by Raziel Reid
There was no point in class that day; everyone was too hyped up on cinnamon hearts or Oxy. All the pretty girls gave each other roses. Even the lipstick on Mrs Kennedy’s teeth was red.
Luke was at school, standing at the end of the hallway with Matt and all their friends, his arm around Madison.
I don’t know how I ended up in front of them. They looked up at me, and if the camera had flashed for the photo, they would’ve had red eyes.
Madison raised her eyebrow and waited. The director had called, “Quiet on set, camera rolling!”
“Luke,” I said, swallowing the vomit caught in my throat. It went back down and made my eyes water. He looked at me and his face went hard. I could tell he was terrified. “Luke,” I said again, even though he was already listening. Everyone was.
“What?” he asked, deadpan.
“Will you be my Valentine?”
Matt started laughing, and Madison said, “Oh my God, you’re joking, right?”
“You know you love me,” I said, my dying words.
“You’re a faggot,” Luke sneered, already looking away. If he wasn’t looking at me, was I there?
“Yeah? Well, so are you. Why don’t you just admit it already?”
“What did you just say?” Madison laughed.
“What, didn’t you tell them, Luke?”
“Tell us what?” Matt asked.
“About how he came back.”
“Shut up,” Luke said, looking at me again. I was alive!
“He came back. Luke saved me that night. It was him.”
“You’re fucking kidding me,” Matt said, turning to Luke for confirmation and finding it in his pupils, which dilated with fear, or maybe with regret for having a conscience. It’s the only thing that can make your star fade.
“He was my hero,” I cried, and I knew this was the reel I’d send in for awards.
“Shut up,” Luke said through gritted teeth. He was so close.
“Don’t be shy, Luke. We love each other. That’s why you saved me. Because you love me. And that’s why every time you came to visit me at the hospital, I gave you the best—”
“Shut the fuck up!” He screamed, lunging at me.
I didn’t step back. I took a breath, trying to take him in. I wanted to feel it. But he stopped himself. He came so close to me that I could’ve kissed him, but then Matt yelled, so the whole hallway could hear, “Luke Morris is a faggot!” And even though I could’ve puckered my lips, I was too busy watching his quiver.
The bell rang, and Mr Dawson appeared at his classroom door, ushering us in. Matt was smiling wider than his future beer belly.
Mr Dawson started class by reading aloud, but no one was paying attention. No one even knew what he was reading. Everyone was tweeting under their desks. Matt was already trying to trend “#LuJu.”
Then Matt looked up from his phone, right at Luke, and started simulating a blow job, poking his tongue in his cheek. Madison made a show of sliding her desk as far away from Luke’s as possible. Mr Dawson stopped reading and glared at her when the desk squeaked against the floor. A few people burst out laughing as Matt exaggerated a gag. Mr Dawson looked like he was ready to throw the book at them, but he didn’t have a chance. Luke stood up, pushed over his desk, and stormed out of class. Madison screamed when the desk flipped and crashed to the floor, but you could tell she wasn’t scared, it was like she had planned it. Like she had fucked for the part and been cast for the way she screamed.
I watched Luke go, wishing that I could run after him. I wanted to tell him that I was sorry, that I was stupid, that I didn’t mean it. I just couldn’t help myself. I knew he wasn’t going to say “yes” to being my Valentine, but I’d had to ask, even if it wasn’t in the script.
I said my lines anyway, hoping there’d been a rewrite.
As soon as class ended, I went to the bathroom to look for him. I don’t know what I would’ve said if I had found him. I don’t know whether I would’ve apologized or rubbed it in. I wanted him to love me, but if he wouldn’t, I wanted him to hate me because love and hate are two sides of the same coin, and I wanted Luke to spend everything on me.
When I walked through the bathroom door, Kenny and Colin were standing at the urinals, and Matt was fixing his hair at the mirror.
“What are you doing in the boys’ room, Judy?” Matt asked.
I should’ve turned around and left, but I had too much pride. Even though I didn’t have to go, I walked past him into a stall that looked like it hadn’t been flushed for a week. I gagged and tried to breathe through my mouth.
“What, is Luke in there with you?” Matt laughed, pulling the door open.
I went over to the sink, trying not to throw up. The whole bathroom stunk like shit.
“Don’t forget to wash,” Matt said.
I turned on the tap and put my hands under the water. I wasn’t thinking. I should’ve just ran.
“Your face,” Matt said. “Don’t forget to wash your face.”
Kenny and Colin came up on each side of me before I had the chance to get away. But the worst part was, even if I’d had a chance, I don’t know if I would have run away. Sometimes I became a freeze frame.
I resisted at first, but Kenny twisted my wrist so hard it cracked. There was no point in fighting them. Matt held open the door of the stall I had just been in, and they dragged me toward the clogged toilet.
“Fucking righteous, man,” Kenny laughed. “I think this is the stall I used this morning.” He took a big sniff. “Yep, that’s my Taco Time all right.”
They forced me to my knees. I would’ve screamed, but I was scared of opening my mouth. I started to struggle out of sheer desperation, but Kenny grabbed the back of my head so hard I thought he was going to rip out my hair.
“Just pretend the water is Luke’s cock,” Matt said, right before my face broke the filthy surface, “and blow.”
They held me under, then lifted me back up so I could take a breath before holding me under again. I zoned out. We were in a prison shower, they were three Aryan skinheads gang-raping me. I felt so needed. They liked to take turns putting on my makeup and then smudging it. One of the crew members kept giving me pain killers. Every time I moaned, the camera picked up the glitter pills I was gargling.
Once they got bored, they let me fall to the floor, spitting shit.
“I thought for sure you swallowed,” Matt said, kicking me in the gut.
They walked out, laughing. I crawled over to the sink, using it to help me stand. I looked in the mirror. My face was pale where it wasn’t bruised, and dirty water dripped from my hair. I leaned over the sink and puked, then held my head under the tap to wash away the shit.
When I looked back up at my reflection, everything was blurred. I batted my eyes and tried to give my best face, my red carpet face, but it was so faded, I looked like a grainy paparazzi shot. I punched the mirror, and the glass cracked, falling to my feet like lost scenes.
Everyone stared at me as I walked down the hall. My skin was cocaine white, which made the blood dripping to my feet look even more red. I had been cast in a horror movie and just come back from the dead. “Jude,” Mr Dawson said when he smelled me at the door. “What in hell?” He rushed over and almost touched my filthy, wet hair but stopped himself.
“And your hand!” he gasped as blood dripped onto his loafers. He took my arm and led me to his desk. “We have to get this cleaned up.” He sat me in his chair and took a handful of tissue to wipe up the blood. “I think you might need stitches,” he said. “What happened?”
I tried to speak, but it was like the bathroom mirror had broken in my throat.
“Shit,” Mr Dawson said, “this isn’t going to cut it.” He dropped the tissue into the waste basket next to his desk and grabbed the red scarf hanging with his coat on a hook behind me.
“This’ll have to do for now, but let’s get you to the nurse’s office. Who did this?” he demanded, wrapping my hand.
“I
don’t want to be here anymore,” I murmured.
Mr Dawson took it the wrong way and hugged me, like he was scared I was going to try and break through the classroom window.
“Don’t say that,” he said. “Please don’t say that. You have no idea how incredible you are.” He started crying, and I was impressed; most of my co-stars needed Visine. “You have no idea how brilliant you are. How brilliant your life is going to be.” My lips were trembling, so he put a finger on them. “There’s nothing to be afraid of,” he said.
Then he removed his finger from my lips and kissed them.
19
Hollywood Ending
My feet didn’t touch the ground as I ran out of Mr Dawson’s classroom, down the hall, and out of the door. I ran until I found myself standing in front of Keefer’s school. I sat on the bench outside the gate. It was recess, and all the kids were playing in the field. I spotted Keef right away because he was wearing his long dragon hat. He was throwing snowballs with some other kids.
As he ran, the tail of the dragon hat trailed behind him, and some kid pulled it off his head. I watched Keef chase him around the entire schoolyard, but he couldn’t catch him. I looked at the teacher, waiting for her to do something, but she was on her phone. Keefer kept chasing him, but the kid was too fast. I wanted to climb onto the field and rip the hat out of his hand, but before I could, the kid ran up to the gate and threw it over. It landed on a snowbank right next to me. Keefer came to the gate, sticking his fingers through, and I stood up to get it for him. His face was red, but I couldn’t tell if it was from the cold. He hated it when I came to his school.
“What are you doing here?” he asked me as I tossed the hat to him with my good hand. The kid who took it stood a couple feet away with a group of boys.
“I don’t know,” I shrugged.
“You’re all wet.”
“I was making snow angels.”
“Why aren’t you in school?”
“I don’t have school today.”
“Liar.”
“What do you know?” I smiled.
“Where’s your jacket?” he asked. “Aren’t you cold?”
“No,” I shook my head. “I don’t feel anything.”
“You look funny. Why do you have a scarf around your hand?”
“Stop with the questions!”
“Your lips are blue,” he said.
“It’s lipstick.”
“No it isn’t. Your lipstick is pink.”
“You’re right,” I laughed.
“What are you doing here?” he asked again.
The bell rang, and most of the kids headed for the school, but Keefer stayed, aware of the boys still standing behind him.
“Hey, Keefer,” the kid who’d taken his hat yelled, “is that your brother or your sister?”
“Why did you come here?” Keefer asked me, pulling his dragon hat over his ears.
“I just wanted to say goodbye,” I said, but he was already running inside.
I stood there even after he was gone, looking at the snowy field stamped with footprints. As I started to walk home, I thought about when Keefer and I still shared a room. One time, when he played on his bed, I sat in front of the mirror, putting on makeup. Madonna played on my iTunes, and I sang along. Keefer kept looking up from his Lego, watching me paint my face.
Our mom was at work, and Ray had been missing for a few days. Keefer had stopped asking where he was. I don’t know if he didn’t ask because he didn’t want to upset Mom or if he had just stopped caring, but I thought it was probably both.
Through the corner of my eye I saw him drop his Lego and sigh. I swear, sometimes the kid was more dramatic than me. “What’s the beef, Keef?” I asked.
“I’m bored.”
“Only boring people are bored.”
He rolled off the bed and came up to me, picking up a brush and bending the bristles. “Why do you dress up like a girl?”
I kept my eyelashes in the curler as I said, “You know on Halloween when you get to dress up?”
He nodded.
“It makes you happy, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, dressing up makes me happy, too. But I just don’t want to wait for Halloween.”
He thought about it for a second and then said, “Okay,” with a little shrug of his shoulders. “Are you going out tonight?”
“Sure am.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere over the rainbow.”
“I want to come.”
“You’re too boring.”
“Am not.”
“Prove it,” I said, opening a tube of lipstick. He hesitated for a second then laughed and took it from my hands, smearing it all over his mouth. “Don’t break it,” I said, taking the tube from him and carefully applying some to his lips.
“More!” he yelled, like it was a game, like every day is Halloween.
I did his eyes and then taught him how to pout.
“I look like a girl,” he said. “I look like you.”
I started lip syncing to “Hollywood,” and Keefer danced. We didn’t hear the front door open or the sound of his dirty boots as he came down the hallway. I took a tissue and told Keefer to blot, but he didn’t know what blotting was, so he told me he didn’t have any snot. I laughed, throwing my head back, and that’s when I saw Ray’s eyes at the top of the mirror.
“What are you doing?” he asked, and his voice gave me chills. Keefer spun around and faced him.
“Daddy!” Keef laughed. “Jude made me pretty!”
It happened so fast. Ray grabbed Keefer’s arm and dragged him out of the room. Keef started crying down the hallway, and I tried to stand, I swear I did, but my knees were weak. I sank to the floor. I heard a slap. Ray yelled, “What do you think you are, a little faggot?” I tried to get off the floor, tried to drag myself to the door, but I was stuck. “Are you a little faggot?” Ray was yelling. I couldn’t move. I heard the shower turn on, and Keefer’s cries turned to screams.
“It’s hot,” he screamed. “Daddy, it’s hot!” I couldn’t move. I lay there and cried and couldn’t move. I couldn’t save him. I wanted to. But I couldn’t.
I couldn’t even save myself.
By the time I got home from Keefer’s school, the blood on my hand had dried, and the scarf was practically fused to it.
I expected my mom to still be sleeping, but she was awake and in the kitchen, cooking, with her hair in rollers. She was wearing her bra and panties, an apron, and nothing else except the fake pearls I gave her for Christmas. Her dress was on the ironing board. She had a cigarette dangling between her lips, and the ash looked dangerously close to falling into whatever it was that she was burning. My mom always looked poetically trailer trash.
“You’re home early,” she said, taking the cigarette out of her mouth and crunching it into the crystal ashtray next to the sink.
“We had early dismissal because of the dance tonight,” I lied, hiding my hand behind my back.
“You must be excited!” she said, but she didn’t even look over at me. “I have to work on Sunday, you know. It’s a big night for the club, so I’m cooking a dinner tonight for me and—” She stopped herself before she said his name.
“What are you and Ray having?” I asked. I was trying to make it easier for her, but I couldn’t hide the contempt in my voice.
She had her back turned, but as she closed the oven door, I bet she closed her eyes too.
“Roast beef,” she said, leaning on the stove. “Don’t look at me like that!” she said, even though her back was still to me. She reached for her pack of cigarettes on the counter and lit another one. “He’s sorry,” she exhaled, turning to face me but not registering the way the makeup artist had made me grotesque. Maybe the cigarette smoke was too thick.
“I know that doesn’t mean much because he’s said it so many times before, but what do you want me to do?”
I didn’t say anything.
�
�Damn it, Jude. What do you want me to do? He’s a bastard, but he’s my bastard. You don’t want me to end up alone, do you? I’m too old to go looking for a new boyfriend.” She took a long drag. “I need him. No one is hiring after Christmas, anyway,” she said. “I should really wait until spring to find a job.”
I nodded.
“He’s sorry,” she pleaded. “He’s going to tell you so himself. He feels bad about everything. You know how he is.”
“It’s okay, Mom.”
“No, it isn’t okay. But at least he didn’t hit you.”
“What about you?”
“He knows he isn’t welcome back in this house unless he changes.” Her eyes were so desperate, I couldn’t take it. She took a drag of her cigarette, and half of it was gone.
“Okay,” I said.
“Are you all right?” she asked, waving away the smoke. “Are you sick? You look sick.”
“I’m fine,” I said, walking toward the bathroom. “Just cold.”
I took a long shower and then went down to my room to bandage my hand. It wasn’t that bad. It’s not like I could see bone or anything. I covered most of the cuts and tried not to move my fingers too much because every time they bent, my knuckles bled.
Then I packed my suitcase with my favourite clothes, shoes, and makeup. I put the holy trinity, People, Star, and In Touch, in my backpack. I also had Candy Darling’s My Face for the World to See to read as inspiration on the bus. Candy was like me. Stubble showed through her powder, and too much of everything was never enough.
Stoned Hairspray curled up in my suitcase. I think she knew. She kept meowing and sounding so forlorn, I wished I could take her with me. But she had her own lives to lead. Besides, Keefer would need the company once I was gone. She’d love him, even if no one else in our house knew how. Stoned was good like that. She had a way of reminding you that you weren’t totally alone.