said, my walls up. My voice robotic. “I’m not.”
“Yeah. You are. I’ve seen your picture. We all have. Oh, damn. How much do I love that I met you? I bet you’re a real good time.” He reached down and stuffed his mouth full of fries. “Nice work, Kilgarry.” His huge hands clapped together as the rest of us sat there and said nothing. “Forget it, then,” he said into the silence. “What the hell. I was only kidding.”
“It’s my experience that if a person says he’s only kidding, what he ought to have said was that he’s sorry,” said Henry.
Julian was inching lower in his seat. He picked up a piece of parsley from his plate and began to twirl it between his fingers.
“Sorry for what?” The Squid leaned back and inhaled another fistful of fries.
“Nothing. You’ve got me mistaken for another person,” I muttered.
“Uh-uh.” The Squid shook his head. “No, sweetheart, I haven’t. Faulk sent the link to a whole group—”
“Leave it alone.” Henry’s tone was bladed. “Present company is absolutely disinterested. Here”—to me. “Finish.”
I blinked. Angled my face so that my hair fell over the milk shake glass, making a curtain as I sipped, though my gesture was all but a guilty admission.
After a pause, Henry forced the guys’ conversation back up and on a different path by pseudo-insisting that Mr. Barlow might actually be a CIA agent. “It’s not nonsense. Don’t dismiss it,” he said. “There are signs. Barlow has an excellent memory. Never says a word about his family. Those clunky bifocals see in infrared. And the other day, I swear I heard the old geeze muttering to himself in Russian.”
As the guys hooted and told Henry he was full of crap, I sent him a mental thanks.
Henry Henry, my secret avenger.
Peeking through my hair, I glimpsed through the diner’s front window the VW looping. Finally. “My ride’s here.” I jumped up. With a look at Julian. “So I guess . . .”
“Yep. Chat later, if you’re up.” With his two-fingered salute. Not getting up, though my entire mind-set willed it.
Walking out, I imagined Julian leaving the booth to follow me. He’d catch up with me outside, pivot me by the elbow and in the same sure voice he’d tell me I had the longest eyelashes he’d ever seen, he’d admit okay, yes, he’d seen the picture, but so what? We could deal with it, get past it, because he didn’t want to let me go, I was The One, and his real self was nothing like the unintentional heartbreaker, player, hookup maestro that everyone from Natalya to his own brother had warned me about.
Dad reached over and opened the door into a blare of Manilow.
As I got in, I gave a glance over my shoulder. Just to be sure.
No Julian.
thirty-one
Mrs. Field never smiled, so it wasn’t a good or bad sign
when she ushered me stone-faced into her office, where I’d pitched up after getting her note. But my heart was hammering as I took the chair opposite her desk. All I could think was that she’d seen my picture on the site, and that a petition to throw me out of Fulton on the grounds of General Sluttiness was circulating.
“Is my office really that scary?” She waved a piece of paper. “Let me give you the good news quick, then. You won.”
“Won . . . ?”
“Second place in the CAFÉ essay contest. Nobody from Fulton has placed in this contest in thirteen years.”
I struggled to remember the second-place prize. It wasn’t Paris.
“Five hundred dollars,” she said, and handed me the letter. Plus a check.
I stared. “Oh.” My brain wasn’t geared for pleasant surprises. Five hundred dollars seemed like both a huge amount of money and a drop in the college fund bucket, where it would surely land.
“Congratulations. You’ve done so well here at Fulton, Raye. You’re really thriving.”
“Um, thanks.”
Back in the hall, I crouched and stuffed the letter and check into my book bag. Some girls walked by and I jumped to my feet. These days, I didn’t like to have my back turned to anybody.
I told Natalya the news at lunch, but I didn’t think about the CAFÉ contest again until that afternoon’s final assembly. A guest speaker lectured us about good versus bad eating. Yes Swiss chard. No Red Bull. Followed by general announcements. Same old, same old. Fire drill tomorrow. New recycling bins. Bel Cantos concert this weekend.
Then Mrs. Field whisked right up to where I was sitting on an aisle seat. The weight of her hand cupped my shoulder. “Raye, stand up,” she whispered.
I didn’t. I couldn’t. “One more announcement!” she trilled.
Noooo.
Don’t do it. Anything but this.
On my other side, Natalya slumped as if the air were leaking out of her.
Realizing that I wouldn’t be standing, Mrs. Field took the plunge anyway. “It gives me great pleasure to tell you all that Raye Archer placed second in the Cultural Awareness For Everyone contest,” she announced throatily. “Which came with an award of five hundred dollars, for any of you who need reminding.”
Murmuring among the freshmen. And then underneath, from the sophomores, another kind of whisper. Mrs. Field continued blithely. “So join me in congratulating her. And at next Friday’s assembly, I’m hoping that she’ll read her essay for everybody.”
Obviously, I wouldn’t be doing that because I would have transferred. Shot myself. Left the country.
Applause spattered. Mostly freshmen, joined by a round from juniors and seniors. From my class, whispers mixed with smothered laughter.
Then Ella’s laugh, whipping out like a jackknife.
And from Alison, in that distinctive gravelly voice. “Oh, you
go
, Nerbit.”
Mrs. Field wavered. She didn’t know what she was up against, and she was no good improvising. Her hand freed my shoulder. “Oookay,” she said. “All right, then. Quiet down, everyone. Quiet. Next announcement is Jessica Flaherty about new rules for senior parking, right, Jessica? Please.”
“Speech, Nerb.” Alison again. Too loud, braving the threat of detention.
“Hush, girls!” Mrs. Field’s voice had become strangled. “This is not the . . . forum.” But I could feel her reorganizing files in her head: Raye Archer is bullied. The other girls don’t like Raye Archer.
Labeling me
F
for Fragile,
D
for Distressing.
NTAMAOMHH
for Not Thriving As Much As One Might Have Hoped.
As Jessica popped up and began to talk, the whispering died. But I was sure I could still hear its restless ebb, all the way until we were dismissed.
thirty-two
WHAT SHOULD NERBITINA DO WITH THE MONEY???
She should start a fund to get her boobs done so they match.
She should buy herself a better personality cuz the one she has sux.
Buy a car and drive off a bridge.
Five hundred dollars is her nightly escort fee.
I think Nerbit should buy herself some blue thongs to match her blue wigs and pole dance downtown at the Foxy Lady.
Yeah she could run a special 241 service: lap dance + tutoring
New posts popped up all weekend, a little boost for the blog just when I thought it was sinking. Most notes were from Lindy and Jeffey and Ella herself, I figured. Even though they listed various identities like “ladybug” and “me99” and “fultygrl.”
Hiding at the Zawadski home protected me from totally fixating on it. But I just couldn’t stop myself from going online, either late at night or during TV commercials or sitting at the kitchen bar while Natalya rummaged for interesting things to add to her Duncan Hines cookie dough mix. First I’d hit Ella’s blog, and then, sort of as a reward . . .
“What about cashews?” From the stepladder, Natalya beaned one at my head. “Would that be gross?”
“Don’t think so. Go for it.”
“With the coconut flakes? Or now is it too much like I’m making a curry? Raye, why’re you looking so secretive? You’d make such a bad spy.” Hopping off the ladder, she was at me in a flash. “Who are you IMing with?”
I’d minimized the screen, but not in time. Natalya stepped closer. “That was not Julian Kilgarry’s name I just saw, was it?”
“It’s just I wanted to ask him about changing the masthead for the
Delta
.”
“You have got to be kidding me.”
“Okay, so maybe I haven’t exactly taken your advice.” I struggled to explain it. “The thing is, online I’ve got this little piece of Julian left. He’s not a cyber-creep, either. We’re friends. And that means something.”
“Sure. It means you’re spineless, is what it means.” Natalya shook the bag of cashews like a maraca in my face. “Earth to Raye. The real Julian doesn’t want the real you. In fact, he’s basically using you.”
“For what?”
“I don’t know. As a homework buddy, I guess, or for sex-ting or playing chess, or just to be a secret, so-called soul mate that he’d never admit to in front of any of his real friends.”
My cheeks pinked. “How do you know I’m not his real friend?”
“I don’t. But there’s an easy test. Tell your
real friend
Julian to call off Ella. Tell him to tell her to shut down that hellacious blog of hers. In person. Get brave. He could do it in a snap.”
“We never talk about the blog.”
“All the more reason.” Natalya moved to the bowl and dumped all the cashews into the mix. “Actually, forget I mentioned it. If you can’t see the light, I can’t make you. But it kind of blows for me to think I’m your friend, knowing that category also includes a narcissist like Julian Kilgarry.”
“He’s not . . . he’s sweet. And he can be very real.”
“Sure, Raye. Go there,” she answered as she began landing blobs of dough on the cookie sheet. “Keep telling yourself that, and who knows? Maybe one day it’ll all come true.”
thirty-three
Monday was cold, and looked better from indoors. Too
cold, really. I could always do it Tuesday, I told myself. But that would mean another day of Natalya’s voice reverberating in my head. By afternoon, I’d made a decision. In the locker room, I pulled one of my XXL sweatshirts over my Health & Fitness uniform, and for the first time ever, I cut gym.