b) Roman is back in school, but she hasn’t seen Gabe.
c) She’s getting used to Amelia Bond’s lack of a hairy face mole, but it’ll be a long road.
I suppose I’d rather Roman, Gabe, and Pete went to the tryouts without me than miss out. But when I think about them reaching the final while I’m stuck at home, I feel left behind. I have serious FOMO.
I wonder how Gabe could’ve done this for a year. I start going nuts after three days. Mom eventually lets me out for a drive with Dad after I start chalking up my days of incarceration on the bedroom wall with Lav’s eyeliner.
Victory! Though I have to buy Lav a new eyeliner.
And, with perfect timing, my aching back and nausea turn out to be not aquarium-related but, in fact, my first period. Mom brings me a hot-water bottle.
“It’s been a memorable week,” I tell her.
“It’s still not as traumatic as my first period.”
“Pffft. How many police were involved in your first period?”
“None, but I was dancing in the school play. In white pants.”
She tucks me in with that horrible thought. I don’t dare sleep in case I dream.
The next day I’m catching up on some homework that Mr. Peters dropped off. (“Lovely guy. Dark eyes,” Mom said. “Bit skinny,” Dad muttered.) With a stomach jolt, I remember Hannah’s email. I cannot believe I haven’t thought about her since the broom closet, but concussion is a funny thing, the doctor said. “Hilarious,” I said, feeling my lumpy head.
I beg Mom for my phone. She’s about to say no, but I tell her about Hannah’s latest messages, about her getting more and more stressed and her parents putting loads of pressure on her. Dad comes downstairs and loiters behind me, making a sandwich and eavesdropping.
“I am going to look through your phone,” Mom says, in a voice that expects me to argue.
“’Kay.”
“Laverne would go nuts if you tried that,” Dad mutters, head in the fridge.
I roll my eyes. “That’s because she has boys begging her to go out with them, and all I have is an argumentative synchronized swimming team.”
Mom leans against the counter and scrolls through my phone. I look at her face for reactions.
“Anything?”
“Your friends from the swim team want to know if you’re OK, babes,” she says wryly. “You’ve got two new emails from Hannah.”
“Can I read them?” I say, getting up to look.
“No. Not after the week you’ve had.” She begins to read.
Dad stands behind Mom and looks over her shoulder. Their faces become grim.
“What?” I demand. “Come on, she’s my best friend!”
They read on. At one point, without taking his eyes off the screen, Dad reaches out and holds my hand. I think he forgets to let go, and I inwardly roll my eyes. It goes on awhile as he and Mom are bent over my phone, heads touching as they scroll through all the older emails, and still we keep holding hands. Am I going to have to drag him off to college with me? Hi, guys, this is my dad, could you get the door? No, it’s cool, we go through sideways.
Finally they finish and they look up at each other. Their noses are practically touching and for a crazy moment I think … are they’re about to kiss? They’re not a couple. They had better not kiss.Plus Dad’s still holding my hand!
Thankfully they don’t kiss and he lets go of my hand. Double win.
“What’s a thigh gap?” Dad asks. I explain.
“Back fat?”
“Um…”
“Maybe fat that is on your back?” Mom says patiently.
“Right.”
Mom catches my eye. I suppress a smile. She holds my hand and looks thoughtful. “So. It doesn’t look like Hannah is coping very well with the pressure. Or that her parents are being very helpful.” She pauses.
“What?”
They’re clearly thinking something about me. I just can’t tell what. Maybe the usual—“I hope she’s not going to get any taller.”
“OK,” says Dad in his I Have a Plan voice. This is usually the voice with which he announces his intentions for experimental pudding recipes.
He hands me my phone.
“Lou, you email Hannah and ask her what she wants to do. Tell her we can call her parents…”
“No,” I interrupt him, “she will flip out.”
“Lou, she has already ‘flipped out.’ She thinks back fat is important. So just be honest with her. And then?”
“Yes?”
“You can give me your phone back.”
chapter 28
Dear Hannah, I’m so so sorry, I didn’t realize you were going mental.
Hmm. Delete.
Hannah, I’m really sorry. I’ve been making new friends and I hadn’t noticed you were …
Even worse. Delete!
Hannah, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were finding training camp so hard. It sounds like a really difficult place. Do you want me to tell your parents? Maybe you could talk to the coaches about slowing down your training? I’m sure if you told someone you weren’t happy, they would help you. It’s easy to feel like winning is the only thing that matters, but I don’t think it is. Take it from a loser! I’m sorry I’ve been so slow to get back to you—I’ve had a crazy couple of weeks. I’ll tell you more later. Please let me know you’re OK!
Lots of love,
Weez xxxxx
It took me ages to phrase this, sitting at the kitchen table with tea cooling in front of me. But finally I think I’ve nailed it. I press Send, then hand my phone to Dad, who carefully puts it in a box. He locks the box with a little key, which he gives to Mom, who pockets it with a smug face. Dad stands on tiptoes and pushes the box onto a high shelf in the kitchen cupboard that not even I can reach.
He turns back and stands shoulder to shoulder with Mom. They fold their arms—no one can take on Team Parent.
Almost immediately my phone makes a pinging sound and vibrates inside the box. Their faces drop.
“That’s probably Hannah replying,” I tell them, unnecessarily. Dad sighs and goes back to the cupboard and Mom digs in her pocket for the key.
It is Hannah.
DON’T SAY A WORD TO MY PARENTS. Seriously! This means the world to them. But you’re not a loser, you know you’re not. That video from the aquarium was amazing, I’ve shown it to tons of people here! I’m OK. I just feel low at night, things always seem better in the morning. Gotta go … we’re all off to the movies. Only joking, trainintrainingtraining. FML.
Xxxxxxxxx
That wasn’t the answer I was expecting. I don’t like how vague it is. Mom takes the phone, and she and Dad read the message.
“OK,” says Dad. “But I’d be much happier if we told her parents.”
“She’d be so angry at me. I already feel bad showing this to you.”
“Keep talking to her,” says Mom, and hands me back my phone. “I’m trusting you,” she adds, hanging on to it a second longer than she needs.
I head upstairs and spend the rest of the day Googling all the things I haven’t known for a couple of weeks. It takes ages. By the time I finished checking distrawn (knew it wasn’t a word), Lav is back from school and flopping wearily down on her bed, shaking her homework out of her bag.
“Good day at school?”
She sighs. “People are still bugging me about you.”
“Can’t they find out from Roman?”
“I heard this girl, Camo—”
“Cammie.”
“—trying to flirt it out of him. He was pretty rude to her.”
I really enjoy that news, for several reasons.
I sigh and catch sight of my stomach. I lift my top up and look at it. It’s less muscle-y than it used to be. Cammie once said, “That would be so hot. On a guy.” She’s good at insulting me in a way that sounds like a compliment. So I have to say thank you or else I’m rude.
I suck my tummy in and push it out as far as I can. Then
suck it in again. Skinny. Fat. Skinny. Fat. Hate Cammie.
“What are you doing?” comes a wary voice from the other bed. I look over and Lav is staring at me over the top of a textbook. I pull my T-shirt down primly. Honestly, no privacy in this room.
“I have you on eating disorder watch, just so you know,” she informs me. “You’ve been on it since the time trials.”
“That’s sweet,” I tell her. “I have you on pregnancy watch.”
“Ha ha,” she says good-humoredly. She puts down her textbook and rolls onto her stomach. Dammit, everything Lav does is elegant. Probably because she has much less body to control. I’m so lanky, when I move, it’s like trying to lead a school trip around the zoo—barely controlled chaos.
“I know you look different now that you’re not training, but it’s OK, all right?”
“OK.”
“Don’t you dare get an eating disorder. If you go bulimic, you’ll rot your teeth. If you go ano, you’ll get a hairy face.”
“I won’t!” I say, horrified.
“Uh-huh,” she says authoritatively, disappearing back behind her textbook. “Your body goes fluffy everywhere, like granny’s chin all over.”
I think for a second, then hand over my phone with a thread of Hannah’s last emails. “Does Hannah sound a bit weight-obsessed to you?”
She skim-reads it. “Yes. Are you going to tell her parents?”
“I told Mom and Dad, but if we tell Barbra and Damian, what if they pull her out of the Training Camp? Then she won’t get to be a swimmer and all her dreams will be ruined and it’ll be all my fault because I told—”
“Lou, breathe.”
“Sorry. It’s very stressful to think about it. It must be worse to live it.”
“Stop picking your lips, you’ll make them bleed. Look, you made them bleed. Hannah sounds pretty messed up.”
“Yeah, but I bet everyone there is messed up!”
She chucks me a tissue.
“Thanks,” I say, dabbing my split lip.
“Well.” Lav shrugs. “I would tell them.”
“I think Dad wants to. Mom and I say no.”
We both lie back on our beds.
“So it’s a tie,” says Lav.
“Hannah makes it three to two we don’t tell.”
“Hmmm.”
I tap out a quick good night message to Hannah. It’s so good to have my phone back.
I watch it send and I see she’s read it immediately. Some dots appear—she’s writing. They go, she’s stopped. They pop up again, she’s having another go. I watch the dots.
“Don’t watch the dots.” Lav says wisely. “It’s a rule of dating.”
I put my phone down. She’ll reply tomorrow.
chapter 29
Drafts Folder
Hi Gabe, are you OK? I’m OK, I’m sorry, I don’t know what happened.
Gabe, can we talk?
Hi Gabriel, what’s going on? Everything is so weird here.
Hi Roman, I don’t know if you want to talk to me but
Hey Pete
I haven’t broken my word to Mom, I haven’t sent any messages to the boys. I would, if only I could think of the right thing to say. Anyway, I’ll be seeing them soon.
Yesterday, Mom and Dad said I can go back to school if I think it’ll be OK. No, Mother, Father, bless your optimism, it will be far from OK. Lav says all anyone knows is that the three boys got arrested and I was there, and that could mean anything, right?
Bottom line: Loner Loser Lou Brown got three popular boys arrested. I can’t see this raising my social standing much higher, but how much lower can it possibly go? I bet people will want gossip for a few days, then they’ll forget about it, so I’ll just keep my head down. Funny after I’ve spent half a semester desperate for anyone to talk to me.
I pack my backpack the night before, and I feel something bulky at the bottom. It’s Swimming for Women and the Infirm. The spine is flaking away, it’s sat forgotten at the bottom of my bag since our last training session. The musty old smell of it reminds me of late nights in the swimming pool, and I feel sad that all that is over. Even my shoe box full of twenty-pound notes makes me feel nostalgic; I’m not sure I’ll ever have the heart to spend the money. Lav offers to take it off my hands if it’s too emotional. So kind, I tell her. But no.
I wake up early the next morning and I’m eating cereal as Mom and Lav come downstairs. They give me supportive looks, but I just stare into my bowl—I’m not in a good mood. I sneak out once in fifteen boring nerdy years and all hell breaks loose. Because when I rebel, I really go in with both feet.
Dad gives us a lift. He pulls up in the school parking lot and Lav turns back from the front seat.
“Want to walk in together?”
“If that’s OK.”
“Of course.”
She waits for me as I disentangle myself from the car and my backpack. I’m nervous and clumsy and I can feel people’s eyes on me. Looking, not actual eyeballs. Gross.
When I finally step out of the car, my legs feel a little rubbery as Laverne and I walk toward the front doors. People are definitely staring, and I’m blushing already. But Lav doesn’t peel away from me to join her friends. She walks me right to my homeroom, and luckily we bump into Mr. Peters in the doorway.
I feel like Lav hands me over to him like a package, but it’s probably for the best. As I enter the homeroom, some people stop talking and stare at me, while others talk more urgently, possibly about me. I don’t look good. My face is still a mess of bruises, and I have carpet burns on my hands and a nasty scab on my lip. I sit at an empty desk at the front rather than risk walking all the way to the back. I’m next to Mr. Peters, so no one dares to approach me.
The people at this school are the worst. It’s either ignore you or stare at you. Find a middle ground, weirdos!
The bell goes off for the first class.
“Hey, is that a bruise?” some guy yells at my back as I race out of the homeroom, and I can hear a couple of girls gasp, scandalized but amused.
Three more years, Lou, I tell myself, hitching up my backpack and walking head down toward my history class. Three more years, take your exams, change your name to Trixie McCool, go to college, and deny Louise Brown ever existed, let alone went to an aquarium after hours.
I’m exhausted already. A week and a half in bed and I feel weak as a kitten. I snooze gently at the front of history with my Interested Face on. The teacher isn’t convinced, but she leaves me alone today. At my size, I’m not one of life’s natural sneakers, but today I do my best. I skulk in the bathroom in the first break, then sit at the front for my next two classes.
At lunch I’m heading to the cafeteria, looking around for Roman and Gabe, but I don’t see them anywhere. Instead I bump into Melia. She smiles, looks genuinely pleased to see me.
“Hey, you OK?” she asks, jumping straight in without any chitchat. Seems odd, but then Cammie and the rest of them appear behind her, putting an end to any conversation.
“Oh my god, look at you!” drawls Cammie. “Who did that? Not Roman? Did he hit you? Were you in an accident?”
People are turning to look, exactly as she intended. Melia looks mortified.
“Cammie,” she murmurs.
“What?”
“Just … forget it.”
Well done, Melia, way to assert yourself. I take advantage of Cammie’s being distracted to sneak past them and do the unthinkable.
I quickly buy a sandwich at the cafeteria and head to my old refuge, the library. I’m going to find the biggest book I can and hide behind it. If it’s big enough, I’ll build a fort and refuse to come out until it’s time to go home. Immature, but that’s my plan.
I turn into an emptier hall and I feel myself calming a little. Honestly, all this drama! The worst thing I did was lie to my parents and maybe scare a few fish. There wasn’t half this much fuss when Lav snuck out to a party, trod on a nail, and ended up in the hospital, in sequin
ed booty shorts, getting a tetanus shot. The injustice rankles.
Head down, I’m marching quickly down the hall. I turn a corner and I walk straight into Roman—I actually bang my face on him.
“Owb!” I say pitifully, pinching my nose. It tastes metallic, as if I might get a nosebleed.
“Sor…” Roman begins but falls silent when he sees it’s me.
A mean voice in my head wonders if he’ll say hi. Bearing in mind he didn’t talk to me at school before I got him arrested and nearly expelled. But a less bratty voice reminds me how he held on to me when we were running through the aquarium and he didn’t let go even when I was slowing him down.
“You look awful,” he says, shocked.
A couple of boys from my grade turn into the hall, see us, and openly stop and stare.
Roman glares at them and they remember they were on their way to something very important, actually, and bustle past.
“I know I do. It’s this new shampoo,” I tell him.
Roman laughs. He never laughs at my jokes. Perhaps it’s a pity laugh, but I’ll take it. I feel sorry for myself. Every time I speak, my lips tug at the scab on my mouth. Bleurgh.
“How are you?” I venture.
“I’ve … been better,” says Roman carefully. I feel like he’s hiding something from me, and also … “Stop talking to my scab, please,” I tell him.
“God, sorry.” He smiles. He’s so handsome when he smiles, but I’m not thinking about that right now. I’m preoccupied with something else.
“Where’s Gabe?” I ask.
“Ill,” Roman says, his friendliness cooling. “With the stress, he’s ill again.”
I feel like I’ve been kicked in the stomach.
“I … I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault!” He seems almost angry at the thought.
“I know it’s not my fault!” I retort. “I’m sorry for him, I mean. I like him, he’s my friend. I don’t want him to feel like he’s got flu all the time and he’s tired and his limbs ache and stuff.”
“Did he tell you that?”
“Yes. Now, where do you live?” I ask, getting out my phone so I can type in the address. I’m going to go see him, I decide. Right now. Roman watches me.
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