by Ryan Schow
In the corner of my eye, suddenly they appear: a pack of snotty looking girls.
Spearheaded by an arrogant looking auburn-haired girl with black knee-high socks, a black leather mini-skirt and a virgin white blouse that looks more appropriate in a music video than in school, I fear things are about to get worse. The girl is pretty, but the shitty look on her face screams of self-importance. I know the look all too well. She sidesteps a line of my vomit, pulls to a stop in front of us, and with the three girls behind her and a devious smile, says, “Looking at her, you think we’d be the ones doing the puking.”
“Yeah,” her friend says, a sanctimonious looking blonde. “Seems the Incredible Bulk has a case of the queasies.”
“Either that or she’s got buyer’s remorse on breakfast,” says another one, a brunette who resembles Natalie Portman in Black Swan.
“Julie Sanderson,” Bridget says with disgust, “haven’t you been quarantined yet?”
“What does that mean?” the music video girl says.
“She’s trying to say you’re a disease,” Victoria says. “Something worse than cancer if you’re asking me.”
“More like the black plague,” Georgia adds. “Or syphilis. After it rots you, not before.”
“Hey,” Julie says, “at least I’m not dumping my guts next to where everyone eats.”
Victoria looks at me and says, “This loathsome scab is Julie Sanderson. The nobody aching to be somebody if only she could keep from getting pregnant all the time. The three behind her, those are her friends.” The pious blonde and her brunette friend both have spray tans that make them pretty but not gorgeous, but the third girl—a quiet little raven haired thing—is very attractive with big emerald eyes that lost look, not at all amused.
“Theresa Prichard is the Natalie Portman look-alike, Cameron O’Dell is the blonde with too many curls made entirely too small and Maggie Jaynes is the pixie in back picking her nails and saying nothing. Who did you say she looks like, Georgia?”
“That girl from Pretty Little Liars. Aria.”
“Oh, yeah,” Victoria says, studying the girl. “Totally.” I think Maggie is the prettiest of the group, and she seems to be the most shy of the four, but that isn’t saying much considering her friends are practically toxic with superiority.
The dark haired girl with the spray tan, Theresa, she whispers to Cameron, “Daddy’s little girl looks just like daddy.” Cameron snickers, and maybe she knows I hear them because she’s looking at me and laughing. Maggie, however, isn’t laughing. She whispers an apology to me as she pushes through them.
Julie steps forward, touches my face. Her perfume is suffocating, her breath as sweet as candy. Like she’s chewing on a tic-tac. Her eyes betray her. With her standing so close, they’re all I see. Looking in them is akin to watching thunderstorms destroying coastal towns, or what a person being killed would look like if you turned the sound off. The mole beside her right eye, it could be a beauty mark if I didn’t feel so humiliated in her presence. I don’t realize she’s wiped something off my face until she examines her finger and says, “No one likes a girl with barf all over her mouth.” She swipes her finger on my pants and it’s all I can do to not start bawling my eyes out again. How did I end up here?
Julie, Cameron and Theresa laugh, then Julie takes a deep breath and says, “Let’s go girls before I lose my appetite.”
Theresa says, “Too late.”
When they leave, Victoria says, “Don’t worry about them, Savannah. Their own mothers don’t even like them. Besides, I’m famished already.” This is curious since my mother doesn’t like me either.
“I should go,” I say, barely holding myself together. “I can’t be here.”
“No way,” Bridget says. “If you leave now everyone will think Julie ran you off. No, you’re going to stay with us and we’re going to project strength, and if that pretentious bitch says one more word, I’m going to punch her in the vagina.”
Okay, after that, I’m totally girl-crushing on Bridget.
Laughing, Victoria says, “Jeez, when did you get so aggressive?”
“It’s my new favorite thing,” Bridget says, grinning. “And let me tell you, it feels good.”
2
We get our food, walk to a mostly empty table and eat by ourselves. Looking at the girls, the fearful part of me is obsessing. The girls, these triplets who aren’t related, I’m sure they’re out to humiliate or embarrass me. But they stood up for me a minute ago. Would they do something like that if they really wanted to be frenemies? Or are they genuine? Is this even possible? The three of them are talking loudly and eating their lunch; all I have is a bag of Fritos, an organic apple and a bottle of 7-Up. My stomach is still unsettled so I start with the 7-Up and then the chips. I never eat the apple.
“Who were those girls?” I finally ask.
“Oh, I hate them,” Georgia says. “How they’re popular is beyond me.”
“But…I thought you were the popular ones.”
“No,” Bridget says. “At this school, it takes more than good looks to be popular. Not that we care.”
In my mind, misconceptions are colliding, reshuffling themselves, seeking new versions of truth. Just when I think something makes sense, someone new comes and turns everything upside down. Georgia, Bridget and Victoria are perfect. Literally perfect. They’re beautiful, nice and happy, so how can they not be the popular girls?
“We’re neither popular nor unpopular,” Victoria explains, “because of how we look. How we look like sisters, but we’re not. It’s unsettling to some people.”
“The whole non-triplets, non-sisters thing aside, girls like you aren’t friends with fat girls like me. It just doesn’t happen.” I’m saying this and I’m trying to breathe at the same time. Seriously, my breath feels so light and so high in my chest. Like I might cry.
Victoria says, “You’re not over that yet?”
“It’s been ten minutes,” I say, almost frantic.
“So?” Victoria counters with a grin.
I muster up the courage to ask, “How can the three of you look the same while not being related? And don’t dodge the question anymore because if we’re going to be friends, I really want to know.”
They trade glances, entire conversations being exchanged with each look, then they collectively shrug their shoulders. What can I say when none of them are willing to meet my eyes? And does it really matter?
“The more you don’t tell me the more I think you’re not really my friends, that there’s some ulterior motive.”
“As odd as this sounds,” Georgia says, “we’re more than our looks. They don’t define us, and we don’t want to be defined by them. Just like you.”
“Is that why you’re not popular, because you look the same but you aren’t the same?”
“Perhaps,” Victoria says.
“We’re something people don’t understand,” Georgia adds, “and because of that a lot of people sort of ignore us, or hate us. Especially Julie and her friends.”
“Yeah,” I say, “well I don’t understand it either. But in the end, I guess, as long as you’re nice to me, I don’t really care why you are the way you are.” My curiosity, however, is off the freaking charts. I’m wondering, test tube babies?
3
After the incident in the cafeteria (i.e. me embarrassing myself in front of the entire student body), I plan on doubling my meds, but instead I say screw it and toss them. It’s time I get to know myself. The only way to do this is to kick the prescription drugs. After all, how much worse can it get? I’m already as anxious as I’ll ever be.
I sleep like a coma patient Sunday night, but come Monday morning, my nervousness devastates my insides with such force that twice I find myself hugging the bathroom toilet. Fighting back tears is useless. They drain from me unhindered. Deep self-loathing follows. My hair is too frizzy, my eyes the color of old chocolate cake. With this ugly face, these unkissable lips and a gross double chin I can
’t stop seeing, I feel like calling Margaret’s plastic surgeon. But I don’t. I do what I do every day which is look at my face without looking at it at all. After intentionally missing breakfast (because who knows how many more times I’ll throw up today?) I force myself to go to class.
The first day is both better and worse than expected. My classes are fascinating, but I’m a black rock on a white sand beach. If there are five other ugly people in the school, as Janine claims, I don’t see them. Everyone here is gorgeous. Everyone. Until third period, no one talks to me, much less gives me the time of day. Not even the teachers, which is a little unnerving. Then finally someone notices me and talks to me. One of Janine’s ugly five. Well, ugly six if you count me. He’s a total swamp donkey, for sure, a boy that could match me flaw for freaking flaw. I’m getting ahead of myself, though. It’s probably best if I start with first period.
Personal finance is an interesting topic and my teacher, Nolan Beswick, is an older man with a three-piece suit, small glasses and a genial face that never stops smiling. His happiness is unsettling. He looks thirty, maybe thirty-five, and I can tell by the way he looks that as a boy he was as handsome as any Astor Academy kid today. Before class, three girls sitting in front of me were whispering about him in ways I would never whisper about someone twice my age. Um…gross! I wish at least one of the non-triplets were in my class to talk to about this, but alas, it’s just me and my rampant insecurities. The first thing Mr. Beswick says has me thinking I’ve lost it, that maybe I’m hearing things.
“Personal finance like we teach it here is not taught to the masses because if the masses knew how to control their spending, many of today’s banks and credit unions would fail. Entire industries would collapse. In the end this will never happen because the more you understand finance and how it relates to the real world, the more you realize consumer debt is used to control the middle-classes, and in the end, to bankrupt and destroy them. You want to know who runs this country? Not the President. The real power is a group of extremely powerful international bankers who don’t like the idea of a middle-class. Ladies and gentleman, today we’re going to talk about the Federal Reserve and how they relate to your finances.”
I was hooked from the word go.
Second period is Politics, which I have with Georgia and Victoria. And thank God because Julie Sanderson is in the same class. When Julie first sees me sitting with the girls, she grins and middle-fingers me. Theresa Pritchard comes in a moment later and I’m like, oh, great. Instead of flipping me off, Theresa smiles wide and winks. Then she blows me a kiss, which has me turning bright red.
Our teacher, Mrs. Verdine Pearce, is a golden girl with the skin and hair of a sixty-five year old, though with today’s plastic surgery advances, technically she could be eighty. Adding to the mystery of her age, she acts like she’s forty. Her voice is perky and strong, her eyes active, her movements fluid. I like her right away. You would have to be blind not to see how much she loves her subject. Near the end of class, Mrs. Pearce says something that has me thinking Astor Academy is so vastly different from other schools, it’s hard to imagine it’s even in the same country.
She says, “To excel in politics, or the higher echelons of corporate America, at some point in time you’ll be forced to compromise your morals. Before you sink into this trap, spend the money to dig up dirt on the people who would force your hand. You need leverage. Combine the two and you can either blackmail, or protect yourself from being blackmailed. With enough dirt and leverage, maybe you bend your morals only a little. Maybe you don’t bend them at all. This will sound underhanded to you young idealists. Blackmail is only something criminals participate in, right? Wrong. Blackmail is a useful tool of any trade. And really, it’s not uncommon. If you want to be in politics, and one way or another you’ll be in politics—even if it’s just office politics—you’re going to want to know how to effectively blackmail people.”
Looking at Julie and Theresa, I’m thinking blackmail isn’t just a political tool, it might be wise to understand it and how it relates to high school.
It’s in my third period class, Branding and Media Relations, that I finally meet the aforementioned member of Janine’s ugly six: Brayden James. He looks like Tobey Maguire in Spiderman 3 before he became black Spiderman, which is to say a complete tool. A class-A jack pine savage. He’s sitting alone with his brown hair swept to the side—like the stupidest looking Justin Bieber fan in history—when I come speed-walking into class late. I got stuck in the bathroom before hearing the bell chime, then took the wrong hallway and had to backtrack fast. The minute I step inside the classroom, I’m out of breath and my big stomach is in the throws of some serious hunger pangs. Next to Brayden is one of two empty seats in the room. I sit down, feeling overly shy, and glance up at him.
His smile draws attention to his face, which isn’t good. Good God, he’s so unattractive! Then a single thought sobers me: is this what other people experience when looking at me? Am I this disgusting? Sadly, I already know the answer and it doesn’t make me feel any better about myself.
“Holy balls,” he says, “me and the human being actually meet.”
“Hi,” I say.
“Well don’t be rude. Introduce yourself.”
We meet, he shakes my hand and the whole formal affair is surreal. In fact, when our hands touch, I let go too quickly, like I don’t want to touch him. I know, this was rude of me, but please.
“Why do you call me ‘the human?’”
“Because no one but a real human being would power up their entire breakfast in front of the whole school the first day they arrive. That was awesome. The girl I was sitting next to, she said, ‘I know how she feels’ and she totally laughed.”
My face catches fire, heat stealing into my cheeks. “I heard a lot of people laughing.”
“I wasn’t laughing at you, dummy. I was laughing because this school is so perfect and pretty it makes me want to kill myself every single day. Not for real. You know what I mean, though.” He nods his head at the class. “Just look at these ass clowns. Barely a human being amongst them.”
A cute girl two seats up twists her head around. She fires Brayden a nasty look. “Especially you, Nina, you fucking fraud,” he says. Her eyes darken. “Turn around. Don’t look at me.”
The teacher, a twenty-something blonde with big breasts and bony shoulders has the very cool name of Coralyn Justice. She pins me and Brayden down with her impossibly large hazel eyes. “Is there something you want to add to class, Mr. James?”
I freeze. Oh crap. I’ve never gotten in trouble in class before.
Brayden says, “No, but there are a few people I’d like to subtract.” This gets a few laughs, then Mrs. Justice says, “Cute” and then class starts and everyone settles down. The way this seems to happen every period, how everyone is so well behaved without having to be asked, it’s like I’ve stepped into the Twilight Zone. Everyone seems alive before and after class, but once the second bell rings they could all be studious robots that’s how focused they are.
For some reason, maybe it’s because Brayden seems like a kindred spirit, I feel myself relaxing for the first time since I arrived. How come I can’t talk to people the way he talks to them? I wonder why he isn’t scared. Or is he? My fleet of therapists might suggest he uses sarcasm as a defense mechanism.
Not so quietly, Brayden says, “I loathe these people. They’re all so…artificial. Like Stepford children. You know, manufactured in a lab to be practically perfect.”
Theresa Prichard and Maggie Jaynes sit a few seats in front of me. If my stomach is an elevator, seeing them just makes it crash to the basement floor. I try putting them out of my head. My eyes refuse to even look at them.
“I hate Julie Sanderson and her stupid friends,” I whisper, grateful to finally talk with someone who understands.
“Julie’s the freaking devil.”
4
The quality of teachers and their subject matter co
ntinues to amaze me. Astor’s teachers—without apology—seem to teach the unvarnished truth, which is not only refreshing, it’s exciting. About Branding and Media Relations, Mrs. Justice says, “Part of the banker bailout funds went to the media. More than one billion dollars. So what does that tell you?”
I know what it tells me, but I’m afraid to say it. Theresa Prichard isn’t afraid though. She says, “It means elements of the mainstream media are for sale.”
“Yes. Part of being successful in this country is having the money to sway the media. It works in politics. It works in business. The key is to network with prominent media moguls, their primary supporters and their friends. In this world, it’s all about who you know and how much they cost. Period dot, end of story.”
My take on the world is fast changing, and this is only day one.
After class Brayden shows me his schedule. We share two more classes: Investigative Journalism and Psychology. My outward joy restrained, I swell inside with a relief that blooms gigantic. Of all my classes, I’m most excited about Investigative Journalism. Though none of my girlfriends are in this class, at least I have Brayden.
The way our school days are set up, we start at nine, do three periods, then have lunch. I like the schedule, and the fact that I get to see the non-triplets next is a relief, even if there is that little nagging voice in my ear whispering ever so softly that I cannot trust them. I try slamming the door on this voice as I meander unseen through the halls and across campus to the cafeteria. Bridget is waiting for me and the others. She asks about my classes. I tell her they’re fine, that I met Brayden and more than just being ugly like me, we have a few things in common. For whatever reason, part of me is nervous being with just one of the non-triplets. That same part of me wonders if she’s feeling the same. But the minute she starts talking with me, I realize this isn’t the case. She’s open and friendly, and everything nervous in me calms.