by Laura Steven
“It hasn’t been easy, has it?” she says thickly.
I don’t know whether she means the last few weeks or the last thirteen years, but either way the answer is the same.
“No,” I admit. “I guess it hasn’t.”
Letting go of the embrace, but leaving one arm draped over my shoulders, she picks up the Thermos again, offering me a sip. I gratefully accept.
“I feel like I’ve failed you, Izzy,” she says, voice full of a regret I hate to hear.
“Absolutely not,” I insist. “You’ve given up everything for me. I’ll never be able to repay you. I’m so grateful to have you.”
A tight smile. “But I’ve never given you an environment in which you could talk about your emotions. You’ve felt like you always had to put on a brave face, always had to be cracking jokes, because that’s the way I dealt with my pain. And you had no choice but to do the same.”
I let these words sink in for a while. I guess it’s true. I’ve never thought Betty made me the way I am, but I suppose I learned a lot from watching her. Every single part of my personality contains elements of her, including her flaws.
Finally I say, “Well, every kid is screwed up somehow by whoever raises them. And if I had to be screwed up by anyone, I’m glad it was you.”
We both laugh at this, but it’s different to our usual defiant laughter. Softer. More real.
“We’re going to do better, okay?” she says, gazing not at me but at my mom’s grave. “We’re going to talk to each other about how we’re feeling. And we’re going to cry when we need to. And we’re going to admit that sometimes life just isn’t fucking funny.”
I take a deep breath, then let it out slowly. “Okay. Agreed.”
We both watch as a cleaner leaves the back door of the church with a mop and bucket, emptying the dirty water over a wall and into the field behind.
“I miss them,” Betty says quietly. “Your parents. They were wonderful people.” Her voice is even thicker now, and this time not with mucus. A tear slides down her cheek. And then another. And then her shoulders are shaking and it’s me with my arms around her. “I could use their advice sometimes, you know? Their reassurance that I’m doing right by them. With you. With everything.”
A massive lump forms in my throat and before I can help it I’m sobbing too. But it actually feels good. We hug each other tight.
She sniffs. “You’re a wonderful person, Izzy. And I’m just . . . proud. To call you my granddaughter. And I know your parents would be proud of you too.”
More tears spill down my cheeks against my will. “But I messed up, Grandma.”
She shakes her head fiercely. “No. You didn’t. The fact that everyone is so damn interested in the sex life of an innocent teenage girl is more a reflection on them than you.”
I snivel pathetically into her purple tunic. A pigeon watches with interest. “I know, but . . . I haven’t told you the worst part. About Ajita.”
“I already know, sweetheart,” she says softly, which is not usually something she’s capable of due to the eternal coughing.
I’m genuinely shocked. “You do?”
“Yes. Mrs Dutta rang me.”
A coil of anxiety tightens in my belly. “Oh God. What did she say?”
“She was mad. Of course, she had to explain everything from beginning to end because as you know I do not understand the interweb, and hadn’t seen the article in question.” A pause. “Is it true? About Ajita?”
“I don’t know,” I whisper. “That’s the problem.”
Betty strokes my hair and takes a sip of coffee from the flask. “Mmmm. Mrs Dutta seemed to think it was impossible. Literally beyond the realms of possibility. I tried reasoning with her – saying she should be open to the idea that it might be true, and try to have an honest conversation with her daughter – but . . . well. I didn’t get the impression that would happen somehow.”
I rub my eyes, which have finally stopped leaking involuntarily. “I wish I could be there for her. Ajita. In case it is true.”
Betty frowns. “You can be.”
“How? Mrs Dutta won’t let me see her.”
A disappointed tsk noise. “You and Ajita have been best pals for so long. Are you really going to let her homophobic mother dictate your friendship?”
I pause. “I feel like you want me to say no here, but have you met the woman? She’s terrifying.”
She glares at me sternly, which she has literally never done before in my whole life. “Izzy.”
“I know.”
And I do.
Monday 11 October
7.32am
As part of the plan I made with Betty to intercept my Lieblingsfreundin [“best friend” auf Deutsch, because even in my worst times I am an educator of the masses] on the way to school, I get to Ajita’s house stupidly early. Seriously, early is stupid. Never trust morning people. They have deeply rooted psychological issues and, as a person with deeply rooted psychological issues, I consider myself something of an expert on the matter.
Parking my bike across the street [and slightly around a corner so Mrs Dutta cannot gun me down with an assault rifle], I pull out my flask of coffee, take a long, hard gulp like an alcoholic’s first sip of the day, and I wait.
7.33 a.m.
After waiting for roughly forty-five seconds, I find it completely unreasonable that Ajita has not yet surfaced, and consider aborting the mission in lieu of a good old “hide in the bush and cry until you spew” session, but I tough it out.
[I know. My bravery is astounding.]
While I wait, I think about the screenplay competition. Yeah, it sucks that I got kicked out. It does. Mainly I feel bad for Mrs Crannon, and a little for myself over the lost opportunity. But something Carson once said soothes me like cooling gel on a migraine.
“You can love a thing without necessarily dedicating your life to it, you know?”
I love writing. I love performing. I love making people laugh.
The school system, and society in general, would have me believe I therefore have to make a career out of it – have to use my interests and talents to plow money back into the economy. That I have to be productive, above all else. A gerbil on a wheel, powering the machine with my success.
And yeah, it’d be cool to sell a screenplay to Hollywood; to hear actors speak my words on the big screen someday. But if that never happens, I think I’ll be okay. My passions bring me enough joy to sustain me, even if they stay at hobby status forever.
Because what matters to me above all else? The people I love. And there’s not a damn thing wrong with that. If people cared more about being kind than being successful, the world would be a much better place. That’s why I need to mend things with Ajita. That’s why I need to protect Betty, no matter what I have to give up to do so.
I don’t think I would ever have had this epiphany if it weren’t for Carson. A sharp pang needles in my chest when I think of him; of the night we spent playing at the basketball courts, meeting his mom and walking home together. Of the way he made me feel warm and fluttery and safe. Of his beautiful, painful art.
Could that boy really have betrayed me? As time goes on, I doubt it more and more.
8.19 a.m.
By the time I finally see Ajita rounding the corner toward school, I’m so jittery that I’ve splashed coffee all over my jeans. I’m just mopping the worst of it off with my roadkill scarf when I see her, all wrapped up in a duffel coat and carrying a stack of textbooks, which is incredibly alarming on account of the fact she’s never voluntarily opened a textbook in her life. She looks like something out of Gilmore Girls.
It takes her a split second to see me, but when she does she stops in her tracks and stares at me vacantly. As if she has no idea who I am.
I edge toward her as though approaching a rabid wolf with morning breath.
“Ajita . . .”
Her massive brown eyes shine dangerously. She looks like she’s about to burst into tears,
and I hate myself so much for causing it. She bites her lip and stares at the ground, clutching those books so tightly her knuckles go white. It’s so cold I can see her breath.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” My voice wobbles as I talk. “They say you’re not supposed to ruin an apology with an excuse, which is a relief, because I don’t have an excuse. Not a single one. That text message was just . . . wrong.”
A cold silence stretches out between us. Then: “That’s the thing, though,” she whispers. “You weren’t wrong.”
There it is.
I hug her. I can’t help myself. She looks so cold and sad standing in the middle of the sidewalk, surrounded by dead leaves and empty chip packets and cigarette butts.
“I wasn’t ready, Izzy,” she mumbles into my shoulder. “I’m still not.”
“I know,” I say, unleashing her from my bear grip. She’s crying a little. I am too.
“Everything’s just so . . . uncertain. I don’t know who I am; who I want to be. What I want to be. And this . . . it’s just so confusing. It’s like this gray cloud over my future. Everything my family want for me – to be a wealthy doctor, to marry a successful man from our community, to provide 2.4 grandchildren – I just don’t know if I can give it to them. Or if I even want to.” She scrunches up her face and shakes her head. “I hated you, you know. When I first saw it. I hated you so much.”
“That’s fair. I hated me too.”
“I still do, a little.”
“Again. Fair.”
Pressing her lips together, she finally looks up at me. Her eyes are still glistening and red-rimmed. “I need you, though. You’re my best friend. And I’m kind of going through a thing that I need a best friend for.” A frown. “And you are too, right? So I’m guessing you feel the same. About needing me, and all.”
“Yes. It’s quite gross, isn’t it? Admitting we need each other.”
A smile, albeit smaller than her usual Cheshire Cat beamer. “So gross. Just like your face.”
“I would retaliate with ‘just like your mom’, but I think she has several snipers pointed at me right at this very second. One wrong word and she’ll give the command.”
Ajita sniffs back a snot bubble. Neither of us are particularly attractive criers, but her nose takes on a life of its own when faced with a tear-inducing situation like this one. “I also have the authority to sanction your murder, so I’d tread carefully, Izzy O’Neill. Very carefully indeed.”
“Noted. Do you have the authority over other killings? I have a hit list I’d like to start working through.”
“Sure. Who’s first? Carson?”
“Nah,” I say, draining the dregs of my coffee. “Carlie, please.”
Ajita smiles properly now. “I heard what you did. Thank you for sticking up for me. I can’t believe Schumer didn’t suspend you.”
I nod. “Yeah, I was kind of hoping he would, to be fair. I could do with a week off. But I think he knew that’s what I wanted, and the bastard didn’t give it to me. So rude.”
“I never did like him.” She sniffs against the cold wind. “Okay, Carlie first. Who next?”
“Danny. I found out he started the World Class Whore website.”
Ajita’s eyes flash wildly. “Wait, he did what?”
“Yep. Sucks, huh?”
All her sadness evaporates in lieu of world-ending rage. She splutters everywhere, stomping a Doc Marten angrily. “That little son of a . . . how dare he! And to think . . . to think! He’s been playing the victim all this time, manipulating the crap out of me, out of both of us, and . . . he’s the one who’s to blame for all this! He ruined his best friend’s life out of jealousy ?! OH MY GOD, WHERE’S MY MOM’S ASSAULT RIFLE WHEN YOU NEED IT?”
10.02 a.m.
As Ajita and I leave math class we notice Carson lingering on the opposite side of the hall – the first time I’ve seen his face since he spoke to the press, although he’s been texting me at regular intervals to promise me it wasn’t him. I want to believe him. God, I want to believe him.
Before he spots me, Ajita grabs my arm and hauls me back into the classroom, nearly knocking out Sharon the deadpan queen with her backpack. Which wouldn’t have been terrible on account of her horrid Twitter rant about my displeasing body shape.
We hunch behind the door and tactfully avoid Mr Cheung’s glares by pretending to rummage in our purses for tampons, which we all know is a surefire way to get male faculty members off your case.
“Shit, Ajita, what am I going to do? Should I confront him?” I mutter as I slip quietly into cardiac arrest. “Carson, not Mr Cheung.”
She considers this for a moment while dangling a paper-wrapped supersize emphatically in front of her face, like she’s trying to hypnotize me on behalf of the period goddesses. “Look, Izzy, boys are like buses.”
“They all come at once?”
“No, they’re cheap, unreliable and smell like day-old dick cheese. Point is, you’re awesome, and none of these pricks deserve you. Not Danny, not Vaughan, and not Carson.” Something deep in my chest rebels at the idea Carson doesn’t deserve me. If he’s the man I think he is, he absolutely does. “Just go and give him a piece of your mind. You’ve got nothing to lose.”
I frown. “What about my last remaining strand of dignity?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You lost that last summer when you touched your foofer after chopping chilies and had to squat in a bowl of Greek yoghurt.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t you remember the moving funeral service I held for said dignity? Betty said a few words; Dumbledore peed on the casket?”
By now I am just so desperate for this conversation to be over that when she shoves me back out the door I’m beyond caring what happens in the next few minutes of my life.
Carson’s eyes meet mine and sheer terror flits across his face. I attempt to fix some semblance of fury onto my own features and stride up to him, trying to forget Ajita’s profoundly disturbing observations about dick cheese.
“Izzy, I –”
“What the fucking shit, Carson? Selling your story? Are you actually kidding me?”
Literally everyone on the planet is looking at us. Drivers on the highway have abandoned their vehicles to get a better look. Every drone in the world is pointed in our direction. Extraterrestrial life forms have finally breached the earth’s atmosphere and nobody has noticed on account of the fact everyone is focusing on this pathetic sex scandal in small-town America.
“You don’t under–”
Red-hot anger bubbles through me. “I don’t understand? I don’t understand needing some extra cash? Really? You’re really saying those words to me right now? For fucking, shitting sake, why –”
He looks genuinely devastated that I’m cursing so fluidly at him. “I can explain. Please. Let me explain.”
“Okay. Go.”
Carson seems taken aback by my bluntness. “Right here?”
Small crowds have gathered around us now, and I don’t know whether surviving several shaming rituals in the last month has toughened me up a bit, but I actually don’t even care who witnesses this exchange.
“Why not? You’ll probably sell your story again and all of these people will find out all the gritty little details anyway, so it might as well be public.”
He shoots me a genuinely pained expression, wincing like I’ve punched him in the kidneys. “I didn’t sell you out. I promise. You gotta believe me.”
“No? So how’d the Enquirer get those screenshots?” I’m starting to yell now, and the corridor is quieter than it’s ever been so my words echo around the lockers.
He almost whispers, “It wasn’t me, okay? Like I say, someone must’ve hacked my phone and screwed me over for a quick buck. I’m not like that, Izzy. I wouldn’t do that to you. Or Ajita. I would never. ”
Something in the way he’s clenching his fists and staring at me so urgently tells me he’s desperate for me to
believe him. And as someone who has also recently had her phone hacked and its contents leaked, I’m aware it’s a thing that can happen, even in a tiny, pointless high school.
I remember the way he acted in the days after the website was made. He didn’t treat me any differently, didn’t talk to me with any less respect. He was sweet and reassuring and gracious.
And the way he is with his mom and siblings. The guy I saw looking out for his family is not a guy who would willingly ruin my life.
And I really, really want to believe him. Because my list of people who aren’t weapons-grade douchebags is getting hella short.
When I don’t say anything for a moment, he adds, “And you know I would never, ever call you a whore. Not even if they paid me a million dollars.”
I smirk despite the situation. “Well, that’s just dumb, Carson. A million dollars would solve both of our financial problems forever. I’d let you brand the word ‘whore’ on my ass cheek for a million dollars.”
“That could be arranged!” someone jeers from a few feet away.
Another snarks, “Let’s crowd-fund that shit!”
Everyone laughs.
This next part I say more quietly. “You didn’t stand up for me.”
“What?” he says, matching my soft tone. He steps forward, closing the gap between us. He looks like he might take my hands, but decides against it, leaving his to curl at his sides. “When?”
“In the hallway. When Baxter and your other teammates were discussing the pictures. ‘If you’re giving it away for free, ain’t nobody gonna pay for it.’”
His face falls. “You heard that?”
“It’s all I’ve heard for weeks.”
“Oh God.” He closes his eyes. “I should’ve said something. I nearly did. I just hate confrontation, you know? Makes me sick. But it’s not an excuse. I should’ve told them to shove it, and I’m so sorry I didn’t.” He opens his eyes again, running a hand over the buzz-cut hair on the back of his neck. “You gotta believe me, though. I had nothing to do with that article. I was as shocked and disgusted as you were, I promise.”