Symptoms of Being Human

by Jeff Garvin

  Okay. So the sender used “dyke” and “faggot,” the same words Vickers called me in the cafeteria. But how common are those words? They get thrown around every day, in and outside of high school, and certainly all over the internet. Hell, that first anonymous sender called me “fag.” There’s nothing here that points specifically to Vickers.

  And the second line: “r school doesn’t need another faggot.” Not “Park Hills High,” but “r school.” Anyone could have sent this message; it’s just an empty threat. Anonymous hate. My panic starts to subside.

  I consider replying—and then, almost without deciding to, I delete the message.

  I close my laptop and lie back on my bed, but my mind won’t shut down. I think about what Solo said, about how I walk around assuming everyone is a bigoted asshole. I try to reconcile his live-and-let-live attitude with the message I just received. I can’t.

  And then I think about the girl at the train station. About how scary it must have been to tell her parents the truth right to their faces, and how crushed she must have felt when they rejected her. To be cast out by your own parents. And I think about her now, wondering if she read my reply. Wondering whether she’s still sitting on that bench, or if she’s already thrown herself onto the tracks.

  I get very little sleep, and when I walk into school Monday morning, I’m completely exhausted. It’s only my second week at Park Hills High, but it already feels like my second year.

  I’m feeling super guyish, so I didn’t really bother to put myself together this morning. I’m wearing a baggy T-shirt and the same jeans I wore all weekend—but I did take the time to tease the top of my hair into a fauxhawk.

  Solo comments on my scruffy appearance via text, and I reply with a stealthily taken phone pic of my middle finger. When Miss Crane isn’t looking, Solo retaliates by bouncing a Starburst off the side of my head.

  Bec is absent from Government—again.

  The lunch bell rings, and I start across the quad toward the cafeteria. I’m still a little uncertain of where I stand with Solo; sure, he invited me to sit with him, but I think he knew I would refuse. Regardless, I’ve decided to let it be, for now. To “pick my battles,” as Mom would say.

  I descend the stairs and enter the Gauntlet without hesitation. As I approach the football table, I brace myself for an onslaught—but it never comes. Solo gives me a curt nod as I pass, but nobody says a word to me.

  And then, just as I’m about to declare victory, Jim Vickers looks up and makes eye contact with me. He smiles, but it doesn’t touch his eyes. All at once, the fear from last night—that somehow he knows about my blog, that he’ll expose me—comes rushing back, and I look down and walk faster.

  Moments later I’m through the Gauntlet and standing in the lunch line. I try to clear my mind, but that cold smile seems to be burned into the backs of my eyelids. Did I see a deeper meaning behind it? An echo of the anonymous hate message from last night? Or was it just my imagination?

  I’m disappointed but unsurprised to find the ramp empty; Bec must be traveling with her dad again. I figure I could eat here alone, or see if Miss Crane is still in her room—but then I look down at my dry cafeteria burrito and decide that I’m just not that hungry. Solo is with his people, Bec is with her dad, and I’m alone on this stupid ramp. By myself. Thinking about being alone by myself.

  And for the first time I can remember, I’m actually disgusted by my own self-pity. I hear Doctor Ann’s voice in my head, telling me to stop thinking about me so much. To get engaged with other people. To find a cause. And she’s right; I really should do something. Reluctantly, I stuff the burrito into my bag and head up toward the activities office.

  I’m approaching the counter when the pretty blond girl behind it looks up and says, “Bonjour, Riley.”

  I stare at her for a minute, caught off guard by the greeting, until I recognize her: it’s Casey Reese, the girl who sits in front of me in French. At my lack of response, her smile fades.

  “Sorry,” she replies. “Need to work on my accent.”

  “No,” I say, too quickly. “No. It’s really good.”

  Casey’s smile returns at full wattage. “I love your hair,” she says, absently reaching up to run her fingers through her own. “How do you make it do that?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I just, like, brush it up, sort of, with my hand.” I demonstrate.

  She cocks her head. “You don’t use hair spray or anything?”

  I shrug. “My hair is naturally sticky-uppy. Plus, it’s shorter than yours.”

  She nods. I think she’ll say something else, drive the conversation deeper, but she just sort of spaces out. Finally, I clear my throat. “Um, do you have, like, a list of clubs on campus?”

  “Oh. Sure!” She retrieves a green three-ring binder from her desk and sets it in front of me. “They’re all in here. Let me know if you need anything else.” She smiles again, then crosses back to her desk and starts sorting through a pile of paperwork.

  I stand there at the counter, flipping through club flyers and sign-up sheets. There’s a young investors society, an academic decathlon team, and a chapter of the Orange County Teen Republicans Network. I could join the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (if I were an athlete, and if they take deeply conflicted Catholics), but I’m really looking for something more service-oriented. Now I’m halfway through the binder, and what little hope I had is dwindling fast. There’s no animal rights club, no vegan teens association, no antibullying coalition. I don’t really expect to find a transgender group—and when I do finally come cross the Park Hills Gay-Straight Alliance, I’m unsurprised to see only two names on the sign-up sheet, both dated three years ago.

  I’m about to slam the binder shut and walk out of the office when a pink flyer catches my eye.

  JOIN “P.A.L.S!”

  PEER ACADEMIC ASSISTANCE AT LUNCH!

  MONDAYS IN THE LIBRARY

  I read it twice, rolling my eyes at the cheesy name. Peer tutoring isn’t exciting or political, but it does meet Doctor Ann’s requirement of “getting engaged with other people.” Reluctantly, I close the binder, say au revoir to Casey, and set off for the library.

  I spot Sierra Wells as soon as I walk through the front door. She’s sitting at one of the long tables next to the entrance, talking to a younger girl who’s stuffing her books into a red backpack. I’m about to turn around and walk out—but then the girl mumbles something, and Sierra replies in a surprisingly gentle tone, “I know, receive still trips me up, too. Just remember ‘it’s better to give than to receive.’ Both words end in I-V-E.” And then her face splits in a wide, genuine smile—this hardly looks or sounds like the same sneering girl who asked if I was a dude or a chick. I pause, half turned toward the door. The younger girl stands, says good-bye to Sierra, and walks past me out the door.

  That’s when Sierra looks up and sees me—and her smile dissolves.

  “Oh,” she says. The gentleness is gone from her tone. “Here.” She reaches into her book bag and extracts a small package wrapped in purple tissue paper. She holds it out to me, and I stare at it. What could she possibly want to give me?

  “Your mom ordered these,” Sierra says, thrusting the package at me.

  “Oh, right. The essential oils. Thanks,” I say, taking it.

  “Yeah,” she replies, then closes her planner and starts packing her things. She’s wearing a long-sleeved sweater, but as she reaches down to put her binder away, her sleeve slides up, exposing a scab-like patch of discolored skin on her forearm. I’ve seen marks like this before, on one of the other patients at Pineview. His were from obsessive scratching; it was the way he dealt with stress. I wonder what Sierra’s are from.

  I feel a sudden wave of sympathy for her—and I speak without really meaning to. “I’m sorry about the other day,” I say. “At my house.” Sierra looks up at me, surprised. I’m surprised, too, but I keep talking. “I hate it when my parents use me like a prop.”

  Sierra
’s face takes on a green tinge, and she looks away. “Yeah, well,” she says, shouldering her bag, “whatever.” She stands, pushes in her chair, and walks out.

  I watch her leave, feeling stupid for even trying to talk to her. After the way she treated me, what made me think I could change her mind? And why would I bother? I guess it’s like Dad says: You only get one chance at a first impression.

  When I get home, I find a note from my mom explaining that she and Dad will be out late at some dinner event. I reheat the tofu rice dish she left me and eat it standing in the kitchen.

  I consider checking my blog, but decide against it. I have a bad feeling about the trans girl from last night—the one who wrote to me from the train station. I’m afraid of what she might say if she replies. What if she calls me out? Like, what gives me the right to give her advice? What experience do I have that could possibly compare to what she’s going through?

  Or worse, what if something happened, and she hasn’t replied at all?

  On Tuesday, Mr. Hibbard informs the class that we have a Precalc test on Thursday. It’s my least favorite subject, and I haven’t done any of the homework. The news sort of derails my day, and I decide I’m definitely not up for lunch in the cafeteria from hell. I intercept Solo as he’s walking out of Algebra and persuade him to sneak off campus with me.

  Since Bec wasn’t in Government, I hold out little hope that she’ll turn up at the ramp, but I convince Solo to walk past it on the way to the parking lot anyway. She’s not there.

  On the way to Shock-o-Tacos, I pick Solo’s brain for volunteering ideas.

  “My church does a potluck soup kitchen on the first Sunday of every month,” Solo says, shrugging. “Or maybe you could pass out juice at the High School Football Association blood drive.” I could probably get my mom to make a dish for the potluck, but that doesn’t qualify as me doing something. And the thought of waiting on a room full of Solo’s bleeding teammates makes me queasy; I’ll have to keep looking.

  That night, I sit down at my desk, thinking I’ll have the courage to check Bloglr—but when I get to the log-in screen, I stop. Between Mr. Hibbard’s looming test and my failed attempts to “find a cause,” the buzz of anxiety has been pretty much constant for the last few days—and the thought of getting another hate message like “go back where u came from dyke” amplifies it even more.

  The trans girl from the train station crosses my mind, too—but I push the thought away. I’m already a month behind; I need to study. So I close my laptop and open my Precalc book.

  On Wednesday, Bec is absent from Government again, and I’m beginning to think she’s not coming back. I shoot her a text, but I get no reply. Still, I’m disappointed when I find the ramp empty. I sit down anyway, and I’m just starting to unwrap my burrito when I hear a familiar voice from behind.

  “You’re just racking up the tolls, aren’t you?”

  CHAPTER 16

  I TURN TO FIND BEC standing over me. She’s wearing a Cure T-shirt with the neck cut out, black leggings, and a plaid skirt that gives me Catholic school flashbacks. She’s been gone for nearly three days, and she looks like she spent the whole time at Super-Hot Goth Girl Makeover Camp. Her expression is, as ever, unreadable behind her mirrored sunglasses.

  “Hi,” I say. Bec smirks.

  “First,” she says, counting off on her fingers, “there’s the toll from last week, and then I actually gave you two juice boxes—plus one for today. And I figure you’ve come looking for me every day this week. So honestly, at this point we’re way beyond Amazon gift cards and deep into narcotics territory.”

  I hold back a smile. “What makes you so sure I came looking for you?”

  Bec drops her backpack and sits next to me on the ramp. She pulls her shades down and looks at me with those blue eyes.

  “Riley, if I were to disclose to you the full extent of my powers, the shadow government would be here within moments to whisk me away in an unmarked black helicopter. Have you ever ridden in a helicopter?”

  “No,” I admit.

  “Well, let’s just say that if I ever decide to tell you my secrets, I will need a triple dose of nondrowsy Dramamine in addition to the aforementioned narcotics.”

  “I see.”

  Bec reaches into her backpack and extracts a three-foot-long stick of beef jerky. I grimace. I take a bite of my bean-and-no-cheese burrito, and for a moment, we just eat in silence.

  “So,” I say. “Were you traveling with your dad?”

  “No. I was . . . taking care of some family stuff.”

  “Oh.” That’s all I get? I want to ask where the hell she’s been, and why she hasn’t called me since our date—if that’s even what it was. And then it occurs to me—maybe she expected me to call her. All these thoughts lock up in my head, and none of them make it to my mouth.

  Bec extracts a juice box from her backpack. “I heard you had words with the football team.”

  I gape at her. “How did you know?”

  “Everybody knows. You were, like, yelling in the middle of the cafeteria.”

  “I never yelled.”

  Bec shrugs. “Well, you made some waves.” A wide grin splits her face. “People are talking about you behind your back.”

  Great. Not only have I failed to blend in, but I’m making waves. I swallow hard. “What are they saying?”

  Bec pulls off her sunglasses and considers me. “They’re saying how the new kid totally owned the couple from hell in front of everyone at lunch.”

  I smile, though I suspect she’s embellishing for my benefit. “‘The new kid.’ Is that all they’re calling me?”

  Bec shrugs. “One person may have referred to you as ‘that androgynous chick-dude.’ But I slapped his hat off.”

  My smile widens considerably.

  “But listen,” Bec says, narrowing her eyes. “You should be careful. Jim Vickers is not a guy you want to piss off.”

  I remember Vickers’s look, and I suppress a shudder. “I’ll be okay. I’m friends with someone else on the team.”

  Bec nods. “Jason Solomona. Aka Chewie. Used to be one of us until Coach Terrance turned him.”

  “Turned him?”

  Bec sighs and stuffs the half-eaten Slim Jim back into her backpack. “You can’t be on the football team and still hang with the freaks and geeks. Chewie learned that a long time ago.”

  “Well, he’s friends with me,” I say.

  “Then why aren’t you eating with him?”

  I smile. “Maybe I prefer the company of cute girls with lip rings.”

  And then I realize that I actually said that out loud, with my actual voice, and my stomach sort of ceases to exist, leaving a large vacuum where my guts were just a moment before.

  But Bec seems unperturbed by the comment. She puts her shades back on and says, “What are you doing this weekend?”

  My guts are back, but now they’re doing somersaults.

  “Nothing,” I say. “I mean, I’m grounded.”

  “When does your sentence end?”

  “Saturday.”

  “Perfect. You’re coming with me to a club in LA.”

  Oh my God. She’s asking me out. Again.

  “I’m—I don’t have ID.”

  Bec laughs. “It’s all ages.”

  “I don’t think my parents will let me.”

  Bec puts a hand on my shoulder and leans in. Her face is inches from mine. I catch that scent again. Smells like . . . vanilla, but with something spicy underneath. Warmth spreads through my middle.

  Bec speaks, her voice soft, the beginnings of her words coming out in a purr. “If your parents knew the crushing weight of your debt to me, and if they understood that coming with me Saturday night was the only way to repay that debt, short of acquiring nearly a metric ton of schedule one controlled substances, they would say yes, Riley.”

  I swallow. Bec doesn’t move, just keeps her face close to mine, waiting.

  I open my mouth to reply—but someo
ne interrupts from behind me, breaking the spell.

  “Hey, Bec,” a vaguely familiar voice says.

  Bec leans back and lets her hand drop into her lap. I turn to see Erik standing on the other side of the railing.

  “How can I help you, Erik?” Bec says, her voice dripping with irritation.

  Erik hesitates, his eyes flicking in my direction as though he wishes I wasn’t here to witness this conversation. He tugs at the hem of his sweaty shirt with a pudgy hand.

  Bec clears her throat impatiently, and Erik finally speaks up.

  “Can I have five bucks?” he says.

  Bec rolls her eyes. “Why should I lend you five bucks?”

  He shoots me another uncomfortable glance, then looks back at his sister. “Lunch,” he says quietly.

  “Oh yeah,” Bec says, and I could swear her face goes slightly pale. She plunges a hand into her backpack and extracts a crumpled bill. “Here’s ten.”

  Erik looks down at it. “I really only need five.”

  “It’s fine,” she says, waving the ten at him.

  “Thanks.” He takes the bill, turns, and walks away with his head down.

  I look back at Bec, but she’s focused on rearranging the contents of her backpack. I want to ask what that was all about, why they both seemed so uncomfortable. But she seems pretty embarrassed by the whole thing, and besides, asking about family stuff would open the conversation to topics I’d rather avoid, too—at least, for now.

  Beck zips her backpack and looks up at me. “So,” she says, “Saturday.”

  “Yeah. Yes,” I say, then bite my bottom lip to stop myself from endlessly rambling on in the affirmative.

  Bec smiles, stands, and throws her backpack over one shoulder. “Pick me up at six.”

  “Where?”

  “I have explained all of this in the note,” Bec says.

  “What note?”

  Bec produces a folded piece of notebook paper and leans over to hand it to me. As she does, the cutout neck of her shirt falls forward, revealing the gentle line of her collarbone where it meets the slope of her neck. She clears her throat, and I look up at her face. She smirks as I take the note, and then she turns abruptly and walks away.