Lemon Lavender Is Not Fine

by Elle Pallmore

  My father is going to have kittens, but that’s only a fraction of the rage I’m barely keeping in check. I want to run clear through the window, pitching myself onto the grass below. I dig my fingernails into my palms to gain some control over my voice.

  “Mom, I don’t want my room redone. I want it back to the way it was.” I pick up the lamp from the floor and plunk it down hard on my desk.

  She crosses her arms, careful not to get paint on herself. “You’ll like it so much more when we’re done.”

  She’s not going to give in, and I’m not going to push her either. I sink to the edge of the box spring, defeated. I’ve already been steamrolled ten times today. From the lemons in my locker and the torturous happiness of girls who received flowers from their boyfriends, to Isabel, who’d expanded her goofy handmade Valentine’s Day cards to include Shannon and Lisa. My shoulders sag. I don’t have any fight left.

  “Where am I supposed to sleep?” I ask.

  As if it’s an afterthought, Mom says, “On the couch, I guess. Or you could clear a place on the floor in here.” She looks over her shoulder. “I have to finish my stencils before the paint dries out.”

  Alone, I slide off the box spring to the somewhat more comfortable carpet. I kick boxes out of my way so I can stretch my legs. I stay like that, with my head resting against a wood plank, until the sun goes down and shadows slide across me. When my father flicks the light switch on two hours later, he surveys the damage but doesn’t comment on my impersonation of a vampire.

  “I have to move your dressers out,” he says. He steps over me and the boxes, then slides one end of the dresser away from the wall. “Come on, Lemon, grab an end. I’m tired, and I want to get this done.”

  What if I stay here, unmoving, forever?

  “Don’t you think you should say something to her?” I ask. “I might not even be able to sleep in here.”

  He presses his fists down on the dresser. “What do you want me to do? Take away the only thing that makes her happy? Besides, I thought you liked this decorating stuff.”

  Since when? I want to ask.

  “She should’ve asked me first, not come in here like a bulldozer.”

  My talking only serves to add more carbon dioxide to the room, because he isn’t going to take my side.

  “Look,” he says, “help her out, and it’ll go fast. You’ll be back in here after a couple days.”

  He pulls me to my feet, giving me no choice. Defeated for a second time, I grab the other end of the dresser. We teeter down the stairs to the soundtrack of Dad’s creative cursing, moving it into the garage before repeating our steps with my desk and mattress.

  After dinner, I spread my homework on the coffee table since my room is uninhabitable. Dad settles into the other end of the couch, where he eventually falls asleep. When he starts to snore, I give up on my homework. I dump my bag near the front door and quietly lace up my sneakers.

  Outside, the sky is clear, the moon a glowing sliver. As I cross the street, I step over a broken bag of chalky candy hearts. They’re as good as any other starting line, so I pick up my feet until I’m running. A minute in, my knees ache against the cold and my ribs are taut with exertion. When I want to stop, I power forward against the scent of lemons stuck in my memory and force oxygen in and out of my crying airway, creating shots of fog with my breath. I sprint hard, as if I can leave my body behind, my personality, my name and all the rumors attached to it. It isn’t until I sway on my feet that I stop to brace my hands on my knees. My body screams, everything protesting until I empty the contents of my stomach into a nearby shrub.

  Exhausted, devoid of feeling, I walk home. A hot shower coaxes blood into my hands and feet. I’m too tired to clear the boxes on my bedroom floor, so I drag my pillow and quilt down the hall to Meg’s room. I curl up on top of her perfectly made bed and wait for sleep to come. It’s the only place I can forget who I am.

  twenty-three

  THE NEXT WEEK, JUST before gym, Hawkins calls me down to his office to talk about skipping homeroom the day of the lemon incident. I thought he’d give me a detention slip and that would be it, but when he leans back in his chair, anxiety peaks like an incoming tide. These meetings never end well for me.

  He tents his fingers, and my eyes drift to the whale poster. Still crooked. Still want to punch it.

  “Miss Lavender, we’ve seen quite a bit of each other this year. I like to get to know all the students, of course, but when I know you, it means you’re doing something wrong. I thought we cleared up the lateness issue.”

  “We did. It’s been months since I missed homeroom.”

  “That’s true, but it makes me wonder if there’s something else going on. Something else I can help you with.”

  “Nothing’s wrong. I’m fine.”

  “Is there anything that’s . . . happened lately?” His eyebrows push upward as he studies me. I’m so tired of being analyzed.

  “Do you think there’s something wrong?” I ask. Two can play at this game.

  He smiles and twiddles with a gold pen. “Some of your teachers mentioned you might be having trouble with your classmates.”

  “Really?”

  “You seem surprised by this. You disagree?”

  “Everything’s fine.”

  He leans forward, resting his elbows on the desk. “So your locker wasn’t vandalized recently?”

  “I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”

  He sets his pen down and sighs. “Miss Lavender . . . Lemon. This isn’t an interrogation.”

  It’s definitely an interrogation. I don’t respond.

  “I can’t help you if you won’t help me. And I think some of the things I’ve been hearing about warrant an honest chat. I know it can be difficult to own up to making poor choices, but I always say, you can’t truly see yourself if you never look in the mirror.”

  Instantly, my defenses shoot up. “I didn’t do anything wrong,” I blurt. I want to give in and tell him all of it, but it’s useless. Even if he believes me, there isn’t anything he can do. Ultimately, I don’t know who is responsible for the lemon incident.

  “I didn’t accuse you, Miss Lavender. I’m trying to understand why someone would vandalize your locker. You were targeted, obviously, and I’d like to understand why.”

  As if my insides are rigged with thousands of rubber bands about to trip, I go rigid. I have to shut this down. If he calls Dad, interrupting the fragile balance we’ve engineered lately with spit and glue, it’ll all fall apart. We’ll go back to the way things were before, when we could barely exist in the same room together. And Mom . . . she’s so unpredictable. I don’t know how she’ll react if I get in trouble.

  I swallow hard and try to find my convincing voice. “I never said my locker was vandalized. There’s nothing to tell.”

  Hawkins begins tapping his pen again. One of the buttons on his cuff hangs loose and bounces in unison.

  “If you’re sure,” he replies. His eyes lock on mine, like he’s attempting mind control.

  “Nope. Nothing.”

  He exhales his disappointment. “Well, if you say there’s nothing, then I have no choice but to believe you.” After another moment of paper shuffling and signing my detention slip, he says, “I hope you’ll come to me if you do think of anything.”

  He holds the paper out, and I take it, but he doesn’t let go. He knows I’m lying about everything.

  “Sure,” I say, and he finally releases the slip.

  After leaving his office, I’m supposed to go straight to gym class, but I decide to make the most of my hall pass and hide in the bathroom for the last ten minutes. When the bell rings, I meet up with Isabel so we can walk to lunch together. When we get to our table, Shannon and Lisa are in the lunch line, so I quickly update her on my meeting with Hawkins, and how I admitted nothing about the lemon incident.

  Isabel flicks her soda tab back and forth until it snaps off. “Everyone was talking about it, so I’m
not surprised he found out.”

  “Who’s everyone?”

  She tilts her head, as if weighing how much to tell me. “Just people. But you know that. And you know it was on Lady W. too.”

  I push my lunch away. “What are they saying?”

  “Nothing in particular. Just that it happened.”

  “Seriously, Iz, can you get a little more specific?”

  She throws open the zipper on her bag and wrenches out a notebook. “I thought you were watching the videos.”

  “I stopped. I turned off my phone.” Not that she’s noticed, apparently. I wonder when the last time she texted me was.

  She flips a notebook page, reading. “I have this chem quiz today, and I swear I know none of this.”

  I scan the lunch line, finding Shannon and Lisa at the register, paying. They’ll be back soon.

  “Isabel . . . do you know who did it? You hear things . . . from Mike, and other people too.”

  “If you want to know if Graham was involved, then just ask me, okay?”

  I pick up her broken soda tab and press it on the pad of my thumb. The tension between us hovers like a helicopter. The chopping blades are too loud and dangerously close.

  “Was he part of it?” I finally ask, not sure I want the answer.

  “Why would you think that?”

  “Because . . . ” I don’t know how to finish. “Because he’s dating Chelsea, or at least he was with her . . . and he’s also best friends with Rob, who is doing a really good impersonation of a mean girl.”

  “Graham wasn’t in on it. He’s not like that.”

  I watch Shannon and Lisa cut through the tables, balancing their lunch trays. I don’t want them picking up on the strain between me and Isabel. I change the subject, sort of.

  “Hawkins kept insinuating it was my fault.” I pause. “Which is crazy, right?”

  “Crazy,” she replies, clicking her pen and writing something in the margin of her notes.

  I plant my hand over her page, forcing her to look at me. Ever since I tried—and failed—to talk to Graham, she’s been ambivalent toward me. I told her what happened, about Chelsea, but she didn’t have much of a response.

  “Isabel, did I do something wrong—or more wrong than usual?”

  She yawns and pushes my hand off her page. “Why do you think that?”

  It’s like being interrogated all over again, as if Isabel is trying to tell me something without getting to the point. “Maybe it’s just me. Maybe it’s because everyone else hates me that I think you do too.”

  “Everyone doesn't hate you. They’re just talking about you. It isn’t the same thing.”

  I can’t understand her. In the past, she’d raise her fist at the injustice, and now, she’s blaming me, or at least insisting that my perception of the situation is wrong.

  “That’s a pretty small distinction. You should try my life sometime and see if you think there’s a difference.”

  She clicks her tongue. “I can’t seem to say the right thing, so let’s just drop it.”

  Shannon and Lisa appear, interrupting us. Lisa’s Coke can hisses when she opens it. As usual, they command the conversation, and Isabel shuts the lid on her notebook and jumps into their banter, as if we weren’t in the middle of something. As if she no longer needs to study.

  While the discussion swings in different directions, I play with my food and sigh a lot. Isabel peppers me with looks, but I won’t glance back. I’m tired of being a target too, but she doesn’t have to act like I’m annoying her to death.

  After a while, even Shannon and Lisa can’t maintain the conversation amidst our obvious friction. Isabel picks at the wire bracelets she’s started wearing while Shannon plays a game on her phone. Lisa leans over and watches. I’m about to leave when a wedge of lemon sails onto our table and lands with a dull thud next to Shannon’s hand. She shrieks, then leans in for a closer inspection. It’s smashed, the seeds leaking onto the table.

  “Uh, I think that was meant for you,” she says, as if I didn’t already know. She glances around, eyes like an owl.

  “Ignore it,” Isabel snaps as another rind plops from the sky onto Lisa’s French book.

  “Ew!” she shouts. She brushes it away with a napkin, as if it were a dead mouse.

  I watch, but it does little to stir up any sensation. I wonder when I became so devoid of feeling. Maybe, day by day, I’ve been stripped open and my insides scooped out. All that remains is an empty, apathetic husk.

  “Whoever it is,” I say, “they have bad aim.”

  Isabel nudges me under the table with her foot. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “Nothing,” I lie. “Just used to it by now.”

  “Well, I’m not,” Lisa squeaks.

  Both she and Shannon are spooked. They turn in their chairs, waiting to be pelted with another flying lemon wedge. A warped sense of pride slides into place; they wouldn’t last a second as me. They look at each other, then at Isabel.

  “Come on,” Shannon huffs. “Let’s hang out in the lab until the bell.”

  I get the impression I’m not invited, so that means they’re going to abandon me. I turn to Isabel. The three of us stare at her, waiting to see who she chooses.

  “We can’t just leave her here,” she says to them.

  Relieved, I dart my eyes back.

  Lisa hugs her French book to her chest. “Maybe this is a good time to talk about what we mentioned the other day.” Isabel shoots her a look that could blister skin, but Lisa directs her attention to me. “We think it might be better if you eat lunch somewhere else.”

  I snort. Actually snort for the first time in my life. This is my table, the one Isabel and I sat at before they even existed to me. It’s one thing for me to volunteer to leave, but entirely another to be booted out by someone I don’t even like.

  “Are you kidding me right now?”

  “What would you suggest as an alternative, Lemon? Maybe you’re okay with being harassed, but I’m not.” Lisa gathers her tray. “We’ll let you guys figure it out. Come on, Shan.”

  The two of them leave just as another lemon wedge hits my knee and drops to the floor. I rub the wet spot on my jeans.

  Isabel sits up straight, alert. “This is getting out of hand, Lem.”

  “Did you really talk to them about me leaving the table?”

  She twists the end of her hair into a rope. “I don’t blame them for how they feel. They have nothing to do with this.”

  “I can’t believe you didn’t defend me.”

  “Please don’t put me in the middle.”

  “The middle? There is no middle! You’re clearly on their side. First Graham, now them. You said you’d always be on my side, but every time, you pick someone else over me.”

  Her mouth purses as her chin juts forward. In a whisper like gravel, she says, “You know what, this is bullshit. I’ve stuck by you from the beginning. Calling you, texting you, inviting you out. I stood by you when Chelsea was on the warpath. I’ve been there through every video. And I told you to talk to Graham and sort things out. I’m even sitting here now, getting rained on in fucking lemons, but I can’t win with you. And I’m really tired of trying.”

  She gathers her lunch before standing up and dragging her messenger bag over her shoulder. I resist the urge to grab her wrist and beg her not to leave me alone. I also don’t want to show how much I need her.

  “What do you mean you can’t win with me?”

  “You won’t help yourself. For the last few months, you’ve done nothing but blame everyone else. Madeline and Chelsea might be the villains here, but this isn’t about them or what they do or why they do it. You can spend a lifetime thinking about it and never get an answer. And I’m not saying it’s your fault this is happening either, but since it is happening, maybe you should do something about it.”

  “What? What am I supposed to do, Isabel? I tried to talk to Graham, and he was with her, which made everything worse. What am I
supposed to do?” I repeat.

  She angles her body to leave. “Before now, I would’ve said to accept friendship wherever it came from, because those are the people that will carry you through. But now, I don’t have anything to say. I can’t keep trying to help you when you won’t help yourself.”

  With that, she whips around, leaving me alone with the withered, oozing lemons.

  FOR THE REST OF THE day, I alternate between feeling angry at Isabel and trying to see her side. I know I’m not easy to be around these days, if lunch is any indication, yet she didn’t abandon me when everyone else started saying I was a Graham-obsessed psycho. But today also shows she doesn’t feel like dealing with me anymore. She wants me to fight back, but how am I supposed to do that when I don’t have any control over what’s said about me? I can’t challenge Chelsea to a duel or threaten Madeline to stop spreading lies. I can’t alter the opinion of the entire school, even though Isabel seems to think I can.

  She’s changed in the past few weeks, or maybe she’s been changing for longer than that, and I simply didn’t notice. She went from wanting to be fearless to actually being that way before I could get used to it. She has more friends now, goes places without me. It’s not that she’s hiding it, or that she doesn’t invite me to join her and Shannon and Lisa. But that’s also the reason she can push me aside—she has other girls to hang out with now. Girls who can actually leave the house, who don’t have to keep one eye behind them at all times.

  I’m no closer to an answer by the end of the day, but as I pass the main hallway, I see her gathering her coat from her locker. A pang hits my heart—we said we’d be there for each other, no matter what. Last time, it was a fight, but this is more. She’s made a conscious decision to put distance between us, and I know she won’t come to me this time. An immediate swell of panic forces a decision. I have to fix this before she’s completely gone—she means too much to me to let go.