Into the Wild Nerd Yonder

by Halpern, Julie

  I take one last look in the mirror before heading down to breakfast. I look kind of cute in my new skirt and eye shadow. Not much different than last year, but not all of us are dying to turn into someone else. Most of the time, anyway.

  At breakfast, Mom and Dad run around, grabbing for newspapers and coffee cups. Both of them are teachers, although we like to refer to Mom as Doc, since she received her Ph.D. in education last year. I never quite understood how regular teachers could turn into doctors. (Like our old, horrid, Southern gym teacher, Dr. Stunter. What did she have a Ph.D. in—Dodgeball? Rope climbing? Child torture?) until Mom spent three grueling years in night school. Not that I’m not grateful, since it forced Dad to hone his cooking skills and prove once and for all that a man’s place is in the kitchen. At least in my house.

  Dr. and Mr. Sloan always leave the house a little before me and Barrett, to uphold the appearance that all teachers do, in fact, live in their classrooms. Both of them are wearing suits, which they usually do for the first week or two of school to scare the children into thinking they’re serious teachers. After that, it’s all Dad can do not to wear his ratty old Cubs hat to work (to cover up his ever-expanding bald spot), although Mom usually at least wears skirts until the slush of winter forces her into cords. She keeps her makeup to a minimum, and her hair is straight and brown, like mine, but in permanent mom-bob. People always tell us we look alike.

  Barrett slouches at the kitchen table, his Mohawk a faded, barfy orange, flopped over, sans gel. “You didn’t fix your hair?” I ask him.

  “I’m tired of it. Maybe I’ll shave it off tomorrow.”

  “I like when you have hair, Barrett. Don’t forget senior pictures. I don’t want you looking like a skinhead,” Doc Mom says. She kisses Barrett’s head, then kisses mine, and says good-bye.

  Dad grabs an apple and blogws a kiss. “Happy first day!” he calls.

  “Excited about going back?” Barrett asks. He knows how much I don’t hate school.

  “Yeah. Kind of,” I say, not trying to sound too eager.

  “Just kind of? What’s the prob?” Barrett chomps on a Strawberry Frosted Pop-Tart (untoasted), his favorite.

  “I’m just a little nervous about what it’s going to be like this year.”

  “Same as last year for you. Now for me, the senior, this will be a year of college crap, followed by the joy of slackness once I get accepted to NYU.”

  All Barrett talks about is going to NYU next year; I don’t even think he’s applying anywhere else, although I don’t want to ask him. Too momish. And the more we talk about him going away to college, the more I have to think about the fact that he’ll be going away to college. “That’s all well and good for you, Mr. Leaving His Sister All Alone, but I have to worry about the mortifying morphing of my friends.”

  Bizza’s and Char’s official physical transformations started this past week, when Bizza received a bunch of money from her mom for mowing the lawn all summer and doing other various around-the-house tasks that most other teens (i.e., me) don’t get paid for. Bizza went straight to the Hot Topic in the mall and bought all of the kitschy T-shirts, skanky stockings, suspenders, studded jewelry, patches, buttons, and stickers mow money could buy. I wanted to tell her that, according to Barrett, any real punk would never set foot in a mall to buy their clothes. (Barrett gets everything he owns from thrift stores, punk shows, and online.) Char opted for a more vintage-looking mix of old dresses and a giant pair of combat boots she found in her attic (I think they might have been her dad’s. They look really huge and make her walk a little like a tripping Frankenstein). She bought a ton of buttons of punk bands and covered her messenger bag. I guess this is how one dresses according to the overnight punk handbook.

  “Ah, the poseurettes,” Barrett smirks.

  “Do you still think they’re poseurettes? You did let them sit with the ’Hoppers at Denny’s.”

  “I can’t say no to your friends, Jess, at least not when they’re already there. I knew them when they were Barbie toddling dorks. But I don’t care how much Manic Panic they put in their hair, they’ll always just be my little sister’s friends.”

  I’m happy to hear he’s not fooled by their punk-in-a-box makeover, but I wonder what everyone else will think.

  I flip my Berry Berry Kix around in my bowl.

  “Hey, don’t look so worried. I’m sure they’ll find something else to glom onto next month,” Barrett tries to assure me. “And just think, if your friends are all punk, we’ll be seeing a lot more of each other.”

  “Yeah, before you abandon me and go off to college.”

  “We have a whole year before I abandon you. Ready?”

  “I guess.” I grab my backpack, deflated without the weight of homework, and head out in Barrett’s car. Fugazi yells out of the stereo and onto the streets through our open windows. I watch myself in the side-view mirror, my straight hair poking me in the eye every minute or so. I hope it doesn’t ruin my eye shadow. Why do I even bother?

  chapter 3

  THIS IS FAR WORSE THAN I EVER could have imagined. I’m at my locker, trying to remember the combination that I spun twenty times a day as a freshman, when a black figure lurks up on me. I see it out of the corner of my eye, but don’t think much of it until I hear a creepy voice. “Jessie Sloan . . . Jessie Sloan . . .” It’s like a ghost or a dream, but when I finally look, it’s way scarier.

  “Shit!” I jump. It’s all I can say. Before me stands Char, her once-beautiful blond hair muddied with equal stripes of black and red. Her left arm is covered up to her elbows in black, ropey, studly bracelets. On her right wrist is—wait—a tattoo? Small black stars are etched neatly in a bracelet around her wrist.

  “You got a tattoo?” I ask in an annoyed yet intrigued way. There are about a million more things I want to ask her, but I refrain. Do I even want to know?

  “Yeah, well, sort of. It’s a drawing. Van did it for me.”

  “Van?” Barrett’s Van? My Van?

  “Yeah. This weekend at Denny’s. I said I wanted a tattoo, and he said he could give me one. Then he drew it. It’s hot, right? He could have given you one, too, if you were there. Touched your hand the whole time,” she smirks. “Why didn’t you come?”

  I want to tell her that I was sick of listening to all of the nonconversations and inhaling the dirty air, but instead I just say, “I had to finish this skirt. You like?”

  “Hmmm. It’s cute. Funny,” which I would have taken as a compliment, but she said it with such dismissal in her voice. I didn’t say anything bad about her hair, so what gives? “Have you seen Bizza?” Char looks around.

  “No. I don’t know if she’s here yet.”

  “Oh, she’s here. I wondered if you’ve seen her. You’ll die. She looks so cool.”

  I’ll die, huh? Of what, exactly? My brain starts making a list of all of the twisted things Bizza could have done to garner even more attention. Then I catch her face coming my way down the hall. But what’s missing? Ah yes, her hair. Bizza has shaved her head completely, so the only hair left is a soft layer of fuzz.

  She holds herself so high that everyone in the halls can’t help but notice. Her hair is gone. It’s something I could never do, would never do. Without her hair, she looks like a different person. Just like Char does. And here I am: same as freshman year. And eighth grade. And seventh grade. Bizza looks so smug and confident and, dare I say, punk. And what am I again? Oh yeah, nothing.

  “Hey, Jess, what do you think?” Bizza does a mock-fancy turn and runs her hand over the top of her buzz. She’s truly interested in my answer.

  I almost say that I actually think it looks kind of good, but I just can’t. Usually I’m pretty generous with the compliments because why not try and make someone feel good? But there is something so annoying to me about this extreme hair show. “Fuzzy,” I decide. She seems satisfied with the answer and quickly moves on to looking around the hallway for other reactions.

  The first bell rin
gs. “Better get to class, ladies. Mrs. Buxton always has a shitfit if I’m late. I can’t wait to see her face when she sees this,” Bizza muses, brushing the top of her hair with her palm.

  The three of us head down the hall. People are packed together, hugging their beginning-of-the-school-year hellos. But as Bizza and Char walk, the crowd parts. I watch the innocent bystanders from behind Bizza and Char (walking with them would feel like a game of “Which one of these things doesn’t belong?”). Some people point and laugh at them. Others’ eyes bug out, and they turn away to whisper to their friends. One guy, I can’t see who, yells out, “Freaks!” Bizza doesn’t seem to care at all. I can almost see the defiant smirk through the back of her shaved head as she holds up her middle finger high and cuts through the hallway. I turn into honors English and wonder if Bizza remembered me in her moment of punk rock glory to turn around and share it with me. It’s not like she shared her shaving experiment with me, so why would she include me in this? Why didn’t she call me when she buzzed it? Did she think I’d try and talk her out of it? Make fun of her? Or maybe she just thinks my boring brown hair wouldn’t understand.

  The quiet normalcy in honors English is a welcome change from the new hair drama in my life. I sit down next to Polly Chlumsky, a familiar, friendly face from years of gifted classes together. Polly is a flute prodigy, which suits her perfectly. She sort of looks like a flute; everything about her is long and elegant—her hair, her nose, her fingers. I have only ever seen her play once, during an all-school assembly. It pissed me off how most of the students talked or slept during the performance because Polly deserved better. If it is possible to kick another flute player’s ass, she definitely did just that. (By the way—I know a flute player is technically called a “flautist,” but something about it sounds a little sketchy, as does “pianist,” so I will refrain. If I need to refer to it in the future I will use the variant, “flutist,” which also works. I looked it up.)

  “Hey, Jessie, how was your summer?”

  Well, Polly, my friends turned into poseur punk rock turdettes who didn’t invite me into their personal hair club. Have you seen them? I’m sure they’ll make an announcement about Bizza’s haircut over the loudspeaker. And maybe they’ll hold a pep rally. “Pretty good.” I decide to just tell her the non-annoying parts. “I made about fifty skirts.”

  “Is that a new one? Very cute. Very ‘first day of school.’ ” Polly knows how to give good compliment. She always appreciated my occasion-appropriate fashion sense, and she actually bought one of my skirts at the Greenville High Summer Craft Fair. It had a bunch of fruit baskets all over it. I doubt she’ll ever wear it, but it was nice of her to show her Gifted and Talented support. “I went to band camp for the first time.” Polly laughs as she says this. “I know, I know. So cliché. And no, I did not stick my flute up you-know-where.” I laugh. I think flutists worldwide will never live down the American Pie flute-in-the-crotch reference. “But I did meet a guy,” Polly says. She opens up her neatly decorated binder, and taped to the inside is a picture of a guy with round glasses, a military haircut (short on top, even shorter on the sides—ugh), and a T-shirt that says “Science Olympiad 2008.” Awkward. I hate when someone you like wants you to like something they like but you can’t quite muster up the fakeness to tell them something, anything, good. This is one of those times. “His name is Jake,” Polly gushes. “Isn’t he cute?”

  “Yeah.” I smile, trying to look sincere. Polly leaves her binder open as Ms. Norton passes out this semester’s reading list and class expectations. I look at the picture of Jake and try to see what Polly sees. Maybe he has a nice voice or he’s really funny or crazy talented in whatever instrument he plays (I’m guessing the oboe). Did they kiss? Do more? I glance at Polly, and suddenly she looks about fifteen years older than she did two minutes ago. Summer sure can change people. Just not me.

  chapter 4

  I’M SLIGHTLY RELIEVED THAT I ENDED up with fifth-period lunch, while Bizza and Char have seventh period. I’d rather not have to deal. But that means that I either have to walk around the cafeteria with a “pick me” look of desperation while I try to figure out who I kind of know, or I can sit outside on a bench and eat while I listen to an audiobook on my iPod. No-brainer.

  I munch an apple as I listen to a particularly gory scene in Stephen King’s Cell, where a zombie-type person rips off another zombie-type person’s ear. I’m pretty grossed out and consider whether to reconsider this as a listening choice when I’m jerked away from the story by a grab on my shoulder. I look up and see the gorgeousness of Van. He asks me something, but I can’t hear him between the apple crunching and the flesh biting. I yank out my earbud.

  “Hi.” I smile. “I didn’t know you had fifth-period lunch,” which, of course, makes it sound like I’m keeping track of his schedule and I should have been more on top of things.

  “Yup,” he says, dangling his car keys from his finger. “You want to get out of here?” I nod, trying not to look as incredulous as I feel. Going out for a second lunch with Van. My hands barely work as I grab my stuff and follow him to his car.

  Greenville High School is located on a major road across from a million fast-food restaurants and car dealerships. If you want to go out for lunch, it’s actually much faster to walk instead of having to deal with the onslaught of lunchtime traffic, but it’s not nearly as cool. Van’s car is what Barrett enviously refers to as “a classic pile of shit,” a Gremlin, which for those who have never seen one is about the grossest, ’70s-looking car on the planet. The outside of the car is a classic vomit green, while the inside is mustard yellow, yet it somehow looks cool. Probably because it belongs to Van.

  Van is a somewhat legendary player (in the female sense, not in the actual instrument playing sense, so I guess I mean “playa,” but writing that just looks like “beach” in Spanish) on the local punk scene, according to Barrett. Loyal to a fault with his guy friends (he once got into a fight with a group of skinheads when they called Barrett a fag), Van is somewhat looser when it comes to the traditional boyfriend/girlfriend thing. Practically every week Barrett would tell our family a dinnertime tale involving Van and (fill in girl-of-the-week’s name here). I was never sure if Barrett did this because he thought the stories were actually amusing (they usually were) or if he was not so subtly trying to provide his little sister with a book full of Van precautionary tales. No matter how much crap Barrett talked about Van and le bimbo du jour, it didn’t stop me from playing around a fantasy in my head that when I’m old enough (not like I’ll catch up to him, but maybe he has a minimum age requirement for hookups), Van will declare his love for me, and tell me he’s done with the hoochie-of-the-week program, and that he never wants to screw around with anyone else but me. Très romantic, I know. But it’s hard not to turn to soup around a guy as annoyingly delicious as Van. He has that TV-show-bad-boy thing (he doesn’t speak as much as he sighs and smokes) going for him, which I’m a total sucker for. All I can hope is that he has a thing for the plain, girl-next-door types (who the bad boys always seem to end up with on TV, right?).

  All of this is going through my mind as I sit in Van’s Gremlin, music too loud and smoke from Van’s dangling cigarette clinging to my hair. We pull into the parking lot of Wendy’s, and Van lets the car and stereo run until he finishes his cigarette. When he’s done, he flicks it out the window and shuts off the car. I want to tell him that not only is smoking bad for him and everyone else around him but flicking the butt out the window isn’t exactly good for the environment. I refrain. So instead, there’s at least a minute of dead silence. “Hungry?” he smirks my way, and I turn to pudding, grateful I didn’t declare a smoking ban.

  “Sure,” I answer, still full from my first lunch.

  “It’s my treat,” he says, and I get the tiniest rumble in my stomach that this could be the date I’ve always dreamt about. I mean, he asked, he drove, and he’s buying. The few guys I dated always asked and paid (but never drove bec
ause they were my age—usually had the humiliation ride from a parent), but those guys were not anywhere near Van status.

  We get to the counter, and Van orders a four-piece-nugget Kids’ Meal. “It’s a good deal.” He shrugs to the zitty adult behind the counter. “And the lady will have . . .”

  The lady. Hee-hee. I say, “Just a Frosty. I’m not that hungry.”

  “A Frosty,” Van repeats to the man, who gives him his total. Van pulls out his chain wallet and fingers the dollars inside. “Yeah,” he draws the word out and looks at me, “do you think I could borrow a buck from you, Jessie? I’ll pay you back.” I’d give him a hundred dollars just for saying my name. “Wait—two bucks?” he asks as he realizes the extent of his shortage. I have now paid for more than my Frosty, but no biggie. People go dutch all the time.

  We grab a table by a window. I sit down and spoon my Frosty while Van pumps out six tiny paper cups of ketchup. He sets them up on the table in a perfect line. “I love the stuff,” he says. He pulls the toy out of his Kids’ Meal, a bunny bobble-head from some forgettable kids’ movie. He holds it up, jiggles it, and hands it across the table. “For you,” he says. I am mesmerized by the giant bunny head. Van munches his ketchup-dipped fry, and I have to restrain myself from jumping across the table and kissing his full, slightly chapped, ketchup-dappled lips.

  I hold the bunny, shake it, and smile. “Thanks. I’d put it in my car, if I had one.” I’m trying to be cool, when I really know that this bunny is going directly onto my nightstand so I can kiss it (i.e., the spirit of Van) every night before I go to sleep.

  Van inhales his tiny meal, and in an instant the lunch is over. I don’t even have time to finish my unwanted Frosty. “Better get back. Wouldn’t want to be late for my first day of shop,” Van chuckles.