by Blake Nelson
So then I got out my thriftstore dress and fiddled with the zipper and tried to figure out why it fit so badly and if I should wear it to Outer Limits. And then Darcy called so I talked to her while I worked on it. She told me about the rest of the party and how Scott Haskell threw up in the kitchen sink and how Mark Pierce came back from the hospital and everybody cheered him and did beer bongs and then afterward Renee invited a few select people to her pool to go skinny-dipping. Then Darcy asked me where I went and I told her I went downtown with Kevin. She was like, “Downtown? With Kevin?” So I told her the whole story and she couldn’t believe it. And she was like, “That guy with the horn-rims? Is he gay?” I said he went to Learning Center and she said, “Well, that explains it.” And then she wanted to know if I was going to break up with Mark Pierce and all of a sudden I got so mad and I was like, I never even said I was going out with him and it was everybody else who said I was his girlfriend. And then I said how Renee Hatfield and stupid Scott Haskell were such jerks and Darcy said, “You don’t mean Scott Haskell,” and I said, “Yes, I especially mean Scott Haskell.” And she said he wasn’t that bad and I said, “You should have heard what he said about Cindy!” And she was like, “What did he say?” So I told her and she got totally defensive and said there was no way Scott did it with Cindy because he had told her every girl he had done stuff with and sworn on it and she was getting mad at me like I had made it up. And I was like, “Darcy, I’m not saying he did it, I’m saying he said it.” But she was still being weird and blaming me and when I hung up it was such a relief. And I turned up my tape player and started bopping around to Girl Patrol and I was so glad I was going to Outer Limits and getting away from the Hillside crowd. And my parents had already told me I could use their car since it was Sunday afternoon. And I put on my dress and looked in the mirror and practiced sneering and looking bored and I was ready!
But then I went downstairs and my mother was like, “Where did you get that dress?” And she yelled for my dad to come look at his daughter and it was totally ruining my mood. And I tried to tell them it was the style and my stupid mom said, “What’s the style? Wearing rags? What is this stain on the back?” And my dad said, “What happened to your lips?” and I looked in the toaster reflection and I still had the black stuff on my lips. I tried to rub it off with my finger and then my mom picked up my hair and let it drop with disgust and I said, “It’s the style!” And my mom asked my dad if I should still get the car and my dad shrugged and said there was no law against driving a car dressed like a clown. And then my mother looked at the zipper of my dress and said it was ripping out and I thought she wasn’t going to let me wear it but then she threw up her hands and let me go.
And the whole time I was getting ready it didn’t even occur to me that it might be weird to go by myself. I guess I thought it would be like the other times, a couple people standing around and mostly people from the bands and I’d hang out with Cybil and Richard and I wouldn’t have to worry about Mark Pierce or anybody else, like what they thought or if they were having fun. But when I drove past Outer Limits there were all these people on the sidewalk and I started getting nervous. I parked far away and spent several minutes doing my lipstick and fixing my hair and adjusting my part. But that made me more flustered and finally I just got out and took a deep breath and started walking.
I never felt so self-conscious in my life. I had to walk down Broadway right past this sports store and all these jock types were standing there and they stared at my dress and all I could do was look at the ground and keep going. And then I went around the corner to Outer Limits and I could feel the people turning to look at me and it was like someone punched me in the stomach, I could barely breathe and my heart started pounding and I didn’t dare lift my head. And I got to the door and went inside and immediately looked around for Cybil or Richard. But they weren’t there. And the room was dark and cold and the floor was dirty and there was no place to sit and I just wanted to cry. But then I remembered how Cybil always sat on the stage between bands so I sat on the stage and bit my nails and fiddled with my hem. And I pretended not to look but I could see the trendy girls talking outside, probably analyzing my outfit and discussing how stupid it was and wondering why would someone come to Outer Limits dressed like a clown?
Then I was saved. Greg’s station wagon pulled up on the sidewalk and drove all the trendies away. And then Cybil and Richard got out and I jumped up and ran to meet them. And I was so happy to see them I was jumping around and they looked at me funny and Richard was like, “Andrea, are you okay?” And Cybil said, “Where did you get that dress?” And I said, “At a thriftstore!” And then I asked Greg if they needed help moving their stuff and he said sure and I grabbed this metal thing but he said that didn’t go in. And then Cybil told me to calm down and she gave me something to carry and I guess I was being sort of hyper.
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When the stuff was all moved we went back out to the sidewalk. The trendy girls had come back and were leaning on Greg’s car and I stood with Cybil and she told me how she was flunking French and how Mrs. Renault hated her but her mom wasn’t going to let her play in the band if she didn’t pass. I sympathized and then I told about Brian Babbit’s party and how I almost had sex with Mark Pierce. Cybil said, “You shouldn’t have sex with him, you should have sex with someone you really like.” But who did I really like? Cybil didn’t know. So then I told her about Kevin and I said he was more like Richard, at least in how he dressed. And anyway he wasn’t a typical Hillside guy like Mark or Scott Haskell, and Cybil said Scott Haskell gave her the creeps worse than any guy she knew.
Another band played first and they were terrible. They banged their guitars with drumsticks and one guy hit a shopping cart with a bat and it was just a lot of noise. Then Thriftstore Apocalypse played and they were great but people weren’t into it that much. But I did notice that a lot of the trendy girls watched Cybil very closely, including one girl who seemed like the trendiest of them all. She had a short bob that was dyed a reddish rust color and she was smoking and standing by herself and all the other girls kept their distance. And after Thriftstore played Cybil and Richard were in a good mood and Greg talked to me and I asked him where Marjorie was but he didn’t know. And it was weird because it was only last fall that Marjorie brought us downtown and showed us everything and now we were all here by ourselves.
The next band was Pax and we all sat along the side and ate the carrots that Richard brought. Then there was some sort of commotion around the door. Everybody looked but I couldn’t really see and then Nick did a headstand on stage and fell into the drums and everybody went back to looking at him. Then, a few minutes later, Richard leaned over to me and said, “Todd Sparrow is here.” I said, “Where?” and I looked around but I couldn’t tell which one was him and I wasn’t sure I could remember what he looked like. But then I saw him. He was sitting across from us and he looked awful. He was really skinny and dirty and his hair was dyed yellow and he had skinhead boots that were old and held together with tape. But his face was the same, really angular and dark and sort of cocked downward like he was about to attack you or something. And who was he sitting with? The trendy rust-haired girl. And she was telling him something and smoking her cigarette and he was sort of nodding and not looking at her. And I looked at Cybil and Richard to see their reaction but they just sat there chomping their carrots.
When the show was over I helped Cybil and Richard carry their stuff back out. And everyone hung out and sat on the curb and Todd Sparrow was there with some other severelooking people and I wondered if Cybil was going to talk to him. And I asked Greg if he ever heard Todd’s band and he said, “No, but I’ve heard they’re intense.” And I looked over and there was another boy with really scraggly hair in his face and the most shredded jeans I had ever seen and you could tell he was with Todd, they were band partners, they were Color Green.
The next day at school I sat with Mark Pierce and the gang and I tol
d Darcy about the show and how intense Todd Sparrow was but how Cybil wouldn’t talk to him. And Darcy wondered if Cybil made out with him when she shaved her head but I said, “Wouldn’t she have told us?” Darcy said, “Why? She doesn’t tell us anything else.” Which was true. But I said maybe it’s our own fault since we still hung around with these idiots and I pointed at Mark and Scott Haskell. And Scott Haskell heard me and said, “Hey! What did she just say? What did Andrea just say?” And Darcy said that I called him an idiot and everybody laughed, fortunately. And walking back to our lockers I told Darcy we had to go to this store called HOP! that Cybil told me about because we were going to the wrong thriftstore and that’s why none of the dresses fit.
8
At HOP! the dresses fit. It was downtown and it was the coolest place. And when we went to London Dungeon that time I was so scared of everything. But I wasn’t scared now. And the boy behind the counter was super cute and super nice and there was cool music and cool posters and the clothes were fantastic. I found a cute summer dress for fifteen dollars and this funny red dress with cows on it. Darcy got a tie-dyed shirt and a skirt and some white pumps that were only six dollars. And everything was clean and the zippers worked and they had cool raincoats and I picked out a beach hat like the one Greg wore when he shaved his head. And Darcy got a Mod belt and I got a gray cardigan sweater that said “librarian” on the tag. And then Darcy said we should get bobs but the cute boy told us not to, that all the girls he knew were growing their hair out. And when we went back to the dress rack Darcy whispered to me that we shouldn’t buy everything now so we could come back and talk to the cute boy some more.
Afterwards we went to Scamp’s for frozen yogurt and I wore the cow dress and the cardigan and everyone was looking at us. And then Derek walked by the window and at first he was just going to wave but when he saw how cute we looked he had to come in. And Darcy was so jealous because Derek was complimenting me and looking at the funny cows on my dress and Darcy knew her tie-dyed shirt was not enough. You had to get a dress and have a whole look. And Derek was going to Monte Carlo later, which was an underage dance club, and he told us how cool it was and invited us to come. But Darcy didn’t want to, she wanted to go back to HOP! first and get a better outfit.
Meanwhile there was only one week of school left and I was still sitting with Mark Pierce at lunch. It was okay though because he was about to graduate so he had other things to do besides pressure me for sex. And Brian Babbit was graduating too and all the seniors were going through their last rites of high school and getting nostalgic and sentimental, which for the boys meant drinking tons of beer, taking their shirts off, falling out of pickup trucks, etc.
And then Renee Hatfield’s parents went to Hawaii and she started having people over to her pool after school. At first me and Darcy weren’t invited but then Mark took us and Renee was like, “Oh look, Mark brought his girls.” And then some other people came over, including Jim Dietz who was senior class president and going to Yale. And he brought some senior girls and Scott Haskell made tequila sunrises and everybody sat on lounge chairs and listened to Jim and Mark tell basketball stories. And the senior girls talked and Scott talked and Renee teased Mark about how he always “scored.” Darcy and I were silent of course. Then Jim left with the senior girls and Renee started arguing with Scott since Jim hadn’t given her enough attention earlier. And me and Darcy drank our sunrises and luxuriated in the lounge chairs in our bikinis and T-shirts and it was pretty fun except when I stood up to go to the bathroom I was so drunk I almost fell on my face. I made it to the bathroom but everything was so strange and out of joint and I put a towel over my head and looked in the mirror and I hardly recognized myself. I went back and told Darcy how drunk I was and she said, “You’re not that drunk,” and immediately spilled her drink all over herself. Then she told me if I was too drunk I should go in the bathroom and throw up and I was like yuck but she said to do it, it worked. But I didn’t want to. I went inside to the TV room and watched MTV instead. Then I stretched out on the couch and put my head on a cushion and then I fell asleep.
When I woke up I thought Darcy was pulling on my shirt and my head was all heavy on one side and when I opened my eyes Scott Haskell was straddling me. His pants were down and he was holding my shirt up and he was masturbating on me. And I was so stunned I just stared at his penis which was purple and pointed right at me. And his hand was going like crazy, milking it like a cow and he was like shhhhhh and I hissed at him: “What are you doing?” I grabbed my shirt back and tried to get up but he held me down. And the stuff started coming out and I kicked him and said, “Get off!” And the stuff got on my leg and I kicked him really hard and he fell off the couch. And it was on my leg, this gross slime, and I grabbed the towel and it was like having an insect on you, I wanted it off. And I stood up and wiped my leg and Scott Haskell was groaning and rolling around on the floor. And I kept finding more of it, this gross stuff, and some was on my arm and some was on my shirt and I was so pissed. And Scott was still on the floor, sneaking his pants up while he pretended to be passed out. And then he said, “I am so wasted,” and I stepped over him and I swear, I almost stomped on his face.
I ran to the pool and it was dark now but Darcy was still sitting there reading a magazine. And Renee and Mark Pierce were getting cozy in the deep end of the pool and I told Darcy we had to leave right now. She asked why and I started to explain but just then we both heard this horrible gagging noise coming out of the bathroom window. It was Scott Haskell throwing up. “That’s the problem,” I said and Darcy listened for a second and there was another gagging noise and then a splattering sound and Darcy made a face and said, “Gross!” I said, “That’s not the worst of it,” and I made a motion like a guy jerking off and she looked at me and I showed her the wet spot on my shirt. And she gave me this suspicious look and I was like, “Darcy, I was asleep!” And she listened while Scott gagged some more and I noticed that Renee and Mark Pierce had separated and were coming over toward us. They wanted to know what was going on. Especially Renee. She was like, “What’s the matter, Andrea?” and she had that catty look she gets and I thought you bitch but I smiled and said, “Oh nothing, I just remembered I have to go home.” And I grabbed Darcy and we got out of there.
Darcy drove. She was in shock. And I felt sorry for her because even though she knew how crazy Scott was she still felt like he was her boyfriend. And she said he’d been bugging her for a blowjob and she was thinking about doing it but now no way because what he did to me was so uncool. And the more I thought about it the madder I got and I said maybe I should tell everyone at school. But Darcy said not to because it would make her look stupid and me look stupid and guys would just twist it around and make it our fault. And then we stopped at 7-Eleven to get some ice cream but we didn’t get out of the car because all of a sudden we both understood our situation with Mark Pierce and Scott Haskell. We were groupies. We were these little sophomore sluts who guys like Mark Pierce and Scott Haskell jerked off on. And all this time we had tried so hard to not identify ourselves with them and that was exactly what they wanted. They didn’t want us to be their girlfriends, they were glad we were stupid and didn’t make any demands and just hung around so they could fondle us whenever they wanted. And Mark Pierce never loved me, he didn’t even like me, he just liked how stupid I was. And he was probably having sex with Renee Hatfield the whole time, probably right this second they were in her parents’ bed doing it and laughing their heads off. And then Darcy said, “I don’t feel like ice cream.” And I said, “I feel sick.” And Darcy started the car and drove us both home.
Three days later was graduation. I wouldn’t have even gone except Darcy’s brother was graduating and she didn’t want to go by herself. And I looked all around in case Scott Haskell was there but I didn’t see him. In the gym Darcy sat with her parents and I sat with Rebecca Farnhurst, who was telling everyone that Mr. Angelo said we were a bad generation and in ten years the kids w
ould be good again. And then she started gossiping about how Cindy wanted to videotape having sex but Dave didn’t want to and they were arguing about it at lunch right in front of everybody. And all I could think of was Rebecca finding out about Scott and spreading it all over school. So I just stared straight ahead and tried to ignore her. I watched the seniors line up to go on stage. Mark Pierce was in the line. And Brian Babbit. And Jim Dietz. And they were all laughing and having the greatest time. And then the line started moving and up they went, getting their diplomas and shaking hands with Mrs. Katz, our principal. And all the parents took pictures and celebrated and congratulated each other, as if a monkey couldn’t graduate from Hillside. And Rebecca nudged me and pointed to Mrs. Parmeter, who was picking at something in her ear. And everybody giggled and made fun of her and also Mr. Angelo, who was sweating and dabbing his face with a napkin. And I thought about how we were just a job to them. We were like so much grass growing, or weeds maybe, they watered us and fertilized us and when it was harvest time, they chopped us down and cleared us out and started over with the next bunch.