At Risk

by Alice Hoffman

  “You look great,” Jessie says. “Your dress looks fantastic.”

  Amanda smiles, but when they get to the door she feels scared. Scared she might throw up or something worse. She hesitates, until Jessie says, “If anyone says anything mean to you. I’ll hit them.”

  Amanda laughs at that, especially because Jessie is so small. It’s strange, but even when she laughs she feels something hot behind her eyes. Sometimes she holds her breath and tries to imagine what it’s like to be dead. How would it be to leave her body behind? She has never believed in heaven, but now she wonders. Sleep, white clouds, wings. Could she actually believe in that? No, she does not. It’s easier to think about becoming one with the earth. She could believe that; out of her body will come grass, roses, black-eyed Susans. She could almost believe that, if it weren’t happening to her.

  “Don’t look behind you,” Jessie Eagan says in the hallway.

  Amanda peeks over her shoulder and sees a boy in their grade. Keith Davies.

  “He’s staring at you!” Jessie whispers loudly, excited.

  “No he’s not,” Amanda says, but when she looks he is staring at her. He’s dopey-looking, but sort of cute, too.

  “Sixth grade is the best grade ever,” Jessie says.

  “Yeah,” Amanda agrees. “Are you ready?”

  “Ready,” Jessie says, although as they walk into their class room, they momentarily forget that they are sixth-graders and hold hands.

  At two forty-five, Amanda and Jessie head over to the gym, their identical pink gym bags slung over their shoulders.

  “Oh, no, not Charlie,” Jessie says dramatically when they see him, standing in front of the gym.

  Amanda is puzzled when Charlie doesn’t have a fast come-back. He can usually create a nasty pun on Jessie’s name in no time flat. Amanda herself is in good spirits, no one said anything awful to her, and her teacher, who Amanda thinks is too pretty and young to be a teacher, called her aside and told her that it was a pleasure to have her in class and that if she missed any time her work could he sent home to be made up. Amanda doesn’t intend to miss any time. She’s a little nervous about gymnastics practice, and she hopes the aching in her legs won’t mess her up and push her way back in the rankings.

  “Well, what is it?” she says to Charlie. She doesn’t actually want to be seen talking to a third-grader. Charlie shrugs, so Amanda turns to Jessie and says, “I’ll meet you in the locker room.”

  “All right,” Jessie says, going on ahead, “but my dad’s going to let you have it if you’re late.”

  “What’s wrong?” Amanda asks Charlie.

  Charlie shrugs again. He has a creepy feeling in his stomach.

  “Come on,” Amanda says. She can hear the coach setting up in the gym. The exercise mats hit the floor, then whoosh as they’re rolled out flat.

  “Sevrin’s not in school,” Charlie says.

  “So what?” Amanda says. “Call him and see if he’s okay.”

  “He’s never home when I call,” Charlie says.

  Amanda feels in her gym bag to make certain she hasn’t forgotten her tape. She hopes the coach doesn’t give her a hard time about Madonna the way he sometimes does when someone wants to set her routine to rock-and-roll.

  “Well, just go on over to his house then,” Amanda tells Charlie.

  Charlie looks at her and blinks. He should have thought of that.

  “Yeah,” he says.

  “Try using your brain once in a while,” Amanda says. Then she runs off to the locker room. As she’s hurrying, she realizes two girls from the team, Sue Sherman and Evelyn Crowley, are staring at her. Amanda faces away and quickly pulls on her leotard. She wishes she were wearing a bra, but her mother thinks she’s too young.

  “They know you’re the one to beat,” Jessie Eagan says as she comes up beside Amanda.

  Amanda nods and clips her hair up with a silver barrette. She had not thought about other people looking at her as if she were sick and she feels self-conscious as she walks into the gym with Jessie. She goes to the barre and does some warm-up stretches; because she hasn’t practiced as much as she should have, her ligaments feel unusually tight. As she warms up, the coach starts yelling at some new girls, who are only fourth-graders, to take off their necklaces and charm bracelets.

  “What do you think this is?” Jack Eagan shouts. “A fashion show?”

  Amanda knows he has come up behind her and is watching her, so she bends even deeper. She’s waiting for him to shout at her, but he doesn’t. He could kick her off the team if he wanted to, because of her illness. She has been thinking all summer about the meet next June, because it would help rank her in junior high. For a while she thought she wanted to be ranked first in her school so she could put it in her letter to Bela Karolyi when she wrote to him to beg him to take her on as his student. She has stopped thinking about trying to get Bela to be her coach, she has stopped thinking about junior high school. She wants to win the meet at the end of the term just to win it. When Amanda can’t take being stared at any longer, she turns around and faces the coach.

  “What am I doing wrong?” she says.

  Caught off guard, Jack Eagan laughs. “You must think I’m pretty mean,” he says, and when Amanda doesn’t answer, he laughs again. He leans against the walls and nods to the uneven parallel bars. “That’s the most dangerous piece of equipment in the gym.”

  He looks at Amanda from the corner of his eye. There have been moments when he’s wished that Amanda were his daughter instead of Jessie. Not that he doesn’t love Jessie, he does, but Amanda is a champion. It’s not just that she’s good, it’s that she wants to win. Badly. Enough to give the sport her all; when she’s here, she’s in this gym and nowhere else. He’s heard about this AIDS problem from Jessie, but even if the girls weren’t best friends, he’d know by now. Schools are like that, information fans out quickly. Besides, his wife, Louise, has gotten a call from some group of protesters, although Jack Eagan can’t quite see what there is to protest about.

  “The thing is this,” he says, uncomfortable, “if you’re weak or you don’t feel good, I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “You must think I’m really stupid,” Amanda says.

  She has never talked to the coach this way before. In fact, she’s afraid of him. She avoids him when she’s at Jessie’s because he yells almost as much at home as he does in the gym. Jessie and Amanda have both wondered if he just can’t talk in a normal voice anymore.

  “I didn’t say you were stupid,” Jack Eagan says. He’s watching a new girl, being spotted on the balance beam. “You’re a champion. Champions don’t let themselves feel pain. That’s why I’m worried.”

  Amanda looks at him hard. Her mouth is dry. In the past he has criticized her when she’s messed up, but she knows she’s doing a good job only when he doesn’t comment at all. He has never actually said anything positive.

  “Are you just being nice to me because you feel sorry for me?” Amanda says hotly.

  “You know I’m not nice,” Jack Eagan says.

  He wonders if she would have given up gymnastics. She might have grown too heavy or too tall, she might have decided to spend her time thinking about boys and schoolwork, might have grown tired of blisters on her hands and black-and-blue marks on her thighs. She might have grown up and left this all behind, anyway.

  “Thought much about your floor exercise?” he asks.

  He knows he should be out on the floor, giving his usual lecture, scaring all the new girls so they’ll be at practice on time. He’s been accused of favoring the good gymnasts, Amanda in particular, and why the hell shouldn’t he?

  Amanda reaches into her gym bag and pulls out her Madonna tape. Jack Eagan squints to get a closer look. He cannot remember the last time he cried. He can’t remember the last time he told his daughter he loved her.

  “Oh, no!” he bellows now, so that the other girls on the floor all turn to them. “Not Madonna!”

  Mos
t of the girls in the gym start to giggle, and Amanda grins when Jack Eagan pretends to tear out what’s left of his hair. Even Jessie, who’s seen her father go through this routine a thousand times before, starts laughing.

  “Anything but Madonna!” Jack Eagan shouts, as the team gathers around to examine Amanda’s tape, making it possible for Jack to ask Amanda to go through her floor exercise first, without having anyone accuse him of favoritism.

  Charlie has already begun to bicycle over to Sevrin’s. He takes the shortcut, through the woods. It still feels like summer, the air is heavy and warm and the scent of damp earth is strong, but it’s an illusion. Some of the maples are already turning red. The oaks and locusts seem faintly yellow wherever sunlight touches their leaves. People come to Morrow from Boston and New York at this time of year to watch the migration of geese. That’s how Charlie knows when summer’s really over, when the marshes are thick with geese and their bonking reverberates through backyards early in the morning and at dusk.

  When he gets to Sevrin’s, Charlie gets off his bike, but he doesn’t go up to the house. He has raced all the way and his face is hot. He sets the bike down near a quince bush and waits, although he’s not certain what he’s waiting for. He just can’t walk up to the door and ring the bell. He feels stupid, and he gets down on his haunches to keep his presence from being too obvious. Betsy’s car is in the driveway so Charlie knows that at least someone’s home. He thinks he can see Sevrin’s bike, out behind the garage.

  Sevrin finally comes out. From where Charlie is crouched, Sevrin looks small as he lets Felix follow him out. He turns and says something to someone through the screen door, probably his mother, who is still inside. Charlie doesn’t call out, but he stands up beside the quince. He feels a certain amount of relief. At least Sevrin hasn’t been sent away to prison or military school. At least he hasn’t gotten some incurable disease.

  Sevrin goes around to the backyard and Charlie has to squint to see him. Sevrin whistles for the golden retriever, but Felix has picked up Charlie’s scent and he ignores his owner.

  “Over here, Felix!” Sevrin shouts.

  Charlie doesn’t know why he feels so bad, why there is a lump in his throat.

  Felix races toward Charlie, and Sevrin stands with one hand shading his eyes, trying to make out what it is Felix is after. Felix doesn’t only wag his tail, he wags his whole body. As soon as he recognizes Charlie, he jumps up and knocks Charlie backward on his heels. Charlie laughs and pushes the dog away. Sevrin has run over and he laughs when he sees Charlie struggling with Felix.

  “Get your dog off me,” Charlie says.

  Sevrin reaches and grabs the still-wagging Felix by his collar.

  “Where’ve you been?” Charlie asks as he stands up. “Vacation?”

  “I haven’t been anywhere,” Sevrin says. He’s holding the dog by the collar and he looks weird. Now Charlie understands why his father complains when someone doesn’t look him in the eye.

  “I’m in a different school,” Sevrin says.

  “Oh, yeah?” Charlie says carefully.

  “Actually, it’s pretty neat,” Sevrin says. “My cousins go there and my aunt is on the board, that’s how they got me in.”

  “Prep school?” Charlie is becoming more and more uneasy.

  “Private school,” Sevrin clarifies. “My dad drops me off in Cambridge on his way downtown. After this week, I won’t get home till after seven.”

  “You don’t have to go on weekends, do you?” Charlie asks.

  “It’s not a prison, idiot,” Sevrin says. “I might get to play on the junior soccer team.”

  “We can get together on Saturdays,” Charlie says, relieved.

  Sevrin still isn’t looking at him. He lets go of the dog’s collar and Felix trots off to a neighbor’s yard.

  “My mom doesn’t want me to,” Sevrin says unhappily.

  “Doesn’t want you to what?” Charlie says, confused.

  “I can’t be friends with you because of Amanda,” Sevrin says.

  “What did she do?” Charlie asks, more confused than ever.

  “It’s because she’s sick,” Sevrin says.

  Charlie stares at his friend. “That’s crazy,” he says finally.

  “My mother’s afraid I’ll get it,” Sevrin says.

  “That’s scientifically ridiculous,” Charlie says. “Where’s her data that confirms that? Didn’t you tell her you can’t get it?”

  Sevrin’s still not looking at him.

  “Some scientist,” Charlie says, disgusted. He can feel his throat get tight, but he’s not about to cry.

  “My mom is really upset about this,” Sevrin says. “She’s not kidding on this one. She won’t take no for an answer.”

  “Sure,” Charlie says. He walks away and gets his bike.

  “I’ll give you half the newts if you want them,” Sevrin says.

  “No thanks,” Charlie says.

  He and Sevrin were born in the same month, February, and ever since they were three they’ve had their parties together. They’ve been planning a dinosaur party for this year; they’ve already ordered rubber claws and fangs from a mail-order catalogue.

  “Good luck making the soccer team,” Charlie says.

  He knows that Sevrin’s crying, but he doesn’t care. He’s thinking about the ride home; if you time it just right and take the bump on Ash Street at full speed your bike will go right up in the air and fly over the curb. He’s a little too old for birthday parties now anyway. They’re stupid. They’re for kids. They’re something he’s not even going to think about anymore.

  EIGHT

  SOMETIMES, IN THE EVENINGS, Laurel Smith rides past their house. She doesn’t want anyone in the neighborhood to hear her, so she takes her bike, an old green Ross that once belonged to her ex-husband. The bike doesn’t have a headlight; she has to pedal through the blackness of the marsh road, carefully avoiding the pitch that leads down to the steep drainage ditches filled with rainwater. In the spring the ditches are a breeding ground for dragonflies; they hover above the still water, lining the road with a shimmering band of blue. The dragonflies are gone now, but there are other things still alive in the woods. Whenever a bike goes by there’s a frantic beating of wings, branches break as deer run away.

  Laurel does not know what all the children in town know; there is a shortcut, a dirt path through the pines, which allows them to ride their bikes from the marsh to the outskirts of town without having to pass the graveyard. The children have been taking this shortcut for so long most of them don’t even remember why they avoid this stretch of road. Some of them still get the chills just before they make the turn off into the woods.

  There is a sharp curve just before the graveyard, a place where the pines are especially tall; in bad weather the place is like a wind tunnel. Laurel always races her bike at this turn in the road, especially when there’s a moon and she can see the iron fence in the middle of the woods. She wonders about that fence, whether it’s meant to keep people out, or in.

  It is dusk when Laurel stops, suddenly, as though she’d been pushed off her bike. The fence around the cemetery has turned green, and even from a distance it gives out a peculiar mossy odor, a mixture of rust and tears. There are not more than thirty headstones, and several of them have been cracked. Angels have been split in half, rain has worn away the features of little stone lambs and made them blind. There is a new cemetery on the other side of Route 16, so no one has been buried here for two hundred years, no one is remembered. It’s a place where grass can’t grow, where mockingbirds and crows nest in the boughs of the trees; they have plucked out so many of their feathers that in one or two of the hollows the earth looks black.

  “I’ve got to get out of here,” Laurel says out loud. Her head churns like a caldron, but she stands where she is, beside her bike. She waits for the dead, but they don’t come out to greet her. They don’t even whisper. Two inky feathers fall from the sky. “Say something,” Laurel Sm
ith commands, but the silence goes on, broken only by twigs cracking and wind. Laurel touches the tip of one of the iron brackets of the gate; it is sharp, it could easily cut her finger.

  Darkness has fallen by the time Laurel gets back on the road, and when she finally turns onto Chestnut Street, she’s certain she won’t be noticed. After the blackness of the road and the woods, she’s always shocked to see the white houses on this street, the globes of light behind the windows, the tubs of obry santhemums beside the front doors. Laurel rests her bike on the grass across the street; she can see into their kitchen window from here. Sometimes she sees them all at dinner, she can smell vegetable soup and broiled chops when the wind is right. She’s checked some of the other houses on Chestnut, peered into other kitchens and living rooms. She feels giddy when she does this; she balances on the edge of window wells like a cat on a ledge. Sometimes she thinks the Farrells are just like anybody else, and it makes her feel good. She believes she knows what’s going on at their table, in their beds, just because she sees them through their window, but she has no way of knowing that Amanda can barely eat and that her lack of appetite seems catching, for half of the food Polly cooks is scraped into the trash. She has never imagined that as soon as dinner is gotten through, Charlie escapes to the basement like a turtle into his shell; that Polly and Ivan can no longer kiss, that their lips seem broken and their tongues don’t work; that Amanda can no longer swallow the vitamins her father gives her. She saves them in her cheek and when no one’s looking spits them out, her head leaning far into the toilet.

  Dinner is over and there are plates of chocolate cake on the table. Tonight the scent of coffee wafts across the street. Charlie has taken his cake downstairs and is feeding crumbs to his hamsters. He can hear his sister in the kitchen as she stomps her feet on the floor, he can feel her fury through the floorboards, as it moves through the pipes and the heat registers in a hot, cloudy swirl. It’s not fair. That’s what everybody thinks. That’s what everybody keeps saying. Tomorrow night there is a birthday party, a sleepover, and everybody is going, but Amanda is not allowed. She has already gone to the mall with Jessie and Mrs. Eagan and bought a birthday present, six colorful plastic headbands and six matching bangle bracelets.