Did I Say You Could Go

by Melanie Gideon

  The front row is empty—nobody wants to sit there, it looks too desperate, but not if you’re somebody who has nothing to hide. Ruth leads Gemma to the front row.

  “Really?” Gemma asks.

  Ruth pulls her down into a seat. “Don’t slouch. Whisper in my ear and then laugh.”

  “I can’t do this, everybody’s watching.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Ruth whispers in Gemma’s ear, and then laughs heartily, as if she’s having the time of her life.

  * * *

  “Welcome, parents!” says Mr. Nunez, the school head.

  Ruth’s hands ball into fists. She despises Mr. Nunez, and Mr. Nunez is definitively not a Ruth Thorne fan.

  When Marley was in third grade, she failed to test into Wings, Hillside’s gifted program. Marley must have had an off day (her IQ was through the stratosphere), but Bee made it in—quelle surprise!—and Marley had to watch her get pulled out of class with a few other lucky children to attend special interdisciplinary classes. It was unfair to the rest of the kids, being subjected to that torture day after day, their failure shoved in their faces, and so Ruth had embarked upon a campaign to do away with Wings.

  She marched into Mr. Nunez’s office and presented her case. “Wings is sapping the kids’ self-esteem.”

  This wasn’t true, most of the kids couldn’t have cared less, but she couldn’t very well tell him that she was traumatized, that she couldn’t bear it, could she? It was so unjust. Marley was the smartest kid in the third grade. She’d never gotten less than an EXCELLENT PLUS on her report card. Hillside didn’t believe in grades until middle school—it was highly annoying.

  Mr. Nunez pursed his lips in disapproval.

  “Well, how about the Wings kids go to the Wings room before class so it isn’t so disruptive to everybody else,” she suggested.

  “In the real world there’s a hierarchy,” Mr. Nunez said. “We do these kids a disservice by hiding that. I know it’s hard, but better they get used to it now. And if Marley doesn’t like it, if she wants to alter her status, then she can work hard and change it. That’s life.” He’d leaned across the table then, close enough that Ruth could smell his stale coffee breath. “By the way, Marley has made it very clear how she feels about being left out of the Wings group.”

  This was news to Ruth. Marley didn’t seem to care at all.

  “She said some… very mean things to one of the kids.”

  “What mean things?” Ruth can’t imagine an unkind word coming out of Marley’s mouth, or even a word for that matter. She was painstakingly shy and introverted.

  “I won’t repeat it,” said Mr. Nunez. “There’s no need.”

  “Repeat it,” demanded Ruth.

  Mr. Nunez shrugged. “She told Tristan Blake he was ‘dumb as fuck.’ ”

  Mr. Nunez had a reputation for exaggeration. Well, he could trash-talk Ruth all he wanted, but it was another thing to go after her daughter.

  “That’s ridiculous. You made that up. And if you insist on continuing to slander Marley, I’ll have to get my lawyer involved.”

  Mr. Nunez backed down. He sputtered and apologized. Red-faced, he waved her out of his office.

  Every December up until then, she’d given him a $100 gift card: to the Orpheum, to Oliveto, to Nordstrom, and every year he said verbatim, “This is inappropriate. We have limits on faculty gifts.” He kept the gift cards, however.

  That year she gave Mr. Nunez a jumbo-size bottle of Goo Gone. He never thanked her.

  He smiles at her benevolently and she realizes he can’t see the audience—the stage lights are too bright. He talks about homework expectations, service requirements, encouraging the students to move beyond their cliques, the latest bullying research, the temptation of Juuling, the evils of social media, and the benefits of boredom.

  Before Mr. Nunez was promoted to head of school, he ran the computer science department. He spends another ten minutes droning on about online best practices. Never open an attachment from a stranger. Free trials are anything but free. Be wary of texts that appear to be from your friends but have no personal messages attached.

  He’s lost the room. The kids shift restlessly in their seats, their water bottles empty, their pea-size attention spans drained. They’re texting, watching TikToks, checking one another out.

  “And there’s one last thing I’d like to address,” Mr. Nunez says. “Test prep courses and private tutoring.”

  Immediately the auditorium goes silent.

  “I’m sure you’ve all heard about what’s happening with Study Right.”

  Ruth is stunned. She can’t believe he’s going there. Gemma is sitting ten feet away from him! Then she realizes he’s assumed Gemma didn’t come to back-to-school night. Of course he did. Why would she put herself through that? She’d sit it out. Wait until the whole thing died down. That’s what a friend would advise. Instead Ruth insisted Gemma go.

  “You know,” says Mr. Nunez, “I’ve never been comfortable with the tutoring companies. It’s an unfair system, rigged in favor of students like ours, students who are privileged, whose parents can afford to buy them an increase of two hundred, three hundred, four hundred points on their standardized tests. It’s a system that’s ripe for cheating, and Study Right is a perfect example. Now, I’m not against studying, what I’m against is procuring an unfair advantage.”

  Ruth sneaks a look at Gemma. She’s holding her breath, her left palm flat against her chest, steadily sinking into her seat. Nunez, that bastard. His untrimmed nose hairs. His broken capillaries.

  “So, to that end, I want to announce that we are increasing our number of group test prep classes here at school. There’s no need to pay thousands of dollars to get private tutoring.”

  Ruth glances behind her. The parents’ faces are stony and closed. They nod along with Mr. Nunez, but there’s no way they’re going to send their kids to group classes. They’ll get private tutoring, they just won’t get it at Study Right.

  “I can’t let him do this,” she whispers to Gemma, rising to her feet.

  “No.” Gemma grabs her arm. “Please, just let it go.”

  But Ruth’s on a mission. She climbs the stairs to the stage, her No. 6 clogs noisily announcing her. Whispers, laughs, gasps, oh my gods. They’re making fun of her and they’re readying themselves for a spectacle. This doesn’t bother Ruth a bit, she’s about to give them one. The audience sits forward in their seats, rapt. Mr. Nunez squints, unable to make out her identity until she’s a few feet away, then his features harden into a mask of displeasure.

  “I have something to say,” says Ruth cheerily, joining him on the podium.

  Mr. Nunez covers the microphone with his hand. “This is not the time.”

  “It is most assuredly the time,” she says, looking down upon his balding head.

  “Two minutes,” he squawks at her, and steps aside.

  “You’re so kind, Mr. Nunez, thank you. I am Ruth Thorne, and my daughter, Marley, is a first year. I’ve known Gemma Howard and her daughter, Bee, since kindergarten. We are very close friends. Inseparable, you might say.”

  Ruth wishes she could see Gemma’s face, but the audience is indeed a blur.

  “Gemma is one of the most scrupulously honest people I know. She got into the test prep business because she wanted to run a center that didn’t just cater to the wealthy. Do you know that for every kid whose parents pay full price, she takes on another kid who pays nothing? She doesn’t advertise this. She doesn’t talk about it. She just does it quietly, behind the scenes, because those are her ethics and her values.

  “Now, Julie Winters, whom many of you requested personally to tutor your children because of, admit it, her Ivy credentials”—Ruth wags her index finger sassily—“was somebody Gemma hired. She was an independent contractor. Yes, Gemma made a mistake. She made the mistake of trusting this young woman and believing her story, and because of this trust, she’s now paying dearly for it. But Gemma Howard is not a ch
eater. And Gemma Howard is not running a scam. Study Right is about equality, about giving every kid a chance to rise up. Not just the kids who go to Hillside, for whom five thousand dollars is nothing.”

  Ruth pauses and takes a shaky breath for effect, as if she’s deeply emotional. “I implore you, please don’t ruin this business, don’t run it into the ground, build it up instead. Help bring it back. We need more Study Rights in the world. And we need more Gemma Howards. People who are in it for the right reasons.”

  She turns to Mr. Nunez, who glares at her. “Thank you, Mr. Nunez, for letting me steal a little of your time.”

  * * *

  Out in the hallway, parents mill around in clusters. Gemma’s in the bathroom. Ruth stands alone, eavesdropping and absorbing the stares coming her way.

  “Did you see the look on Nunez’s face?”

  “Study Right’s like the Warby Parker of test prep centers. Who knew?”

  “Are you going to re-enroll?”

  “I wish I had a best friend who stood up for me like that.”

  Ruth allows herself a slight smile.

  “Don’t ever do that to me again,” says Mr. Nunez, from behind her.

  Ruth whirls around. “Do what?” she asks innocently.

  “Interrupt me.”

  “I didn’t interrupt you. I was only offering an alternative point of view on the subject you were opining about.”

  “I was not opining,” he seethes.

  “Come, come, Mr. Nunez. We all know you love nothing more than to deliver a holier-than-thou lecture. It’s your specialty.”

  He wheezes incredulously. “I’d step carefully if I were you, Ms. Thorne. I don’t think you want to make any more enemies than you already have.”

  “Is that a threat, Mr. Nunez?”

  A finger taps her on the shoulder. Madison. “Hey there, Ruth. Hi, Mr. Nunez,” she says. She looks back and forth between them. Mr. Nunez pulls at his collar. “Am I interrupting something?” she asks.

  “Nothing at all,” says Mr. Nunez, collecting himself. “Good night, Mrs. Harris. Ms. Thorne.”

  They watch him weave his way through the throng.

  “Does he have a problem with Ms.?” asks Madison.

  Gemma walks up, the labradorite necklace accenting the green blouse perfectly. “There’s a line twenty people long for the women’s bathroom. I gave up and used the men’s. I thought they were going to make all the bathrooms gender-neutral.”

  “Next semester, I think,” says Madison. “Hey. Boy, that was something. Ruth really went to bat for you!”

  Madison flashes a genuine smile, one in which her entire face participates, eyes crinkling up and everything. “It was brilliant, Ruth, what you did for Gemma. You took my breath away.” She reaches out for Ruth’s hand and squeezes it. “And hopefully it will turn the tide for you, Gems. Get you back on your feet.”

  There’s a lull in the conversation and Madison continues to hold on to her hand.

  “Oh, sorry,” says Madison, releasing her. “Gosh, your skin is so soft.”

  “Um—thank you.” Did Madison Harris just give her a compliment?

  “What lotion do you use?”

  “Cetaphil?” says Ruth, hating the way she devolves to uptalk when she’s nervous. “The cream, not the lotion,” she says firmly.

  “I’ll have to get some,” Madison says and winks at her.

  * * *

  Complete silence in the car on the way home. Gemma pulls into Ruth’s driveway. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “I hope—what I did—wasn’t too much,” says Ruth.

  “No, it was great,” says Gemma, after a pause.

  “Are you sure?” Doesn’t she deserve a more effusive thank-you? Shouldn’t they all have been buzzing about her Norma Rae speech on the way home?

  “Yes, yes, I’m just exhausted.” Gemma leans over and kisses her on the cheek and Ruth stiffens—she’s being dismissed.

  She swivels around. “So, do you like your new car, Bee?”

  “I love it.”

  “I guess the old car was on its last legs, huh?”

  Bee catches her mother’s eye in the rearview mirror.

  “Yes, it was,” says Gemma.

  “Well, you’re lucky. It’s a big improvement over your last car. That car was a wreck. Unsafe, really.” Ruth opens the door. “Ready, Marls?”

  Ruth and Marley are at the front door when Gemma yells, “Thanks again.”

  Ruth pretends she doesn’t hear her.

  GEMMA

  Gemma glances at the clock: 2:32 a.m. Precisely one hour has passed since the last time she checked. She knows the rules of sleep hygiene—if you’re awake longer than twenty minutes you should turn on the light, go to another room, and read a book or have a mug of herbal tea. Under no circumstances should you use electronics. NO SCREENS.

  Gemma grabs her phone and opens her Momonymous app. The name of her pod is IN ONE EAR AND OUT YOUR MOTHER. She’s been a member since Bee was in first grade, and her username is SoccerMommy#1. Bee has never played soccer in her life; she’s not what you would call a team player. Gemma feels confident her identity is well disguised. The moms were quite active last night.

  DuckDuckGoose: OMG what an evening!

  LoveYouMore: What a SHOW!

  WineLuvva: Do you think Gemma knew Ruth was going to do that?

  BearMama: Doubtful. She looked stunned.

  WhatsUpWomen: So what do we think?

  TotesAdorb: What do we think? COMEBACK!!

  BarkingUpTheWrongTree: Yes but whose comeback? Ruth’s or Gemma’s?

  OhThePlacesYou’llGo: I think it was both haha. A twofer. Ruth put Gemma and herself back on the map in one fell swoop.

  LoveYouMore: And she lay claim to Gemma as well. Clearly she was letting us all know they’re BFFs again. So thirsty.

  WhatsUpWomen: I’m really happy for Gemma. It’s great what she’s doing. Not everybody can afford private tutoring.

  BarkingUpTheWrongTree: I’m signing my DS up. I wasn’t going to enroll him for PSAT prep until next summer, but why not now?

  DuckDuckGoose: There’s something really off about Ruth Thorne.

  BearMama: Maybe it’s time to let bygones be bygones.

  LoveYouMore: You can’t be serious.

  BearMama: The Egans left Hillside years ago. Shouldn’t we move on? I always felt bad about how Ruth was treated. We slut shamed her.

  LoveYouMore: She deserved it, AND in our defense, slut shaming wasn’t really a thing back then was it? Also, I happen to know that Sal has never “moved on” from it. She’s still with her husband, but their marriage is basically over. They’re staying together for the kids.

  MsFoxy: The Chron article broke my heart. It BROKE MY HEART! I understand completely why Gemma went underground. I would have done the same thing.

  DuckDuckGoose: Well Ruth Thorne pulled her out into the light tonight. No more hiding.

  BearMama: Loved her necklace. Was that labradorite?

  Yes, Ruth had pulled her back into the light, but it wasn’t lost on Gemma that Ruth had pulled herself back into the light, too.

  “Mom?”

  Bee stands at her bedroom door, hair mussed, rubbing her eyes. She wears a Nike tank top and faded pink drawstring pants. She has a perfect innie belly button.

  “Can’t sleep?”

  Bee makes a sad face. Gemma pulls aside the covers and pats the mattress. “Come here, sweet girl.”

  Bee crawls into the bed and yanks the covers up to her nose.

  “Are you worried about something?”

  Bee blinks at her. “Was that good for us? What Ruth did? I can’t tell.”

  Gemma draws Bee under her arm. “It was good,” she says, trying to sound confident, but she’s not all that sure. Ruth ripped off the Band-Aid without consulting her first.

  Bee yawns. Her jaw cracks. “So it’ll be over soon? People will forget? They’ll come back to Study Right?”

  “Yep, absolutely. The
y will,” says Gemma.

  Maybe if she says it out loud it will be true.

  RUTH

  Ruth takes a big spoonful of her poached egg sprinkled with Trader Joe’s Everything But the Bagel. She eats the same thing for breakfast every morning; she never tires of it.

  She opens her laptop. Her password: RuthAnnThorneTheGreat. Ruth Ann Thorne the Great was her mother’s private nickname for Ruth. When she was drawing Ruth a bath, or tucking her in, or giving her a quick hug before putting her on the school bus, she’d whisper that into her ear. When her mother uttered those words, Ruth felt like a pat of butter melting slowly in a cast-iron pan.

  Ruth takes another bite of her poached egg, picks a poppy seed out of her teeth, and opens her email. She has one new message. The subject line: YOU’RE INVITED TO JOIN MOMONYMOUS!

  She listens for Marley. Not a sound from upstairs. It’s 9:03 on Saturday morning; she’s not awake yet. Ruth gets up and twirls, her arms raised above her head like Rocky. She’s finally gotten the invitation! After all these years she’s been let in!

  Wait, is this a joke? Is somebody playing with her?

  Ruth opens the email. It’s real. She accepts the invitation by clicking on the Momonymous icon—a vintage silhouette of two women whispering. It must be because of last night’s Oscar-worthy performance. Why else would she suddenly get a Momonymous invite to a pod called MY MOTHER MADE ME DO IT.

  Ruth thinks carefully about a username. She picks PennySavedPennyEarned. Let them think she’s a frugal, composting, tight-fisted mom.

  HappilyEverAfter: Welcome PennySavedPennyEarned!

  PennySavedPennyEarned: Hello! Thanks so much for inviting me!

  WhatYouSeeIsNotWhatYouGet: Hello PennySavedPennyEarned!

  TortoiseWinsTheRace: A new member. Yay!

  PennySavedPennyEarned: Is this a new pod?

  WhatYouSeeIsNotWhatYouGet: Relatively new. About a year old. You’re our fifth member. We’re a small, intimate group. It works for us. We can really get into the nitty-gritty that way.