The Sweet Revenge of Celia Door

by Karen Finneyfrock

  Drake started pacing through the leaves. The wind was picking up strength each minute, and it felt like a storm was coming. It started getting dark even though it was late afternoon.

  “What happened?” I asked, rooting in my backpack now for Band-Aids.

  “He climbed through the window and back into the apartment; I followed him. And I was so close to telling him. I mean, I was seconds away from telling him everything I was feeling, when he said, ‘I’m not gay,’ and he grabbed his stuff and ran out the door. He actually ran.”

  I felt helpless. I looked desperately until I found a tiny first aid kit hiding out in the bottom of my bag. Part of having a nurse for a mom. I motioned for Drake to sit down next to me, and carefully took hold of his injured hand. I tore open the wrapper, pulled off the slick paper and covered Drake’s cut.

  “I went back to the fire escape and watched him run all the way down the street toward the subway. I cried. I thought about jumping off. I thought about drinking all the whiskey and the vodka,” Drake said. “But I ended up just putting the bottles away and going to bed. My mom came in my room when she got home and asked if Japhy and I had a fight because he had texted his parents to tell them he went home. They were all angry because Japhy left and took the subway alone at night. That’s funny, huh?” said Drake, even though it wasn’t funny.

  “I told my parents I wanted to take the train back early today. I didn’t tell them what really happened with Japhy, I just said I needed to get back and do some homework,” he finished, stuffing his bandaged hand into his jacket pocket. “I feel so stupid. I’m so stupid.”

  A few fat raindrops plopped onto my shoulder, and the wind picked up more leaves and dumped them against our log.

  “So much for coming out,” Drake said, kicking at the leaves that were trying to bury us. “Being in the closet isn’t so bad. Closets are warm and cozy, and filled with clothes,” he said without smiling.

  My heart cracked right down the middle. I couldn’t think of one useful thing to say.

  Drake stood up to fish around for his screwdriver in the leaves where he threw it. I picked up his skateboard as five more heavy drops fell on my back.

  Then we turned and put our arms around each other. The sky opened its mouth and cried all over us.

  CHAPTER

  14

  “We’ll have to remove the hand,” I said, inspecting Drake’s cut Monday morning on the way to school.

  “What about my career as a circus knife-thrower?” He stepped on his skateboard.

  “We can get you transferred to the sideshow freak department.”

  Drake slid down the sidewalk beside me listlessly, barely spending the effort to push. Luckily, the path to school was mostly downhill.

  “Are you okay?” I ventured.

  “Well, I’m dying. We’re all dying, and everything we do on Earth is pointless, but yeah,” said Drake without passion. “I’m fine.”

  At school, we parted ways to go to our lockers, and Drake rode his skateboard down the hall, which is massively illegal at Hershey High. I watched him stop and flip his board up into his hand just as Mr. Foster, our principal, stepped out of the nurse’s office. Principal Foster looked at Drake, nodded, and kept walking.

  Becky Shapiro, who has the locker next to mine, was dialing her combination when I arrived. If Becky was just overweight at the start of eighth grade, she was obese by the beginning of ninth.

  “Hey, Celia,” she said kindly. Becky has a small crew of friends, gamer girls mostly. They might have accepted me into their group in eighth grade if I had tried. I guess I didn’t try.

  “Hey, Becky,” I said back, opening my locker. My CELIA THE DARK sign had disappeared over the weekend. It could have been a janitor. We’re technically only allowed to decorate the inside of our lockers.

  “Do you want to buy a candy bar to support the band?” Becky asked, pulling a box of Hershey’s chocolate bars out of her locker.

  Hershey Corp. gives chocolate bars to local schools to raise money for things like cheerleading camps and musicals. So, at any given time, half of the kids in Hershey are selling candy bars and the other half are buying them. I refuse to eat Hershey’s chocolate because I refuse to be a cog in the great American corporate machine. I was about to tell Becky that when Joey Gaskill walked down the hall, flanked by two of his meatheads. “A fat girl selling candy bars always makes me hungry!” The guys with Joey started laughing, big dumb laughs falling out of their mouths like drool.

  I felt the Darkness rise up in my chest. Before I could stop myself, I slammed my locker and turned around. “You’re stupid and mean, and you suck at basketball.”

  Danger filled the hallway. Joey stopped short and shined his menace on me like a spotlight. I braced for direct, physical violence.

  “The troll speaks,” he said, looking me up and down. “It’s okay, I’m not trying to steal your fat girlfriend.”

  “Keep marching, hate parade,” I said in a Dark voice, pointing down the hall.

  “Such a weird little gremlin,” he said back, shaking his head and backing down the hall with his minions. His voice was casual, but his look was murderous.

  My heart was pumping enough blood for three bodies. I felt my skin hardening into armor as I turned to open my locker again. Becky was staring at her box of candy bars, her chest bowed in like she had been punched in the stomach. Tears stood at the corner of her eyes ready to jump to their death on her cheeks. “Thanks, Celia,” she whispered. I just nodded.

  People criticize kids for being fat, but then hand us birthday cake and Valentine’s chocolate, Saint Patrick’s Day cupcakes, and everything at Christmas. Looking at Becky, you know that she isn’t just fat because she likes to eat cookies. She’s using the fat for something, like punishment or protection. I think Becky is fat for the same reason I’m Dark.

  My hands were still shaking when I got to first period. I was doing everything I could to control my breathing as Mr. Pearson walked around the room returning the assignments we turned in on Friday—essays on the poem “We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks. I had decided to write my paper in the form of a poem.

  In Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem “We Real Cool,” what poetic devices does the poet use to convey meaning? Does Gwendolyn Brooks think it is cool to leave school?

  DYING IS NOT HOT

  By Celia the Dark

  Cool is no longer cool because cool is now hot,

  and school isn’t school if you’re skipping.

  Then the neighborhood is school and John,

  the creepy dropout guy is teaching.

  And it isn’t cool because the cool kids stay in school,

  where the other cool kids tell them how hot they are

  and they wouldn’t want to miss a dance for cutting.

  Kids who skip school were never cool or hot but

  already dumped into the trashcan with leftover lunch pizza,

  bruised into a locker, asking their parents for extra lunch money

  so they can smoke and act like they never cared anyway.

  And skipping’s not cool but it is school

  because that’s where they learn what the un-cool learn

  about life and dying.

  I even ended the poem with death the way Gwendolyn Brooks ended her poem. Plus, I said way more about what it’s like to skip school now. I mean, does anyone play hooky to go to a pool hall? Either kids really did that in, like, 1960 or she just said that because it rhymed.

  When he handed my work back, balding Mr. Pearson, who looks like he’s never been inspired by a poem in his life, said, “Celia, what is this? I said write an essay. Do it over.” Mandy laughed quietly to herself.

  A whole tree splintered inside me, just like it had been struck by lightning. My mouth opened and said, “Shut the fuck up, Amanda,” while my leg reached over to kick her desk so hard that it moved a foot.

  Language Arts exploded. “What did you say?” Mandy jumped out of her chair. Sandy spun around
like she had never heard such language. Mr. Pearson put up his hands like a referee and metaphorically blew a whistle. “Mandy, sit down. Celia, detention, tomorrow.” He pointed a beefy finger right in my face. Mandy flipped her long hair over one shoulder and made a show of pushing her chair back into place and sitting down again.

  “I don’t tolerate that language or that behavior in my class, Ms. Door,” Mr. Pearson said as he walked to his desk and dramatically pulled a detention form out of his drawer. I felt sick enough to vomit down the back of Sandy’s sweater. My bones were full of dry ice and my ears were smoking. I couldn’t believe I just lost my mind like that. English? I just got detention in English? English was supposed to be my safe harbor, my happy place. I closed my eyes and tried to remember Ms. Green’s class. This never would have happened with Ms. Green.

  Ms. Green was my eighth-grade English teacher. In her class, I never got below an A. She was the first person to suggest that I write a poem. She did a lot more for me, too.

  She always wore high heels and pencil skirts, while the other teachers wore shapeless dresses and clogs or flats. She had brown hair that swung around her shoulders like she was in a shampoo commercial. Ms. Green didn’t miss one day of school when I was in eighth grade. She was never sick or on vacation. No one in her family died. She was the only teacher who never had a substitute, and at the end of the year, the principal gave her a plaque to acknowledge her lack of absences.

  All the desks in Ms. Green’s classroom were arranged in a circle surrounding a braided rug with an overstuffed armchair and reading lamp. Every Friday, Ms. Green turned out the fluorescent lights and let sunlight flicker through the blinds while she read poems out loud. Once, she cried while reading us a poem about a girl whose father had died. She didn’t stop reading the poem, she just kept reading through her tears. It wasn’t just the boys in my class who swooned over Ms. Green. I think the entire eighth grade was in love with her.

  It was May, a month after Ruth’s mother took her out of school and two weeks after my parents announced their trial separation, when Ms. Green handed me the note. She was walking around the circle in front of our desks and handing back our papers on the book Night by Elie Wiesel. She stopped at each desk, resting one high heel against the other as she put down a paper in front of each student.

  The papers were identical, all stapled at the top, left corner with a letter grade and her red handwriting above the title. When she stopped at my desk, she paused for a second. I looked up at her as her hair fell around her face like a hood and she smiled her straight-teeth smile. She put down a paper with a purple sticky note affixed to the front and then, without speaking, she continued around the room. The note said:

  Celia,

  You have talent as a writer. In my eight years of teaching, I haven’t come across a more natural and engaging voice. I hope that you will continue to work hard and hone your craft both in school and in your spare time. I believe you have been given a gift.

  Ms. Green

  A tingly feeling started at the base of my skull. It crept all the way around my head and stretched my mouth into a smile. Ms. Green had noticed me! Ms. Green thought I had a gift! I sat staring at the purple note until I got the prickly feeling that another set of eyes had joined mine on the paper. I glanced to my left just in time to see Sandy Firestone, seated next to me, with her eyes glued to Ms. Green’s note.

  As soon as she felt my gaze on her, Sandy’s eyes darted around the floor as if she was innocently looking for a dropped pencil. I glanced at Sandy’s paper and noticed a large, red C sitting there like a mouth hanging open.

  Sandy looked up and saw my eyes on her paper. She snatched it up and shoved it into her notebook, slamming the cover closed.

  That’s the day the trouble started. The trouble that nearly ruined my life. The trouble that turned me Dark. The trouble that begs me for revenge.

  CHAPTER

  15

  FORM OF

  REVENGE

  PRO

  CON

  Trip her in the hall

  Embarrassing but not public enough

  Not clever, involves physical violence, could get suspended

  Post a photo of her online with mean caption

  Mildly embarrassing

  Have to find photo, would enough people see it?

  Steal one of her bad English papers and spread it around

  Might be able to steal it in L.A.

  Being bad at school is not very embarrassing

  I spent the rest of L.A. working on a Revenge Plan Pro & Con list. Since I want my revenge to cause humiliation and be public, and for Sandy to know that I orchestrated it, it wasn’t the easiest plan to concoct. Also, I wasn’t thinking clearly because my heart was beating so fast. By the end of class, I had gotten nowhere. As everyone was standing up and shuffling out of the room, Mandy kicked my chair subtly and whispered, “Watch out, Weird.”

  Before lunch, I waited for Drake at my locker while he dropped off his science book. He was walking down the hall toward me when I witnessed a scene. A group of girls was standing around another bank of freshman lockers when Drake tried to walk by. One girl pushed another girl hard on the back so she fell right into him, dropping the book she was holding. Drake looked surprised at first, but then he gave the girl a charming smile and picked up her book. When he walked away, the girls exploded into giggles like they were toy volcanoes that erupt in pink icing.

  “Hey,” said Drake flatly when he reached my locker.

  Over his shoulder, I could see that the girls were still watching him, transfixed by our interaction. Drake seemed unaware of the audience.

  “Hey,” I said back, closing my locker and walking with Drake away from the girls and toward the doors to the picnic area. I glanced back over my shoulder once to find that they were still staring.

  A brooding quiet joined us for lunch on the lawn that day. We both chewed our sandwiches with lazy mouths like horses gnawing on grass.

  “Not playing the pickup game?” I asked, noticing the basketball players collecting on the court while Drake sat unmoving.

  “Not feeling it,” he mumbled, and went back to chewing.

  “I got detention,” I said.

  “Of course you did”—he chewed—“because everything sucks today.” When he said the word sucks, a little piece of tuna sandwich projected out of his mouth and landed on my hoodie sleeve. It flew right through the tension and forced us both to laugh. Drake took a napkin and wiped it off for me.

  “Do you want to buy tickets to the homecoming dance?” a high-pitched voice piped. I looked over and saw a girl in jeans and a Hershey High sweatshirt bouncing over to us from the picnic tables. She was trailed by another girl holding a metal cash box, and they both had paint on their faces that said Junior on one cheek and Class on the other. “It’s on October second,” she said.

  “No thanks,” Drake answered politely. I just shook my head, sending the spirited juniors on to the next group of students sitting in the grass.

  “Will you still be here on October second?” I asked, trying not to sound too invested in Drake’s departure date.

  “Who knows? My parents called both admissions offices, but I’m still on the wait list. It’s not like I have much to go back for now anyway. Then again, it’s not like I have much to stay here for.” He put his head on his hands and lay back in the grass as the other boys started the pickup game.

  I put the rest of my sandwich into my bag, having fully lost my appetite.

  CHAPTER

  16

  “Back again, Celia?” Ms. Edgar, the school librarian, greeted Drake and me warmly when we drew open the double doors to our library. I had asked Drake to walk to school early on Tuesday so I could exchange my book. I still hadn’t returned Foreignisms, so I felt I was getting behind on my Dewey decimal project. Also, I wanted a new book to read during detention.

  Detention. It was the first word that came to my mind when I woke up that day. I couldn
’t imagine what horrors awaited me there. Luckily, Mom was working the swing shift again, so I didn’t have to mention it to her over dinner Monday night. Plus, she wasn’t telling me anything about Simon from the hospital, so I didn’t feel the need to tell her about detention. You could get two of them before a letter went home requesting a conference with your parent.

  “Morning,” I said back to Ms. Edgar, trying not to sound too Dark. I was wearing a short, black skirt and my thick-soled combat boots again, along with some purple striped tights. My boots and hoodie were turning into my school uniform.

  Drake looked sleepy, and his hair wasn’t styled. He hardly talked on the walk to school. But as soon as we walked into the library, he whispered, “I tried texting him last night. I emailed, too. He un-friended me online.” Drake didn’t have to tell me who he was. There was a deep well of sadness in Drake’s eyes.

  We walked along the nonfiction books, closest to the glass doors. The next section after language was science, the 500 class. I browsed through titles on planets, the nuclear age, and biodomes, looking for the next topic to grab my interest.

  “Maybe he will . . . change his mind?” I said, but didn’t sound convincing.

  “Yeah,” said Drake, but didn’t sound hopeful.

  Drake took a left turn and headed off into the stacks. I finally chose a book called The Kingdom of the Earthworm from the gardening section and went to the circulation desk to check it out.