On the Outside

by Siera Maley

  “Ew.”

  “I’ll kiss you,” I offered.

  “I thought that wasn’t allowed.”

  “If we’re telling Evan within the week, maybe we can let it slide one or two more times,” I decided.

  “Hmm.” She bit her lip and looked away from me, then began to flip through her Calculus book. “Well… maybe I’ll come over, then.”

  ***

  “Why are you having me do this?”

  “Because I know you struggle with it and it amuses me,” I said, grinning up at Riley from my spot on the stool in my bathroom as she squinted hard at me. She was concentrating on spreading an even coat of lip gloss across my bottom lip.

  “You could do it yourself.” She pulled away and I rubbed my lips together.

  “I like seeing you do it. Remember when I did it for you on Prom night?”

  She forced a laugh. “Uh, yeah. Very clearly, actually.”

  I stared at her as she moved away, my eyebrows furrowing as I took in the way she couldn’t quite look back at me. “Oh my God. You were totally into me!”

  “Obviously? We kind of established I had a really embarrassing perma-crush on you.”

  “Yeah, I know, but I don’t mean it like that. You zoned out. I remember you zoning out because I did too, kind of!”

  “You did not,” she argued.

  “I mean, not exactly, but I definitely remember checking out your lips.”

  “So I had to get all dolled up for you notice me,” Riley said, scoffing, but I knew she was kidding. “I see how it is.”

  “I had to get a boyfriend for you to notice me,” I pointed out.

  “I was twelve! And what do you call this summer, anyway? Because I call it me having to get a boyfriend for you to notice me.”

  “A little hypocritical,” I teased.

  “Yes, you are,” she countered, examining the tube of lip gloss still in her hands. “Oh, hey, it’s the same one you put on me, too. It kind of tasted like strawberries in that artificial sort of way, from what I remember.”

  I puckered my lips at her and gave her an over-exaggerated wink. “I could refresh your memory, if you’d like.”

  She laughed and set the tube aside. “Gross. If that’s the best game you’ve got, it’s no wonder you’re a virgin.” I gaped at her and she feigned apathy, examining the spread of makeup on my bathroom counter. “What should I do next?”

  “Don’t make fun of me; you’re a virgin, too.”

  “I was kidding! You’re adorable.” She picked up a random powder and asked, “Want this on your eyelids?”

  “It’s foundation, so no.”

  She groaned and tossed it back onto the counter. “How do you keep up with all of this crap?”

  “How do you stay on a skateboard for longer than two seconds?” I asked rhetorically, but Riley answered anyway.

  “Practice.” She grabbed a black pencil and offered it to me. “How about this?”

  “That’s eyeliner.”

  “Do you want it?”

  “Sure. You can put it on me if you promise not to poke my eye out.”

  “I can make no such promise.” She offered it to me, but I grabbed for her free hand instead and pulled her toward me.

  “Try it. I gave you a pass when we were just friends, but if you’re going to be my girlfriend, you’ll have to learn to help me with my makeup. And I’ll help you with yours.”

  “That’s not a fair trade,” she said, laughing. “I just wear that liquid skin-clearing stuff my mom forces on me, and only sometimes. But alright. Just because you called me your girlfriend.” She bent over, the eyeliner pencil in her hand, but I stopped her.

  “Let me stand up. It’ll probably be easier if we’re at the same height. Just put a little on my waterline. I’ll fix it up when you’re done.”

  “Excuse me, your what?”

  “Here,” I said, grinning and pointing to the correct spot while she watched.

  “Yeah, okay. I’ll try.”

  She moved in closer until she was nearly pressed against me, then tried to find a good angle for a moment before she finally rested the outside of her hand against my cheek. She looked into my eyes and I hid a smile, then joked, “Feel the sexual tension yet?”

  “Shut up,” she mumbled, furrowing her eyebrows in concentration. “Or I’ll blind you.”

  “Mmkay. If that’s what you really want.”

  “Shut up,” she repeated, sounding more aggravated this time, but she was also fighting off a smirk. I moved my hands to rest them on her hips and she immediately leaned back, scrutinizing me with suspicion. “You were never gonna let me do this, were you?”

  “You could blind me,” I told her. “So not worth the risk. I just wanted to see if you would.”

  She huffed and tossed the pencil aside, then leaned in and gave me a kiss I knew was meant to be quick, because after only two seconds she started to pull away. I tightened my grip on her hips and she took the hint, wrapping her arms around me and grinning against my lips.

  “Honey? Your d-!”

  Riley pulled away from me as soon as we heard the first syllable, but it was too late. I cringed inwardly, even as we both turned to look at my mother, who’d barged into my bedroom and was now staring into the bathroom at us from where she stood beside my bed. Her eyes were wider than I’d ever seen them and she was frozen in place, her mouth still open after she’d cut herself off mid-sentence. “D…” she started again, and then stared at us some more before she managed, “date is here, I’m sorry, did I just see what I thought I just saw?”

  Riley looked over at me, panicked, and I opened and closed my mouth for a moment, struggling for words. “I, um.” I swallowed hard and glanced between Riley and my mom, and then squeaked out, “Yes?”

  “Maybe Riley should go home for the night,” said Mom, taking several seconds to find words after my response. When nobody moved, she added, pointedly, “Goodbye, Riley.”

  “Goodbye, Ms. Copeland,” Riley replied hastily, and then added quietly to me, “Bye, Kayla.”

  “Bye,” I barely got out. I cleared my throat as I watched Riley go, and felt my face heat up as my mom closed the door behind her. When she turned back to me, she motioned for me to come sit on the bed. I was too flustered to do anything but obey.

  She joined me, and we sat together in silence for a moment, until, at last, she took a deep breath.

  “We’re just going to be frank about this, okay?”

  I nodded wordlessly.

  “So.” She paused, seemed to gather herself, and then asked, “Are you… confused?”

  I shook my head very quickly, and she didn’t seem to know how to respond to that.

  “Well… so then you’re…?”

  I shook my head again as she trailed off.

  Her eyebrows furrowed, and now she looked confused herself, before it dawned on her and she asked, disbelievingly, “Both?”

  I nodded enthusiastically, relieved she’d gotten it so quickly.

  She still looked dubious, and I saw her glance to the closed bedroom door. I realized that Vanessa and the guys were probably waiting downstairs. “At the same time?” she clarified.

  I took a deep breath, and then admitted, “The date is for Vanessa.”

  She shot me a stunned look. “Vanessa, too?”

  A series of coughs overcame me, and I sat there for a moment, unable to speak until it passed. “No! Oh my God. I meant that the date is only happening because she likes a boy. I’m just keeping them company. I’m not interested in my date.”

  “But you were interested in Josh,” she confirmed.

  “Yes…” I said, leadingly.

  “And Riley was interested in Evan.”

  “No.” I shook my head.

  “But she’s… and you… you two are-?”

  “Mhmm,” I said quickly. “You’re all caught up. Can I please go?”

  “I’m not sure.” She was silent for a moment, and then added, more to herself t
han to me, “What would your father say?”

  “Who… cares?” I tried.

  “Does Nicole know?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “Any why not? She’s your sister!”

  “I was gonna tell her eventually!” I insisted. “You too! I just thought you might be upset!”

  “Well of course I’m upset! I just expected-”

  “-me to have your dream wedding,” I acknowledged at the same time that she finished, “-you to have some respect for your friend!”

  We both froze, and then she looked at me, flabbergasted. “What?”

  “Oh,” I mumbled, my face heating up. “You’re upset because Riley and Evan only just broke up. Okay.”

  “You thought I had a problem with you being with a girl? Kayla. You know me better than that. I mean, I won’t say that I’m not surprised, or that it was exactly what I had in mind when I had a daughter, but if you want to date a girl, that’s fine. It’s another thing entirely to do something like this to your friends, because I don’t like the idea of you dating one of them after she’s just dated the other. You need to think about whether or not this is worth the risk of ten years of friendship to you. And while we’re at it, I really don’t think that this date tonight is a good idea.”

  “Mom,” I groaned out. “I know what I’m doing.”

  “No, I don’t think so.” She shook her head and stood. “I’m going downstairs and telling them you’re going to have to cancel. You are juggling enough hearts as it is, young lady. And don’t think we aren’t going to talk about this some more when I get back.”

  “Mom! Seriously?” I groaned out. She ignored me, and I gaped at her back as she left my bedroom and closed the door behind herself. “Mom!”

  ***

  “Most awkward night of my life. Nothing even comes close.”

  “At least she was cool,” Riley said on the other end of the line. “I have no idea if my parents are going to be okay with it.”

  “No, you don’t understand,” I elaborated, feeling a little nauseous. “I got a freaking modified talk. I don’t even want to know how my mom knew so much about how lesbian sex works. I mean, it’s not like she went into detail, but she knows more than I thought she did. She knew stuff I didn’t know until I googled it while I was trying to figure out if I was legit into girls or just wanted to kiss you.”

  “Oh… wow, ew, that’s traumatizing.”

  “As it turns out, there is such thing as too accepting. Also, apparently she had a ton of gay guy friends in grad school. Who knew?”

  “We need to, like, take some of your mom’s acceptance and suck it out of her and put it into my parents. The only thing I’m certain of is that they won’t hold an exorcism or kick me out of the house. Otherwise, all bets are off. Not gonna lie, though… a part of me is glad your mom shut down your date tonight.”

  “Vanessa won’t be happy with me.”

  “Why not? You couldn’t help that your mom made you cancel. I bet she won’t blame you.”

  I shrugged my shoulders, though she couldn’t see it. “I guess we’ll see.”

  Chapter Twelve

  We had a test in the Statistics class Vanessa and I shared on Monday, so I only got a couple of seconds to talk to her at the very beginning of class.

  “Hey, I’m sorry about last night,” I told her. “Did it ruin the whole thing?”

  “Don’t worry about it,” she replied with a shake of her head, much to my surprise. “I’ll fill you in after school today.”

  “Alright.”

  I went through the rest of my day wondering what I could’ve possibly missed that warranted an explanation Vanessa couldn’t give me in the hallway between classes. After school, we met up outside her Physics class and walked together to the gym, where we planned to meet up with the other girls from last year’s squad to hold tryouts. None of us were going to have to try out, but there were newcomers who were supposed to have routines prepared. Our coach would be there to help make a decision too, but Vanessa and I, as official co-captains, would share just as much responsibility in choosing who would make it and who wouldn’t.

  “So Jesse – your date – and Danny and I all decided we’d go back to Danny’s house rather than to dinner like we originally planned. He has this wooded area behind his house and he wanted to smoke pot, which I’m not, like, that into, but I didn’t want to be lame so I said I’d go. And Jesse was really weird. He was already clearly not into the idea of the date before we got to your place, so you wouldn’t have liked him anyway. Also, he was way too pretty to be straight.”

  “Oh?” I asked, trying hard to follow her. Her story was kind of all over the place, and I wasn’t sure that it had a point.

  “Yeah. Anyway, we went to Danny’s and the two of them got really high and acted like idiots for a few hours. Jesse ate like ten of those mini bags of potato chips. It was really boring. Danny wanted to do another date another time afterward, but I turned him down.” She shrugged. “So I guess it was kind of a bust.”

  “I’m sorry I ruined it,” I apologized.

  “No, it turned out to be a good thing. If you’d have come along, you and Jesse would’ve had nothing to talk about and I might’ve never realized Danny wasn’t my type.”

  “I thought the idea was that I didn’t have to like the other guy?” I recalled, confused.

  “Well, you didn’t have to, but that doesn’t mean I wanted the friend Danny brought along to be a stoner closet case.”

  “Oh,” I said again. We were approaching the gym; I could see it at the end of the hallway. Worried we’d get there before I could hear more from her, I hurried to add, “Well, if he is gay, I hope he, like, realizes it and doesn’t keep going on dates with girls.”

  “Right? Don’t waste our time. I’ll set us up on another double, though, once I actually find good guys for both of us. Next time I’ll screen the friend before I set you up with him.”

  We reached the gym and she moved to push open the door, but I reached out a hand to stop her.

  “Wait. Uh, I should tell you something.”

  “Hmm?” She paused and let the door close. “What?”

  “I’ve been dating…” I started, and then hesitated and finished, “…someone. So I can’t help you out with the whole double date thing.”

  She looked taken aback at first, and then confused. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

  “Because.” I paused, trying to figure out how best to break this to her, if I was really going to go through with it. My mom had surprised me, so I could only hope that Vanessa would, too. “Okay, so remember that time you went out with Trent Ronsky after he’d just been suspended from the football team for having a ‘C’ in one class, and you didn’t want to tell me even though I wound up being fine with it? And I told you that I’d support you in whoever you dated as long as he was a decent guy?”

  “Yeah, but then he started talking to Tabitha Reynolds who was on the soccer team and who isn’t even cute, so I decided-”

  “You stopped seeing him, yeah, but that’s not the point,” I interrupted, stopping her before she could get going. “The point is that you were worried I’d judge you for liking him, and so you didn’t tell me about it.” I paused, waiting for it to click, and she sighed in realization.

  “Oh, God. He’s a nerd, isn’t he? Is he at least cute?”

  “He’s a she…” I said carefully, and then pressed my lips together and waited for her reaction.

  She smiled a little at first, like she wasn’t sure if I was joking or not, and then, when she saw how nervous I looked, she shook her head at me in disbelief. “Wait, what?”

  “I’m kind of seeing a girl?” I repeated uncertainly.

  “Like, a female? A girl?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh my God.” She was silent for a moment, letting it sink in, and then she gripped my arm and leaned in close, gaping at me. “Who?”

  “I shouldn’t say yet,” I told her.
>
  “Do I know her?”

  “Yes? Not really… but kind of?”

  “Is she hot?”

  “Well… I mean, I think so,” I replied, a little confused at the direction this was going in.

  “But, like, hotter than me? You can’t date someone hotter than me.”

  I laughed despite myself, and she smiled back at me. I knew then that we were going to be okay. “Why not?” I asked, curious to hear what I knew was going to be a ridiculous answer.

  “Because then if she hangs out with us I’ll be the ugly single friend, duh. Anyway, are you, like, bi or whatever now?”

  “I’m kind of new to this so I’m not totally sure how it works, but I think I kind of always was?”

  She shrugged. “That’s cool. Hey! Last question: did you ever have a crush on me? It’s okay to admit it.”

  “Stop,” I laughed out, shoving her a little, and she grinned and moved to push the gym door open again.

  “I’m gonna take that as a ‘yes’. You are so telling me more about this when we’re done with tryouts. I mean, I’ve thought about kissing a girl because how could I not at least try it, but actually doing it seems like a stretch. How did you get the guts to go there?”

  “I’ll tell you all about it later, V,” I replied with a shake of my head and followed her into the gymnasium.

  ***

  Three days later on Thursday afternoon, just a few minutes after I’d gotten home from school, I found myself pacing back and forth in my room, staring down at the cell phone in my hand.

  Two things were supposed to be happening now. The first was that Riley was coming out to her parents. The second was that I’d been tasked with inviting Evan down to the creek to finally tell him the truth.

  I stared down at the unsent text I’d typed out, trying to gather the courage to send it. “Creek with me and Riley? Not sure what time yet but need to talk,” it said.

  The worst thing was that I couldn’t even hope for a delay this evening, because the only one I might get would be caused by a bad reaction from Riley’s parents. And honestly, I was so sick of coming out to people that the less of a deal was made out of it, the better.