Chemistry is in my head. Chemistry. Why did I take Chemistry? I knew it wouldn’t be easy.
Annie turns off the car. She sits there, quiet, and I don’t move. I’m not sure why I’m not out of here and headed to class as fast as I can walk so I can get some last-minute studying done.
“Once I packed up all my stuff in the car,” Annie says. ”To go. Loaded the trunk because I knew no one would check it.”
A car alarm goes off. People call to one another.
“Why?”
She takes a deep breath, which is funny because I can’t breathe at all. “Have you ever thought of running off for good? You know, never coming back?”
A snowball hits the car and I jump. Someone laughs. The tree we’re parked under reaches toward the hood.
I shake my head no.
My skin is plastic.
“Oh,” Annie says. Then she opens the door, slams it behind her, and heads off to class.
sarah
Leaving me alone after saying something like that. The brat.
sarah
The first bell rings. Then the second. I’m going to flunk Chemistry if I keep going late. That’s what I think, but I don’t move. I wonder about Floyd Freeman shoveling non-existent snow. Or shoveling in a storm. Wonder about Annie. What’s going on between the two of them?
What’s made my pacifist sister so mad? Should I talk to Mom?
There’s no way Annie’d forgive me for going behind her back.
What’s wrong?
The worry is like weights. We were just laughing about wrinkles, about being sexy. And now she says this? Right after she sees Mr. Freeman?
I sit in the car until I’m so cold I can’t stay any longer. The lot is cleared of people. Cars are parked skewampus. A cloud moves in from the north. Low. Almost touching the ground, it seems. Another storm. This one with lightning, something that doesn’t happen often. Already, thunder rolls closer.
I can’t go to class. Can’t walk in late where everyone will see me. The thought makes my mouth go dry.
So I wait in the bathroom until second period starts. Those dark clouds have now covered the school. It’s like we’re in some fantasy story, the way things look outside.
What’s Mr. Freeman doing now? Does he stand in his driveway, watch the storm come in, and maybe look toward our home the way Annie looks at him as we drive past his place? The hair on my arms raises at the possibility.
sarah
Why is there so much to worry about? I’m hardly sixteen and there’s trouble with my parents. Trouble with my sister. Trouble with my anxieties. I want things to be the way they were Before. Way before. Like when I was little, begging my mother for cookies, and she lifted me up on her hip, letting me point to one still hot on the pan.
I’m not stupid. I know there are all kinds of crap out there. And Annie’s got me thinking. Believing Tommy Jones and Mr. Freeman are both guilty.
Where does it start? Did someone who is a rapist today try to have his way with girls when he was in high school, like Tommy Jones? Did he hold them in the halls and force himself on them?
Did someone who’s now a murderer bully kids in class? Did he write horrible notes?
Are we born this way? Born to hurt? To kill? To love? To serve? What about home? Is what’s going on at home because of a workload? Frazzled nerves? Someone trying to keep up with the Joneses?
Or only about parents watching a child grow heavier and heavier when they can do nothing about it.
Is being ignored abuse? If your mother doesn’t see you and your father only notices that you aren’t like your sister, what is that? Are Mom and Dad responsible at all?
And why all this with Annie? I’ve been wondering about that for months.
sarah
At my locker, the hall like Grand Central Station, I dig for books. I’m jostled, shoved once, and witness a couple making out right next to me.
Ick.
Get a room, I want to say. But I don’t have the courage. Annie would holler that, laugh afterward.
Something in Annie’s locker catches my eye. A bit of folded paper stuffed in an air vent. Not again.
Does this happen to her every day?
“Homer,” someone yells. “Debate team meeting right now.”
“Coming,” someone else answers.
Cold air swirls around my feet. A door to outside was opened down the way. It feels good with all these bodies hurrying to classes. With people breathing my air. And kissing in my personal space.
“Dang it.” I pull at the paper, heart hammering, but can’t get it out. Whoever stuffed it in here wedged it in tight. That last note—I won’t think the words—is in my head. I have to get rid of this new one, so I open Annie’s locker myself.
There are lots of notes in here and several tumble to the floor.
Who?
Why?
I scoop them up, but they fall again. So I push the paper into a pile. Some are wet from damp shoes and dirty puddles of water.
“Did you see who did this, who left these?” I ask the couple.
“Notes,” the girl says, standing on tiptoe. “Cool.”
“Did you see?”
She shakes her head. “You’re the first person here since me and Abe stopped.”
“Thanks,” I say. For what? Talking to strangers has given me a pounding headache.
The kissers leave, arm in arm, saying how much they love each other.
Each piece of paper — and there are at least twenty of them — says something grotesque. Like stop eating and pig and ugly. Stupid stuff. Cruel stuff. I stand there, because I can’t believe this. Then, fast as I can, I shovel the paper out, crumple it, stuff it into my backpack.
Home school is best for you. Keep you away from us.
And the worst one, Just di-et.
They want her to die?
Slut. Whore.
The writing’s the same. All blocky. One person wrote all of this. Tommy.
My mouth feels raw. I can’t quite see because of the headache, and I’m sick to my stomach. The halls clear, and I’m late again. I’m spending more time this week in the hall than in the classroom.
I don’t get it. Annie is far from the heaviest person in school. She’s not that overweight. Yes, she’s gained weight, but I can think of lots of fat kids. And teachers.
Do they get picked on too?
I search Annie’s locker. Look for everything. Look until I am sure the evidence is gone. Take it all. I’ll throw it away. Burn it. Something. She packed up to leave.
“Hey.”
I let out a little yelp, then turn to see Melanie. I don’t realize until I’m looking at her that I’ve been crying.
I close Annie’s locker. “What are you doing here?” I have this urge to slap Melanie. For ignoring Annie. For no longer being her friend. And maybe, maybe—“Did you do this to Annie?”
It’s all I can do to speak up.
Melanie comes closer. “What are you talking about?”
I swallow. “The notes,” I say. Wipe at my eyes.
“What notes?”
My fingers feel like ice. “They were in her locker.”
Melanie picks up a slip of paper from the floor. Something I missed. She reads it, then tightens a fist around it. “No,” she says between clenched teeth. “I didn’t. I was checking to see where Annie is. She skipped class again.”
Again. And then . . . Oh no.
“She found them,” I say.
sarah
We look for her in bathrooms, in the class she’s supposed to be in with Melanie, check with the nurse. Two teachers tell us to get to class, but neither of us answers. Melanie does a good job staying up with me even though she wears spiked heels and a short skirt that flounces with each step.
Peering out at the parking lot, I see our car’s gone.
“I need to go home,” I say. We live only a few miles from school. I can walk.
“Let me take you,” Melanie says.
I hesitate then say, “Yes. Thank you. Okay.”
It’s a quiet drive, like the search was. Neither of us speaks. The sun shines, making the snow a mirror for the light. My eyes water again, but I can’t cry now.
When she pulls into my driveway, Melanie puts the car in park, and before I can open the door she says, “Look, Sarah.” She lets out a sigh. “I know you’ve blamed me for ending my friendship with Annie, but I didn’t quit being her friend.”
The door is cracked open, and cold air edges in. The heated driveway is wet, but clear. That’s what Mr. Freeman needs. A heated driveway.
“What are you talking about?”
“Annie is one of my best friends.” She waits. “She was one of my best friends.” Melanie stops talking again. “I still want to be her best friend. I’ve called, texted. Even cornered her at school. But she’s quit doing stuff with me.”
I stare at Melanie. “That’s not true.”
She nods. “It is. Annie hasn’t done anything with anybody from our group, Sarah. You know that.”
I don’t answer.
“I wouldn’t hurt her feelings. I love her. This whole thing has been hard on me too. I want my friend back.”
I sit there a second longer. Then I open the door the rest of the way and get out of the car. The wind blows, hard, kicking iced snow up. It glitters in the air.
“I miss her,” she says again.
I raise my hand in a weak goodbye. “Thanks,” I say. “Thanks for helping me.”
“Of course,” she says.
annie
School is
bodies doors toomanysounds touching groping swearing laughing screaming calling talking dancing bells smells crowds whistles catcalls whining kissing grabbing slapping crying wishing panic hating loving eating commands orders cropping fighting lectures.
And notes.
Too many notes.
annie
The curtains are closed
but I peek out
when I hear the car.
Melanie and Sarah?
Together?
She’s brought my sister
home.
Melanie used to
tease Sarah
because she
seems to
blend in
with the world.
Sarah doesn’t stand out
flounce
swirl.
But follows the edges of halls
and sits at the sides of classrooms.
Away.
Alone.
It’s like she isn’t quite here.
Some people pick up on that.
Some people see it.
Go in for the kill.
Melanie is with Sarah now.
Saying what?
Being kind?
I stand here
my heart weepy.
I had planned to go back
get her myself.
Be waiting in
the car.
Not desert her.
Not leave her stranded.
I peek out
the window, cheesecake
on a plate in my hand.
Tears slip down my cheeks as
I watch my sister
my best friend.
Are they the same person now?
annie
I feel guilty about that past.
annie
You made me, it’s your
fault
I love you
You were so beautiful
No one can care like I do
like I do
No one will love you this way
this way
This is all the same
in
my
head
annie
Some nights
it’s too dark for words
and I lie in bed
the blankets like weights
the sound of the heater
like a train
anxiety
forcing me out of bed
to the bathroom
where I get in the tub
fully clothed
and try to calm my breathing
calm my heart
ease
the memories
erase
the past
sarah
Annie?”
She sits in the front room, a black blotch on the white furniture. Elton John peers out from her shirt, his huge glasses what I notice first.
“Melanie brought me home.”
Annie doesn’t move.
Mom’s running the vacuum around upstairs.
“Who did it?”
Nothing.
“Annie,” I say.
There have to be words. The right words. The words that support. I’m the girl who punched someone in the nose for calling Annie ugly. Sure, we were five. But it’s proof fear doesn’t need to control me.
“It’s Jones, isn’t it?”
Annie looks up at me. She seems so small, sitting there in this princess chair. “What difference does it make? They’ve suspended him once. What good will this do, you knowing?”
“Just tell me.”
Annie hesitates. Then nods. “I’ve seen him do it,” she says.
I kiss Annie on the cheek. “I love you.”
Then I leave the formal living room. Get my set of keys and go out to the car that I’ve driven only a handful of times.
I’m going back to school. Shaking. Scared. Crazy, maybe. But Tommy Jones needs to be knocked off his bike and right on his butt.
sarah
With no traffic it doesn’t take long to get to the high school.
There wasn’t even one near miss. Pulling into visitor parking, sweat on my upper lip, I think perhaps I could drive again if needed.
“Hope I’m never needed,” I say.
The air stings, it’s so cold. The notes are shoved in my pants pockets and in my jacket as well. Melanie threw a handful away.
Here’s the deal. It’s not like the movies.
I don’t storm into Ms. Cleland’s office and sling notes onto her desk. I don’t swear and holler and follow Tommy to his classroom and kick him in his . . . manhood. Or lack thereof.
It takes forty minutes of waiting to see the vice principal. And when I show her the notes, I keep my voice calm and try not to pass out.
“We’ll take care of this,” Ms. Cleland says. She’s angry, I can see that. “This is distasteful, to say the least. And bullying of any sort is not allowed here.”
“What will happen?”
“Suspension to start,” she says. “There is the past incident that we have to take into consideration.” She pauses. “And I need Annie to come in and talk to me. I need to know how long this has been going on. If there has been a new . . . assault. Or anything else.”
The chair I sit in is uncomfortable. Is that by design or is it how I feel? “She might not,” I say. “She hasn’t told you about the other notes.”
Ms. Cleland nods. “I’ll talk to her. And maybe you could encourage her to come and see me?” She stands. “Head on back to class now.”
I stand too. Nod. Lie by saying nothing.
“Sarah?”
I turn back to Ms. Cleland. “Yes, ma’am?”
“Thanks for coming in here when Annie wouldn’t.”
I swallow. “Sure.”
When I get back to where I parked, I throw up in a pile of snow, expecting the bees I feel I’ve swallowed to buzz away like something from a Stephen King movie. My stomach’s empty when I get in the car, and now I have the dry heaves. This is going to be a long drive home.
annie
Some secrets must be kept.
No
matter
the
consequences.
sarah
Annie’s on the phone when I walk back into the living room.
Talking to who? Ms. Cleland? Tears run down her face. Her voice is low. I leave Annie alone. Sh
e needs time. I know I would. She sort of nods at me when I pass.
Maybe things will change now. For all of us.
Just like that, I’m overcome with fatigue. I’m not sure I’ll make it up the stairs, past the hallway pictures. I’m not sure I can open my door, can even turn the knob. But I do.
I fall on my bed. A sigh escapes.
I love my room.
Love that I feel safe here. Something I’ve not fully realized until right now. Calm. Like me with no pressure. I can breathe. If I had the energy, I’d get up and lock the door.
annie
I know from my own life secrets can be
deadly.
Enough secrets and
you weave a
pattern
that ends up all lies.
they have for me.
I thought I could
control it all and now I see
this controls
me.
sarah
I dream of a stranger who talks in muffled tones. Annie answers.
Ms. Cleland is in her office and she whispers to me through the door. Tells me to mind my own business but still watch out for Annie.
“How can I do both?” I ask.
I’m in the hall. My feet are heavy, tired, it seems, and no matter how I tug to free myself, I can’t.
I can’t get to Annie, who’s crying now.
I just can’t move.
thursday
sarah
The next morning, when I wander into the kitchen, Dad says over coffee, “Party Saturday night. You know the procedure.” Then he leaves. Doesn’t even say goodbye. Didn’t speak to Mom. Have they stopped talking altogether? Is work that important?