Apartment 1986

by Lisa Papademetriou

  “Desmond, I’m sure he’s a mammal.”

  “That means a horrible person, Callie.”

  “Oh. Well at least he’s not bothering you—”

  “What difference does it make? It bothers me when my friends get picked on,” Desmond says, and the words hit me like a slap.

  Ms. Taymor waves her arm at the group, flapping the long, loose sleeve of her tunic. “Pause, everyone! Pause button! Pause!” Then she turns to me and Desmond. “Would you please—” She gestures wildly with her hands, somehow communicating that we should be quieter. “It’s so hard for the actors—”

  “This is not a professional environment,” says one little girl with braids.

  “Sorry, guys,” I announce to the group of seven- and eight-year-olds. “I think we’re going to—” And I gesture to Ms. Taymor to indicate that Desmond and I are leaving. I guess I’m just trying to communicate in her language. She nods and then gestures that she hopes Desmond feels better, and that maybe we should check his temperature to make sure he doesn’t have a fever, and then I nod, and she turns back to the machine and cries, “RESUME!” and it all starts back up again.

  I grab Desmond’s backpack for him, since he’s busy with the pretzel, and we trudge up the stairs.

  “That’s what I’ve been saying,” Desmond tells me in the stairwell. “Simon Yee is awful. It’s just how he is . . .”

  “I really thought he would stop after you got rid of the lunch bag.”

  Desmond sighs. “It’s not about the lunch bag,” he says.

  “Well, maybe it’s a little about the lunch bag.”

  Desmond looks at me, his dark eyes serious beneath his floppy bangs. “No,” he says simply. “It’s not.”

  For some reason, I am still thinking about Desmond and Simon Yee and the lunch bag after dinner, when I am in my room, supposedly doing my history homework, ha, ha.

  I am considering calling Min. But what would Min do? Freak out, maybe, and then try to get into a poorly spelled Twitter war with Simon Yee.

  What about Zelda? She wouldn’t even understand why I’m butting into my brother’s problems. She has three older brothers, but they’re all either off at college or long out of it, and it’s basically like they live on a distant planet—one without phones to call home.

  The person I want to call is Anna. Not just because Anna knows Desmond better than Min or Zelda do, but because I know Anna will say what I need someone to say. She will be mad. She will want revenge. Nobody messes with anybody around Anna. “Somebody needs to go to beat-down school,” she would say.

  Look, I do not believe in physical violence. Of course, I also do not believe in Santa Claus, but that does not stop me from jumping out of bed on Christmas morning.

  I am not saying that I am planning to beat up Simon Yee! I am only saying that I wish I knew someone who would do it for me. Except that I kind of want the satisfaction of dealing with Simon myself.

  Because something is dawning on me. I feel like someone just set my hair on fire! Literally! Except not literally, because then my head would be on fire, but you know what I mean!

  Desmond was right: it’s not about the lunch bag. It’s never about the lunch bag.

  It’s about being a bully.

  Even though I tried to help Desmond, I didn’t help him. I didn’t help him be Desmond—I tried to just tell him to act like someone else, to get a different lunch bag, to blend in, to pretend . . .

  I thought I was Keeping It Positive! But, really, I just didn’t stick up for him. The same way I didn’t stick up for Anna.

  I think about my dad, and how he stood up for his brother, even though it cost him. All he wanted was for Uncle Larry to be able to be himself.

  I start dialing the phone before I realize what I’m doing. But, as usual, I have to leave a message. “Hey. Hey, Anna. You know, I’ve been thinking. About the pie party. My mom was kind of weird that day. I think it was basically temporary insanity. But she’s better now. Anyway, that’s not the point. The point is that I should have stood up for you. I’m better now, too. I just, uh . . . I wanted you to know that. I miss you.”

  I click off, and it is amazing how much better I feel. I feel relaxed, and calm. Like, maybe this is what meditation is supposed to feel like.

  “Wow, this is so Zen,” I murmur. Just then, the phone buzzes in my hand and I am so surprised that I scream and throw it across the room.

  When I scramble off my bed and pick the phone out of the garbage can it landed in, I see that the person calling is Anna. My heart freaks out, and for a moment, I consider throwing the phone away again. No. God! What is my problem? Anna is my friend! And she is finally calling back!

  “Hello?”

  “Hey—Callie. It’s Anna.”

  “I know. I know! Hi!”

  “Hi.”

  “Hi!”

  She laughs softly. “Hi. Again.”

  “I’m so glad to hear from you!”

  “Yeah. I’m sorry I haven’t called . . . I just got your message.” She blows out a breath, and I can imagine her bangs fluttering the way they do when she does that.

  “Yeah . . .” Anna’s voice sounds different. She sounds cautious. This is the first time it really hits me that I hurt her feelings. The last time I saw Anna, we were saying good-bye on the pavement in front of my apartment building. She gave me this weak little hug and sort of looked behind me, to where the tiny blue lights glowed on a huge silver-and-teal holiday wreath, illuminating the white wall in the lobby. “Thanks for having me at your pie party,” she said.

  “Thanks for coming.”

  And then her dad pulled up in his van, and Ivan opened the door for Anna. She glanced at him, and said, “You sure are lucky, Callie.” The door closed, and the van pulled away.

  I didn’t want her to leave.

  “You were waiting for me to apologize,” I say now.

  “I guess so. I guess . . . I thought you had changed.” She’s silent for a moment. “I’m glad the insanity was temporary.”

  “Well—I didn’t say it was over.”

  Anna laughs.

  “So—so what’s going on?”

  So Anna tells me all about what’s going on with our friends. How Leroy and Janelle were a couple for a while, and it almost broke Jannie’s heart because of course she’s had a crush on him since sixth grade. And how Minti wants everyone to use his real name—Mintesinot—now, but everyone keeps forgetting and calling him Minti. And how the science teacher got fired last month, and the substitute has a weird smell.

  And I tell Anna about Desmond and Simon Yee, and of course she is furious on my brother’s behalf. It feels so good to have someone listen for a while. But it turns out that I don’t really need her help, after all. I already know what I’m going to do.

  I’m going to walk my brother to school tomorrow morning.

  By the time we get off the phone, it’s late, and I don’t feel like dealing with my history homework. But that’s okay, because I’m not going to school tomorrow, anyway. I’ll just call in another excuse and then make a fresh start on Monday.

  My phone buzzes; it’s a text from Zelda: Are you coming tomorrow? and I cringe. Uggh. I don’t even dare to text her back. I don’t have her money. I can’t face her. I can’t deal with everything all at once.

  But I can face Simon Yee.

  CHAPTER FIVE THOUSAND, FOUR HUNDRED, AND SEVENTY-SIX, OR THAT’S WHAT IT FEELS LIKE

  In which someone goes to beat-down school

  “THAT’S HIM,” DESMOND SAYS, although I already know what Simon Yee looks like. He looks like a preppy kid in a school uniform, that’s what he looks like. He wears his clothes like a rich kid. I can’t explain it, but they look cleaner, and their skin is better, and their hair is more . . . I don’t know . . . glossy. Simon Yee looks like he spends his spare time posing for Ralph Lauren Kids ads. And he’s got that Ralph Lauren Kids model look on his face—smug, and bored, and oooooh, I just want to smack him. But I will not. I
will restrain myself because I am going to be mature.

  The whole block is closed to traffic for the half hour before and after school, and the kids run wild all over the street, as if it’s a normal playground. Older kids lounge close to the buildings, but younger ones are screaming, jumping rope, playing tag, gossiping, just like they would in any suburb or small town or city. It’s funny how some of them—like Simon—look like rich kids, while some of them look regular and you would not know that they were rich as heck except that they, obviously, go to this school, which costs as much as college and I am not even exaggerating.

  “You wait here,” I say to Desmond, depositing him near the gate.

  “Just be careful, Callie,” Desmond warns. “He’s dangerous.”

  “Des, I think I can handle a third grader.”

  Desmond shrugs, like okay, but he doesn’t seem very sure and I force myself to try very hard to not be annoyed that my little brother does not have faith in me.

  I—very, very calmly because I am being mature—walk over to Simon. He is outside of the gate, standing near a tree, chatting with a couple of other bored-looking kids. They’re all short. I’m a head taller than they are. I could crush you, I think, looking at Simon.

  “Simon, may I please speak to you?” I say very maturely.

  Simon looks me up and down. “Sorry, I don’t have any spare change.”

  One of his little friends says, “Oooooo,” and the other one says, “Burn.”

  I turn on them. “What are you two—his minions? Get out of here, turd-brains!” I shout, and while I realize that this may not have been a very mature thing to say, it is effective, because the two henchmen scurry off.

  Simon narrows his eyes at me. “What’s the deal—Desmond had to send his fat sister in to solve his problems for him?”

  “What?” I am not even fat, but my face burns. “Listen, you little dung beetle,” I say. “You’d better leave my brother alone. And you’d better leave all of the kids in this class alone.”

  “Or what?”

  “Or I’ll call your parents.”

  “Like they’d care.”

  “Is that it?” A little drop of sympathy oozes into my heart. “Is that why you’re so angry? Your parents don’t care about you?”

  Simon looks like he wants to kill me, and I know I’m right. I’m right! And suddenly, I feel sorry for Simon Yee, and I am also proud of myself for figuring this out, and I realize that I really am incredibly mature! I think of my mom’s words, “I like to know that I’m helping people,” and I think, Yes. Yes—I know how you feel, Mom! Poor Simon. He’s been lashing out at people because he is suffering. I reach out to touch him on the shoulder and say, “Simon, you don’t have to hurt people to get atten—”

  But my words are cut off because SIMON KICKS ME IN THE SHIN!

  “Ow, you little jerk!” And I reach out to steady myself on the tree because I’m hopping on one foot. And then Simon starts fake-crying and wailing and holding his shoulder, and I’m all, “What are you doing?” and that’s when a teacher rushes over to Simon, saying, “What’s wrong? What’s wrong?” and Simon just points at me and before I know it, I am being escorted to the principal’s office.

  ME!

  “I told you he was dangerous!” Desmond calls.

  “He is the one who kicked me,” I say to the woman with the whistle on a lanyard around her neck, who is dragging me down the hall by my arm.

  “Save it,” the gym teacher says. “I don’t listen to bullies.”

  What????????????

  Me—a bully. Yes, she said that!!

  So she forces me into a chair outside Mr. Becker’s office and then goes in to talk to him. I hear raised voices. This is not going well.

  “What happened?” Only half of Mrs. Lewis’s head—snow white hair and dark brown forehead—shows over the counter.

  “Simon Yee kicked me in the shin.”

  “Did you kick him back?”

  “No!”

  “Too bad.” The bell rings, and I slump in my chair a little. I’m going to be late to meet Cassius.

  “Don’t you need to call your school?” The question floats up at me over the counter, and I swear that it takes me a little while to understand what Mrs. Lewis is even asking. It’s like I don’t think of myself as someone who even goes to school anymore. “Haverton, if I remember?”

  “Oh—uh . . .” I’m about to say, “No, thanks; I’ll just text them from my mom’s phone,” but then realize that this will seem suspicious, so I say, “Sure. Um. Thank you.”

  Mrs. Lewis stands up and crosses over to the landline on the counter. “I’ll call Roberta for you,” she says, and I realize that she means Mrs. Palmer, our school secretary.

  “I have the number on my phone—” I say, pulling it out, but Mrs. Lewis just smiles and dials and I realize that she thinks I’m going to pretend to call the school and not really do it, which is, of course, what I was going to do, but I am still impressed that she figured it out.

  “Hello, Roberta? It’s Opal. Yes, I believe I have one of your students here. Mmmm-hmm. Callie Vitalis. Yes, she will be in today, she’s just got a meeting with Mr. Becker. Unh-hunh. Right. I’ll remind her. Okay, thank you. And I’ll see you Thursday? All right, great. Okay, have a great day.” Mrs. Lewis hangs up. “She said to remind you that placement testing is today, beginning at nine fifteen.”

  “Placement testing?!” A dim memory of Zelda stressing out floats through my mind. Ohmygosh, I forgot! This day is getting worse and worse. Now I really do have to get to school—

  At that moment, Mr. Becker’s door opens, and the gym teacher storms out, glaring.

  Mr. Becker’s voice drifts over to me. “Please come in, Ms. Vitalis.”

  Mrs. Lewis lifts her eyebrows and drops back into her chair, and I realize something very important at that moment, which is that Mrs. Lewis has everyone’s number and could probably rule the world if the world were a different place.

  “Ms. Vitalis, please take a seat.” Mr. Becker’s elbows are on his desk, and he is holding a pencil perfectly balanced between two fingertips. Somehow, this manages to make him seem like a cartoon villain. “It seems that you have decided to take things into your own hands—”

  “I never even touched him! I just wanted to talk to him!”

  “Why do members of your family feel the need to antagonize others?”

  “He kicked me in the shin!”

  “Ms. Vitalis, I’m forced to call your parents about this incident.”

  “Fine. Call them.”

  “And I’m not sure that we can continue to offer your brother a place in this school—”

  “What?! You’re kicking out Desmond?!”

  “I’m saying that unless I get a satisfactory response from your parents—”

  “Listen.” I stand up because I have had just about enough of this bull. “Simon Yee is a bully. A clean, cute, adorable bully! This happened because you didn’t speak up for Desmond when he needed you! You made him get rid of his lunch bag! Well, there is nothing wrong with Desmond’s lunch bag and there is nothing wrong with Desmond! So get your head together, Mr. Becker!” And just like that, I turn and storm out, and I hear Mr. Becker shouting, “Come back here, young lady, I am not done with you!” but I am too busy stomping away and CAUSING DRAMA BEFORE TEN A.M., but as I pass Mrs. Lewis’s desk, I see that she is clapping. She’s not making any noise, but she is clapping and she is smiling at me, and I stop for just a second, and I smile, too.

  “You’d better hurry up,” Mrs. Lewis says, glancing at the clock on the wall above my head. It’s 8:58. I’ve got seventeen minutes to get ten blocks uptown—to my so-called school.

  I’m going to have to run.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  In which our heroine learns to prioritize

  IT IS NOT EASY to text and run at the same time, especially in Manhattan, where running down the street is a lot like playing a video game, only one where the obstacles are
real, actual human beings and cars and garbage and stuff. I am trying to text Cassius and it is not working.

  Cargh . . .

  Mah . . .

  I feel like Min.

  I crash into a man coming out of Le Pain Quotidien on Madison and Eighty-Fourth. “Hey!” he shouts as high-class French iced coffee spills all over his shirt. Luckily, it’s a Life Is Good, so it kind of deserves to be spilled on, as they are one of my biggest future competitors in the inspirational mug and T-shirt business.

  “Sorry!” I shout over my shoulder as he screams some really creative vocabulary in my direction.

  I dart across the street, narrowly dodging a taxi, and leap over three small dogs in a cluster being walked by a dude on a unicycle. (What? This isn’t Brooklyn!) My watch says 9:06. I pour on the speed.

  “Slow down!” An old man shakes a cane in my direction, but I wave at him anyway, because he’s wearing a cute little Newsies cap and I love adorable old people.

  I pass the dry cleaner’s, the weird antiques store, the expensive children’s clothing boutique, the kitchen counter place, and finally round the corner and dart into the marble front entranceway of Haverton Academy.

  My head feels enormous—blood is throbbing through my ears and I’m gasping for breath. The air in the hallway feels cool and I step into the strange silence. I am late. Very late. Students are already sorted at desks behind the closed doors, listening to announcements and preparing to take the placement exams. I take a deep breath, and then another one. Sweat trickles down my back, and I can feel it under my armpits, which is ew. This is why I am not an athletic person—sooner or later, you are going to have to sweat. I don’t like to feel anything oozing from my pores.

  Okay. I calm down, stand up straight, and walk forward, trying to move quietly. I’m still hoping that I can slip into class without anyone noticing I was late; I’m still hoping to avoid that last tardy sl—

  Briiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!

  Crap!

  Briiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!

  Why do I have my phone set to the loudest possible setting? I cut it off midring. “Hello?” I whisper.