by Ryan Schow
He sticks out his hand and says, “I’m Damien Rhodes.” I glance up and shake it, feeling the strength of his grip, the warmth, how his hand envelopes mine. Suddenly we’re one person. It’s not sex, and I feel stupid with joy, and then somehow—without sounding foolish—I manage to utter my name.
“I’m Savannah.”
That’s when I actually look up into his eyes and everything in me turns warm and syrupy and lustful. Something low and charged swoops through my lower belly. With his dark hair, his bronze-colored skin, and his liquid brown eyes, he is so unbelievably hot it hurts to be near him. To even look into his eyes. To want someone this badly, to be left to bear the weight of such a ravenous need—the kind of need a chubby-chubber like me knows is unattainable and will remain unfulfilled—it’s the worst kind of torture ever.
He is not thin or fat, but I sense a physical strength in him that makes me think about how he would look on the beach, carrying a surfboard. Or how he would look in New York in an overcoat, the collar popped up against a winter gale. I blush even harder thinking these thoughts. I get even more nervous. He’s six feet tall and everything I ever wanted, and the best I can do is barely remember my own freaking name.
That’s when Julie and her friends pour into the hallway, all boisterous and domineering, their obnoxious voices sucking all the joy from the air and filling it with animosity, dread, fear. Cameron sidles up to Damien and says, “I see you met the clones’ newest pet.” Damien’s face blisters. Horrified, my mouth hangs open and my weak, ugly body deflates in shame. Clones?
“Careful of this one,” Julie says, “she’s got a weak stomach.”
Cameron kisses Damien on the cheek, smacks his butt and says, “See you after school.” All the way down the hall they laugh and make retching sounds, and the whole time I’m thinking this is it, my life is officially over.
I turn to walk away, not even caring that Damien and I were talking. He grabs my arm, stopping me, and says, “I’m really sorry, Savannah.”
“That girl is inhuman,” is all I can mutter. My eyes burn with more tears and all I want to do is get out of there before snot starts dripping from my nostrils.
“She’s my girlfriend,” he says, almost embarrassed. “Sort of.”
Defeat falls from me like a wounded grunt. As if things couldn’t get any worse. The tears gathering in my eyes, hot and wet, finally flood over and I say, “That’s just awesome.” I shrug out of his grip and walk the busy hallway to fifth period, trying not to overtly bawl or be sick. On the way to class, I think how easy it would be to get in the Rover and drive someplace normal. Someplace plain and boring. Someplace where there are lots of chubby, isolated losers whose life’s mission is not to feed on the suffering of others but just to exist in peace.
Fifth period is Physical Education and Diet and that’s when I see Georgia and the girls and every emotion I’ve been holding down comes rushing forward in one embarrassing release. We’re talking about me going from semi-normal to sobbing in three seconds flat. Georgia hugs me, smoothes my hair while the other girls rub my back and shoulders.
I tell them what happened.
“It’s hard not fitting in,” one of them says. They all have the same voice, but I think it’s Victoria talking. “Especially around people like Julie and Cameron. They’re awful, I know.”
My eyes are so watery their faces appear blurred. Other people are changing in the gym’s locker room, but I don’t care. Not until I see Maggie Jaynes. For some reason, she isn’t snickering. Our eyes meet and she actually looks sad for me.
“I’d better get dressed,” I say, standing up.
“Just hang in there,” a girl says from behind me. “It’ll be okay.” I look around and there is a slightly overweight girl with gigantic breasts and round thighs and suddenly I’m relieved to be meeting who I’m certain is another one of Janine’s pack of uglies.
“Hey, Laura,” Georgia says. Victoria introduces me to Laura Downey. We smile at each other and suddenly I don’t feel so alone in the disgusting pig department.
“If you want, most everyone does weights and bands and sometimes yoga, but I’m on the treadmill the whole time. There’s usually an open treadmill beside me.”
“She’s lost ten pounds since the semester started, right Laura?” Georgia says.
“Twelve now, working on fifteen.” She grabs a truck-tire sized mash of belly fat and says, “Miss Hunnicut says the treadmill will help with all this…extra…gross…lard. So I’m running it off a day at a time.”
“I’ll join you,” I say, trying to pull myself together. Ten pounds wouldn’t make me pretty—not by miles—but it would go along way toward bolstering my self-confidence.
Just before class starts, my teacher, an athletic woman with nice teeth and two big dimples in her smile, calls my name. She stands in her gym clothes in the weights cage with her roll-call clipboard in one hand and some kind of a smoothie or protein shake in the other. The smoothie is the same shade of brown as her tan, which is excessive, and fake for sure. Like some kind of a rub-on bronzer. Inside the cage, I weave around the machines, trying not to see how cute everyone looks in their workout outfits and how dumpy I feel in my track shorts and baggy t-shirt.
My teacher introduces herself as Tuesday Hunnicut then hands me a note and says, “This just came for you.” It’s from the school physician, Dr. Wolfgang Gerhard. Apparently he wants to see me after sixth period. Okay. Whatever. Folding the note in the top of my sweat socks, I step on the treadmill with Laura and in minutes my mind is washed clean of everything but determination. I go from walking to running to panting like a dog in blast furnace heat back to walking and almost to dying from overexertion, all in the span of only twelve minutes.
Next to me Laura is running steady, her eyes focused. Her giant boobs flop around like unsynchronized slabs of blubber; her belly fat jumps in short, hard jiggles. I admire her effort in front of everyone. She sees me staring at her. She slows to a walk. She wipes her face with a small towel then sips from her water bottle.
“The more I think about how much of me is bouncing around,” she says, nearly out of breath, “the more ashamed I feel. The shame fuels me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“For what? For staring? Everyone looks at me, makes their snide comments, says things like, ‘When the belly is gone, what are you going to do about those big ass cows’ udders?’ Stuff like that.”
“That’s horrible.”
“It drives me to work harder,” she says. “My mother says if I lose forty pounds she’ll pay for breast reduction surgery, and any other surgery I need to get rid of the loose skin. No sense in trying to look good only to end up looking like my grandma in a two piece, right?”
She smiles and starts running again. My knees and feet hurt so bad I figure a slow walk won’t completely murder me. Or I could just get off the treadmill altogether. Maybe lay down. Oh, that sounds so much better. I start walking again.
Julie Sanderson struts by, flaunting her incredible body. Everything is toned, flawless and so perfectly proportioned it’s no wonder she acts like such a snob. She looks like Emma Stone, but with big brown hair and super mean, like something coughed up from hell. For real. I hate her, maybe worse than Margaret. She comes and stands right next to me as I battle a wicked side-cramp. My face is a fountain of sweat. My underarms smell like cooked hamburger and stale gym socks.
Julie watches me from like twelve inches away, wordless. It’s intimidating. Distracting. Finally I glance over at her, pushing damp strings of hair out of my face. Everything about me feels pathetic right now.
“You keep running on this thing, and start shedding the pounds like Laura here, and maybe we could be friends.”
Thinking about Brayden, about his courage and his sharp wit, I say, “I don’t want to be your friend.” It sounds so vanilla, with no emotion at all, so I add, “You miserable twat.” And then I realize that dish had too much flavor, but the look on her face says there’
s no going back.
“Wow,” she says, feigning surprise, maybe even faux hurt. “Here I come waving a white flag and you decide to wipe your big butt with it.”
“My big fat butt,” I say, fighting a smile. “My big fat dimpled thunder butt.” Inside, I’m beaming. And terrified. Completely reckless, but beaming and terrified never-the-less.
“I guess if you’re content being the clones’ bomb sniffing dog, their little toy mutt, that’s your business.”
“I like it a lot. Go back to hell, Satan, your congregation of demons misses you.”
She stares at me, her eyes wild with hatred, her face betraying an inner rage that’s all but oozing off her. She has the look of a serial killer. Or a monster. At first her hostility strikes me as curious, but the more she holds me captive with that awful stare, the more it scrapes my nerves. Pretty soon I’m downright frightened, my head clogged with all the things she will do to me. Finally I look away and up my speed, pretending I’m running away from her even though at a dead sprint she could still shove me off the machine without much effort.
Out of the corner of my eye I see her leaving. Next to me Laura says, “Oh. My. God. Where in the world did that come from?”
The fear tangling in knots inside me loosens, but then my anxiety comes roaring back and my insides coil tighter than ever. I feel menstrual, even though it’s not that time of the month. “She’s going to get me back, I know it.”
“Oh, yeah,” Laura says. “You’re screwed. But who cares after that? Savannah Van Duyn, you’re my new hero.”
3
After class Laura and I walk back to the locker room and that’s when I find out exactly what Julie had in mind for me. My locker door stands wide open, my clothes gone. She even took my shoes. At least she left my backpack. Inside is the key to my room, my notebook, my iPad (thank God because it has all my school texts in eBook format), and my iPhone. I heave a sigh of relief.
Laura says, “It’s only just begun. You’re lucky they didn’t leave you a used tampon or someone else’s dirty underwear in there because that’s how rotten they are.”
“Or steal my backpack.”
“There’s that, too.”
The non-triplets catch up with us, sweaty as well, but still looking photo ready. Laura tells them what happened. They are giddy listening to my triumph, and they brush off my disappearing clothes, saying, “Victoria’s going shopping tonight. You should come over.”
“Where are you going?” I ask Victoria.
“All my favorite online sites. We’ll find you something totally cute to wear.”
Standing there, with the four of them, I have to wonder, is this what it’s like to have real girlfriends? For someone to have your back when you need it most? For someone to soften the daily blows of high school life? Looking at them, seeing their faces, how they don’t seem bothered by the theft of my belongings, the stupid parts of my brain are still wondering if they are somehow setting me up for later. Am I being naïve, or is this for real? Do I have real friends, I wonder again, or are they frenemies? Inside, voices are telling me I’m an idiot.
Inside, I’m telling myself I’m and idiot.
In the end it doesn’t matter. I’m happy now, well not happy happy, but close, and now is all that matters, so I shelve my fears for a minute and say, “Sure, let’s go shopping tonight.”
The Assignment
1
Sixth period is Psychology with Brayden. He sees me and smiles, and—thank God—he saved me a seat. I sit next to him and just as I get situated, a pretty girl with sharp, birdlike features that aren’t ugly but look halfway to pretentious, says, “Excuse me, but I’m sitting there.”
Brayden says, “No you’re not, dummy, you’re standing there watching her sit there. And now you’re leaving. Yep, you’re leaving.”
“You can’t—”
“Just did,” he interrupted. “Now go. Seriously.”
She walks away, ruffled by Brayden and stabbing hateful eyes at me, but Brayden says, “Forget that scab, she’s barely even popular. I mean, her father works at Goldman Sachs. Everyone knows what kind of an organization that is.” I didn’t, but then again, what do I know about Goldman…whatever? I shrug my shoulders. He shrugs his back.
He says, “Not to be rude or anything, but you totally stink, and you’re looking ten times worse than you did a few hours ago. What gives?” I tell him about my run-in with Julie, making sure he gets all the credit for inspiring me to put that bitch in her place. Grinning, he takes a seated bow. When I tell him about my clothes being stolen, he says, “Well then have I got something for you. The meanest surprise ever.”
Before he can tell me what it is, the classroom door opens and in walks my teacher. I expected him to be older—the stereotypical Mark Twain type with a tweed jacket and spectacles and maybe a pair of well worn loafers—but the man who walks in is not Mark Twain at all. He’s like something out of a dream, or a fantasy. Twenty-something with black hair, mysterious eyes and a two day beard. He has strong features, but a pretty boy look, and you can see by the way he carries himself he’s comfortable being dreamy around hot girls who want to have his two point three children. All the girls in class heave a collective sigh. You can practically smell the pheromones sifting through the air. Just one look at my new favorite teacher, and my peers’ lust makes perfect sense.
He’s wearing a long sleeved white linen button up with a pair of ripped jeans that look expensive and fitted, and the kind of designer shoes most under-styled teachers would never wear. Is this my teacher or a male model? I can’t help thinking this is going to be my best class ever.
Then he turns and looks right at me and says, “Savannah Van Duyn is new to our class, please everyone say hello to her,” and everyone says hello like good little girls and boys.
“Welcome to Psychology, Miss Van Duyn,” he says. “I’m Professor Jake Teller, but you can call me Jake.” His blue eyes level me like a shockwave, or a euphoric kind of PG-13 ecstasy that boils my insides and makes the lower parts of me swim with a honeyed, rated R warmth. That is until I realize how horrible I look, and how—with all these Stepford kids and their fitness model bodies and their Bloomingdale’s wardrobe—I must look like an abused dog in stinking wet grubbies with my flat, sweat-frizzed hair tucked back behind my ears.
Literally, I’m at my very worst.
That stupid saying, you only have one time to make a good first impression, could also be said as, you only have one time to make a bad first impression. That’s me, queen of the bad first impressions.
Then Damien Rhodes walks in and sits down and Professor Teller says, “Damien, nice of you to join us. We were just saying hello to Savannah Van Duyn, our new student.”
Damien looks over at me, even though I prayed he wouldn’t, and says, “We’ve met, Professor Teller.” He studies me a minute longer, confused by my appearance, and suddenly I’m looking for the nearest corner to hide in. I would say I’ve never been so embarrassed in my life, but throwing up in front of the whole school next to the food line seems too juicy to top, even by my standards. Still, this might as well be rock bottom.
Cameron O’Dell raises her hand and Professor Teller says, “Yes, Cameron?”
Over her shoulder, she shoots me a pitiful look, then turns back to him and says, “Is it hot in here, Jake, or is it just Savannah?” and everyone tries not to laugh too hard. My cheeks are set ablaze.
Professor Teller looks at me and says, “Are you hot, Savannah?” and Julie says, “Not in her lifetime,” and suddenly it becomes impossible for everyone not to laugh even harder.
Professor Teller fires Julie a warning look, then returns to me. He shows me compassionate eyes, his features bent into a look that says he knows I’m embarrassed. That maybe he feels bad for me.
My eyes clear and something inside me shifts, something deep and fundamental. “No, Professor Teller, I’m not hot…in either capacity. Someone stole my clothes in PE, but I’m okay with that
considering I have a really bad case of head lice right now and the girls who took them are now most likely infected.”
Most everyone falls abruptly silent, but a few girls around Julie and Cameron laugh even harder. Julie and Cameron sit wide-eyed and speechless.
Someone says, “Ew,” and Brayden whispers, “For real?”
“No,” I whisper. “Not for real.”
Professor Teller is clearing his throat, snapping his fingers to get everyone’s attention.
“Give me your cell phone,” Brayden says. “You need to see what I’ve been working on. It’s an app.”
With order finally restored, Professor Teller shuffles through his class notes, clearing his throat one more time. He sips his afternoon coffee, all the girls watching, dreaming.
Under my breath, I say, “Don’t you have your own phone?”
“It’s not internet capable.”
“What are you, from the dark ages?”
“No. It’s the Feds, I got into a bit trouble last year—it’s one of the reasons I’m here, but I’ll tell you about that later. Seriously, give me your phone already.”
I fish it out of my backpack, hand it over. As Brayden is messing with it, complaining about how slow it is, how small the buttons are, Professor Teller starts his lecture. I see Bridget and Georgia, both preparing their iPads to take notes. Bridget smiles, gives me half of a wave. They are the only two girls, besides me, who aren’t hanging on Professor Teller’s every word. If I hadn’t seen this kind of focus in my other classes with every other teacher, I would sit and marvel at how in lust my class is with GQ Jake.
Brayden says to me, “Cameron or Julie?” and not knowing what’s about to happen, I’m thinking, does he really want me to pick one of them? Trying to decide which one sucks out loud the most—and this really is a toss up—I say, “Cameron.” She isn’t worse than Julie, but she’s dating Damien, which makes me sick, otherwise it would be Julie. Brayden punches in a number, then types a quick text message.