Sloppy Firsts

by Megan Mccafferty

  I didn’t let Mom know I was done with my holiday shopping. It would have broken her already fragile heart. So I spent sixty minutes in the food court, fueling up on Cinnabon and Coke, because when we reunited, it would be time to begin our search for the anti-homecoming dress and I would need to tap into my sugar reserve for energy.

  I know that as a red-blooded American teenage girl, I should be thrilled that she considers buying something for me a better present than the tiny bottle of Chanel No. 5 my dad and I’d already given her. Yet it was an excruciating process anyway.

  "Oooooooh," my mom cooed, putting down her shopping bags so she could rub a swath of burgundy velvet between her fingers. "You would look lovely in this."

  "Mom, you’re missing the point," I said. "This is supposed to be an anti- homecoming dress. Anti meaning something I wouldn’t wear to homecoming."

  "Oh, right," she said, her voice as flat as my chest. "Like what?"

  "Like nothing in the ’Midnite Expressions’ juniors section of Macy’s."

  I dragged her to Delia’s, which is sometimes too trendoid for me, but where I can usually find something sorta cute for my pathetic, size-nothing bod. After I ruled out about a dozen of my mom’s girlier ideas, she finally pulled out a hanger that I could say yes to: a slate-blue corduroy, zip-front shirtdress. Cute, but not too cute. I tried it on in the dressing room and was actually pretty pleased by my reflection. So much so, that I actually stepped out and let my mom see me in it. Big mistake.

  "You really live up to your name in that dress," she said, brimming over with maternal pride. "You look so darling in it."

  Darling. I looked darling, which means I didn’t look like me. And that’s when it dawned on me: I was making my mom happy on her birthday by being like Bethany. Suddenly, this whole venture seemed stupid. I didn’t really need to get this thing. I had no reason to look darling for anyone or anything. I unzipped the dress, stuffed it on the hook, opened the door, and told my mom it was time to go.

  "You’re not going to get it?" She looked crushed.

  "No."

  "Why not?"

  "I don’t need it, Mom," I said.

  "Nonsense," she said, grabbing it off the hook. "I’m getting it for you."

  "Moooooom," I said, tugging it away from her. "I have nowhere to go in it."

  "You’ll have somewhere to go in it, I promise."

  If she wanted to max out her credit card for no reason, who was I to stop her?

  Finally, four major department stores and 170 specialty shops later, we were done.

  "The mall wasn’t crowded at all today," Mom observed, over a salad at TGI Friday’s.

  I shoved a fistful of fries in my mouth, so as not to spew venom Linda Blair–style.

  "I bet everyone is home getting ready for the homecoming dance," my mom said, spearing a cherry tomato.

  Daggers. From my eyes. Through her heart.

  "What?" she asked.

  "Can you go for two seconds without reminding me about the goddamn homecoming dance?"

  "Watch your language, honey," she said, her voice tight. "I just can’t believe that you’re the only girl in your class who couldn’t find a date."

  "Well, Bridget isn’t going either."

  "Bridget?" she sat up in her seat. "Bridget didn’t get a date? What about Burke?"

  "She and Burke broke up."

  "They broke up? When? Why? How?"

  My mom lives for this stuff. It was her birthday, so I decided to throw her a juicy bone. Besides, I thought she should know how disgusting my former fake friends really were. Then she might get off my case for not hanging out with them anymore.

  "It all started when Manda had sex with Burke while Bridget was in L.A.…"

  And I told her the whole sordid story. When I finished, she was dumbstruck.

  "I don’t believe it."

  "It’s true."

  "That poor girl," my mom said. "Such a pretty girl home alone on homecoming night."

  Homecoming again. Jesus Christ! I was barely keeping it together.

  "She’s not home alone," I said, my throat tightening. "She flew to her dad’s for the Thanksgiving weekend because her mom had to work."

  "We should’ve invited her out with us," she said. "It would have been fun! Just like the old days …"

  That was it. The end.

  "You’re right," I shouted, throwing my napkin on the table in disgust. "How could I have been so stupid. I should’ve rented Bridget out for your birthday! Rent-a-Daughter. So you wouldn’t have to go through the torture of walking around with me."

  "Keep your voice down!"

  "I’m outta here!" I screamed.

  The thing about making a dramatic exit is this: It helps when you have a way of getting beyond the parking lot. I hadn’t thought to swipe my mom’s keys, or grab my backpack so I could call a cab. I was stuck. I had to resort to sitting on a bench outside the entrance until my mom came out.

  I heard her heels clicking on the floor before I saw her. She walked right past me and straight to the car. I followed her. She unlocked the door to let me in, so she wasn’t going to drive away without me.

  "Do you want to tell me what that was all about?"

  Part of me did. And part of me didn’t.

  "I’m not leaving here until you give me an explanation."

  I couldn’t tell if she meant it or not, but I felt like every second in that car took a year off my life.

  "I …"

  When I opened my mouth to talk, I had fully intended on only telling her enough to make her put the key in the ignition and drive home. But once I started, I couldn’t stop.

  "I … feel like you only want to be with me if I can be someone else, someone beautiful like Bethany or Bridget. And I feel like Dad only wants to be with me if I can be like the star athlete he wanted his son to be. It’s like when I try to be me, you’re not happy with who that person is. You’re constantly trying to talk me out of my feelings or make me feel bad for thinking differently than you do. I’m sorry I’m not popular and born to shop and I don’t have a ton of boyfriends like Bethany. I’m sorry that Matthew died and Dad never got to coach him! But that’s not my fault! And I’m sick and tired of you both taking it out on me! "

  Tears were streaming down both our faces when I finished. I didn’t know if my mom was going to hug me or hit me.

  "Jessie," she said. "I had … no idea … you …" She then wrapped her arms around me and started stroking my hair. Her body was soft and warm and as comforting as it was when I was kid.

  She released me and held my face in her hands. "I don’t want you to be Bethany. And your father doesn’t want you to be …" She couldn’t bring herself to say his name. "… anyone but you. Neither one of us does."

  "It doesn’t feel that way," I said.

  "I understand Bethany better than I understand you. She was no picnic, but she was definitely less …" She cocked her head to the side, trying to find the right word. "Less complicated than you. And as a parent, I sometimes can’t help but think that things would be easier if I had two children like her. But then you wouldn’t be you."

  "And what a joy it is for us all that I am."

  "You have to stop saying things like that," she said. "I know things are hard for you right now. And I know I’ll never quite understand why. But I think these difficulties are going to make you a much better person in the long run."

  "But why do some people, like Bethany, seem to coast right on through high school and college and life?"

  "I love Bethany, you know that. But she is so used to getting her way that it has made her a very spoiled, selfish person. And I’m partly to blame for that," she said. "Sooner or later, that’s going to catch up with her, though."

  This all sounded very familiar, like dialogue straight out of the touching Parent-Bonds-with-Misunderstood-Teen scenes in my favorite flicks. Normally, a revelation like that would make me crack up. Or cringe. Or cry. Why? Because it proves that I’m just
a cliché, and not the complex iconoclast I (deep down) like to think I am. But at that moment, I didn’t give a damn that my mom was being totally corny, and that I was being corny by association. She made me feel better.

  When we got home, I decided to show Mom my editorials. If she really wanted to know what went on inside her second daughter’s head, so be it.

  "You write for the school paper?"

  "Yeah," I said. "It’s no big deal."

  "Why didn’t you tell me?"

  "Like I said, because it’s no big deal."

  She put on her reading glasses and opened up The Seagull’s Voice. I had to leave the room because I couldn’t handle watching her reaction.

  About ten minutes later, I heard a knock on my bedroom door.

  "Boy," she said. "You are your father’s daughter."

  That was not the reaction I’d expected at all.

  "Me and Dad? No way."

  She sighed and sat next to me on the bed. "You’re both perfectionists. You’re both hardheaded. You both have trouble dealing with people. You both get depressed when things don’t go your way. You both think too much. You both keep your feelings inside, then explode at inopportune moments," she said, tracing the triangles in the quilt with her shiny fingernail.

  "If we’re so alike, how come the only thing we can talk about is running? Otherwise we don’t talk at all."

  "It’s the one thing he feels he has in common with you," she said. "It’s his way of trying to connect with you."

  "But he puts so much pressure on me! I start to hate him and the sport, and I don’t want to do it anymore."

  "I know," she said. "Just try to remember that every time he talks to you about running, it’s because he loves you, not because he lives to torture you."

  Deep down, I already knew that. But that’s so much easier said than done.

  "Thank you for showing me your editorials," she said, getting up to go. "That’s the best birthday present I’ve ever gotten."

  the twenty-sixth

  Hope called tonight, gasping, choking, sobbing.

  Heath would have turned twenty today.

  The most upsetting thing about it was that she’d been so caught up in the minutiae of private-school life that she forgot her brother’s birthday until her parents called to ask her how she was coping on this sad occasion.

  "How could I let my life go on so easily?" she asked me. "How could I?"

  I was silently asking myself the same thing. How could I?

  Yes. How could I talk to Marcus, someone indirectly responsible for the death of my best friend’s brother, someone so indifferent about it that he’s never once brought it up? Never once apologized or expressed any grief or regret or anything.

  And to think I almost caved in and called him last night.

  How could I?

  the thirtieth

  So I haven’t heard from you in a week. What’s up?"

  Marcus had tapped me on the shoulder before History class. He had fresh, faint Mia lipstick smears on his neck, right above his shirt collar. Brownish enough to blend in with his still-tanned skin, but clearly visible.

  "Nothing’s up. I just haven’t called. That’s all."

  Truth was, I had wanted to lift my moratorium on Marcus before it even began. But the guilt of our midnight phone calls ultimately won out over the need for sleep. Plus, I just couldn’t handle getting the details on the homecoming dance. I was starting to feel like half of his perfect woman. Mia was the body. I was the brains. And when I saw him and Mia together, they reminded me of the Twin Towers. I was any anonymous curb.

  "Oh," he said. "So does this mean that you want me to call you?"

  Did I want him to call me? Did I want him to call me?

  Yes. No. Yes?

  "Don’t answer that," he said. "I know I want to call you. So I will. And if you want to talk to me, we’ll talk. If you don’t want to talk to me, you can hang up."

  He held out his hand. "Deal?"

  I hesitated. He reached for my hand. We shook on it, skin on skin. Yes.

  Then a lightning bolt shot straight through my skivvies. Sha-ZAM!

  December 2nd

  Hope,

  No charts necessary this month.

  Bridget and I are talking again. And Manda and Sara are talking again, I assume in response to the fact that Bridget and I are talking again. Very, very lame.

  Without Burke, Bridget isn’t so brainless. In fact, their breakup has brought on a sort of metamorphosis. Bridget actually quit the cheerleading squad and is trying out for the school play. She wants to take acting seriously. Rah-rah for her. Seriously.

  Now if only I could get a boyfriend to break up with me so I could go through a similar life makeover …

  I’m kidding.

  All of this is just a way for me to avoid writing about what’s really on my mind right now anyway.

  Could you really be here on New Year’s Day?

  I can’t think of a better way to make up for last year’s suckfest.

  Here’s the thing: Don’t say it unless you mean it. I don’t think I could handle another psych-up and letdown. I know it wasn’t your fault that we had to cancel my summer trip. I don’t blame you, but it was really hard to get over anyway.

  So please don’t say you’re coming unless you know you’re coming. And don’t visit unless you really want to visit. Coming back when you really don’t want to would be even suckier than spending New Year’s alone. For me, anyway.

  Brutally but honestly yours, J.

  december

  the fourth

  Today is the one-year anniversary of the first day of my last period.

  I’m not exactly celebrating.

  When I lied to my mom about getting my period, it was just the easiest escape route at the time. I didn’t think much of it because I was sure that sooner or later, it would turn out to be true. So every twenty-eight days I take tampons out of the box under the sink and flush them down the toilet to make her think that I’m cycling as I should.

  But I can’t tell her now that my ovaries still aren’t back from vacation. She’ll not only freak out and ground me for lying, but she’ll force me to go to the gyno. And the very thought of getting into the stirrups and letting a total stranger go elbow-deep and up to my uterus … Jesus Christ! I can’t handle it. I just can’t. I’d puke all over the exam table. I swear.

  What is wrong with me? Will it ever come back? Why would my female equipment break before I even got a chance to use it? Why was my womanhood revoked? Why am I back to prepubescence?

  Oh, the irony. I’m decades ahead of my classmates psychologically. Physically, however, I’m a goddamn kindergartner.

  the sixth

  PAUL PARLIPIANO IS GAY.

  Jesus Christ O’Mighty.

  Our whole school is buzzing about it. He came out to his family over Thanksgiving. His family tried to be supportive, but they didn’t want the news spread all over town. They wanted to keep it secret. But yesterday Mrs. Parlipiano ran into a neighbor at Super-Foodtown and broke down right in front of the deli counter. "My son is gay!"

  Apparently, Paul Parlipiano had suspected his gayness for a very long time. But it wasn’t until he moved to NYC that he got in touch with his inner George Michael and was ready to be seen as the rainbow-flag-waving fag he is.

  I know. Shame on me. How Slim Shady. I know I should be happy for Paul Parlipiano. He’s not lying to himself anymore. Yet I can’t help but be pissed. Not because I don’t have a chance with him now, because God knows I never had a chance with him, even when he was "straight." No. I’m pissed because I can’t fantasize about him anymore. I’ve created this stellar little imaginary world around him and now he’s ruined it. It’s one thing to get all torqued up over a guy who doesn’t know you exist. It’s quite another to get all torqued up over a guy who doesn’t know you exist and likes to take it where the sun don’t shine. One is fantasy. The other is just plain masochistic.

  You only
think you love me, he said. If you knew me, you would know better.

  I’m starting to think I don’t know a damn thing about anyone. Or anything. My entire notion of sex and love is totally, completely, and irreversibly screwed.

  the seventh

  What does it mean when your true love turns out to be a homosexual?" I asked Marcus on the phone tonight.

  "Well, Darlene, I’d assume that means he’s not really your true love."

  Darlene is my alter ego. She was born last week. Marcus was lying on his bed, smoking a cigarette, waiting for me to call. He said he started saying my last name over and over and over like a mantra until darlindarlindarlindarlin became Darlene. Marcus says Darlene has sort of a trailer-trash allure that makes her more fun than I am. Jessica Darling had always sounded too cute, a cheerleader or head of the Clueless Crew or someone else I’d hate. So I welcomed the mutilation.

  I tried to explain how much I thought I loved Paul Parlipiano.

  "I was totally convinced I loved him, even though I barely knew him."

  I could hear Marcus suck on his cigarette. I pictured the orange tip growing and glowing, and Marcus closing his eyes and holding his breath.

  "There’s an explanation," I said. "I learned in Psych that sometimes the sensory receptors send impulses straight to the amygdala, which controls emotional responses, bypassing the hypothalamus, which processes and relays the information to the brain."

  There was a thoughtful pause.

  "I’m not going to pretend I know what you’re talking about," he said. "But you’re basically blaming your love on biology."

  "Biology," I repeated, imagining a thin ribbon of smoke reaching for the ceiling, the sky.

  "That’s interesting …"

  "What?"

  "It just makes me wonder what subject you blame for talking to me every night."

  I’m still settling on an answer for that one. Probably Chemistry.

  Jesus Christ. I can’t believe I just wrote that.

  the ninth

  Marcus called me tonight and said, "Let’s do something."

  We’ve been talking for two months. Not only have we never "done something" together before, but he’s never even called me on a Saturday night. It was understood: Weekdays at midnight were for me. Weekends were for Mia.