Who I Kissed

by Janet Gurtler

  “Zee told me. That you were swimming. I’m glad,” Taylor says. “I hope you come back soon. Even if you miss finals. It’s who you are.”

  “Is it?”

  It’s who I used to be.

  “How are you and Zee doing?”

  “Zee and I? We’re fine.”

  “Freaked out, Insecure, Neurotic, and Emotional?” she says and laughs.

  I can’t help but laugh with her. We step forward with only one person in line ahead of us. “Things are messed up,” I admit.

  Taylor nods. “I know, sweetie.” She puts both arms around me. For a moment I stiffen, but it feels incredibly good. To have someone on my side.

  I squeeze back.

  “You’re a good person, Sam.”

  “Not really,” I say. “But thanks, for standing by me through, you know. Everything.”

  She pushes my braid behind my ear. “I know.” Then she grins. “So. What’s up with you and Casper? Why were you two so late?”

  I swallow and squish up my nose and shake my head, fighting off an overwhelming urge to cry. I wish I could be happy and squeal about my first time like girls on TV who are sophisticated and tell each other everything and analyze every move. But I’m confused. And not terribly happy or proud.

  I can’t tell her I’ve lost my virginity to a guy who doesn’t think it’s a big deal. And that afterward he didn’t even pay for me to get into the fair. Or offer to buy my drink, like Justin did. Even though he’s richer than all of us. That he won’t hold my hand in public, or introduce me to his parents. And it’s a huge deal to me.

  Instead I sigh. “It was nothing.”

  “Good,” she says.

  The lady in the food kiosk calls down to us. “Next! What’ll you have?”

  Taylor looks at me.

  “I’ll get my own,” I tell her.

  “Forget it. Justin’s buying. Hot chocolate?”

  I nod and she orders four. “Be careful with Casper,” she says when she hands up the money. “I mean, you’re not emotionally involved, right?”

  My body sure got involved. But what about my mind?

  “He’s a good guy most of the time,” Taylor says and hands me a styrofoam cup. “But I don’t know. He’s spoiled. Entitled.”

  She hands me another cup. “His house is huge,” I say.

  “I know. His family is loaded. Both of them. But it’s more than that. Justin’s family has money too. But he’s more…respectful. Casper’s dad…”

  She stops to take two more cups and thanks the woman who sold us the drinks.

  I glance across the crowd and spot the boys. She follows my gaze. “What about his dad?” I ask as we start toward the boys.

  “He thinks Casper can do no wrong. You know? He encourages bad behavior.”

  I shrug. My dad certainly doesn’t have the luxury of thinking I do nothing wrong anymore.

  Taylor looks at me as we scoot around an old couple walking slowly. We start toward the boys as they hand bills to a guy holding baseballs. There are big baskets behind him. They have to throw the balls inside, without them bouncing out, to win.

  “Look!” Taylor shouts. “Justin just won!” I look over as Casper throws a ball and it bounces out. He laughs along with Justin, but there’s something about his smile that hints at anger.

  The carnie hands Justin a huge stuffed toy.

  He whoops as he holds up the huge Pokemon character. It’s almost as big as him.

  Taylor squeals and runs over and does a cute victory dance. Justin’s grin is wide and proud, and he looks at her with so much happiness it makes my insides hurt. He puts the animal down, takes the drinks from her, and gives her a big smooch. “For you,” he says, and she picks up the huge animal and hugs it.

  I hand Casper a drink.

  “Thanks.”

  I point at Justin. “Thank him.”

  Casper’s lips smile, but his eyes don’t crinkle in the corners. “Stupid game is rigged.” He takes a long sip of the drink. “Justin got lucky. Hey. I have to use the bathroom.” He points off to the right. “They’re right over there.” He takes off. “I’ll be right back.”

  “He hates not winning,” Taylor says.

  “He’s totally into scoring, though,” Justin says.

  I wince, and Taylor punches him in the arm.

  I throw my cup in a nearby garbage, apologizing that the taste doesn’t agree with my stomach. Casper returns, and we’re both quiet. When I tell him I don’t feel well, he seems relieved and agrees to take me home early.

  “You’ll miss everything,” Taylor says, hugging her big plush toy.

  But I feel like I missed out on a lot already.

  I need to make changes.

  chapter twenty-two

  “Cut it all off,” I say to the hairdresser.

  Monday morning I walk into the first salon I see on the way home from school. The place is old and smells like cleaning supplies. There’s only one customer besides me, an old woman with short white hair. She’s getting it blow-dried by a young girl with tattoo sleeves on both her arms.

  “Define ‘all.’”

  My hairdresser is middle-aged, in high heels and tight jeans that give her a definite muffin top. She snaps her gum as she runs her brush through my hair. She’s looking at my reflection in the mirror. I stare back at hers.

  I hold up a picture I found in an old magazine in the waiting area. It’s Emma Watson, when she cut off her hair after the last Harry Potter movie. Cropped short. The hairdresser shakes her head and keeps brushing. “Boys don’t love the short hair, you know.”

  I narrow my eyes at her reflection.

  “All right,” she says and snaps her gum. “If you’re sure. It’ll take a while to grow back. I’m warning you.” She lifts the long, thin braid that’s been my trademark for so long. “This too?”

  I nod. “But can I take it with me?”

  “Whatever floats your boat,” she says. In a swift movement, she grabs a pair of scissors and snips it off, leaving a short piece at the top. She puts it in my lap. “It’s all yours.”

  ***

  Aunt Allie is sitting in the living room reading when I walk through the front door. Her sweater is bulged in the front. Fredrick is burrowed inside.

  “Wow,” she says and puts her book down. Fredrick grumbles, sticks his head out of the top of her sweater, grunts, and snorts hello. He doesn’t move, though.

  “Your dad know you were going to do that?”

  My neck feels vulnerable and exposed with no hair covering it. I’ll need to borrow some of Aunt Allie’s scarves. I shake my head, still clutching my braid in my hand.

  Aunt Allie reaches inside the sweater, removes Fredrick, and puts him on the floor. He limps over to me and wiggles around, demanding to be picked up. I ignore him until he snorts indignantly and toddles out of the living room. No doubt going to his little house to pout.

  “I like it,” Aunt Allie declares. She stands and moves toward me and places a hand on each of my cheeks. “You look older. Wiser.” She moves her hands down to my shoulders and pulls me in tight. “You’re going to be all right, butterfly,” she says.

  I sniff in the familiar, comforting scent, and her sweater soaks up my tears.

  It’s a little different when Dad walks in and sees what I did to my hair, but I stand up to him.

  ***

  Bob stands, watching me walk across his office to the chair I sit in for our visits. “New haircut,” he says. His tone is noncommittal.

  I shrug and sink down. “Why is everyone so worried about my hair? Dead, useless follicles on my head.”

  He sits down after I do. He’s old-fashioned that way. “It’s a big change. Usually something like this is symbolic.”

 
He doesn’t ask me of what. For that I’m grateful. The pit of anger in my belly eases a little. “I had sex,” I blurt out.

  He nods but doesn’t comment. I’m getting used to his silences. He usually gives me time to find the courage to say what’s in my heart, but today the whole story spills from me in a burst. I’ve been wanting to tell someone what happened. Someone who is paid to listen and stay nonjudgmental.

  I tell him that I don’t love Casper. I ask him if he thinks I’m a slut.

  A small smile tugs at his lips before it disappears. “I don’t think you’re a slut,” he tells me. “I think you’re a smart and nice young woman who made a mistake.” He stops when he sees my eyes fill with tears.

  “Mistakes don’t make us bad people, Sam. They make us human. You’re in a vulnerable place. You’re searching for meaning. But I want you to think about something.” He leans forward and taps my knee with his pen.

  “Why do you think you did what you did?”

  I sniffle my nose. Sigh. “I wanted it to make me feel better. Or to make me forget everything. Maybe I wanted to feel loved.” I stick out my tongue and make a face. “It’s so cliché. It’s embarrassing. I thought it would make me feel good, but it made me feel worse later. More alone. Horrible about myself.”

  He nods and presses his lips tighter, watching me.

  “Do you think you’re worth loving, Sam?” he asks.

  I can’t answer him. I hold onto the necklace around my neck. It doesn’t help me. Nothing can. I don’t want to tell him what he already knows. The answer is no. I shake my head back and forth, but I don’t look up.

  “Well,” he says. “I don’t like to tell people this too often. But you’re wrong. You’re wrong, Sam.” He stands up and I glance up, surprised. He has a strange expression on his face. Almost as if he’s mad. I hunch my shoulders and look down.

  “You are one hundred percent worth loving.”

  My cheeks warm then.

  “What can you do now?” he says. “What can you do to start feeling like you are a good person again?”

  “I don’t know.” I reach for my braid, to twirl it in my fingers, but it’s gone. At home in a drawer. Put away. No longer my security blanket.

  My hands go to my lap. I’m sick of myself and my feelings.

  Bob sits back down. “Well. We’re going to figure that out. If it’s the last thing I do.”

  I don’t want him to feel like he’s failing me. “I went swimming,” I tell him.

  He nods. Sticks his pen in his mouth and leans back.

  “I did it for my dad.”

  “And?” he prompts. “How did it feel?”

  “It kind of sucked,” I admit. “It pissed me off. I was in great shape. I was good. Really good. Before.”

  “You can be again.”

  “I know.”

  His lips turn up in the corners. “When you do it for yourself.”

  “There’s something else too.” My insides swirl with a little bit of excitement. I’ve been going ahead with my plans. With or without Chloe. “I’m starting a local chapter of NAAN. For kids with allergies. I’m raising money in a walk to build a website. And I put word out online that I need people to go into schools. To talk to kids about how they can help keep other kids safe.”

  He claps his hands together, and it’s loud and sudden and startles me.

  And then he smiles. “It’s a start,” he says. “Don’t tell your dad, but I like your hair.”

  I smile back. “I’ve been thinking about what I can write to Alex.”

  chapter twenty-three

  A few days later, Aunt Allie is pushing the grocery cart, grumbling that the store doesn’t carry Fredrick’s favorite treats. Which are human treats, of course. Fredrick doesn’t eat dog food. He’s in a baby sling around her chest, his little pencil leg still in a cast. He’s fast asleep, and from the front it looks like she’s carrying a baby, so no one bothers her about having a dog in the store.

  “I’m going to go to the produce section to grab the peppers. Okay?” She nods once and wrinkles her nose, frowning at a bag of dried chicken treats. “Seventeen dollars for this? I thought this grocery store had competitive prices.”

  A woman wearing a tight skirt and blouse and tottering on high heels that make her legs look great gives Aunt Allie a side-eye. Smiling to myself, I push the cart around the corner and head toward the produce section.

  My legs stop when I make it around the corner. My body freezes. Directly in front of me is a woman I feel like I know intimately. Better than my own mother. A woman whose face has spoken to me from television reports.

  Alex’s mom.

  In person, she looks normal. You wouldn’t know that she’s suffered a tragedy. From where I’m standing, she looks like a million other women her age shopping for groceries. Not someone who lost a child. She’s wearing a pair of jeans tucked into a pair of tan boots and a floral blouse with a blazer. A thick gold necklace is wrapped around her throat, and her hair is up but kind of in wisps, the way women her age like to wear it. She lifts a honeydew melon to her nose, sniffs, and then places it in her cart. And then she must sense me, because her eyes look over and meet mine.

  We stare at each other like deer looking into bright headlights, unable to look away. I see questions run through her mind. Why? Why a peanut butter sandwich? Why did I kiss her little boy after eating a peanut butter sandwich?

  Part of me, most of me, wants to run. But Alex’s mom is right there. Looking at me. And the thing is, she looks afraid. My eyes open wider as we peek inside each other’s souls.

  My heart beats faster than when I’m standing on a starting block, waiting for the horn to start a race. I step toward her. I won’t run. I can’t. I failed once when I didn’t walk into the funeral home. She deserves to have her moment. To yell at me. Or cry. Or slap me for taking away her boy. Whatever she needs to give me, I prepare myself to take it.

  Mrs. Waverly’s lips turn slightly up, not quite a smile, and her features wobble. Slowly she pushes her cart toward me. Her heels clack on the floor. A tear rolls down my cheek, leaving a warm trail, and I reach to wipe it away, ashamed to have her see that. My sorrow. My guilt.

  I want her to feel the freedom to spew any words at me she needs to. The blacker the better. She’s earned the right to hate me. “Samantha,” she says simply. We stop with a short space between our carts. Of course we don’t need to be introduced. “You cut off your hair.”

  I nod and try to smile, but I can’t. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. It sounds trite. I want to tell her it’s okay to despise me. That I hate and I loathe myself too, almost as much as she does. That I’d shave myself bald if it would help.

  She lifts her chin slightly, her jaw clenched. She moves her head down and then back up. A barely perceptible nod. Acknowledging the apology.

  “He told me about you. He loved your long hair.” Her voice is barely above a whisper, and she tucks her hands into her blazer sleeves, as if she’s freezing.

  My hand goes to my short hair. Have I offended her? By cutting it off?

  A smile turns up her lips. Her eyes look off into the distance, and I realize she’s remembering him. A lost conversation. It breaks my heart, because I hadn’t even been aware that he’d noticed my hair. I barely noticed Alex until the day I killed him. With a kiss. Meant for someone else. Not him.

  “He went to see you swim. He said you were good.” Her mouth turns up again. “Better than me, he said. He likes to tease me.” Her eyes widen. “Liked,” she corrects herself automatically.

  “You swam?” I ask in a soft voice.

  “Swim,” she says. “It’s been years since I swam competitively, but when I was young—your age—I used to swim against your mother.”

  I inhale quickly. My hand goes to my necklace. I touch it but
quickly let go.

  “She was an amazing person,” she says. “I’m sorry you never got a chance to know her.”

  “Thank you,” I manage, but I’m dizzy as if I’m about to faint.

  A tiny smile pulls up her lip on one side. A crooked, shaky smile. “Alex also said you were pretty.” Her voice is tight, and it doesn’t sound like a compliment.

  “I’m not,” I say automatically and immediately regret it, hoping she doesn’t think I’m digging for compliments. My face burns and I look down, staring at bunches of unripe green bananas in a bin beside me. I wish so hard that Alex had never noticed me. And I know she does too.

  “Smart too,” she says, and I want to tell her to stop.

  Someone coughs, and I step aside slightly as a woman pushes her cart around me with a dirty look. I move my cart to the side a little more.

  “Chloe said she had coffee with you,” Mrs. Waverly is saying.

  I glance around at other people in the produce section. Shopping. Squeezing tomatoes and checking strawberries for mold, not aware that I’m talking to the mother of the boy I killed.

  “She said you were nice.” She’s speaking quickly.

  I blink. Shake my head. “She told me about your aunt’s dog too. The accident. I’m glad it’s okay.”

  “He’s fine,” I tell her. “He’s doing good.”

  She nods. “I read your note. Chloe didn’t tell me I could. But I found it and read it anyway.”

  I open my mouth, but nothing comes out.

  “I think about you a lot,” she says quietly, and she seems to run out of energy.

  “I think about you too,” I whisper back, and my voice cracks.

  She blinks quickly and takes deep breaths through her nose and presses her lips together. “I’ve wondered how you’re doing. We got the flowers and note from you and your dad.”

  She looks to me, as if it’s my turn to say something.

  I can only shrug and blink quickly. I can’t tell her I didn’t know he sent them. That I was not thoughtful enough to do anything but hide in my room for days.

  She takes her hands out of her sleeves and places them back on the handle of the grocery cart, staring down. The moment drags on, and I wonder if I should walk away and leave her. Let her have privacy and dignity. Seeing me must stir up so many things.