He tries to touch my hair and I wriggle away from him and start to walk to English class, with him trailing behind me. Because I’ve been cold to him all day, he’s been nervous and attentive and I can sense a delicate yet important shift in our balance of power. In my awful dream future, he started to lose interest when we were seniors, so I’d get him jealous by breaking up with him and making out with other guys. But now that I sense I can have authority over him by just being bitchy? I can do that! I am so going to flip the script. Dismissively, I tell him, “I’ve got to get to class.”
He’s all puppy-dog eyes. “Can we talk later?”
I wave him off. “In-box me.”
He stops in his tracks and stares at me. “Do what now?”
“Hit me up on Facebook.”
“Huh?”
“Or you can just text.”
His confusion reminds me that none of this technology is on the market in 1991!
Holy crap, I could invent Facebook before that Michael Cera–looking douche and I’d be the scrillionaire! Oprah would have no choice but to be my friend! I vow to pay more attention in my computer class.
Anxious not to give away my get-so-freaking-rich-quick scheme, I tell him, “I said ‘I’ll smell you later.’” I punctuate this statement with a toss of my gloriously scented hair. I leave him in a cloud of flowers and Tahitian spice.
As I make my way to Miss Beeson’s class, I notice all the junior girls admiring how I knotted my scarf. Ten bucks says they show up wearing them that way tomorrow. I give them the vaguest hint of a smile and they all start acting like they just won both showcases on The Price Is Right.
Damn, it feels good to be a gangster.
When I get to English, all the Belles are surrounding my empty desk. The whole crew is here—Nicole, Kimmy, April, Tammy—and they’re each clad in some variety of pastel miniskirt, slouch socks, and oversize blazer. They take in my jeans and knotty scarf, and when Kimmy starts to ask about them, Nicole makes frantic neck-slashing motions. Kimmy slinks into her chair like a scolded puppy.
Class begins and Miss Beeson instructs us to take out our Jane Austen books. Apparently we’re studying Emma. Ha! I know Emma! I never read it, of course, choosing to cheat off of know-it-all April during the exam back in the dream past. But Gwyneth Paltrow is a national freaking treasure in the dream future and she starred in Emma. She won an Oscar and everything! (Yeah, she ruined Glee and also that CeeLo song at the Grammy Awards, but that’s not important.) Plus, there’s no one I love more than Cher Horowitz in the modern-day version called Clueless, which I DVR every single time it’s broadcast.
(Note to self: Invent DVR. And do it soon, because 90210’s on at the same time as Cheers and no one in my house can figure out how to work the timer on the VHS.)
Miss Beeson asks us, “What’s the significance of Mr. Elton framing Harriet’s portrait?” She sweeps the room with her gaze. “Anyone? Can anyone answer?”
No one raises their hand, not even Books Fatty. Should I be calling her Books Fatty, I wonder? According to my diary, her nickname didn’t go mainstream until the week of the homecoming dance. Plus, she seemed awfully touchy about it in my dream, so maybe I’ll just let that one go.
Miss Beeson seems particularly disappointed that no one’s participating. She’s all deflated in her dumpy skirt and nurse’s shoes. (Cher Horowitz would give her a makeover.) (But I don’t actually care enough to try.)
“Really, no one knows? Oh. I thought you guys might like this one. Austen’s sensibilities normally translate so well into modern times.”
Wait . . . isn’t that when Elton put Tai’s photo in his locker, not because she was classically beautiful, but because Cher snapped the shot? My hand flies up into the air.
Miss Beeson is taken aback by my sudden enthusiasm, but calls on me nonetheless. She seems to be bracing herself. Really? Having to brace oneself? Am I that much of a loose cannon? Is this because I don’t want to give her a makeover? Regardless, I say, “The significance is that Emma misinterprets this as a symbol of Elton’s, I mean, Mr. Elton’s affection for Harriet, when really he treasures the portrait because it was Emma’s work. It’s one of the main conflicts in the movie, er, book.”
Miss Beeson looks like she’s going to bust her oh-so-polyester buttons. Okay, fine, if I were to give her a makeover—which I won’t—we’d start with natural fibers and a keratin treatment. “Very good, Lissy! Very, very good!”
I feel a flush of pleasure that registers somewhere between a strawberry margarita and half a hit of Ecstasy. Wow. Who’d have guessed that positive attention’s even more of a rush than negative?
“Who can explain what happens when Emma realizes she’s in love with Mr. Knightley?”
I raise my hand again; I’m about to own this class. I rattle off a dozen more answers (I have a PhD in Paul Rudd, natch), and when the period ends, everyone’s looking at me like I’m a rocket scientist/supermodel and it feels glorious.
That’s right, bitches. Beauty and brains.
Lissy Ryder just made being smart cool.
Believe it.
Wait until I invent Facebook.
Then we’ll see who truly reigns over the twentieth reunion.
CHAPTER SIX
But I Can’t Trace Time
I kick serious academic ass in all my classes. I zip through questions on the sinking of the Titanic in World History (thank you, James Cameron), and I completely blow away my speech teacher in a practice debate. (Sixteen dream-future years of spinning bullshit for a living will do that.) What really gives everyone pause is when I detail the process for copper plating in my physics lab.
Of equal importance is that I’m able to teach the other cheerleaders an amazing hip-hop routine that I call the SuperLiss, which looks suspiciously like that from Soulja Boy, whose baggy pants I’ll be suing right off in about nineteen years.
Watch me crank it, watch me roll! SuperLiss, now whoa!
I may not have been the best teenager before last week’s weirdness, but now I’ve got this new life on lock. I’m going to capitalize on all that I gleaned from my dream future.
First I plan to take this crazy psychic knowledge and use it to get into a better college than the University of Central Illinois. Playboy magazine ranked UCI first in the nation for partying, but academically? They fall somewhere between Hamburger University and barber college. The UCI mascot is a sloth, for God’s sake. Sloth pride? Um, no. The worst part is that in the dream past I was accepted to UCI only because Daddy called in a favor from his law school buddy who’s on the board. So shameful.
“Whatcha doin’, honey bunny?” Mamma asks, hovering in my doorway.
What I’m doing is writing down every bit of information I can remember about the dream future, because I plan to find a way to make it pay off. One word . . . Sportbook! I can’t wait until I’m eighteen and old enough to go to Vegas!
But . . . even though I’m extra-close with my mom, it’s probably best not to share this information for fear of being sent to a shrink. That’s always her home-run swing whenever I don’t do exactly what she wants—she threatens to enroll me in therapy. Well, that or fat camp.
For now I tell her, “Studying for my Italian test tomorrow.” In the dream future, I spend a whole summer bumming around Italy after graduating from UCI and I come back semifluent. My teacher was so impressed today when I could say, “Il mio fidanzato non ha bisogno di sapere” (“My boyfriend doesn’t need to know”) with a flawless accent!
She saunters into the room, cocktail in hand, and then putters around, straightening pictures and adjusting trophies before she comes to perch on my bed. She sips her drink and intently watches me. “Well, finish up, ’cause the Dynasty reunion is on. Don’tcha want to find out what happened to Alexis and Dex?”
Actually, I already know. Ooh, ooh! Write that down, too!
I say, “I’ll be ready in a few.”
Mamma doesn’t get up. She takes a long pull on her drink. �
�I jus’ worry about you, darlin’. Study too hard and you’re gonna get you some wrinkles.”
I jot, Item #37—Invent Botox.
“I’ll be fine,” I reply.
She sets her glass on my nightstand and idly fingers the fringe on my bedspread. “Y’all in any classes with June Childs’s daughter? Name’s Amy? Smart as a whip, but the poor thang’s been beat in the face with an ugly stick. Her nose?” She leans in all conspiratorially. “It’s shaped like a P-E-N-I-S. Her mamma had to drop out of Jazzercise because she’s savin’ up for plastic surgery.”
At this news, my stomach knots just a little bit. I give her an almost imperceptible nod.
“What about this girl named Brooks? Brooks Paddy? You know her? She’s about y’all’s age.”
There goes my stomach again. I say nothing, keeping my eyes on the page.
“Well, her mamma is in the Junior League with me. Good Lord, that child is fat as the day is long. When the family flew to Washington, D.C., this summer they had to ask the stewardess for one o’ them special seat belts. You know, for the O-B-E-S-E. Awful, just awful.”
I put down my pen. “Which part, Mamma? The fat part or the being embarrassed on the flight part?”
My mother bristles. “Young lady, I do not care for your tone. All’s I’m doin’ is tryin’ to help you, because you do not want to be lahk these girls.” When she gets rattled, the South really comes out. Once when Daddy tried to cancel our country club membership because he said the dues were too high, she went from zero to Atlanta burning in point five seconds. (The membership stayed.)
I try to maintain my temper, because trust me, no one wins a fight with my mother; it’s best not to even try. Yet I can’t stop myself from saying, “What’s your point, Mamma? That I don’t want to be like them because they’re on the honor roll?”
What I don’t say is that these girls have committed the cardinal sin of not being pretty enough for Virginia “Ginny” Cavanaugh Jefferson Beaulieu Ryder, top debutante at the Savannah Christmas Cotillion, circa 1971.
From the time I was old enough to hold my own hairbrush, my mother has been grooming me on the importance of grooming. She’s always said it doesn’t matter what you’re like on the inside if folks can’t get past your outside.
When I was in grade school, no matter how late I might have been running, I wasn’t allowed to leave for the day until my ribbons were tied, my shoes polished, and my cheeks pinked. I remember saying, “Why do I need rouge? I’m six!” and she’d simply reply, “Trust me, darlin’. This is an investment in your future.” She even hooked me up with a cheerleading coach in seventh grade to make sure that by the time high school rolled around, there was no way I wouldn’t make the squad.
At no point did she ask me if I wanted any of this.
For the most part, I did and I do, but it’s nice to be consulted, you know?
She waves her hands in front of her face like she’s trying to dry her long, expertly manicured talons. “Oh, honey! Nobody gives a fig what your grades were in high school! What everyone ’members is what you drove and who you dated and if you won you some crowns! And once you get to college, it’s all ’bout being a Kappa or a Tri-Delt, ’cause that’s how you land the best husband. The right man’ll set you up for life!”
I roll my eyes—like I haven’t heard a million times how she was the belle of every ball and how she dated the lieutenant governor’s son. Instead of engaging, I concentrate on my list. What am I missing? I do a quick, seated Pilates stretch to help my blood flow. Hey . . . Pilates! I pick up my pen and write, Item #38—Invent Pilates.
I chew on the tip of my pen while I concentrate.
Item #39—Invent GPS.
What else might make me rich, rich, rich in the future?
Item #40—Invent LOLCats.
“You’re getting all squinchy again right there.” She taps me above the bridge of my nose with the lip of her glass.
I duck away from her. “That’s because I’m thinking.”
She brushes my hair out of my face. “Well, maybe you should think less, darlin’. After all, your job as a young lady is to be attractive, not smart. Trust me, boys do not line up for the clever girls. No one ever says, ‘Oh, my—check out the big IQ on that one!’”
At some point during our conversation my dad materialized in the doorway and now he’s hopping mad. “Really, Ginny?” he sputters. “It’s one thing to insist on rewarding piss-poor academic performance with a brand-new sports car, but to hear you actually encourage our daughter not to try? To say it’s more important to be attractive than intelligent? What kind of message are you sending?”
Mamma deliberately sips her drink before she responds. “The right one.” Which comes out sounding like raaaaaaaaaaht.
Daddy is seething mad. “What do you want, for her to still be living here twenty years from now because she never learned how to work hard enough to hold a job? Help me out, Ginny, because I really don’t understand your warped set of values.”
My mother leans back against my David Coverdale poster and crosses her arms. She draws back into herself, not unlike a cobra about to strike.
In a voice as chilly as the little shards of ice floating on top of her martini, she says, “George, soon as anyone in this household gives one hot goddamn about what you thank, we’ll be sure and let you know.” Then she winks at me.
It’s the most terrifying wink anyone has ever seen.
All the blood drains from my dad’s face, and for a second I kind of hope he’ll fight back. But instead of exploding, he takes a few deep breaths before retreating to his library.
My mother turns back to me and gives me a victorious smile. “Now, honey bunny, let’s talk about homecomin’. Forget your silly ol’ test. I say we go shoppin’ for gowns tomorrow!”
* * *
Save for the usual tension with my folks last night, this has been one of the best weeks of my life. The Belles are looking at me with newfound respect, Duke/Martin’s mooning over me like he’s completely lovestruck, and I’ve aced every single test, quiz, and homework assignment. And my new (old?) convertible? Every girl wants to be me and every guy wants to be with me.
I am unstoppable.
So, if and when I hit my twenty-year reunion, I’m showing up with an amazing job, a fat checking account, a doting husband, and Michelle Obama arms. Bank on that.
I’m in the ladies’ slicking on one more coat of the same shade of bloodred lipstick Donna Martin wore on last week’s 90210. Debbie (I mean Deva—no, I mean . . . crap, this is so confusing) comes into the bathroom and makes a beeline for a stall. We don’t have any classes together and it’s a huge school. I only ever run into her when she’s burning herbs in the basketball gym. As we’re smack in the middle of football season, this is the first time I’ve seen her since my dream.
I monkey around with my hair and give serious deliberation to having bangs cut. I’ll focus-group the Belles on this, with the caveat being if I opt for them, there’s a moratorium on anyone else having a trim for at least a month.
Yes.
That’s exactly what I’ll do.
I forgot the rush that comes from wielding this kind of influence. I’m the trendsetter, the tastemaker. What I say goes. I even have enough cachet to make everyone listen to hair metal again if I were to publicly deem it cool. Seriously, if I came to school in a Van Halen tee tomorrow (which I totally own) it’d be 1984 all over again. At the moment, no one can shut up about the local band the Smashing Pumpkins, whose lead singer, if my dream future is correct, is cue-ball bald and wears no eyeliner whatsoever! Blech.
Somehow, though, I kind of want to keep Axl and Tommy and Kip and David and the rest of them all to myself. So much of what I do lately is subject to public scrutiny that I’m starting to feel oddly private about a few things.
I guess what I’m saying is, I have the power to make “fetch” happen . . . but I choose not to exercise it.
I hear a toilet flush and Debbie me
anders out in one of her oddball kimono shirts, all rigid and upright in her back brace. I give her a quick nod—a serious social coup for any non-Belle—and then I brush on another layer of Great Lash.
Debbie grins back at me. She methodically washes her big hands and then dries them on the scratchy brown paper towels known exclusively to public lavatories everywhere. Then she just stands there real close to me, waiting to catch my eye. When I glance over, she says—all matter-of-fact, like she’s asking me about the math assignment—“Have you achieved clarity yet?”
The only sound is that of my mascara clattering into the sink. Every ounce of my blood has completely frozen. “Excuse me?” I whisper.
“Your journey, Lissy Ryder. How’s it going? I’ve been meaning to catch up with you all week, but ironically chemistry’s giving me trouble this time around.”
“What? I mean . . . how?” I feel my knees go weak and I have to steady myself against the wall. Because if this isn’t Debbie doing the usual talking out of her ass, I have just fallen into a massive metaphysical wormhole. (One of the Real Housewives of New Canaan has a metaphysics coach, which is why I’m familiar with the concept.)
“The Incan tonic, of course.”
I gasp for breath as the wind rushes out of me. “Are you telling me that was all real? That I didn’t have some bullshit dream like on Dallas? Are you Patrick Duffy or something?”
Now Debbie seems confused. “No, Lissy Ryder. I’m Deva. We’ve met. Don’t you remember—I brought you to my place after the reunion? The wheatgrass? The Ikat robe?”
I nod numbly as I slide down the wall and sink to the floor. “The tonic did more than fill in crow’s-feet.”
“Far more.”
I rest my face in my palms for a moment, not even considering what that might do to my makeup. The whole room feels like it’s swirling around me in a blur of baby pink and mint green tiles. I try to focus my eyes on the paper-towel holder while I collect my wits. I’m not sure if I want to barf or scream.
“Does this mean I don’t get to invent Facebook?”
Here I Go Again: A Novel Page 7