Year of the Guilty Soul
A.M. Leibowitz
Part of
Seasons of Love
Anthology
Beaten Track
www.beatentrackpublishing.com
Year of the Guilty Soul
SMASHWORDS EDITION
First published 2018 by Beaten Track Publishing
Copyright © 2018 A.M. Leibowitz at Smashwords
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ISBN: 978 1 78645 238 2
www.beatentrackpublishing.com
The year is 1991, and Antonia “Toni” Moskowitz is caught in the middle, always having to pick a side. Whether it’s between her family’s two religions or in her relationships, she has choices to make. Does her heart belong to the outgoing boy with the lime-green nails or the girl in the black velvet skirt? Where does she fit in when both gender and gender roles feel confining?
But learning who she is and who she wants to be with has a price. Every decision has consequences, especially when some kinds of love and expression are still taboo. Sometimes it’s hard to choose between being good and being right. Four seasons. Four kisses. One year to figure out what her heart wants.
Part of Seasons of Love Anthology.
***
Genre: young adult LGBT fiction
Keywords: bisexual, genderqueer, literary YA, romantic elements, religious (Christianity & Judaism)
Contents
January
April
July
October
Seasons of Love
About A.M. Leibowitz
By A.M. Leibowitz
Beaten Track Publishing
January
It’s the first Sunday of the new year. I slouch into the upstairs room where all the teens meet for Sunday school. For over a year, I’ve been coming to church because of this girl I know from school. Gwen is nothing if not enthusiastic about her evangelism. I’m not the New Girl anymore—every few months, Gwen brings a recruit to the youth group. We get to be her best friend until the next person comes along. Most of us stay, always hopeful Gwen might turn her attention back to us even though she never does.
She’s had a string of boys like this too. Gwen has a policy not to date boys who aren’t Christians, so a lot of the ones who like her follow her to church. It always surprises me when they stay after Gwen uses her “not ready for a relationship” line on them. I’m sure some of them genuinely became Christians. The rest? Who knows. Maybe a few of them think they still have a chance.
Over the summer, she replaced the previous kid with a quiet girl named Cari: pronounced Cah-ree not Care-ee. Since Gwen’s already moved on to the boyfriend of the month, Cari is left to the rest of us. Like me, she doesn’t seem to fit anywhere. I know the look about her, a lost expression which speaks volumes about Gwen’s motivation for inviting her in. Cari and I aren’t Gwen’s real friends now, and we weren’t when she dragged us here. We were her pet projects, people she saw as being in dire need of a thorough churching. I’m never sure if it was the lesbian rumors at our school or my unfortunate history with the bullies which brought Gwen my way, but in either case, she saw her work as done once I was sucked in.
Cari isn’t Gwen’s usual type, and I wonder how it happened. Maybe someday Cari will tell me. That would probably be on the same day I explain to her why I stayed after Gwen moved on.
I try to look like I’m focused on the Student Bible and the yellow highlighter in my lap, but I’m stealing glances at Cari. She’s like me in the way she stands out. Most of the other girls have this creepily similar Sunday aesthetic—modestly feminine dresses, light brown and blond hair pulled back with a clip or a scrunchy, delicate cross necklaces, and button earrings.
Instead of the standard church uniform, Cari is in all black. The skirt of her scoop-neck velvet dress touches the floor, but I can see her Renaissance boots peeking out from underneath. Her choker is a black ribbon with a chain down the back and a heart-shaped pendant. She wears large, dangling stars in her ears that catch the light when she moves. She’s paler than I am, but her hair is darker. Where mine is a frizzy deep brown, she has thick, smooth hair that’s almost as black as her clothes. I’m in awe of the cranberry-colored lipstick she has on and the way she’s made her eyes pop with black liner and smoky shadow.
I’m the only girl wearing pants. Gray-green cargos with a pink fabric belt and a pale pink T-shirt. I own one dress, and I never feel like it looks right on me. Not only do I hate pantyhose, I also don’t care for the way it emphasizes my stomach. At least with the shirt, I can cover everything up. Pink isn’t my favorite color, but I’m making the effort to look somewhat more feminine as a way of dressing up for church.
The couch dips next to me, and I look away from Cari. It’s Hannah, a bubbly girl one grade above me, and her brother, Noah, who is in tenth grade like me. I swallow. I have nothing against either of them. Like most of the group, we all go to the same school. We’re not real close or anything, but they’re the nearest I have to friends here now that Gwen’s ditched me.
Their father is an elder, and their mother is on half the committees at church. It intimidates me, the authority their family has. Hannah is so outgoing, it’s always overwhelming to be in her personal space. Noah is one of those guys who makes me sweat by being in the same building. My hands are clammy, and I have the urge to check if my deodorant is working.
Hannah glances at me and grins. Startled before I can work up to hyperventilating, I do the only sensible thing and squeak, “Hey.”
“Morning,” she says, her tone breezy. She leans in as though sharing an important secret. “They’re starting hellfire school today.”
That’s not the real name for it, of course. We all got a letter to bring home to our parents letting them know we were going to watch a video series called Hell’s Bells, all about the satanic influence of rock music. It’s about two years old, but our teachers seem to feel it’s highly relevant. As my parents are both agnostic, Dad rolled his eyes and asked if he and Mom should throw out all their old vinyl. Mom nearly forbade me to attend but gave in when I said all my friends would be there. That may have been a stretch. I don’t have that many friends even at church.
“Should be fun,” Noah adds. Something in his tone suggests he doesn’t mean he thinks he might learn something.
I nod at them both, too surprised to reply. They’ve always struck me as the goody-goody types, and their faint mocking of the class causes me to see them in a different light.
Noah stretches, and when he brings his arms back down I notice his nail polish. It’s lime green to match his shiny shorts. I can’t decide if I’m more shocked at the color or the fact that it’s snowing and his legs are bare. I look back up at his face, and he winks.
My cheeks go hot, and I turn away. Now is not the time for whatever games he’s playing. I’m used to boys at school doing that kind of thing, flirting for the sake of mocking me, but Noah hasn’t ever joined them in their sport. Annoyed, I face forward with my arms crossed, trying to ignore him. I imagine his eyes are still on me, but I’m careful not to sneak peeks at him.
At last our Sunday school teacher arrives, flanked b
y two of the other adult volunteers and a couple of the student leaders. One of them is Bonnie, a girl who makes a career out of being holier-than-thou. She’s a senior, and she and her stuck-up boyfriend are the youth group popular couple. She wheels in the television and pops the tape into the VCR. I try to relax as our teacher introduces the video, but I can’t. Out of the corner of my eye, I keep seeing Noah almost making a show of his disinterest in what’s on the screen.
There’s nowhere I can look that isn’t a problem. I can’t look at either Hannah or Noah, and I can’t stare at Cari. So I focus on the television, where there’s now a warning about sexual and occult material. For the next half hour, I listen to the mustached host and wonder how much truth there is to what he’s saying. Does it apply to the collection of cassettes on the shelf in my bedroom? Or to the books? I’m too lost in my own thoughts to pay attention to the post-video discussion.
When class is over, I throw on my sweatshirt and head for the door as fast as I can without seeming rude. Noah stops me before I can leave. I don’t want to talk to him. All I want is to get out of there, away from the images we’ve been subjected to on the screen.
“Hey, Toni. What did you think of the film?” he asks.
I can’t tell if he really wants to know or if there’s some other reason for this conversation. I shrug. “It was okay.” No way am I going to tell him how rattled it has me, with the talk about us being fertile soil for Satan’s seeds of deception. He’ll think I’m stupid or crazy or both.
“Yeah,” Noah agrees. He clears his throat.
“Is that what you wanted to ask me about?”
“Sort of.”
There’s a longish pause, and it’s so uncomfortable that I blurt the first thing to pop into my head. “What’s with the nail polish?”
“This?” He laughs, waggling his fingers. “I do it to piss my parents off. Also to keep them from knowing what else I’m doing. If they’re jailing me for the nail polish, they don’t ask about other shit.”
I want to ask him more about that, but I don’t. He’s swearing, and it’s thrown me off, right along with the blatant disregard for the whole “honor your father and mother” thing. He doesn’t seem concerned that one of the adults will hear him and give him a lecture about keeping his words and thoughts pure.
He reaches out and toys with the cuff of my sweatshirt sleeve, surprising me for the second time in under a minute.
“Can I call you?” he asks. “I mean, maybe to talk. About…the stuff from Sunday school or something. You know.”
I’m burning up despite the fact that it’s chilly in the church. My face must be giving me away, but Noah doesn’t say anything about it. He’s gone a bit red too.
“Yeah, okay,” I say.
He holds out his forearm and hands me his pen. When I finish, he winks at me again and walks away, leaving me stranded and a little confused outside the Sunday school room.
***
Mom calls me to help set the table. I’m still on edge, both from the video in class and from Noah’s attention. He’s good-looking in the sense of filling a spot on my list of top ten boys I’d like to kiss, but I’ve never thought of him seriously as someone I’d go out with. If I’m honest, I don’t think about most boys that way. I’m not the kind of girl boys go for.
I sigh and rise from the couch, leaving my copy of A Prayer for Owen Meany on the coffee table. Dad bought it for my birthday a few months ago, and this is my second time reading it. Only now I wonder whether it’s on the approved book list at church.
In the kitchen, Mom hands me a stack of plates and gives the silverware to my sister, Sofia. Wordlessly, we put out the place settings. Sunday afternoons are our big family meal. Sometimes Mom’s parents, Gran and Gramps DiNapoli, join us. Other times, they drop me off after church and go visiting with other members. I think they’re secretly pleased to think I picked their religion over my Bubbe and Zayde Moskowitz.
I should say something about my parents. They have this running joke that my mother was going to become a nun and my father a rabbi, but they met, had my oldest brother Dominic, got married—in that order—and the rest is history. It’s not even true. Well, the part about having Dom is, and they are married, but not the rest. My mother’s parents like to bring up the fact that she wanted to be a nun for about five minutes when she was eight, usually as a way of reminding her she chose poorly when she married Dad. Which doesn’t even make sense because my grandparents are Baptists, not Catholics, and the only reason Mom wanted to be a nun was because her best friend at the time said she did.
Meanwhile, there is no possible way Dad ever wanted to follow in his uncle’s footsteps. Needless to say, neither side of the family was thrilled when my parents got together. They still aren’t. That’s why there’s such a big gap between Dom and Vincent, the second oldest. They waited a while to let the families cool off then had the next three of us pretty close together.
We sometimes share a Shabbat meal with Bubbe and Zayde on Friday nights, and they like to ask Mom really weird questions about her religion during dinner. They’re a lot better than Gran and Gramps, though. Gran still tells Mom at least once a month that she’s praying Dad will accept Jesus as his Messiah. That’s not going to happen, seeing as both my parents are against organized religion, and in twenty-four years, he hasn’t done it yet.
Vince is home, doing laundry before going back to Syracuse. He’s eighteen, a freshman with a full scholarship to play soccer. He still comes home weekends to eat all our food and take up the washing machine for hours. At least he’s cleaning his clothes, right?
As he passes me on the way to the kitchen to steal something out of the pot on the stove, he says, “Hey, squirt,” and messes up my hair. I’m long past the age when that’s even a little bit funny or cute, so I glare at him. He smirks. I don’t know why he never does any of this crap to Matteo or even Sofia.
I’m short one setting, leaving an empty place at the table. “Isn’t Dom coming?” I ask Mom when I return to the kitchen.
“He has plans this week.” There’s an awkward pause before Mom adds, “With Levi.”
Levi is Dom’s boyfriend, but no one says so. It’s one of those things everyone avoids talking about, like how Dad doesn’t tell his parents I’m going to church with my other grandparents or how no one says anything when Matteo wears Sofia’s outgrown dress-up clothes and gets into Mom’s Avon drawer and pinches her tiny sample lipstick tubes. Gran and Gramps call Dom and Levi “roommates.” I don’t think my parents are against Dom being gay, but it’s not open for discussion. I wonder sometimes if it’s because they worry about him, not because they agree with my church or with Gran and Gramps.
Dom is nine years older than me, and he and Levi have been together for a while. Levi is really cool. He’s the exact opposite of Dom. Both my brothers are sports freaks, but Levi works at Xerox doing some computer stuff. He looks like a complete nerd, if kind of a hot one—tall and skinny, thick glasses, the whole thing. He also plays the piano, dances like you wouldn’t believe, and talks a lot with his hands. Aside from some of my DiNapoli relatives, I’ve never met anyone more expressive.
Unlike me, Dom chose Judaism. He had a bar mitzvah and everything. Of course, I don’t remember it at all, seeing as I wasn’t even in Kindergarten at the time. It’s made him more or less Bubbe and Zayde’s favorite. Vince is even more anti-religion than Mom and Dad. At college, he’s picked up a bunch of stuff about how only the weak-minded need it.
When I started going to church, Sofia begged to come along. She’s a lot more into it than I am, and she hasn’t needed any help making friends there. Then again, Sofia hasn’t needed help making friends anywhere she goes. Sofia is thirteen and beginning to be a pain in the butt. I don’t think I was ever that cranky when I was her age, but I’m not sure. We get along all right, for the most part. We just don’t have anything in common. We don’t even steal clothes from each other like regular sisters do. That’s probably because she
’s so skinny and I’m so…not skinny. We couldn’t even fit in each other’s jeans.
Sofia’s one of those girls who if she weren’t a nice person—relatively speaking—would be easy to hate. She’s pretty and popular and good at stuff, like ballet. Meanwhile, I’m dumpy and have two left feet. To Sofia’s credit, she doesn’t really make fun of me, but some of her friends do.
While I’m busy laying silverware by the plates, Sofia twirls into the kitchen. Mom smiles at her and hands her the basket of rolls. She takes them gracefully and brings them to the table.
“How was Sunday school?” she asks. “Marcia’s sister is in that class, and she won’t tell us anything. She says we’re too young.”
It’s not surprising that some of the older girls are acting like they’re the adults and lording it over the middle schoolers. They’d probably be mad at me for saying anything, but this is the first time in ages Sofia’s wanted to talk about stuff with me.
“It was okay. A little weird. I don’t know what to think.”
“It sounds creepy.”
“If you want, I’ll fill you in tonight after we go to bed,” I offer.
“Okay.”
She returns to the kitchen, and I go into the living room. Matteo is there, reading a book. He’s dressed in ordinary jeans and a plain blue shirt. I suspect Mom made him change and wash his face because of Gran and Gramps. I see a faint smear on his lower lip where he didn’t get all the lipstick. The color reminds me of Cari.
Matteo looks up at me and grins, wiggling his toes inside his gray wool socks. “Hi, Toni.”
“Heya. Can I sit?” When he scoots over, I plop down on the couch next to him. “What’re you reading?”
He holds up the book: Castle in the Air. Maybe too advanced for a seven-year-old, but Matteo is a smart kid. I check inside the cover. It’s not a library book.
Year of the Guilty Soul Page 1