The Alliance

by Gabriel Goodman

  “Would you like to come with me to church on Sunday? You could talk to Father Erikson. I always talk to him when I’m sad or confused.”

  I didn’t want to offend her, but religion was never really my thing. “Thanks, but that’s okay. I was doing some research online last night, and I think I know one thing that might make me feel better. Do you think the office is still open?”

  “I doubt it. School got out an hour ago. Why?”

  “I need to get the paperwork to start a new club.”

  Cory’s eyes lit up. “Oh, that sounds fun. What kind of club?”

  I explained to her about the GSA I wanted to start in Jamie’s memory. She smiled and nodded.

  “That’ll be a lot of work,” she said. “Are you sure you’ll have time for it? What about your grades?”

  Ugh. Something was wrong with the world when my girlfriend was asking the same questions as Ren.

  “I’ll make time for it. This is really important to me. I feel like I should have been there for Jamie. I feel like I let him down.”

  Cory drew me close and kissed me hard. She pulled back slowly so that only our foreheads were touching. She looked me right in the eye.

  “I bet you anything that if you could ask him, Jamie would say you never let him down. I’m sorry that, for whatever reason, he didn’t think he could tell you about everything that was going on. But it wasn’t your fault. You were such a good friend to him.”

  I really wanted to believe that. Some nights, I stared at the ceiling and got mad at Jamie. It seemed so selfish for him to kill himself and not even give me the chance to help him. But then I turned it around and got mad at whoever made him feel like his life wasn’t worth anything. Like suicide was the only way out. I didn’t know what I’d do if I ever found out who did that to him.

  “Let’s go,” I said. “I can stop by the office in the morning. First thing tomorrow, we lay the groundwork for Southside’s new GSA.”

  Cory’s lips pulled back. It looked like she was smiling, but I couldn’t really tell. If I didn’t know better, I’d have thought she was biting her tongue.

  “Sure,” she said. “Tomorrow.”

  I

  couldn’t help it. I laughed out loud. Mr. Olson gave me his dirtiest look ever. And he’d given me plenty since school started. From the minute I walked into his class, his looks told me exactly what he thought of me. When Ma looked at my clothes, she just hated that they weren’t her style. When Olson looked at me, his eyes said, Troublemaker.

  Olson turned back to the whiteboard to continue explaining the themes in The Scarlet Letter. I looked down at the note Ricky passed that made me laugh in the first place.

  NO JOKE. SCOTT KING IZ STARTING A GSA.

  Scott King? The football player? He was a complete and total tool. Oh, sure, he wasn’t your typical dumb jock. He got good grades. But he was such a … golden boy. A lily-white, self-centered jerk that all the teachers adored. What did he care about the queer students in school?

  I scribbled on Ricky’s paper. PROBLY SOMETHING FOR HIS COLLEGE RESUME. HE’LL GET BORED N SAY WELL HE TRIED. SOME IVY WILL LET HIM IN JUST FOR TRYING.

  Ricky snatched the paper, read my note, and nodded with a grin.

  When the bell rang, everybody gathered up their stuff. Ricky and I were headed for the door together when Mr. Olson blocked us.

  “Miss Mendoza,” he said, folding his arms. “I hope this isn’t going to be a problem every class.”

  I wanted to tell him off so bad. Three weeks I sat there and listened to him drone on every day and never once did anything wrong. Except that laugh. One stupid laugh, and now I’m the class scuzzball.

  “No, sir,” I said, thinking how much I’d like to sic my parents on him for singling me out. But I liked to fight my own battles. I was giving Olson this round. But if I kept my nose clean and he kept coming at me, we were going to have a problem.

  Ricky and I slipped into the hall and joined the river of students. “Why does he have it in for you?” Ricky asked.

  “Because I’m not normal,” I said, batting my eyes and flouncing like a beauty pageant contestant. “Some people are so threatened by anyone not exactly like them. But I’m playing it cool. I’m not giving him anything to nail me on the rest of the semester. I’ll wet my pants before I ask for a bathroom pass, I’ll hold a sneeze all hour. But he ain’t getting nothing on me.”

  We bumped fists and made our way down to the first floor for Mrs. Carney’s Intro to Film History class. Everywhere we went, people said hi, high-fived us. We were like a power couple, only we weren’t dating. Ricky was single. I didn’t know for sure if he was gay or not. He’d never dated anyone, and he never wanted to talk about it. So I just let him be.

  Mrs. Carney was standing by the door when we strolled in. Unlike Olson, Mrs. Carney was cool. She never played favorites. If you were being a jerk, she called you out, but then she didn’t hold it against you. And where Olson just droned on and on about a book he clearly couldn’t care less about, Mrs. Carney loved what she taught.

  “Good morning, Ricky, Carmen,” she said just as the bell rang.

  We took our seats in the back corner as Mrs. Carney dimmed the lights. “We’ll continue our unit on Alfred Hitchcock,” she said, turning on the TV at the front of the room, “by watching Psycho.”

  “Ree! Ree! Ree!” Ricky shrieked, doing his best impression of the Psycho theme. This chick in front of us jumped. Everybody laughed, including Mrs. Carney. Once the movie started, things got quiet.

  About half an hour in, Ricky leaned over and said, “Is it just me, or does that Norman Bates guy look like an older version of Scott King?”

  I choked back my laugh, having gotten in trouble once already for that. But he was right. Norman Bates wasn’t as buff as Scott King, but they both had those clean-cut, all-American-boy looks. The resemblance was only creepier knowing what Norman Bates does in the movie.

  I still couldn’t believe he was trying to start a GSA.

  “But, you know,” I said to Ricky, “it’s not a bad idea.”

  “What?”

  “The GSA. That Jamie Ballard kid got bullied to death. We need a group here where the queer kids can go to feel safe and supported.”

  “So, why don’t you start the group?” he asked.

  “No comments from the peanut gallery,” Mrs. Carney called out from her desk. That’s what she said to shut people up during the movie. I had no idea what a peanut gallery is.

  Yeah. Why didn’t I start a GSA? There was no way Scott King was going to see it through. He’d do just enough so it looked good on his college applications and then walk away. Meanwhile, a real GSA could be doing real work.

  I spent the rest of the class daydreaming what our GSA would do. By the time the bell rang, I’d had the whole alliance built, staffed, and working hard. This was gonna be awesome.

  – – – – –

  I ran to my locker after film class. I had a lot of plans to make to get the GSA up and running. As I got closer to my locker, I spotted Jon Renquist coming down the hall at me. He had a dopey grin on his face, which was pretty much what I’d come to expect from him. Ren wasn’t known for deep thought.

  As we passed, he brushed against me, knocking my books to the floor. “Watch where you’re going, douchebag!” I yelled after him. I thought I heard him chuckle as he moved on without looking back.

  I scooped up by books and opened my locker. A piece of paper, slipped in through the vent, fluttered to the ground. I opened and read it.

  It was Jamie Ballard’s obituary from the paper. Someone had written over his picture: ONE DOWN … YOU’RE NEXT, TURBO DYKE.

  I

  hung out at the edge of the cafeteria as lunch started. People filed through the hot lunch line and took their seats. I clutched the clipboard in my hand and suddenly felt nervous. I got a first in the state speech and debate competition last year, but now I was having trouble working up the nerve to talk to my classmates. I decide
d it would be best just to work on a couple people at a time. So I scanned the room and found a couple girls hanging out by the Coke machine.

  “Hey,” I said, walking up to them. “Shelly, right?”

  Shelly Markham and her friend looked at each other like I’d just said I was from Mars. “Uh, yeah?” she said.

  “I’m Scott King.”

  Again, they looked at each other. “Yeah, Scott, we know who you are.” They turned away and went back to buying their drinks.

  I leaned against the machine. “So, I was hoping you guys could help me out. You know what a GSA is?”

  They didn’t even look at me. They grabbed their Cokes and walked to the cafeteria tables. I followed and kept going.

  “It’s a Gay–Straight Alliance. I’m trying to start one here at Southside. Rules say I have to get at least thirty students to express interest in an organization before the school will okay it. You don’t have to join. You just have to agree that there’s a need for it.”

  Shelly and her friend sat at the edge of a table and popped open their cans. They still weren’t looking at me.

  “So…” I held out the clipboard and smiled my best smile. “Any chance you guys would sign this to say we need a GSA?”

  Finally, Shelly rolled her eyes my direction. She stared at the petition on my clipboard. She looked disgusted. “So, GSAs protect gay kids from bullies, right?”

  I nodded. “Yes. But you don’t have to be gay to join. Anyone can—”

  “Well, who protects the rest of us from you, Scott?” Shelly’s friend asked.

  I blinked. “What?”

  Shelly’s friend shook her head. “You don’t even remember me, do you, Scott? Maggie Foster? I think you called me Fattie Foster every day during junior high.”

  My stomach fell. Yes, I remembered Maggie. Today, she looked nothing like she did four years ago. I also remembered teasing her. More than that, I remember Jamie calling me out the summer between junior high and high school.

  “Dude,” he said, “lay off Maggie Foster. Your best friend is gay. I’m the easiest target at school. How would you feel if people were calling me names?”

  And people were calling him names. And worse. But he never told me.

  I didn’t say a word to Maggie after that, and when we came to Southside, we hardly saw each other. Jamie had told me to apologize. I never did.

  “Look,” I said, “I’m really sorry about that. Really. I don’t do that anymore. I’m trying to start this GSA because of Jamie Ballard. He was being bullied and—”

  Shelly stood, and Maggie followed. “Come on, Maggie,” she said. “We’re not falling for any doglist.” And they walked off.

  Doglists. The football team was famous for the prank. Some guys would go around, trying to get girls to sign a petition that they claimed was to extend lunch hour or have shorter classes or some idea that was never gonna happen. Once a bunch of girls signed, they posted the list all over the school. But at the top, it said, “WE THE UNDERSIGNED ARE THE UGLIEST DOGS AT SOUTHSIDE.”

  I felt like crap. I didn’t think I’d ever done anything to Shelly. But she probably hated me just for how I’d treated Maggie. God, I was stupid.

  I took the clipboard and made the rounds to all the tables. The student council, the chess club, the Future Farmers of America. They all sat together and all refused to even look at the petition. I even hung out by the kitchen window, trying to snag people as they dropped off their trays. But nobody signed.

  I wasn’t going to give up. This was just one lunch period of three. I was sure Mr. Winston, the vice principal, would give me a pass to miss a couple classes and try to recruit from other periods. But I clearly needed to work on my pitch.

  “Problem, Scott?”

  I looked up and found Mrs. Carney, the media arts teacher, smiling at me. I’d had her for Media Studies last year. She was pretty cool.

  “Hey, Mrs. Carney,” I said. “Yeah, big problem. I need to get thirty students to sign this, saying they think the school needs a GSA. But I’m not having much luck.”

  Mrs. Carney looked over the petition. “Is this about Jamie Ballard?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She nodded. “Well, you can start by signing it yourself. That might help. Someone needs to set a good example for the rest of the students.”

  I laughed. “You’re right.” And I threw my name down.

  “What about your teammates? Football? Baseball?”

  I thought about Ren. Even if I explained that signing the petition didn’t mean he had to join the GSA, I don’t think he’d get it. And I wasn’t sure about the rest of the teams either.

  “I could try,” I said. “To be honest, I thought I could get a ton of people to sign. I thought … people liked me. I mean, not sports people. But, I guess I used to be kind of a jerk.”

  Mrs. Carney folded her arms and smiled. “The good news, Scott, is that jerks can change. Everybody can change. But I don’t think you have time to wait for that. So maybe you should concentrate on your strengths for now.”

  “My strengths?”

  “You are liked, Scott. Think about it.” She tapped the clipboard and walked away. Mrs. Carney was always doing stuff like that. She had an answer, but she wanted me to come up with it on my own. It was kind of annoying.

  The bell rang, ending lunch. I joined everyone as they left the cafeteria and moved towards their next classes. I was almost to English when a pair of arms wrapped around my waist and pulled me aside. I turned to find Cory, grinning.

  “Just wanted to wish you luck on your English test today,” she said, kissing me on the cheek.

  “Thanks,” I said. “But what I need is luck getting people to sign this.”

  She looked over the petition. She didn’t stop smiling, but her eyes narrowed. “Oh. You’re going through with this.”

  “Yeah, I told you I was. I gotta get thirty students to sign it, and so far I’ve got one. Me.”

  Cory handed me the clipboard. “Jesus started with five loaves of bread and two fish, and He fed the multitudes. I’m sure you can do it.”

  The headache I’d started to get during lunch faded. I loved it when Cory believed in me. “Hey, since I got you here, would you sign …?”

  The next bell rang and she ran off. “Gonna be late for lunch!” she said. “Catch me later.”

  I waved as she disappeared around the corner. I wished we had the same lunch period. With her at my side, I bet I could have gotten more than thirty signatures.

  I took my seat in English and waited for Mr. Olson to pass out the exam. But my head wasn’t there. I needed twenty-nine more signatures. Mrs. Carney thought there was a way to do it. I just needed to figure it out.

  Y

  ou’d think that with all the time I spent in the vice principal’s office, I was some kind of public menace. At least, that’s what most of the faculty thought. I never got why the stuff I did to end up in the office was considered “making trouble.” I had opinions, and sometimes I expressed them. Very loudly.

  I was never disrespectful. But if Mr. Olson said we couldn’t read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn because it contained the N-word, I would explain that the book was a product of its time and was antislavery in many ways. I expressed lots of opinions like that about the books we could and couldn’t read. And sometimes, instead of having an intelligent conversation about it, the teacher would get upset at the girl with the pierced lip and send her to the vice principal.

  So, it was really weird to be in Mr. Winston’s office without having done a thing. I just got a note when I went to homeroom: PLEASE REPORT TO MR. WINSTON’S OFFICE. I thought maybe it was because I’d laughed in Olson’s class. But as much as Olson hated me, I knew he wouldn’t send me here for something like that.

  “Am I in trouble?” I asked.

  Winston had invited me to sit across from him at the desk but then hadn’t said anything. He just sat there.

  “Ms. Mendoza,” he said, “I’m
told you recently asked for paperwork to start a Gay–Straight Alliance in school. Is that true?”

  Oh. That.

  “Yes, Mr. Winston. It’s my understanding that any student can petition to have a special-interest group started at school, provided they follow procedure. And that’s what I’m doing.”

  Winston nodded. “And you really think there’s enough interest here? I mean, I don’t know any other gay students apart from you.”

  I bit my tongue. He was baiting me. Practically challenging me to lose my temper. No way would I give him the satisfaction.

  “I’m out and proud, Mr. Winston. Sure, everyone knows I’m queer. Just like everybody knew Jamie Ballard was queer. And look what happened to him.”

  Suddenly, the baiter became the baitee. Winston’s face flushed, and he shook his finger at me. “Nothing has proven that Jamie Ballard was bullied. I won’t have you spreading rumors …”

  “I’m not spreading anything, Mr. Winston,” I interrupted him gently. “But kids are being bullied, and it’s happening whether they’re gay or not. You can get bullied in this school if people even think you’re gay. A GSA would send the message that being queer is okay. It would tell queer students that they’re accepted. And it would tell straight students who are accused of being gay that they shouldn’t be ashamed.”

  Winston stewed. He couldn’t do much more. I wasn’t speaking loudly, just firmly. I looked him right in the eye and was careful not to look angry. He couldn’t do anything to me, and he knew it.

  He leaned back in his chair. “You are aware,” he said slowly, “that in addition to having thirty student signatures, you also need three staff members to approve of the new organization. And one of those must agree to be the faculty advisor.”

  I nodded. “I read the rules very carefully, sir. I don’t think it will be a problem.”

  Winston raised an eyebrow. He looked amused. “Oh, you don’t? Ms. Mendoza, when a student goes through the proper channels to form a new school-sponsored organization, the group becomes eligible for funding. That’s why we have such stringent requirements for starting a club. We can’t fund any group that is poorly organized or doesn’t have substantial support.”