Rules for Being a Girl

by Candace Bushnell

  Bex just shrugs. “If you need to make it up, we can talk about extra credit.”

  Something about his attitude has the skin on the back of my neck prickling unpleasantly. This isn’t about the essay. This feels personal.

  “What is this really about?” I say.

  “Excuse me?” Bex’s eyebrows almost crawl off his face entirely.

  “I don’t deserve this grade. I just . . . I don’t.”

  We both just stare at each other for a minute until Bex blows a breath out.

  “What’s up with you, huh?” he asks me, leaning back against his desk and scrubbing a hand through the hair at the back of his neck; for a moment he’s the same Bex I recognize, whose class was my favorite part of the day.

  That stops me. “What?”

  “You’ve been a really tough crowd lately. With the reading list and your attitude in class . . . And you know, I didn’t want to say this about your essays in the Beacon, but honestly . . .” He trails off.

  I frown. “Honestly what?”

  His eyes narrow. “I thought you said everything was cool.”

  I take a step back. “If everything was cool, would I not be getting a D on this paper?”

  The words are out before I can think better of them. For a moment they hang there between us like a dare. Finally Bex presses his lips together, a muscle twitching once in his jaw.

  “Easy, Marin,” he says, and his voice is all warning. “I’m your teacher.”

  “Yeah,” I say, shoving my useless paper into my backpack, turning around, and heading for the door. “I know.”

  I don’t mention the paper to my parents. I don’t know what stops me, exactly; I can’t figure out who I’m protecting—me or Bex. It’s my turn to clear the table after dinner that night, and I hold the plates distractedly under the faucet to rinse them, wondering if I made the smart move confronting him. Just once I’d like to be sure I was doing the right thing.

  I stick the leftover cheese and sour cream back in the refrigerator—my dad made tacos tonight, Gracie loading hers up with enough jalapeños to have my eyes watering clear across the table—and wipe the counters with a slightly-grungy yellow sponge. My mom comes up behind me as I’m finishing up, resting her chin on my shoulder and wrapping her arms around my waist.

  “Oh, hi there, daughter of mine,” she says, squeezing gently. “I’m proud as hell of you, you know that?”

  I glance at her out of the corner of my eye. I don’t know how she senses when I need the extra encouragement. “Thanks.”

  “I mean it,” she says, planting a kiss against my cheek before straightening up again. She gives the counter a perfunctory wipe with a dish towel, then glances at the clock on the stove. “Grey’s Anatomy doesn’t start for twenty minutes,” she says thoughtfully. “You think that’s enough time to run to Seven-Eleven for ice cream and get back?”

  I consider it. “If we speed,” I conclude after a moment.

  My mom nods, scooping her keys off the hook near the doorway. “Let’s go.”

  Nineteen

  Gray takes me skating at the Frog Pond on Boston Common on Friday night, his big hand warm against my chilly one as we weave our way through the crowded rink. Little kids in hockey skates whiz past clusters of college students in fur-collared parkas while Ariana Grande blasts over the speakers; a giant Christmas tree winks with colored lights.

  Once the session ends we get hot chocolates in a tiny coffee shop overlooking the park, all Edison bulbs and basket-weave tile, a heavy velvet curtain hung across the doorway to keep out the chill. Gray folds his bulky body basically in half to sit in a wobbly chair by the window, his knees bumping the mosaic tabletop, which isn’t much bigger than a dinner plate.

  “You okay over there?” I ask with a laugh, grabbing my mug before its contents go sloshing over the sides.

  “Oh, I’m great,” he says, and I think he’s joking around until I glance up and catch how he’s looking at me, his gaze calm and steady. My whole body gets warm.

  “Well,” I say, taking a sip of my cocoa to hide my blush. I never felt like this with Jacob, like my actual bones were glowing deep inside my body just from being near him. “Good.”

  Gray breaks a massive snickerdoodle into two pieces, handing me half. “My moms make these every Christmas,” he tells me. “They have this whole baking day they do—they both have a bunch of sisters, so my aunts and all my girl cousins come over and make like a million different kinds.”

  “And you taste test?” I joke.

  Gray snorts. “You think my moms would let me get away with sitting on my ass while a bunch of womenfolk make me food?” he asks with a laugh. “I do my fair share. I’ll have you know I’m an excellent measurer.”

  “I don’t doubt that,” I say with a smile. “So you have a big family?”

  “Huge,” Gray says, finishing his cookie in two bites. “Like, twenty-two first cousins. And some of them have kids now too. It’s a zoo.”

  “That sounds nice,” I tell him, using a teaspoon to scoop a mound of whipped cream out of my hot chocolate before it can sink to the bottom of the mug. “It’s always just been Gracie and me and our parents. It’s part of why we’re so close to our gram.”

  “Oh yeah?” Gray looks interested. “Is she cool?”

  “She’s the best,” I say immediately, leaving out the part where she’s not always reliably herself these days. “And I actually just found out she’s got this whole secret Riot Grrrl past I never knew about.”

  “That’s awesome,” Gray says with a grin.

  We sit in the coffee shop for a long time, until the crowd thins out and it’s just us and a glamorous-looking middle-aged woman nursing an espresso, and still I’m in no hurry to get home. Gray’s a good question asker, full of self-deprecating stories about being the only guy in a family full of ladies; he’s got a sister named Alice who’s studying political science in Chicago.

  “You guys will like each other,” he says, totally confident, and I can’t help but smile at his use of the future tense.

  Finally the baristas start wiping down the tables in a way that feels like a hint. We head out and make our way down Charles Street, our footsteps echoing on the cobblestones. Laughter spills out the doors of the bars. It should feel festive—Christmas break is only a few days away, and there are fairy lights and garlands strung up over the empty street—but out here in the cold and the dark I can feel the cloud of dread that’s been following me around lately come sulking back. I’d forgotten about yesterday’s conversation with Bex while Gray and I were hanging out—I’d forgotten about all of it, actually—but forgetting only works for so long. This whole thing is still a baffling, humiliating mess. God, what am I going to do?

  Gray can tell something’s up: he’s been rambling cheerfully on, holding up the conversation for both of us, but as we tap our cards at the entrance to the brightly lit T station he pauses.

  “Everything okay?” he asks, his cheeks gone pink from the cold. “It feels kind of like you just . . . went somewhere.”

  I shake my head. “It’s nothing,” I promise as we take the escalator to the elevated train platform, the dark expanse of the Charles River visible in the distance. The giant neon Citgo sign glows white and orange and blue. “It’s dumb.”

  “It’s nothing, or it’s dumb?”

  I hesitate. “Both?” I try, glancing down the track for any sign of the train, even though the arrival board on the platform says we’ve got ten minutes to wait. “Neither?” I sigh, my breath just visible. “I don’t know.”

  Gray nods, tucking his hands into his coat pockets. “You don’t have to tell me jack shit, obviously,” he says, rocking back on the heels of his boots. “But like, just FYI, you can if you want to. I get that this might come as a shock to you, but I’m actually a pretty good listener.”

  I snort, I can’t help it. “You do realize that people who self-identify as good listeners are never actually good listeners, don’t you?”
<
br />   “Oh, really?” Gray shoots back, all mischief. “Did you come up with that theory while I was telling you my life story just now and you were like, reorganizing your sock drawer in your mind?”

  “Rude!” I protest, elbowing him in the bicep. I tip my head back, look at the sky.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Gray says, dimples flashing. Then he shakes his head.

  “Marin,” he says, quiet enough that nobody else on the platform can hear him. “Try me.”

  I sigh, and then I just . . . tell him. I tell him everything—about Bex and about how Chloe has been so busy it feels sometimes like she’s avoiding me and about lying to my parents and about the paper and the creeping feeling that somehow all of this is my fault.

  “I don’t want to get anybody in trouble,” I finish finally, shivering a little inside my peacoat. “But I also feel like ignoring it hasn’t made it go away so far.”

  Gray’s quiet for a long time when I’m finished. Then he shakes his head. “Holy shit, Marin,” he says, and I’m surprised by how angry he sounds. “That dude is a total dick.”

  I bark a laugh, so loud and surprising that a woman looks at us curiously from the other side of the platform. All at once I realize it’s what I was expecting Chloe to say when I told her. What I kind of needed for Chloe to say.

  “Yeah,” I reply, swallowing down that now-familiar tightness in my throat, that feeling of trying to keep it together. “I guess he kind of is.”

  “Not kind of,” Gray says decisively. “A hundred percent.”

  I glance down at my boots on the concrete. “Do you think I should tell somebody?”

  Gray thinks about that one for a moment. “I have no idea,” he finally says, and he sounds very honest. “I think this is probably one of those times where my mom would say you have to decide what you can live with, which is seriously one of my least favorite mom-isms because it means there’s no right answer.” He shrugs. “But I can tell you I’ll have your back no matter what you decide.”

  The train comes rumbling into the station then, fast and noisy. Gray reaches out and takes my hand.

  Twenty

  I make an appointment to see Mr. DioGuardi during my free period on the Monday before Christmas break, perching on the very edge of his fake-leather visitor’s chair and tucking my hands under my thighs to keep them from shaking. It’s a small office, cluttered: the desk is heaped with file folders. A potted plant droops on the windowsill. There’s a photo of Mr. DioGuardi’s kids on the bookshelf, two college-aged guys with red hair and freckles clowning around at a campsite. A part of me can’t help but wish he had a daughter too.

  “Just, ah, give me one more second here,” he says vaguely, holding up a finger and squinting at his computer screen; judging by the beeps and honks the thing has let out in the six minutes I’ve been sitting here, he’s either attempting to hack into a government database or trying unsuccessfully to send an email attachment.

  “Take your time,” I say, though the truth is the longer he keeps me waiting the more I feel like I’m about to jump clear out of my skin and take off down the hallway, shedding muscle and viscera in my wake. I breathe in and force myself not to fidget. Calm and quick, I remind myself.

  Finally Mr. DioGuardi folds his hands on top of his keyboard, frowning and jerking back as he hits the space bar by mistake. The computer dings in protest, and I bite the inside of my cheek to hold back a nervous giggle.

  “So,” he says. “Marin. What can I do for you?”

  I take a deep breath. “Well—”

  “I’ve been reading your editorials in the paper, by the way,” he tells me, raising his eyebrows in a way that I’m not sure how to interpret, exactly. “I hadn’t realized you had quite so much to say about the gender politics here at Bridgewater.”

  “Yeah.” I muster a smile, cheerful and nonthreatening. “It’s something I’ve been thinking about lately, I guess.”

  Mr. DioGuardi nods. “So it would seem.” He clears his throat. “Now. What’s on your mind?”

  I swallow hard, digging my nails into my nylon-covered knees. “It’s about Mr. Beckett,” I admit.

  “Oh?” Mr. DioGuardi’s eyebrows twitch, cautious. “What about him?”

  I take a deep breath and keep things as factual as possible, starting with the first day he drove me home and ending with the afternoon in his apartment.

  “He kissed me,” I say, cringing; God, I can’t believe I’m using that word in front of Mr. DioGuardi. I can’t believe I’m using that word about Bex. Everything about this is humiliating.

  When I’m finished Mr. DioGuardi doesn’t say anything for a long time, whistle clicking rhythmically against his two front teeth.

  “These are serious allegations, Marin,” he tells me finally. “You realize I’m required to report them to the school board. They’ll want to do a full investigation.”

  “Okay,” I say slowly, not sure if he’s trying to warn me off or not. It kind of feels like maybe he is. “I just—what else is there to investigate?” I shake my head, confused. “I mean, I just told you what happened.”

  Mr. DioGuardi’s impassive expression flickers, just barely. “Well, this is a process, Marin. We’ll need to gather more information before we decide on a course of action. They’ll want to interview you themselves, first of all. And I imagine they’ll want to speak to Mr. Beckett as well.”

  “And what if he says I’m making the whole thing up?”

  Mr. DioGuardi frowns. “Are you?”

  “What? No!” I say, more sharply than I mean to. “Of course not!”

  “Watch the tone, please,” Mr. DioGuardi reminds me, reaching for the whistle around his neck like he’s checking to make sure it’s still there in case he needs to foul me out. “I know this is an . . . emotional situation, which is exactly why there’s a procedure in place.” He smiles again—reassuring, dadlike. “These things take time, Marin. But the board will be thorough. You can trust us all to do our jobs.”

  I wrap my hands around the arms of the chair, knowing somehow—the way he said emotional situation, maybe—that there’s no room to argue without proving his point.

  “Okay,” I say instead, reaching down for my backpack before standing up so quickly I get lightheaded. It’s claustrophobic in here all of a sudden, the air too hot and thick to breathe properly. “Well. Um. Thank you. I should get back to class.”

  Mr. DioGuardi frowns. He was expecting me to be more grateful to him, I realize. And I’m not following the playbook.

  “Marin—” he begins, but I paste another bland smile on my face before he can say anything else.

  “I appreciate your help with this, Mr. DioGuardi.” I promise. “Really.”

  “Of course,” he says, mollified. I’m somebody he recognizes again: good student, reliable coeditor of the Beacon, not one to make a fuss. A nice girl.

  “Feel free to come to my office with any questions. We’re here to support you.”

  I thank him one more time, keeping the smile plastered on my face as I head out of his office. I wave to Ms. Lynch, who’s scrolling industriously through Facebook on her office computer. I wait until I’m out in the empty hallway to let the mask slip off my face, leaning against a bank of sophomore lockers and taking deep breaths, trying to swallow down the whirlpool of dread rising in my chest. I wanted telling Mr. DioGuardi to put an end to this whole miserable episode.

  But now it looks like it’s barely begun.

  Gray’s waiting by my locker at the end of last period, tie already loosened and a charmingly ridiculous reindeer beanie—complete with pompom—shoved down over his wavy hair.

  “Hey,” he says, with a smile that makes me shiver in spite of the sense of impending doom I’ve been carting around since my meeting with DioGuardi. “How did it go?”

  I shrug. “Okay, I guess?” I fill him in as quickly and factually as possible, trying not to sound like a person at the mercy of her own emotional situation. “It sounds like I’ll know more
after the break.”

  “Well, that’s good, right?” Gray asks. “That he’s bringing it to the school board?”

  “No, it is,” I agree, though in fact the very idea makes me want to dig a hole in the nearest snowbank and live inside it till spring. Already I feel like an idiot for having ever imagined I could tell my story to DioGuardi and that would be the end of it. It feels like a theme in my life lately: what did I think was going to happen? “It is.”

  “Good,” Gray says again, like it’s just that simple; still, I know he’s just trying to be encouraging. “You coming to pizza?”

  I shake my head. Everybody at Bridgewater always goes for slices at Antonio’s on the last day of school before Christmas break; normally it’s one of my favorite afternoons of the year, the line spilling out onto the chilly sidewalk and the smell of cheese and pepperoni warm in the air. Today, though, I can’t face the thought of being around that many people. “There’s something I gotta do,” is all I say.

  My mom is working on her laptop at the dining room table when I get home, paperwork spread out in messy piles all around her; my dad is already prepping the Feast of the Seven Fishes for Christmas Eve tomorrow night.

  “Hey, guys?” I say, setting my backpack down in the mudroom, tucking my hair behind my ears. I steel myself against the panicky feeling of having set a series of events into motion, when I’m not even sure it was the right thing to do. “I think we probably need to have a talk.”

  Twenty-One

  I’m expecting fireworks from my mom in particular—after all, this is the same woman who marched down the street in her pajamas and put the fear of god in Avery Demetrios when she was mean to me at day camp the summer after fourth grade—but instead she just sits stock-still at the table and listens, one hand in my father’s and one hand in mine.

  “He did what?” she asks when I get to the part about the kiss, but my dad’s grip tightens around her fingers, and she immediately presses her lips together.

  “I’m sorry,” she says, shaking her head like she’s trying to clear it, and I see her eyes getting watery. “Keep going.”