Skin

by Napoli, Donna Jo

  Joshua and I had talked about going to the dance together. We had talked about me selling cookie dough with the cheerleaders and the Go-Camels, which is the support group for the football team. Lunatic mothers run it. They’re all in love with their sons. They’re the ones who sit on the bleachers and scream encouragement during the games even though the players can’t possibly hear them. And fringy, moon-eyed girls are in it. I would have been part of it. Just to help raise funds for that dance.

  Instead, of course, I didn’t sell cookie dough. And I sure didn’t go to the dance.

  But Joshua did. With Sharon Parker.

  He had to go. He’s captain of the team, after all. And he needed a date.

  But then he showed up at a party the next weekend with Sharon. Devin told me. And he didn’t have to have a date for that.

  And Becca had another dance party, the Saturday after Thanksgiving, and Joshua went with Sharon to that, too.

  Then this week Bill Brant tried to chum up to me at lunch. It was obvious: now that Joshua’s not into me anymore, his friends are free to hit on me. I almost puked on Bill’s sneaker.

  Joshua’s over me. He’s with Sharon.

  He’s safe. That’s what I wanted. Right?

  Life goes on.

  Joshua’s safe, safe, safe. He has someone else to turn to. Someone waiting in the sidelines. He can forget. He has Sharon.

  All I have is me. This is what I wanted, and I have it, and I hate it, and I’m burning up inside.

  Life goes on. How dare it?

  Which is why I am now standing on one foot with my other leg cocked, the bottom of the foot pressed against my standing leg’s thigh. This is tree pose—vrksasana. It’s a balance challenge. Ms. Martin says the point of this pose is not balance; the point is to find other relationships within the body—other relationships that will support you. I need other relationships to support me. I can do this.

  Life goes on.

  I hold the pose a full three minutes on each side, which amazes me. Then I walk into the bathroom and scrub my face clean and look in the mirror and repeat that thought: life goes on.

  And I’m sick of being mad. I can’t control vitiligo. I’m not normal. So what? This is my life. It’s taking a shape I never would have planned—but it’s mine. It’s all I have. I can be a tree; I can find a way to support myself on one foot.

  It is Saturday night. Life goes on. It is December. Life goes on. Christmas is coming. Salvation Army bells and decorated trees and Christmas carols and lasagna and red and green and silver spangled days. Christmas. When everyone is happy with the greedy thoughts of presents ahead.

  Presents.

  Anyone deserves a Christmas present. I’m going to give myself one. Now. Tonight. It’s been over a week since the last spot appeared. Maybe this is who I’m going to be. But even if I keep getting worse, tonight feels right. The me I am in this very moment is ready. I declare that—silently, but firmly.

  Dante and two friends are watching the third X-Men movie. This is, of course, the nine hundredth time Dante has watched it.

  I walk down the stairs slowly. No cosmetic cream. No stamps on my hand. No lipstick. And I’m wearing a shirt with a regular neckline and no scarf. I am a mutant, like the characters in the movie. So it’s fitting I should arrive like this.

  I stop a moment midway on the stairs and stand absolutely still. In mountain pose now, tall as I can be. I breathe deep. I feel my body’s weight. Anger dissipates. All I feel is the strength inside me. I can do this. Tim and Zach and Dante—I can face them.

  I descend to the bottom step and look at my hand. It’s white, but not just the spot. It’s white all over because I’m gripping the banister so hard. Fuck this shit. That may become my new mantra.

  I walk in. The lights are off, of course. What a brave girl I am, to expose myself to the dark. I almost laugh. I sit down on the couch beside Zach.

  “Hey, Sep,” says Zach.

  “Hey,” says Tim. He’s on the floor with his back leaning against the coffee table.

  “What do you want?” asks Dante. He’s in the chair.

  “I just came to see the movie.”

  “You hate this movie,” says Dante.

  “No, I don’t. Not anymore.”

  “You can’t stay,” says Dante.

  “Why? Are you guys going to make out or something?”

  Zach laughs. “Who cares, Dante? Let her watch.”

  “Come on, Sep. These are my friends.”

  “You’re just watching a movie. I won’t say anything.”

  “You’re already saying things.”

  “I’m just answering you.”

  Dante stands up. Then he sits down. “Okay, you can stay. But only if you go make us popcorn.”

  “All right.”

  “All right?” Dante sounds so surprised he just might faint.

  I leave and go make popcorn in our old hot-air popper. But not just ordinary popcorn. I sprinkle it with garlic salt and grate parmigiano on top. It smells fantastic. I carry it back.

  Tim turns on the light.

  I’m stunned. I thought I had till the end of the movie before I’d be exposed. But here it is. Now.

  I put the bowl on the coffee table.

  “What’s on your face?” asks Zach.

  “Skin.”

  “No, you’ve got something white on your lips and smeared across your cheek. And your forehead and temple. And neck. And hand…” His voice trails off.

  “It’s skin,” I say.

  No one speaks.

  Tim finally takes a fist of popcorn and stuffs it in his mouth. “Great,” he mumbles.

  “I’ve got vitiligo,” I say. “It’s a skin condition. It gives me white marks.”

  “So what do you have to take for it?” asks Zach.

  “Nothing. It’s just there. It doesn’t hurt me.”

  “And it’s not contagious,” says Dante quickly.

  “Will it go away?” asks Zach.

  “Probably not.” I take a single popped corn and mash it flat in my mouth. It sits on my tongue like a mangled, pregnant Communion wafer. “Do I look like a monster? One of your mutants?”

  “It’s not so bad,” says Zach. He looks at the popped corn in his hand. “My cousin got burned with acid, and he looks a lot worse than you.”

  Dante leans forward. “Shut up!”

  “It’s okay,” I say. “I need to hear it, Dante. I need to be prepared for what people will say.”

  Everyone’s silent.

  “Sep?” says Tim at last.

  I look at him.

  “With your tits and ass, you’ll always be hot.”

  I have to clench my teeth not to cry. Maybe my molars are going to get filed down to nothing with all the pressure I’ve put on them lately. “If you’re trying to get me to fuck you, Tim, forget it.”

  Tim and Zach laugh; Dante doesn’t.

  “Oooo,” says Tim, “the mouth on you. I never knew you spoke like that.”

  “I never knew you did, either. You’re lucky Dante didn’t punch you.” I look around. “So are we going to watch the movie or not?”

  Tim turns off the light.

  I sink to the floor and sit beside Dante’s chair. That wasn’t so bad.

  Okay, these boys have known me practically all their lives. Certainly all their lives that they remember. I’ve made them peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and poured them glasses of milk since they were five and I was seven. So they’re not an accurate picture. They care about me. Strangers will be different. I’ve read about it.

  But I have to start somewhere.

  “HEY, DEVIN.”

  Devin smiles at me, then her face freezes, then she catches hold of herself and smiles harder. “How you doing, Sep?”

  “I’ve got vitiligo.”

  “I know,” says Devin. But I can see from her face that she never guessed how far it had gone. And she had no idea how revolting it would be.

  “Now everyone will kno
w.”

  “You look good.”

  “Don’t say that. I haven’t yelled at my mother for trying to be nice for over a month now. Don’t make me yell at you.”

  “Okay.” She grows visibly taller. The way she lifts her sternum and brings her shoulder blades together in the back, you’d think she had been doing Ms. Martin’s yoga asanas.

  “You’re my fellow warrior,” I say.

  “What?”

  “It’s a yoga thing. Don’t worry about it.”

  “No bagel today?”

  “I already ate.”

  We march side by side. It’s Monday morning.

  As we turn the corner, Becca joins us. She stares at me. “What happened?”

  “I have vitiligo. It’s a skin condition. It’s not contagious. It gives me white blotches. All over. You should see my chest. No, you shouldn’t. It’ll probably never go away. It doesn’t hurt. It isn’t degenerative. I’m not dying. I didn’t do anything to make it come. I can’t do anything to make it go away. It’s not the same as being albino. My hair and eyes won’t change. Or at least my eyes won’t and probably my hair won’t. Any other questions?” I talked a mile a minute.

  Becca nods slowly. “Wow.” Then she snaps her fingers. “The lipstick! That’s why you started with the lipstick.”

  “You’re an Einstein, Becca.”

  “Look, the way to handle this is to tackle it head-on. You know, grab it and smash it to the ground.”

  “I know what a tackle is, Becca. Remember Joshua?”

  “Yeah.” And her eyes grow huge and blaze up. “Hey, did he dump you because of this? That piece of slime!”

  “No. He doesn’t know. We just split.”

  “Why?”

  I should tell her it’s because I acted like a shallow piece of slime myself. But I don’t want to deal with the way the two of them would rally against such self-deprecation. “It’s personal.”

  “Well, anyway, tackle it. This thing. Viti—what?”

  “Vitiligo.”

  “Right. Let’s tackle it. We can give you a nickname. That takes away the chance of people coming up with one on their own. Zebra. How about zebra?”

  “I don’t want a nickname. If people call me names, fuck ’em.”

  Becca winces. But she says, “Right. Fuck ’em.” She blinks.

  It’s funny who wants to be a warrior for you. I’m stunned, and grateful. But I can’t bring myself to say thank you.

  I get through the morning with a lot of stares, but a minimum of questions. Lunch is a bitch, though. People ask. I get tired of answering. I have my warriors—I might as well use them. So I tell everyone to ask Devin and Becca. And I eat my eggplant parmigiano. It’s delicious—one of Mamma’s specialties. I’m glad my taste for food has come back. Rachel did that for me—on Halloween, with her little Chinese steamed buns. It was like she pressed a toggle switch back to on. Lunch is a good thing.

  Speak of the devil—Rachel appears and sits down across from me. She stares at me while I eat. I am about to tell her just to ask Devin, when she says, “That’s eggplant parmigiano, isn’t it?”

  I nod.

  “Your mother’s trained you. You know good food. Here. Eat this.” She puts a little plastic container and fork in front of me.

  I open it and blink fast. The smell is sharp. “What is it?”

  “Cold sesame chicken with scallions. Eat it.”

  I nearly laugh. “You’re becoming a tyrant, the way you order people to eat things.” But I take a bite. “Oh my God.”

  “Do you like it?”

  I finish the whole thing and pass the container back to her. “Fill it again for tomorrow.”

  She glows. “I’m going to be a chef.”

  “Better. You’re going to be a goddess to gluttons everywhere.”

  Well, how about that? I’m not the only one bleeding internally these days—I bet Rachel’s parents are almost dead they’ve been bleeding so bad. A chef, and why not? Fuck neurology.

  The afternoon passes. And the evening. And the night. I lie here in bed and clutch my sheet to my chin. I came out today for real—not just to Dante’s friends, but to everyone—out of the vitiligo closet, and I haven’t dissolved or exploded or otherwise vanished. I am alive.

  Tuesday doesn’t go as well. I can see it coming before it actually gets here. I’m walking home alone and three girls are walking on the other side of the street, eyeing me. They’re sophomores, I’m pretty sure, because I recognize one. They cross to my side and my stomach closes around a cold stone, like oyster nacre around a grain of sand. Only I don’t think pearls will be the outcome.

  “What’s the matter with you?” asks one of them.

  “Vitiligo,” I say.

  “Is that some Italian word? Your mom’s Italian, right? Is this some foreign disease?”

  I want to answer her, say something, anything, but words won’t come. I want to shrug at least, but my shoulders won’t move.

  They walk ahead of me, silent, and turn at the corner.

  “Everyone said it was awful up close, but it’s worse than awful.”

  I can hear them, and they know that. My hand goes to my cheek—to the tomato-worm splotch.

  “Like someone dropped her in an acid bath.”

  I think of Zach’s cousin, the burn victim. My hand works its way up my temple and across my forehead. So many splotches.

  “She should put on makeup or something. It’s disgusting to go around like that.”

  Then they’re too far away for me to make out their words.

  I stop still. My breath comes quick and shallow and for a second I think I’ll suffocate, just fall and die. But then the dizziness passes. I catch my breath.

  And I stare after them, my hands in fists. Disgusting. The word hisses inside my head.

  I knew it was coming. I dreaded it. But it’s still hard to believe. Their eyes… good Lord. They looked at me like I was a monster.

  I can imagine doing any number of things right now. I could rend my clothes and scream and roll on the sidewalk. I could shout obscenities or throw bricks from that pile in the yard over there.

  But I don’t.

  And I won’t.

  I uncurl my fingers and my hands drop heavy. Those girls can’t reduce me to raving. I’m not a monster. I’m me, Sep.

  Though right now, as this pain washes over me, I feel like a wounded beast.

  I felt that way earlier today, too, when I saw Joshua in the lunchroom. I looked away fast. I don’t know if he saw me. But he has to know about my vitiligo by now. He has to be curious as to how bad it is. He must have looked at me.

  And now he knows why I asked him to turn the lights out.

  Joshua. I wipe my face off and walk slowly now. Joshua Winer.

  The worst thing is, sometimes I wonder if our whole thing together ever happened. I mean, of course I know it did. But maybe it didn’t happen the way I remember it. Maybe I’m totally crazy and I made up the kisses, the sex. Maybe I’m some pathetic, deluded thing. Joshua Winer with me? It is unbelievable.

  When I think like that, I want to slap myself. That’s the old me—the one who put labels on people—who thought of him as Mr. Cool. Joshua Winer was with me, for real and true. Because he’s a real and true person. Not just a popular football guy.

  I get home and I can’t do my work. Well, everyone needs a night off. I sit in the backyard, wrapped in a blanket, and hope Foxy will come. But he doesn’t.

  Wednesday slogs along. Nothing new. Until after Jazz Dance Club. Melanie’s sitting on the bench in the locker room when I get out of the shower.

  “You’re not hiding anything anymore,” she says. “So you don’t have to be the last one to shower anymore.”

  Her directness would be offensive, except it isn’t. She’s just being honest. “I guess it’s habit now.”

  “Break it. Those old habits need to be swept away.”

  And that anger I’ve been controlling so well comes burning up aga
in. “What do you know about it?”

  “Lesbians face some of the same stuff. Ever since you came to school all natural on Monday—no makeup or lipstick or anything—I’ve been thinking about you. Nonstop, really. You have it easier in some ways.”

  Whoa! “Exactly how?!”

  “No one believes you chose it, so no one can blame you. But people are always coming up to me and asking why I don’t act right, just act right.” She snaps her fingers. “Like that.”

  “But people don’t have to know it about you. It can be your private thing. It’s not tattooed on your face.”

  She smiles, but her lips give her away. They quiver just a little, like before you start to cry. “That’s why I tattooed it on my ankle.”

  The inside of my nose goes all prickly. It was a brave act, that tattoo. “Solidarity.”

  “You bet.”

  “But you’re in control. You can put on socks and hide that tattoo and no one gives you a second look.”

  “I do sometimes. But most of the time I want to shout out: ‘I’m a lesbian! Get over it!’” She stretches out her legs, and crosses them at the ankle and points at her tattoo, and gives a little laugh. “A quiet shout.”

  I walk to my locker, towel dry, and pull on my clothes, fighting self-consciousness about my blotches. Melanie’s still there. I can feel her eyes on my back. I go suddenly lightheaded. Weird. Almost frantic.

  I turn to her, completely dressed now. “Why did you say, ‘Think pink’? You know, months ago, you said it to me. Maybe you don’t remember, but you said it. Think pink.”

  “I’ve been waiting for you to ask.” She leans toward me. “You know the pink ribbons people wear? To raise awareness about breast cancer? The Think Pink Foundation makes them. My aunt got cancer and moved in with us during her chemo, so my mom filled our house with pink junk.”

  “I’m sorry. About your aunt, I mean.”

  “Don’t be. She’s doing good. She moved back to her farm in Lancaster months ago. But what I want to tell you is my aunt became a nut about pink and she taught me. Here’s how it works. If you stare at pink long enough, then take it away, everything looks green. It’s some trick of the eyes.” She smiles. “Anyway, green is hope. You seemed so sad, I wanted you to have hope.”