She slaps the counter with her hand, which has only 800,000 rings on it. “You be patient. You’ll be a superstar, mark my words.”
I don’t have the heart to tell Dolly that I don’t want to be a superstar so I just smile and nod, which is my good-girl reaction to situations of this sort. Dolly stands back up straight. “How’s your mumma? Still singing the wrong words?”
Everyone in town knows about my mother’s wrong-words syndrome. According to Dolly, my mom was kicked out of the high school’s show choir because of it. I’m not supposed to ask about that though because Dolly said it might “hit too close to the bone.”
“She’s good,” I say and cast a glance over my shoulder for Em. She’s obviously still scoping out the perimeter. She will probably scope out the perimeter until I’ve completed the transaction, she’s such a wimp.
Dolly makes her voice one decibel quieter than a jet landing in Bangor. “What’cha here for, honey?”
I step up to the counter and make my voice a whisper. “Girl things.”
Dolly leans forward so I can smell the cigarettes on her clothes. Her eyes twinkle behind her glasses. “You stuck buying tampons for Emily again?”
I straighten up, shocked. My hand zips over my mouth.
Dolly slaps her hip with her hand and hee-haws. “Like she thinks I don’t know. That’s one uptight chicken.”
I giggle. Dolly winks and I walk down the feminine-products aisle. She calls after me and I turn around and she mouths a word, but I’m not sure what it is. Maybe “Dylan?” I wish I could read lips. I give her a little wave and turn away. My Snoopy shoes slide on the smooth linoleum and take me past the douches and sanitary pads, the weird medicine stuff for yeast infections to the nice blue and white boxes of the tampon section.
I look for slender regular. How ridiculous it is that I know what kind of tampon Emily uses. I decide I deserve the BEST FRIEND OF THE YEAR AWARD.
“That girl owes me,” I say.
That’s when I hear it, the low, deep laugh of Dylan when he’s trying not to laugh. It’s a snort really. That always happens when he’s trying really hard not to guffaw, like the time one of Em’s tampons fell out of her locker and she had to stomp on it with her foot to hide it.
Dylan’s here. My breath catches in my chest. I should try to warn him again, about what Tom’s dad said, I think, or tell him that I’m so sorry he had to lie to be with me. I grab a tampon box and walk around to his aisle.
It takes me a second to figure out what it is I’m seeing under Rite Aid’s fluorescent lights. It’s Dylan and he’s struggling so hard not to laugh that he’s leaning into the guy next to him. The guy next to him has his arm around Dylan’s shoulders and it looks as if he’s smelling Dylan’s hair. It’s Bob. Of course, it’s Bob.
My heart falls to the floor. They look so happy, even Bob. He’s smiling and chuckling and Dylan’s golden glow seems to have touched him too.
I reach out and grab a shelf to steady myself.
Dylan has flown away from me. How far away love goes. A tiny part of my heart is so happy to see him safe and laughing, but the other part is a black pit that threatens to suck all of me into it. He is happy without me. He is laughing without me. But what about me? I kissed Tom.
Okay, I will be above this, I think and I start walking down the aisle. One step. Another. Bob sees me first and his smile vanishes just like that. My hand zooms up and checks my hair. Bob nudges Dylan in the ribs and he looks up too. The happy vanishes from his eyes in less than a second and he looks down into his hand. I look there too. He clutches an industrial-size variety package of condoms. His eyes glance up at Bob. Bob’s face turns bright red.
I swallow. Condom purchases are a whole different league than kissing on the couch.
My Snoopy shoes stop walking.
Dylan’s face doesn’t move. His body doesn’t move. His eyes are just sad, sad, sad guitar strings with no one to play them. No, that’s me.
Bob is the one whose mouth moves. “Belle.”
He says my name like an apology.
He says my name like a bad dream.
He says my name like it’s the end of the world.
I swallow. I tilt my head. Em’s feet stride down the aisle behind me. I make myself say the words with a kind smile. “Well, at least you’re practicing safe sex.”
No one says anything and Em finally makes it to my side. She gasps.
“Oh my God,” she says. It would be a hiss but there are no “s” sounds. It’s more like a snarl. She turns into her angry teenage girl mode, hands on her hips, face flushed. “I am all for protection and I am all for being gay and able to express your love in any anal-orifice way possible, but could you have not waited like a week or something?”
She looks like an angry mother. Her mouth twitches. Her eyes squint to half their size and her head bebops around with her words. Her right hand points at the boys, an accusation. Bob backs up and bumps into Dylan. Dylan puts himself in front of Bob, protecting him.
“We can do whatever we want to, Emily,” he says. His voice is strong and sure. This is Dylan at his toughest. I used to call him “Viking” when he got like this, like the time he was so upset that Mr. Patrick gave me a ninety on my Plath essay. This is the Dylan I remember, not someone about to kill himself or go hide, but a man who knows what he wants and what’s right. A little part of me is so proud of him.
Emily takes a deep breath, brings her hands down to her hips again. “I know you can, but think about Belle. She loved you. Have a little respect.”
I glare at her and find my voice. “Emily!”
She shakes her head, snatches the tampon box from me, and walks away.
Dylan steps back to Bob’s side, grabs for his hand but only manages to clasp his wrist, and looks at me, all his anger melted away. “I still love you, Belle. Just not that way.”
I walk past them, everything inside of me churning and mixed up. There’s all this anger and guilt and there’s no words to describe it, even if I had Gabriel, I don’t think I could make the right music to express it. It would take an orchestra.
So I walk past them, mouth closed. There is nothing I can say.
After I get all my homework done, I shrug on my jacket and stand in our front yard, leaning against a tree, staring up at the sky.
I remember. It was about a month ago and Dylan had just given some concert in Augusta. Everyone crowded around him afterwards, even though he was part of a choral ensemble. He’d had an important solo. People stood around him, basking in his glow, like he was some sort of superstar. He smiled at each of them, talked to everyone, wasn’t flip, wasn’t cocky, was humble and good.
I waited near the back of the church where they’d be singing, hanging out with Em near the table that held the extra hymnals, letting Dylan get all the praise he deserved. He caught my eye and winked. Then Bob pushed his way through the crowd and hugged him, really tightly. Dylan hugged him back.
I turned to Em. “Let’s go wait outside.”
There’s something about the outside that is so much better than the in.
I know that some people know they are gay all their lives. I know that some people sort of know but they fight it. I know that some people never admit it to themselves and no matter how much it hurts thinking about Dylan loving Bob, I know it’s better that he knows, that he allows himself to be who he is. No matter how hard that is.
And who am I?
I am Belle Philbrick, kisser of Tom Tanner, player of guitar, friend of Emily.
I sigh, roll myself around on my toes so that my head touches the bark of a maple tree. The bark roughs my skin. The cold air pushes through my clothes.
Someone coughs. I whirl around and see Eddie.
He walks toward me, hands in his pockets. “You okay, Belle?”
&n
bsp; “Yeah,” I laugh, embarrassed, “just telepathically communicating to the trees.”
He stands there staring at me, not sure what to make of me, I guess. He doesn’t have a coat on. His eyes tighten. “Why’d you do it, Belle?”
“Do what?” A light turns on at Mrs. Darrow’s.
He chokes out a laugh. “Go out with him.”
I place my hand flat against the bark of the tree. “I loved him.”
Now Eddie does laugh. “He’s a fag.”
“That’s crap, Eddie. That’s a crappy thing to say.” I let go of the tree, stand up straight. Something small moves in the woods behind me, but I don’t turn around.
“But he is. He’s a faggot.”
“He’s gay.”
“Same thing.”
I stomp like a little girl. “No. It isn’t.”
He glares at me like it’s all my fault somehow, that he’s a bigoted freak, that Dylan is gay, that nothing is the way it should be. I point at him. “Don’t look at me like that.”
He shakes his head. “What happened to you, Belle? You used to be such a nice girl.”
My mouth drops open. “I am a nice girl.”
“Nice girls don’t go out with fags,” he takes a step closer. He looks away, looks back, his eyes soften for a second. “Why didn’t you ever go out with me?”
Headlights motor down the street. They zip into my driveway and my sweet mom flounces out the car door. “Hey sweetie! Hey Eddie!”
She looks at both of us. “It’s cold out here. Eddie, you want to come in?”
He shakes his head but just keeps staring at me. “No, thanks, Mrs. P. I’ve got homework to do.”
“Okay, then.” She reaches into the car to retrieve her purse and then starts walking toward me. “Bellie-bear, you coming inside?”
“Yep,” I meet her on the walk and grab her hand.
Eddie calls after me. “I’ll be seeing you, Belle.”
I really don’t hope so.
Tonight I pace around my house, do extra-credit homework, tell my mom I have too much studying to do so that if anyone calls can she tell them I’m already asleep?
She looks up from the newspaper. “Okay, honey.”
Muffin takes that moment of distraction to pounce into the middle of the editorial page and settles herself in. My mother shakes her head, scratches at her hair with her pen, and laughs. “You little nuisance.”
Muffin just looks up at her and purrs.
My mom scratches her beneath the chin and says to me, “You haven’t been practicing guitar.”
“I’ve been too busy,” I lie.
She gives me a look that tells me she’s not falling for that one. She stands up, catches me in a hug. I hug her back, just rest into her softness, inhale the smell of lilac and baked potatoes.
“It’s so hard to be seventeen,” she says into my hair. This is an eye-rolling comment, but I don’t pull away first. She always says that she needs me to hug because I’m all the family she’s got left, which is true, but a lot of responsibility and sometimes I just want to pull away, but I don’t. I don’t because I know how much that can hurt. Dylan taught me that.
She puts a little space between us so that she can look into my face. Her eyes glisten with worry.
“I saw Chief Tanner today,” she says.
The shock does make me pull away. I pick up Muffin, snuggle her into my chest. “Yeah?”
“He told me about Dylan.”
Everything inside me flares red and Muffin jumps out of my arms and scoots under the table. “Great, Mom. Just what I need. An inquisition. Are you going to ask me how I didn’t know he was gay? I don’t know . . . I just didn’t, okay. I’m obviously stupid.”
“Oh, sweetie,” her arms reach out, but I duck away. “You aren’t stupid.”
“Yeah, right.” I start folding up her newspaper, putting it all back together. The ink rubs off on my fingers. She’s started a Sudoku puzzle, but hasn’t finished it. She’s given up partway.
“It’s normal to be hurting, Belle.”
I glare at her. “I am not hurting!”
I try to stomp by her, but she grabs me by the arm, traps me, pulls me in against her. “Sweetie, it’s okay to hurt.”
I let out some sort of inhuman yell, yank myself free, and storm off into my bedroom like a complete jerk. I throw myself onto my bed, glare at Gabriel waiting for me to play her, and then give up, pull my covers over my head and cry.
She comes into my room later and shuts off the light. She sits on the edge of my bed and smoothes my hair out of my face.
“Belle, I know you’re not really asleep,” she says.
I don’t answer, just keep my eyes shut.
“You know, Eastbrook is a small place, honey, and everybody knows everybody’s business and this whole Dylan thing is probably going to embarrass you for a bit, and hurt for awhile, but people will come around, honey. They won’t hold it against you, and Dylan . . . well, Dylan, they’ll come to accept him and love him again too. Really.”
People like Eddie Caron. I almost laugh.
I open my eyes. My mother’s face is shadowed in the dark of my room. Her breath smells like coffee. I keep my eyes open and wonder how I can love someone so sweet and so incredibly dumb. “People are mean, Mom,” I tell her. “People are really, really mean.”
The words hit her like fists and she tightens up, trying to escape the blows. Then her back solids up, her fingers turn to steel against my cheek. “No they aren’t, Belle. I know how this town helped me out when your daddy died. They’ll come through. I know they will.”
She kisses my forehead and leaves. She doesn’t slam my door, but I think she wants to. I can’t blame her.
I get up, stretch big and long, open my mouth, and think about singing. No sound comes out. My hand flutters up to my throat, grabbing it, like maybe that will some way, somehow make the words emerge into the darkness of my bedroom. Nothing.
My voice has vanished.
I trod over to the window, stub my toe on the nightstand, swear without making a sound since now I am soundless girl. Pulling up the shade, the outside word greets me with white crystals touching my window in patterns, patterns forming and overlapping with spikes and swirls, crystals as sparkling as diamonds. Jack Frost has visited over the night. That’s what my mom would always say back when I was little. She’d pull up the shade, smash open the curtains, and with a smiling voice say, “Wake up, sleepy head. Jack Frost was here!”
“Here?” I’d say and struggle up to sit, knocking over the legions of stuffed animals, but never Teddy, my one-legged bear.
“Here,” she’d say and come kiss the top of my head. “He came last night and he made you a picture.”
Tears make pools in my eyes and my fingers trace the patterns. Why I’m so sad, I don’t know. Jack Frost was here. He made me a picture and I can’t even tell him how beautiful it is. I am soundless.
I can hear my mom singing all the way down the hall. She’s massacring lyrics again. She’s singing that old Carly Simon song, “You’re So Vain.”
“I dreamed there were crowds in my potty, clowns in my potty,” she croons.
The right lyrics are, of course, clouds in my coffee.
I schlump into the kitchen anyway. My mom stops singing, turns around with her sleep hair all crazy in the back, and smiles at me. She’s got ready-made Postum in her hand and looks so sweet, like a movie mom. I smile at her and grab her hand, tugging her toward my bedroom.
“What, honey? What?” she asks me, but she doesn’t resist, just lets me pull her down the hall.
“I want to show you something,” I say, but no words come out.
“You’ve lost your voice?” She stops walking.
I nod and tug her
hand. In my room I point at the window and the patterns of white lace, the images there, the magic.
“Oh,” she says, her voice like a little girl’s. “Jack Frost came.”
She touches the window with the end of her long fingernail. I smile big at her. She smiles back. When she passes my guitar, she plucks the low E-string and the sound of it resonates off the Jack Frost window and around the room.
“You should start playing again,” she says casually, as if it’s nothing important, as if trying to make music isn’t the hardest thing in the world.
Emily picks me up five minutes late. Her hair’s still wet from the shower and cranky plasters her face.
“I overslept,” she says, yawning.
I nod, grab her camera, and snap a picture of her. She gives me the finger.
She backs out of my driveway and my mom waves from the window and then grimaces, because Emily’s little red car has come two inches from smashing over our mailbox. My mom spent the last five minutes pacing, combing her hair, sipping her coffee, pacing some more and pretty much chanting, “She’s late. She’s late. Is that girl ever on time? She’s late. She’s late. You are going to get another tardy.”
Emily shifts into drive or forward or whatever it is that you shift cars into and peels down the road. I close my eyes and try not to imagine my mother’s face. Now, she’ll be praying, Please don’t let them get in an accident. Please don’t let them get killed.
“I finished my applications last night,” Emily says. She yawns again. I catch it and play the yawn back to her. “So, I’m only a week behind you.”
I finished mine last week, signed, sealed, and mailed. Bates. Smith. Cornell. Trinity. A ragtag assortment of schools. Emily’s applying to Duke, Bucknell, Loyola, St. Joe’s. Neither of us is applying to U Maine. Neither of us has a safe school. I figure Smith is my safety, or close enough. I’m proud of Emily for getting it done. She tends to be a late-fee kind of person, the kind of person who leaves her library books in the car for months, because she keeps forgetting to return them, the kind of person the video store calls and leaves threatening messages because she’s had “She’s All That” for three months.