by Rachel Hruza
I saw a book on the bed and picked it up, laughing. It was a dictionary—Megan’s goal for the summer had been to read the entire thing. Her bookmark was in the G’s, but I don’t think she’d even made it that far.
Megan slipped the brace on over her t-shirt and jean shorts, standing there with the three Velcro straps undone. Immediately her expression shriveled to one of disgust. She looked down at it, her long, blond hair covering her hazel eyes.
“Do you want me to strap you into it?” I asked her.
“No way. This totally sucks,” she said.
“For me,” I retorted.
“Yeah,” Megan sighed. “I feel bad for you.” She paused as she slipped the brace off. Her hands reached behind her, grabbing each end of the brace’s open back, and I watched as she struggled to stretch it around her hips. By now, I’d gotten the hang of it and could rip that thing off in one second flat once I’d undone the Velcro.
As Megan lowered the brace to the ground, her eyes narrowed. I knew she was trying to incorporate one of her new vocabulary words. “I have fortitude for you.”
That’s not what I wanted to hear from Megan. She was supposed to act like everything was exactly the same as it had always been.
“No. No pity from you. And fortitude means strength or bravery.” I threw a pillow at her. It hit her in the face, and she dropped the brace on the floor. It thumped against the carpet and shook slightly as it settled there.
“Oh no! Did I break it?” she asked.
“I wish. And I’m serious. Don’t pity me.”
“I won’t.” Megan put out her hand and we slapped each other five.
“Remember when Tyler Thompson said the high five would never be cool because we were the ones trying to bring it back?” I said. We’d been trying to make the high five cool again for years.
Megan flopped onto the bed next to me. “Yeah, he’s a total jerk-face. And totally wrong! We’re bringin’ back the high five one hand at a time, girl!”
She put out her hand again. I rolled my eyes at her as I pushed her hand away. “I think he was right.”
Megan laughed. “Shut up, Tru.” Her face lit up. “Speaking of Tyler Thompson, his sister Hannah told me Brendan knows you have a crush on him.”
“No!” I said. I sat up immediately.
“Yes!”
“That’s horrific news!” I flopped back on the bed and covered my face.
“Why? You’ve liked him since fifth grade,” Megan said.
No matter how hard I tried to explain it to her, Megan would never understand. She was my best friend, and unless I did something crazy like spread an awful rumor about her or kill her pet cat, Mr. Winston, she would always think of me in the same way: like her.
But now, I wasn’t. Isaac Newton didn’t have it out for her like he did for me.
I shook my fist in the air, cursing Newton and his love of apple trees. I sat up again and pointed at the bane of my junior high existence.
“That’s why,” I said. “How can I talk to Brendan when I’m wearing body armor?”
“I’m sure nobody will even care, and it’s not that big of a deal anyway,” Megan replied.
“Yeah? Well I’m sure Brendan will take one look at me and my square hips and smashed butt and run screaming in the other direction.”
“You never know. Maybe that’s what he’s into.”
Megan winked at me, and I couldn’t help but laugh. Megan always knew how to make me laugh, no matter what.
“Did you get your class schedule?” she asked me.
“Came in the mail last week.” I’d memorized it already, and I blurted out the list.
“Slow down,” Megan said. “What’s after lunch?”
We compared schedules, and they were the same, except for Gym and study hall. Megan was disappointed because we wouldn’t be able to hide in the locker room during weight-lifting class or pass notes in study hall. I was upset because I realized I’d have to find someone else to help me put my brace back on after Gym. My doctor had cleared me to take off the brace for any kind of sports, which was one reason I was especially excited about volleyball starting up soon. Charity had been on the junior high team, and I loved practicing with her and going to her games—this year, it was finally going to be my turn to play on a real team, too. The doctor didn’t have any problem with me playing, which was a relief—staying agile and strong was important for keeping good posture when I wasn’t wearing the brace and for the future, when I wouldn’t have to wear it ever again. That future seemed like a dream. For now, I was just glad for any opportunity to take the thing off. However, I didn’t know if there was someone else I could trust to help me with the Velcro straps, and I’d be mortified if I had to ask Mrs. Tomjack, the girls’ P.E. teacher.
“I may end up hiding in the locker room every day,” I said.
“Knock it off. Gym is one of your favorite classes. Maybe I can sneak out of study hall to help you.”
“Maybe,” I said.
Megan liked to try to break the rules, but she usually chickened out when it came time to follow through. I was the one who always ended up sneaking out of my house at night to walk the block to Megan’s house so she could let me in her open window. She’d only tried it once, and she’d turned around when she’d heard a cricket chirp. I didn’t trust her to break the rules in front of her parents, let alone a teacher who might give her a detention.
“I better put it back on.” I stood up and lifted the brace under my shirt. I shifted it around my hips and felt the uncomfortably familiar smashing of my rear and the tight cinching of my waist. Megan threaded the three straps through their corresponding metal loops, pulling them as tight as she could.
I liked to wear the brace as tight as possible for two reasons: one, hopefully it would fix my spine and make it straight again (or at least straighten it a bit); and two, if it was flush against my body, maybe no one would notice it.
I’d decided that I would not let wearing this back brace change me at all. No one would know I was wearing it or treat me differently because of it, and everything would be normal.
“C’mon,” Megan said. “Maybe my dad will take us to get ice cream. One last hurrah before school starts.”
“School doesn’t start for three days. We’ll have plenty of time for a last hurrah,” I said.
Megan rolled her eyes. “I’m trying to get free ice cream, Tru. Don’t ruin it for the both of us.”
“Sorry. What was I thinking?”
I followed Megan out of her bedroom and into the hallway. Megan’s dad, Mr. Borowitz (Mr. B, as I called him), worked from home as a life coach and inspirational speaker. He came and spoke at our school at least once a year. Last year, he talked about achieving our dreams, and the year before, he talked about the importance of education. He used to joke he was going to step in for the school nurse to tell us about our “changing bodies,” and Megan always played along, telling him she’d ask the most embarrassing questions if he did.
“Hey, Pops!” Megan said, as she walked into his office. “Hit us up with some frozen treats!”
Mr. B turned around in his computer chair and smiled. “I just took you yesterday, Megs.”
“But Truth is here now, and she really wants to go,” Megan whined.
I was always Megan’s scapegoat. I didn’t mind; apparently I was good at it. She usually got what she wanted.
“Yep,” I said.
“I see,” Mr. B said. He winked at me. “Well, I just happen to have some time in my schedule. I can work in a quick ice cream break.”
On the way to the ice cream shop, I caught Mr. B staring at me in the rearview mirror every so often. I think he was trying to figure out what my brace looked like. Apparently he was fascinated by it and wanted to ask me a bunch of questions, but Megan wouldn’t let him. He was probably rolling ideas around in his head for a new inspirational speech.
I didn’t want to be inspirational. I just wanted to be “Truth Trendon, normal per
son.”
Not wanting to appear any different than I did before, I sat as still as possible with my hands in my lap. Then I relaxed—I’d never thought about how to sit before, so why start now? I’d probably draw more attention to myself trying to act normal than I would just being myself.
We pulled up to Udder Perfection. It was one of those locally owned shops that had a window you ordered at rather than going inside the building. There were picnic tables next to the building, and Mr. B sat down after giving us money for the ice cream. Megan got a large cone for herself, but I ordered a small because I didn’t want to take advantage of Mr. B’s money. Plus, ever since I got the brace, I couldn’t eat as much as I used to because it squeezed my stomach too tight. I took the change back to Mr. B while Megan waited for our cones.
“Thanks, Mr. B,” I said, handing him the dollars and coins. A quarter slipped off my hand onto the ground.
“Oops,” he said.
“I got it.” I bent over and grabbed the silver coin. Since the bathroom floor incident, I’d become more limber, bending my knees more often and figuring out how to rely more on my waist than my spine. “Here you go.”
“Your brace comes down that far on your hips?” Mr. B asked, looking at me.
“What?” I said.
Megan walked up with our cones.
“I could see it when you bent over,” Mr. B said. “I didn’t know it came down that far.”
“You could see it?” I asked him, panicked. No one had said that the past few weeks I’d been wearing it.
“Oh. My. Lord. Dad!” Megan said. She handed me my cone. The pink ice cream was already leaking down the side of the cone, like the sweat droplets that had suddenly formed on my forehead.
“I’m sorry! I didn’t mean—I wouldn’t even know you had one on if Megan hadn’t said you were getting one,” Mr. B said.
“It’s okay,” I said. Though in my mind, I was freaking out. For one thing, my mom and I had specifically shopped for clothes that completely hid my brace. Normally, I wore a size five in shorts, but I had to get a size eleven to find a pair that would come up to the waist of the brace above the hip parts that jutted out. And I had to tie my pants with a shoelace to keep them up, since no belt seemed to work with my plastic torso. Leather, cloth, macramé—they were either too big or rigid, or they stuck out abnormally far from my pants. And there was no way I wanted to risk the possibility of my pants falling to my ankles when I stood up at school, so, shoelace: welcome to my waist.
“Good grief, Father,” Megan said. She rolled her eyes. Both Mr. B and I knew she was upset. She only called him “Father” when she was angry with him. He just shook his head. I could tell he felt bad about saying anything.
“Really, Megan,” I said, licking ice cream off my fingers, “it’s okay.”
But I wasn’t hungry anymore, and I would have thrown the cone away if Mr. B hadn’t paid for it.
The ride home was quiet. After he parked the car, Mr. B apologized again and quickly disappeared into the house. Megan remained in her seat, and after a few seconds turned to look at me. “Truth, I’m sorry. You know my dad can be such a tool. Like, a real wrench.”
I knew she was trying to make me laugh. In the next few days, with school starting, I wouldn’t be doing much laughing. I couldn’t even commit myself to not dropping anything, because I was clumsy with my fingers; pencils always found their way onto the floor, and I’d have to chase them so people walking by didn’t trip on them as they passed. Once, our elementary school principal actually tripped over me. I, of course, was trying to keep the hallway safe by grabbing a pencil.
Bending over was inevitable. People seeing my brace was inevitable.
We climbed out of the car, and I turned to Megan.
“Here’s hoping for oblivious classmates,” I said, raising my melted ice cream cone as a toast to the new school year.
“To oblivious classmates!” Megan shouted.
She whacked her ice cream cone against mine, which sent a lump of melted vanilla sailing across the front yard.
We laughed until Megan had tears in her eyes and I had fallen to my knees because I couldn’t get enough air. My ice cream had basically melted down the cone and onto my hand, but we shared what was left of it as we walked into the house.
Even though it was difficult to laugh, knowing there was someone to laugh with me rather than at me made me think I could do this. I could survive junior high under the heavy thumb of Newton’s law of gravity.
Maybe.
CHAPTER 3
The First Day of the Rest of My Life
My mom told me I didn’t have to wear my brace the first day of school if I didn’t want to.
I graciously accepted her offer with a loud and excited “Heck no, I don’t!”
Therefore, I was actually excited for morning when I went to bed the night before school began.
I’d already laid out my outfit on the bench at the foot of my bed—a habit of mine since kindergarten, when I decided I was old enough to dress myself. I used to try to always wear the wackiest thing I could find. I went through a phase of polka-dot pants with zebra-striped shirts, and jewelry all colors of the rainbow. Some days I wore pajamas. My parents saw it as me becoming an individual, but when I walked into class wearing furry footie pj’s, my teacher told Mom it was okay if I was late to class if she needed more time to dress me.
Fortunately, I grew out of that phase. Unfortunately, I now had a complete fear of fashion. It was bad enough before getting a back brace. I was terrible at the whole “layering” look, and most days Megan would stop by on her way to the bus stop to make sure I was presentable. Some people might say that’s an insult, but not me. I know my strengths, and dressing cool isn’t one of them.
I wasn’t worried about tomorrow, though. Megan had helped me pick out a short jean skirt (one my mother might have nixed for school, except she probably felt bad I never got to wear it anymore), a tank top with fabric flowers on the straps, and a pair of teal flip-flops. I was happy I might actually look good for one day out of the whole school year.
That night, for the first time in over a month, I fell asleep with a smile on my face.
The morning of the first day back to school, my head popped off the pillow as lightning shattered the skyline, thunder reverberated off the windows, and dark, dismal clouds bulged across the heavens without an end in sight.
I threw on my summery outfit anyway and ran downstairs. Already dressed for work in his dark gray suit and blue tie, my father looked at my skirt, caught me by the shoulders at the bottom of the stairs, and spun me around to face the way I’d come.
“Coldest day for August on record. Put some clothes on,” he said.
“But Da-ad!” I cried. “This is the only chance I get to show people I’m not shaped like SpongeBob SquarePants!”
Harold, who was eating cereal at the kitchen table, looked up at me. “You don’t look like SpongeBob,” he said. “SpongeBob is cuter.”
I took off a flip-flop and threw it at his face. It landed in his Cheerios.
“Come on, Tru. Put some jeans on. It’s just school.” Charity grimaced as she pulled the rubber shoe out of Harold’s bowl, dripping milk. It was easy for Charity to act as if she wasn’t excited, but I knew she was nervous about starting high school—she’d even had Mom iron her plain white cotton t-shirt.
Junior high (comprising the hormonal craziness of seventh and eighth grades) and high school were based in the same building, but junior high was separated into a completely different section. Moving from one section of the building to the other was a major shift on the social scale. Freshmen were peons to the rest of the grades in high school, while junior high kids were peons to freshmen.
Really, I had three years—seventh grade, eighth grade, and then finally my high school freshman year—left at the bottom of the student ranks, but this year was the dirt-level bottom. The lowest of the low.
“Why don’t you have Mom iron your p
ush-up bra too, Charity?” I said, trying to sound as bratty as I meant to be. “Oh wait, it’s just school.”
“Trendons, unite!” my father shouted in the loud bass voice he saved for church choir solos. We all stared at him. “Knock it off,” he said. “Truth, change your clothes. Harold, quit eating that dirty-sandal cereal. Charity, you’re going to love high school.” He put his hand out as if he were a coach in the middle of a huddle. Nobody joined him. “Break!” he shouted, throwing his hand in the air.
I turned and stomped up the stairs. Dad followed me and grabbed my arm. He spoke quietly. “You’re pushing people’s buttons, Tru, but we’re on your side. We’re all rooting for you. Remember that, okay?”
He looked up at me from the bottom step and I could tell he meant it. It was hard to stay mad at my dad. He was right. I was pushing buttons. I wanted to push them. Because Isaac Newton had already pushed mine.
As I walked to the bus stop, the cold rain stung my skin through my blue long-sleeved t-shirt and jeans. I could have been wearing the stupid brace for all anyone knew. Though at least I had a day off from the skin pinching, bruise rubbing, and constant sweating. One of my personal goals for the day was to come home and still actually smell good.
I met Megan at our bus stop, and she knew instantly why I was upset. Her sympathetic smile didn’t erase my disappointment, but it at least helped me hope that the day would be downhill from here.
After the fifteen-minute homeroom period, my first class was Band. And at West River Junior High, Band was not lame and full of dorky kids; everybody who was anybody was in Band. We had almost one hundred members. The high school band had a great reputation, and we all wanted to be a part of the magic when we got there. We were all band geeks and happy about it.
I played the trumpet. When I’d started in fifth grade, I’d wanted something loud because I had always been a quiet person. It was my chance to be the leader, to blast explosive notes like a cannonball shooting out of a cannon. I can play quiet, graceful notes too (I’ll admit it—I’m pretty good), but the loud notes are the most fun.