November Surprise

by Laurel Osterkamp

  “Why do you think so, Reggie?” Mrs. Fischer tries to be very diplomatic, and gives everyone an equal opportunity to express their opinions, even an ignorant jerk like Reggie.

  “Have you turned on the news lately?” asks Reggie. “Dukakis is a short, weird guy who talks like he’s an alien, and Bush is a tall guy who actually makes sense when he has something to say. Only a nimrod would vote for Dukakis.”

  “Are you kidding?” Anna practically shouts. “You care about how tall they are? Like that has anything to do with how they can run a country.”

  “It has everything to do with it.” Reggie speaks before Mrs. Fischer can call on anyone else, although several other people have their hands raised. “World leaders aren’t going to respect some midget they have to crouch down to see. If we elect Dukakis, Gorbachev will nuke us in no time flat.”

  I’m sort of shocked that Reggie actually knows who Gorbachev is, but my overwhelming response to his statement is of course, anger. Being short myself, I resent any insinuation that height is somehow connected to personal power.

  I speak even though I haven’t been called upon.

  “Height didn’t seem to help you much, back in third grade.”

  Reggie squints at me. “What?”

  “You know,” I say. “You ran for every class office possible, and you were the tallest person in our class. Yet you still lost, even to me. So I guess that proves height has nothing to do with electability, likeability, and most especially, intelligence.”

  Everybody is silent for a moment, probably because they’re in shock. Nobody is more in shock than me, however, and when Mrs. Fischer shakes her head to show her disapproval I feel the burn of embarrassment in my cheeks. But then Anna begins to clap. I glare at her, trying to get her to stop, but she doesn’t. Instead, she is joined by some of the other liberal-minded students in our class. Soon several people are clapping, others are laughing, and even Reggie’s friends are joining in.

  “I’d forgotten about that,” I hear one of them say.

  “She totally got you,” another one says.

  I sit up straighter, my shame turned to pride.

  “Ha ha,” says Reggie. He pretends he’s not bothered, but I can see that he is. Good. He deserves it. I immediately start crafting my letter to Sharon in my mind. She’s going to love this.

  “You need a Prozac,” Reggie says to me. “I think it would help you mellow out a lot.”

  Now Mrs. Fischer sternly shakes her head at Reggie. She switches the subject. “It’s interesting, Reggie, that you mentioned world leaders. I do agree that their impression of us will be important in the next few years, especially with the international landscape changing so. Does anyone have any thoughts?”

  I raise my hand, but since I’ve already spoken, it takes a while for her to call on me. When she does I tell the class that when the USSR pulled their troops out of Afghanistan they created ramifications that could lead to civil war, and that affects everyone, and we need someone diplomatic like Dukakis to handle it. But by that time most people are no longer listening.

  My good mood lasts several days, until the evening of the second and last presidential debate. I keep hoping that Dukakis’ poll numbers will rise after Quayle’s disastrous performance the other night, but they haven’t. So now I’m hoping Dukakis will score big in his debate like Bentsen did. But when Dukakis’ pivotal moment comes, he fumbles. When asked if he’d want the death penalty for some guy who raped and murdered his wife, he stammers a little, but remains as calm and emotionless as if he were reading the phone book.

  “… I think you know that I've opposed the death penalty during all of my life. I don't see any evidence that it's a deterrent and I think there are better and more effective ways to deal with violent crime."

  God. Reggie is right; Dukakis really is an alien. Nobody could be so unemotional unless they were the direct descendent of Spock.

  I had recorded the debate and afterward I keep rewinding and watching that one moment again and again, irrationally hoping I’ll find a different moment, a different response, if I just watch it one more time. Finally my mother tells me to stop being obsessive and go to bed.

  The next day as I walk to school the ugly truth sinks in. The sun bounces off the autumn leaves, a gentle breeze promises another warm fall day, and I’m confident that I’ll ace my test this afternoon on Beowulf, but none of it can deter me from admitting a horrible reality: Bush has already won. The Willie Horton-soft-on-crime character slams, the silly pictures of Dukakis in a tank, the rumors about Kitty Dukakis burning flags and Dukakis’ mental instability, they’ve all built to what seems like an inevitable loss for Dukakis.

  I reach the school doors, and of course, Reggie is there, and he is looking for me. When he sees me approach he starts walking in my direction.

  I keep going.

  “Lucy, wait up!” he yells.

  I walk faster. I think maybe I’ve lost him by the time I reach my locker, because the crowd of students in the halls makes it difficult to see if he’s still behind me or not. Quickly I take off my coat, and my heart is racing in the hope that I’ll make it to first hour without a run-in. Unfortunately though, I feel a hand on my shoulder as I lean down to retrieve my book.

  This time, his touch isn’t irritating. It’s just a guy’s hand on top of my Calgary Olympics t-shirt, and I can feel the coolness of his skin through the thin fabric. I sigh and turn around.

  I speak quickly, and my words have an angry edge. “What do you want?”

  He flinches and takes his hand away.

  “You really hate me, don’t you?” He asks me this simply, just a statement of fact phrased as a question.

  “You’ve bullied me since third grade. Am I supposed to like you?”

  “I wasn’t exactly bullying you,” he says in a soft voice. He drops his head for just a moment, and his dark hair hangs in his eyes. “You need to look at things from my side.”

  “No, I don’t.” I hug my book to my chest and close my locker door with my foot. I try to move past Reggie, but he steps in my way.

  “You don’t understand how humiliated I was, losing to you like that.” He looks down and tugs on the sleeve of his sweatshirt. It’s almost like he’s humble.

  I shift my weight from one foot to the other. My palms are growing damp, and I’m not sure why. Yes, I’m nervous, but about what, exactly? I clutch my textbook and my doodle-covered notebook more closely to my chest, and wipe my other hand against my corduroy skirt. Good choice. Never let them see you sweat.

  I look Reggie in the eyes, and he gives me a modest smile, like he’s admitting a mistake.

  “Can we talk sometime?” he asks.

  “Aren’t we talking now?”

  He laughs, as if I’d said something flirtatious, when really, I was simply asking a question. His laugh is low and intimate, and now my heart is starting to race.

  “Are you going to Donna English’s party this weekend?”

  “I, uhmm… is she having a party?” I stammer a little. “I don’t think I’m invited.”

  He laughs again and punches me playfully in the shoulder. “We’re not in the fifth grade,” he says. “This isn’t a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese. You don’t have to be invited; you just have to know about it.”

  Even though my throat is dry, I swallow. I’m starting to form a reply when he continues to speak.

  “You should come. We can talk there.” He brushes his hair away from his face, looks down at his faded black Converse high-tops, and kicks his toe against the floor. Without looking at me he says softly, “I’d really like to talk to you, so I hope you can make it.”

  With that he walks away, and I’m left standing at my locker, feeling as if the ground has just shifted beneath me.

  All day and for the rest of the week, whenever I see Reggie I catch him looking at me first, and if our eyes meet he gives me the same shy smile. Then on Friday, during Modern Government class, Mrs. Fischer begins a discuss
ion about the election.

  “So,” she says, “This is the final weekend before the vote. Do we have any predictions for last-minute antics?”

  The class stays silent. I keep my head down, choosing to breathe rather than speak. I can feel Mrs. Fischer’s eyes on me; she can usually count on me to say something. But today I’m just not in the mood. What’s there to say? Bush is obviously going to win.

  Reggie raises his hand.

  “Reggie, yes.” Mrs. Fischer gives him a nod.

  Reggie clears his throat. “I don’t think there’s going to be any surprises. Bush has already won. All he has to do is play it cool, and let Dukakis lose. If Dukakis hasn’t figured that out yet, then he really is a moron.”

  I turn around so I can see Reggie, sitting in the back row. Today he’s wearing a button down Oxford shirt with a skinny tie, black jeans, and his trademark black Converses. His dark hair has been swept back – very new wave. A lot of girls think he’s cute. I try to look at him through their eyes.

  “Okay,” says Mrs. Fischer. “Any responses to that? Lucy? What do you think?"

  I sigh. “Well…” I turn back around in my seat. Suddenly I’d rather be looking at anyone but Reggie. “I think Reggie’s right.”

  There’s a stunned silence. Mrs. Fischer gives me a comic double-take, and the rest of the class laughs. “Lucy, did I hear you right? You agree with Reggie? Should I alert the media?”

  I look straight at her eyes, which are sitting serenely behind large, square rimmed glasses. They’re the only thing I feel safe looking at in this moment. “No. I’m not saying I want Bush to win. I’m saying that he will win. I’m saying that people would rather hide their heads in the sand when it comes to Noriega and the Iran Contra scandal, or the arms race, or slashed funding for education and the arts, or that for the last eight years we’ve had an administration who planned its schedule around what the first lady’s astrologer said. Bush was complicit in all of it, but hey, he’s tall and he doesn’t talk like an alien, so yeah, let’s elect him.”

  Reggie chimes in. “They always come around, Mrs. Fischer.” The class laughs again, and the bell rings.

  Reggie climbs out of his seat, catches my eye as he passes, and throws a wink in my direction. It’s only when I grab my books to leave class that I notice a note on top of my desk. I quickly unfold it.

  See you tomorrow night!

  (please????)

  J

  I crumble the note and toss it in the trash on my way out the door.

  Donna English’s party is exactly the sort of party I always hear about but never go to. I convinced Anna to go with me, and when we walk in I’m immediately tempted to cling to her sleeve.

  Anna appears to feel the same way. She turns to me. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather go to a movie? The Accused has a nine o’clock showing. I’ve heard it’s really good.”

  I square my shoulders and shake my head. “No. Let’s do this. It will be fun.”

  We walk into the swarm. People are hanging out, laughing, sharing inside jokes that I’m not a part of. One couple, the most popular in school, is hanging off each other, and the girl is wearing an oversized flannel shirt that I’ve seen the guy wear countless times. They share an intimacy and casualness that I’m sure I’ll never experience.

  Anna props up the six-pack of peach wine coolers we brought, which her cousin bought for us. “Maybe we should put these in the refrigerator.”

  “Right. Let’s do that.” We walk towards the kitchen; when we get there we each remove a wine cooler from the six-pack, and then Anna puts away the remaining four.

  “I hope nobody steals them,” she says. “Do you think we should put our names on them?”

  I think for a moment. “I doubt it would make a difference.”

  We simultaneously open our drinks and take a swig. They taste sort of like cold, peach cough syrup. But the taste is better than beer, or really any sort of alcohol. At least this I can swallow.

  “Let’s move out to the deck.”

  Anna agrees, and we join several other people who are standing in the semi-cold, and we pretend to look loose and relaxed. But after a few more swigs of my drink, it isn’t so much of an act. Anna and I have joined in the conversation, and I’ve actually stopped looking for Reggie. Then I feel him come up behind me.

  “You made it,” he says.

  I turn around. “Yeah. Anna wanted to come, so I said I would too.”

  He smiles. He’s holding a beer, and his eyes look kind of red and glazed over.

  “Awesome.” He sounds like a surfer. He reaches down and gently grabs my hand. “Come with me.”

  Anna is laughing way too loudly at Jeremy Miller’s impersonation of Pauly Shore, so I don’t tell her I’m going. I let Reggie lead to me a destination unknown, and I try to silence the scream that is vibrating inside of my head. Any buzz I had from the wine cooler has left me as quickly as the warmth you get from a shower after the hot water has run out. In fact, I’m shaking in the same way I would when I’m naked and wishing for a towel. Something inside me refuses to believe this is a good idea.

  Reggie has brought me to an empty upstairs bedroom, well away from the rest of the party. He turns to me before we enter. “Don’t worry,” he says. “I just want to talk.”

  “About what, exactly?”

  “Don’t worry,” he says again, as if he’d answered my question by doing so. Then he pulls me into the bedroom, and I let him. Thankfully, he leaves the door open. He sits on the bed, and I stay standing—well, leaning actually—against the dresser, my back to the open door. I smooth out my oversized long-sleeved t-shirt that hangs over a gathered mini-skirt. I hope I’m not overdressed.

  “Hey, thanks for hearing me out.” He pats the space on the bed next to him. “Are you sure you don’t want to sit? I won’t try anything, promise.”

  “I’m good.”

  “Right. Okay.” He rolls his head and stretches out his back and neck. “So here’s the thing.” He stops his stretching and looks up towards the ceiling. “I feel really bad about how I’ve treated you the last few years. Pretty soon we’ll graduate and then I’ll never be able to make it up to you. So you should let me try now. Okay?”

  I wish he would look me in the eye. “I don’t know,” I say. “Maybe we should just call a truce. That would be plenty.”

  He’s now looking at his hands, studying his fingernails and a callus on his thumb. “You don’t really mean that. If you did, you wouldn’t be here.”

  He could be right. Why am I here? I can’t say for sure, but maybe I’m just tired of waiting for my real life to begin.

  He finally faces me, his eyes meeting mine. “Have you ever thought about how love and hate are a continuum?”

  “No.” I grasp the edge of the dresser I’m leaning against, and bite my bottom lip. Would it be rude to walk out?

  “I have,” he says. “I think about it all the time. Hate isn’t the opposite of love. Apathy, that’s the opposite of love. Not caring is the worst insult of all, you know? And I’ve never, ever, been apathetic towards you.”

  He gets up and he walks to me, so we’re now standing face to face. His dark hair is, as always, hanging in his eyes, his teeth are faintly yellow, and the combined effect reminds me of a Halloween mask.

  Now I can taste the same peach wine cooler that I finished several minutes ago; it’s revisiting me through burps. What if I actually puke it up? Never mind. I need to get out of here.

  I start to tell Reggie no, no thank you, not interested, thanks anyway, etc, etc. But before I can push the words out somebody grabs me from behind, placing his hand over my mouth, while his other arm is restraining both of mine.

  Reggie continues to talk and we’re so close that I can taste his sicky-sweet breath as if we were kissing. “So Lucy, you should feel flattered when I tell you that I really, really hate you.” Then he spits in my face.

  I try to wriggle out of the grasp of whoever it is that’s holding me
, but his strong arms may as well be an iron straightjacket, they won’t budge no matter how hard I push against them.

  Horror fills me from the pit of my stomach to the top of my brain. Tears blur my vision as I try to scream through the hand that’s smothering me.

  Reggie laughs. “Don’t worry, you big baby. I’m not going to do anything to you. I have absolutely no interest in touching you. In fact, even the idea of touching you makes me want to barf. No, I asked you up here to prove a point. And here it is—you’re desperate and stupid. Otherwise, why would you have followed me, after the way I’ve treated you? It’s because no guy has ever liked you, have they? And deep down, you know that no guy ever will.”

  Another wine-cooler burp escapes from my mouth, only this time it is more than a burp; a little bit of puke comes out too.

  The guy who is holding me quickly releases his hand from my face. “Gross!” he shouts. “She just puked in my hand!”

  I take this opportunity to escape, and I run from the room before I can identify Reggie’s accomplice, but their laughter rings in my ears. I wipe Reggie’s spit off my with my sleeve while I race downstairs, find Anna, and implore her to leave the party.

  “But we only just got here,” she says. “Don’t be such a loser.”

  “Anna, please. Please.” The urgency in my voice makes her notice my tear-streaked face.

  “Are you okay? What happened?”

  I sniff back more tears. “I don’t want to talk about it. Please. Let’s just go. Now.”

  Begrudgingly she complies and we leave. I had already planned on sleeping over at her house, and to be dropped off at home now would cause unwanted questions from my parents, so we go back to her place and watch a video in her basement. Three Men and a Baby.

  I stay stubbornly silent as we watch, convinced it’s all a lie. Men can’t possibly be as sweet and innocuous as the ones in this movie. I’ll never trust any of them, not ever.

  That night as I try to fall asleep I keep replaying the scene with Reggie over and over, long after I wish I could erase its existence from my mind. Hurt, shock and fear settle into a knot located somewhere in my chest cavity, and it’s going to take more than a peach wine cooler to make it go away.