How to Be Remy Cameron

by Julian Winters

  Today, it’s the latter, so after school Lucy and I sit at one the few outdoor tables at Zombie. She’s studying fashion magazines. I’m scowling at my laptop screen. The Essay of Doom glares back at me. I have five hundred words written. Only ten of them are any good. Then again, two of the ten are my name, so I’m not sure that counts.

  “Orchid or coral?”

  I blink at her. Lucy’s head is bowed. Her hair is piled messily on top of her head, surprisingly kept in place by four highlighters.

  “Which color?”

  I flinch. “What?”

  “I’m trying to find the perfect color for my dress.”

  Her dress. Right. It’s hard to forget homecoming is around the corner. Everyone’s talking about what to wear. Advertisements are plastered everywhere, including the VOTE 4 REMY poster taped to Zombie’s big, scenic window: rainbow and unicorn and my big manga-style eyes for every caffeine addict to mock.

  Our drinks are sweating next to each other on the table. The sun’s gradually descending. Dying light softens Lucy’s features. She’s glowing.

  “Gold,” I say. “Definitely gold.”

  She sweeps fallen strands of dark hair from her face. “Is that your gay-best-friend stamp of approval?”

  I roll my eyes. She’s only teasing. But it’s been in my head lately: the GSA, the Ford Turner comments, the homecoming campaign posters.

  Is this who I am? Am I too gay? Is that a thing? My brain’s a mess. I set a new record getting ready for school this morning: forty-five minutes. I kept staring at the clothes in my closet: pastel this, neon that; pink and yellow and bright; so much gay and gay and gayer. Every shirt, every pair of jeans screamed, “Hey, look at me and my attention-needy self! I’m a rainbow! I’m a stereotype!”

  I decided on a pair of black skinnies—of course—and matching pair of Nike Air Force 1 low-tops and a plain collared shirt Aunt Sandra bought for my last birthday. Black, obviously. Today, I just wanted to be average. No stereotypes. No declarations. Except, on cue, everyone noticed.

  “Did someone sell you some bad product? Have you gone emo?” Alex and Zac asked.

  Totally.

  “You don’t look like yourself,” Jayden said.

  Perfect! I don’t feel like Remy Cameron right now.

  “Who are you?” Sara asked.

  I don’t know.

  “You’re still helping me shop, right?” Lucy asks.

  I cock my head. “You don’t want to go with your mom?”

  “Nah.” Lucy sips her macchiato. It’s no longer an Instagram-worthy aesthetic masterpiece. “She’ll be too busy with work.”

  She casually leaves out the part where her mom probably can’t afford anything new either. Paying rent and buying groceries and school supplies for four girls doesn’t leave much money for homecoming dresses. I think Lucy’s mom’s secretly saving for a prom dress, anyway. But none of that bothers Lucy. She’s happy using the money she gets from tutoring neighbors’ kids to hit up a thrift store for something to wear.

  That’s Lucy—our rock, our foundation. All the things that make our table of friends cool extend from Lucy. I’m in awe of her. If I’m honest, I’ve always been in awe of her. I just don’t say it out loud enough. Maybe that makes me a coward or a bad friend.

  “Yeah, I’m still down,” I say, my lips curved into a half-smile. We’ll make a day of dresses and fitting-room selfies and pizza afterward. As much as I’m dreading homecoming, I’m looking forward to this.

  “Thanks,” whispers Lucy. Her eyes crinkle and her cheeks lift.

  Sunlight reflects off my laptop screen. I haven’t typed a new word in thirty minutes. The Essay of Doom is taunting me. “Hey.”

  Lucy barely lifts her eyes from dress-browsing. “What’s up?”

  A planet-sized lump clogs my throat. I scratch my eyebrow. “Do you think you know who you are?”

  “Who I am?”

  “Yeah.” I hiccup. “Yes.”

  Lucy twists loose hair around her finger. Her eyebrows do this funny dance when she’s thinking: wiggle-wiggle, up-down. “No,” she replies coolly. “I know the things people see me as—Latinx, brown skin, seventeen, a girl whose dad threw her the deuces because responsibility isn’t on his agenda.”

  I bite my lip hard. The skin around Lucy’s eyes tightens. She doesn’t look mad, more annoyed. I shouldn’t have asked.

  “I know who I’m going to be, though.” She sits up straighter, shoulders pulled back. “A leader. A legend. I’m going to make Latinx people in political office the standard instead of an abnormality.”

  I grin. “SAT word.”

  She smacks my shoulder. Then, serious as ever, she says, “I’m going to kick down a lot of doors, Rembrandt. For my mom. For my sisters. For me.”

  This has always been Lucy: confident, groundbreaking, a superhero.

  I slump in my chair. Pink and yellow spots crowd my vision like exploding pixies. My brain melts like a popsicle in mid-June. This is another confirmation, another reminder. Everyone around me knows who they are or are going to be. I know nothing.

  “But what if—” I can’t look at her. “What if you don’t know who you’re going to be because you don’t know who you are currently?”

  We’re quiet. Cars cruise by playing music or talk radio. Kids run from an SUV to the ice cream shop. Traffic lights dance from yellow to red to green.

  Lucy says, “But you know who you are.”

  “I don’t. I mean, I did and this thing,” I wave a hand at my laptop, “came along and now there are so many questions.”

  “Questions are good.”

  “Are they?”

  “Sure.” I can hear the smile in her voice, even though I still can’t look. “Questions are how we start to discover things.”

  I don’t tell her how I don’t want to discover anything. For seventeen years, I’ve been Remy Cameron, a music junkie. I’ve been that boy who got hard when Dev Patel sneezed. I was the boy with a cute dog, a beyond-awesome little sister, and two marginally cool parents that everyone knows. A picture-perfect reality.

  Now, I’m squinting at my world, discovering all the cracks. Mrs. Scott sees me as a gay, black teen she can guide to success. Everyone at school associates me with being the GSA president or Dimi’s ex-boyfriend. The neighbors think I’m Willow’s babysitter; not her brother. I’m a lost adopted boy instead of a boy in love with the family he was given. My world is filled with identities overshadowing who I am. Who I think I am.

  Lucy folds her hands and rests her chin on them. “You didn’t know who you were at eleven when we forced Wyatt Matthews to eat a mud sandwich.”

  I chuckle. “We were criminals.”

  “We were vigilantes. That asshole said Rio looked like a lumpy squash when she wore that epic sunflower dress. He deserved it.” He did. “And you didn’t know who you were the summer before freshman year.”

  I rub my curls. The age of BCO—Before Coming Out.

  “You didn’t know who you were last summer.”

  “I was a virgin. A relatively awesome virgin.”

  “You were passable on the awesome scale.”

  “True that. Dimi brought down my stock.”

  “You set the standards too high with him.”

  We crack up. My cheeks are damp, and I hope it’s from the laughter. I hope Lucy doesn’t notice.

  When we stop, Lucy’s voice is gentle, far away. “Point is, you found out a little more about who you are. You always do. Life is a journey, Rembrandt. You don’t know all of it at seventeen. Or as an adult. In fact, I think when you finally do know all of who you are, the universe stops the clock and ends the journey.”

  “That’s kind of morbid, Lucia.”

  “Shut up. I’m going through an emo phase, like your wardrobe.”

  “I still look gr
eat.”

  “You look like death.”

  “High-fashion death.”

  She rolls her eyes. “The jury’s still out.”

  We slip back into comfortable silence, the kind that’s existed forever between us.

  Inside Zombie, Ian’s shuffling around. I watch him hang a new menu he’s doodled on, talk to Trixie, fix his glasses, sip a steaming matcha latte. I haven’t said anything to him since lunch today. I asked him for a fry. Red-faced and stammering, he passed me the whole tray. And he didn’t say anything after the last bell when he hooked a finger in my belt loop and tugged me into an empty classroom. He spoke in kisses.

  Ian sees me through the glass. My smile feels never-ending.

  “I’ve seen that look before,” accuses Lucy.

  “On yourself?”

  Lucy gasps, then kicks me. “I have never.”

  Oh, but she has. It’s true, Brook Henry’s unbearable levels of puppy love when it came to Lucy started the second she stepped on campus freshman year. But peak Brook-infatuated-Lucy was scary: hardcore stares and notebook poetry and forcing me to watch endless YouTube videos of Olympic swimming events.

  “I tried to ask Brook about it.” I freeze. “But he says it’s nothing. I’m seeing things,” she says, and my limbs finally relax. Unspoken trust lives.

  “It really is nothing,” I say. She squints. “We’re friends.”

  “A likely story.”

  We leave it at that. I know why I can’t tell her, but that doesn’t make keeping this from Lucy any less difficult. I used to tell her everything about Dimi, even when things were starting to fray, when I could tell she hated him. This is new for me, dating—or non-dating—someone who isn’t out. I’m more aware of every touch or look because that might tip someone off. I can’t walk up to Ian at his locker and kiss him in the middle of Maplewood’s morning traffic jam.

  Someone clears their throat. Standing over us is Darcy. While the rest of Maplewood’s student population usually looks like the Walking Dead after school, Darcy always seems ready for another eight hours of social awkwardness and pop quizzes. In her peach sweater and khaki skirt and blonde hair strategically pinned up to show off her cheekbones, she’s a preppy candidate for sainthood.

  She shoots me a half-wince, then turns to Lucy. I guess I should be thankful she didn’t publicly damn my sexual deviancy to passersby.

  “We need to do something about this Mad Tagger situation, as a collective,” she says, huffing.

  “What about them?”

  “He struck again.”

  Lucy raises an eyebrow. “Again?”

  “Yes!” Darcy shrieks. Her skin’s blotchy-red. “My posters for a prayer circle to be held before the dance were vandalized.”

  I quickly grab my drink to stop myself from snorting. Anyone could’ve defaced GTFO’s posters. Darcy has a select group of minions and an army of non-fans.

  “The class presidents should convene and stop this madness.” Darcy makes a face like a disgruntled cartoon lion. “Clearly Principal Moon and Chloe’s dad are clueless.”

  “O-okay,” says Lucy, slowly, “but what’re we, you know, teens gonna do to stop a criminal? We’re not Dumbledore’s Army.”

  “It’s obviously a student. We could sniff out the culprit.”

  I guffaw. “Did they forget to wear deodorant?”

  Darcy’s glare is like a vampire on steroids. I raise surrendering hands. It’s one thing to combat Darcy, President of GTFO and Queen of Cardigans, in the halls of Maplewood. I can guarantee a small measure of safety there. But public Darcy doesn’t seem quite as determined to keep a clean slate with the law.

  “Okay, Darcy,” Lucy says. “Maybe we can plan something?”

  “It’s already being coordinated. We can’t let homecoming be desecrated by…” She pauses, directs that venomous glare at me. “…people who don’t understand the purpose of traditional values.”

  I bite my lip so hard, hints of coppery blood drip on my tongue.

  “Fine. Text me the details,” Lucy says, rubbing her temples.

  Darcy nods curtly at Lucy. She doesn’t spare me another glance. Good. I’d hate to ruin her day with my one-fingered response to her “traditional values.” It might add a couple of years to her soulless life.

  Lucy sighs. “What the hell?”

  I shrug. I have enough to figure out about myself. I don’t need to analyze who Darcy Jamison is too.

  “I wonder if Rio knows about this latest incident?” Lucy’s already texting .

  Rio’s been on radio silence. There was no morning meet-up on the steps outside school. She wasn’t at lunch. I texted her twice after school—no response. Maybe she’s knee-deep in this Mad Tagger stuff. Maybe it’s nothing.

  The setting sun peels blue from the sky. It’s pinker, verging on rose-gold. Everything smells like ground coffee and exhaustion. Lucy texts, and people pass our table, and my brain implodes with more thoughts. I don’t add a single word to the Essay of Doom the rest of the day.

  * * *

  “Hey.” I find Rio at her locker the next day before homeroom. “You’ve been hiding.”

  She tucks a lock of amber hair behind her ear. She’s wearing this cool crossbones-print shirt under a denim jacket layered in enamel pins. And she’s strategically not making eye contact with me.

  “Rio?”

  She sighs, nose wrinkled.

  “What’s up?”

  “The sky,” she says, her voice clipped.

  “Okay, lame.” I tilt my head. “What’s going on? You’ve been missing.”

  “Busy.”

  “But you—”

  “I’m gonna be late.” She slams her locker shut and starts to move around me, but I catch her arm. Her face tenses.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m busy.”

  “With the Mad Tagger thing?”

  Rio’s eyes cut me like a machete. “Yeah, that whole ‘Mad Tagger thing.’ That thing you’re too busy to help out with.”

  “I’m not—” I pause. I guess I have been busy. And maybe I’ve been devoting more time to Lucy because, well, Lucy doesn’t think Ian’s the Mad Tagger. Rio does. But that’s not the only reason I’ve been too busy for Rio. I have homework and family time and an essay that’s eagerly devouring my academic career like a snack. Oh, and that half-sister I still haven’t told anyone about.

  Rio glares, pouting impatiently. I don’t have anything to say. I’m drowning in a sea of “who am I?” and I don’t know how to scream loud enough for my friends to hear. “I’m not too busy.”

  Rio pffts, then shakes my hand off. I let it fall to my side. We stare and stare as students hustle around us on their way to homeroom. I can’t move. It’s as if a thunderstorm is about to crack heaven open and flood the hallway. And my feet have decided this is where I’ll stay.

  “Lucy said you’re going to the dance,” hisses Rio.

  I suck in my cheeks. “I mean,” I wave my hand at the wall plastered in campaign posters, where mine is smack in the middle of ones for Jayden and Armin and Ford Turner and, surprisingly, Silver, “I kinda have to, don’t I?”

  “Nope.”

  “But—”

  “This is so predictably you, Remy. Pretending to hate the social hierarchy. The rebel who’s only rebelling because he doesn’t know what else to do,” Rio spits. “You don’t hate the system. You fit in with it. You’re popular.”

  “So are you.”

  She laughs harshly. “By association. I’m popular with an asterisk. With a disclaimer.” Her voice breaks. “And I don’t give a damn about it.”

  “It’s just a dance.”

  “It’s not just a dance, Remy.”

  “For fuck’s sake, what do you want of me, Rio?”

  “I want you to be a friend.”
Her face is crimson, and not because she’s supporting Maplewood’s athletic department. There’s this little tremble to her bottom lip. It’s scary. “I want you to stop being a friend when it’s convenient. Be a friend instead of always, always being caught up in a new boy. Elijah. Dimi freaking Antov. And now Ia—”

  “Don’t,” I plead. The hallway is relatively empty now, just us and two lost freshmen. But still, I don’t know who might hear. I can’t out Ian. “This isn’t a thing.”

  Rio rolls her eyes. “It’s such a thing.”

  “Jesus, Rio, I’m sorry, okay? It’s been…” My throat closes. The words can’t escape. “It’s been tough.”

  “Really? Tough? You look fine. Content.”

  “I’m trying here.”

  “This is trying?”

  There’s something about her voice. I’ve always been pro snarky-Rio, but not today. The late bell rings, and I’m done. “Forgive me for, like, finding other ways to deal with stuff instead of being bitchy and a loner. Geez, it’s not like Lucy’s been around either,” I say, venom burning the roof of my mouth. “She’s busy too.”

  Rio yanks her phone out of her back pocket. “No, it’s just you,” she says, wiggling her screen in my face. Her thumb swipes through the camera roll. Photo after photo. Rio and Lucy at the movies. At a park. At a damn pet shelter. Photos of Rio with Alex Liu too. A lot of Rio and Alex.

  “Is he replacing me?”

  Shock dilates Rio’s pupils into black holes with pale green rings. “No,” she says, quietly. “It’s not like that.” Something in her tight shoulders and nervous eyes says it’s something.

  “So, you’ve been chilling with everyone but me?” I try to dilute the hurt in my words. “You haven’t posted anything about this.” I’d know. Rio’s timeline has been nothing but a collage of Mad Tagger artwork.

  “Seriously?” Rio’s exasperated. “Plot twist: I don’t post every little aspect of my day on Twitter or Instagram or whatever social media platform to give my life validation. Likes don’t make any portion of my life more significant.”