The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things

by Carolyn Mackler

  “Why are you all dressed up?” I ask.

  “Mom invited me to some fancy dinner. Lots of big-time shrinks will be there. Should be interesting.”

  Dad hates wearing tuxedos, so Mom is always bringing Byron to black-tie events. She used to do the same with Anaïs. I keep hoping Mom will invite me one of these days, but she hasn’t so far.

  As soon as I’ve finished with his cuff links, Byron runs his fingers through his wet hair. “Does your big brother clean up nicely or what?”

  “You look great,” I say. I quickly glance at his chest, to see if it’s true what Brie said. He looks a little bigger, more filled out. He spent all summer lifting weights, so I guess it’s starting to pay off.

  “After jeans and sweatshirts on campus every day,” Byron says, “it feels so civilized to dress up.”

  “Speaking of sweatshirts, what do you think? Shannon just mailed it to me.”

  Byron studies my sweatshirt. “I don’t get it.”

  “What’s there to get?”

  “It’s a little silly. I mean, Paris is for lovers, not Walla Walla.”

  I roll my eyes. “That’s the irony, stupid.”

  “Couldn’t she have gotten a smaller size?” Byron asks.

  “What do you mean?”

  “That one’s just so . . .” Byron searches for the right word. “Extra-large.”

  Extra-large. I can feel the tears coming on. Virginia who? That chubby girl. I choke out a quick laugh and tell Byron I have homework to do.

  Once he’s gone, I yank off the sweatshirt and kick it under my bed, so it’s mingling with the dust balls and Jolly Rancher wrappers that the vacuum cleaner never seems to reach.

  To: goddess_shannon

  From: citigurl13

  Date: Wednesday, September 25, 4:38 P.M.

  Subject: extra-large

  Shannon—

  I just got your sweatshirt in the mail. I’d vowed to wear it every single day until you return home, but then Byron told me it looked extra-large. Which means, of course, that he’s talking about ME and the fact that I LOOK extra-large in it. Which is probably true. No, I bet I look FAT. Because I am. I’m fat and repulsive and should live among the blind for the remainder of my days.

  I’m sorry to sound so down.

  I love the sweatshirt.

  It’s just me that I hate.

  Virginia

  “Don’t you look handsome!” I hear Mom exclaim.

  “I can’t get my bow tie straight,” says Byron. “Can you help me with it?”

  “Sure, honey. Just let me set down my . . .”

  As their voices fade, I stretch out across my comforter. I’m on my bed reading People and trying to clear my mind. Mom thinks tabloid magazines are a waste of time, but a good dose of celebrity gossip always helps me forget my own problems.

  There’s a knock on my door.

  I shove People under my pillow and stick my nose in The Scarlet Letter. That’s what we’re reading for language arts right now. We’re doing a unit this fall called “Ostracism and Oppression.” I actually like The Scarlet Letter. It’s about a woman in colonial New England who committed adultery, so the Puritanical townspeople force her to wear an embroidered red “A” on her chest as a punishment for her sin. Bizarre, but interesting.

  “Yeah?” I ask.

  Mom peeks inside.

  “You’re home early,” I say.

  “I rescheduled some patients so I could get ready for tonight.” Mom twirls around the center of my room. “What do you think?”

  “About what?”

  “My hair. I just got the color touched up.”

  Mom’s hair is naturally dirty blond, like mine, but she always has her colorist add darker streaks.

  I shrug. “It looks nice.”

  “Well, it’s a professional expense.”

  That’s how Mom justifies treating herself to facials, expensive shoes, silk scarves. She gives the receipts to her accountant, who writes them off as professional expenses. Dad’s always saying that we’re doing fine and Mom doesn’t have to justify her luxury items. But Mom grew up on the verge of poverty, so it’s difficult for her to spend money without major guilt.

  Mom is so together that it’s hard to imagine she used to be Phyllis Nutford, Fat Girl from Ozark, Arkansas. Her classmates used to call her Phyllis Nutcase. I only know this because I once discovered her old yearbooks stashed in our storage space in the basement. I also learned that her high school’s mascot was the hillbilly. No joke. Barefoot, overalls, a corncob pipe, the whole bit. Mom would murder me if she knew I looked through her yearbooks. She wants to put as much distance as possible between her Ozark past and her Manhattan present. She barely even stays in touch with the Nutty Nutfords. I’ve only met that side of the family once, when I was nine and they were in town for a dog competition. I have to say, they were definitely up there with cashews and pistachios.

  “Mom?”

  “Yes?”

  “Why can’t I ever go to these events with you?”

  Mom clicks her manicured fingers up and down my keyboard. “You will.”

  I sit up. “Really?”

  “Sure.”

  “Do you have any idea when?”

  “I can’t give you an exact date, Virginia,” Mom says. Then she pauses and adds, “I just wanted to tell you that I made an appointment for you with a new doctor. It’s next Monday afternoon. I’ll meet you here and we can take a cab up there together.”

  “Why do I need a new doctor?” I ask. “What’s wrong with Dr. Nakamura?”

  Dr. Nakamura is my pediatrician. I’ve been going to her since I was three.

  “This guy specializes in adolescent medicine,” Mom says. “I heard about him through some colleagues. He’s all the way up at Columbia Presbyterian, but I think it’ll be worth it for you to see him.”

  “Why?” I ask. “I feel fine.”

  Mom gets an uncomfortable look on her face. I know what’s coming next. It’s about my weight. Mom has a hard time talking about my body. Her shrink side wants to reassure me that I’m fine the way I am, accept myself, all that self-esteem stuff. But her Mom side wants me to be thin and perfect, like the rest of the Shreves. The end result is that she can barely say the word “fat” around me. She uses euphemisms such as “heavy” and “like I used to be.”

  After a moment Mom says, “I want to discuss your nutrition with the new doctor.”

  “My nutrition?” I ask. “Why can’t I see Nan again?”

  Nan Grossman is a friend of Mom’s from the gym. I privately called her Nan the Neurotic Nutritionist because she’s always freaking out about additives and preservatives and caloric content.

  Mom sighs impatiently. “Look, I’ve got to start getting ready for tonight. Just remember . . . Monday at four-thirty.”

  “Fine,” I say. I lean against my pillow and pick up The Scarlet Letter.

  I know Mom’s intentions are good, like she wants to help me feel better and look better and be a better person. But I can’t help wishing she’d accept me the way I am. And I can’t help wondering whether if I were thin, I’d get invited to these fancy dinners as well.

  As soon as Mom is gone, I grab People out from under my pillow and immerse myself in a scintillating story about collagen lips.

  Mom said that Dad would be home around seven, but I don’t hear from him until eight, when he calls from his cell phone.

  “I’m picking up some Chinese food,” he says. “What would you like?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Aren’t you hungry?”

  “Not really,” I say. I don’t mention that I’ve already eaten a heaping bowl of pasta, the leftover Vietnamese food from last night, and a container of cherry yogurt.

  “Do you want an egg roll?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “OK. I’ll be home in ten minutes. Has the game started?”

  “Just singing the national anthem.”

  When Dad comes through the door
, he’s toting two plastic bags. I’m stretched on the couch, wrapped in a blanket and watching the ball game.

  “Score?” he shouts as he heads into the kitchen.

  “One–nothing, Yankees.”

  “Inning?”

  “Top of the second.”

  When Dad joins me a few minutes later, he’s carrying a glass of wine and a plate overflowing with shrimp, asparagus, and rice. He sits on the ottoman and spreads a checkered dishtowel across his lap.

  “They’re going to beat Boston, Ginny,” Dad says as he sips his wine. “I can feel it in my bones.”

  “Me, too.”

  Dad and I both love the Yankees, though for different reasons. He wants to see them make it to the World Series. I want to bear their children. Whenever Dad is home, we watch the games together.

  During a commercial Dad carries his dishes into the kitchen and returns with a plate heaped with pastries.

  “I stopped by the bakery,” Dad says, handing me a napkin. “Thought I’d pick up some treats.”

  I prop myself onto my elbows and eye a plump slice of apple strudel.

  Dad drops two cookies onto his napkin. “Let’s consider it a precelebration.”

  I sink my teeth into the strudel.

  We’ve polished off all the pastries when a beer commercial comes on. A woman in microscopic shorts and a bikini top parades around the baseball diamond.

  Dad whistles. “Now there’s an attractive woman.”

  Typical Dad. He’s constantly praising thin women’s bodies. It used to drive Anaïs crazy. Whenever Dad complimented her figure, she would yell at him and spout feminist theory about how men shouldn’t judge women by their body type. Even though I’ve heard the skinny-women-are-more-attractive spiel a million times in my life, it strikes a sore nerve tonight.

  I feel my stomach tightening up.

  Nine hours ago, Brie Newhart said that if she were as fat as me, she’d kill herself.

  Five hours ago, Byron called me extra-large.

  Four hours ago, Mom announced that I have to see a special doctor about my “nutrition.”

  And here I am, wolfing down Popsicles and pasta and pastries like they’re going out of style.

  To: citigurl13

  From: goddess_shannon

  Date: Wednesday, September 25, 9:58 P.M.

  Subject: wallowing in walla walla

  Virginia—

  Duh! What a dumb thing for Byron to say! Why can’t he be nice to you for a change?

  Not much to report in Walla Walla. Liam and Nina are currently having a love affair with onions. It’s all they talk about. And cook. French onion soup. Sausage and onions. They even baked an onion pie the other day. No wonder I’m not making any friends.

  I’m counting the days until I return to NYC.

  Love,

  Shannon

  P.S. 298. See? I really am counting.

  To: goddess_shannon

  From: citigurl13

  Date: Wednesday, September 25, 10:11 P.M.

  Subject: sucky solidarity

  S—

  It sucks here, too. At least we can be comforted by the fact that we are in sucky solidarity.

  I can’t write much because I’ve got to study for Friday’s French quiz. Did you know that “fat” in French is “gros”? If I didn’t hate French enough already, I hate it even more now.

  V

  P.S. Byron was just being honest.

  “Carry me back to old Virginny,” Mr. Moony sings as I approach his desk.

  I hear a few kids in the study hall chuckling. I hug my notebooks to my chest and pray that my cheeks aren’t too flushed or my butt doesn’t look too big.

  “There’s where the cotton and the corn and taters grow,” Mr. Moony warbles, tapping his worn leather shoe as he sings the old hymn about the state of Virginia.

  Clive Moony is my geometry teacher and the oldest living person. He probably taught math back when the abacus was the latest technology. He’s so ancient that he’s senile. He can never remember any mathematical formulas. But he’s managed to retain a database of songs in his head, songs that have our first names in them, songs that he delights in singing to mortified students.

  I generally try to avoid Mr. Moony. I never raise my hand in his class for fear of being serenaded. He’s also my study hall teacher, so I rarely ask for a pass to the bathroom or the water fountain. But I’ve been languishing in study hall for the past twenty minutes. I’ve finished my homework and chewed off nine fingernails. If I have to listen to the buzz of the fluorescent lights for one more second, I’m going to gnaw off my left arm.

  I finally reach Mr. Moony’s desk. I hurriedly explain how I must go to the computer cluster to finish up a global studies assignment. Instead of simply filling out a hall pass, Mr. Moony responds with another song.

  “Almost heaven, West Virginiaaaaaah . . .”

  He pauses to suck in a raspy breath, so I quickly interject. “Could you please give me a pass to the computer cluster?”

  Mr. Moony closes his eyes, sways his liver-splotched head from side to side, and continues crooning “Country Roads.”

  “TODAY!” I shout, surprising even myself.

  Mr. Moony flaps open his droopy eyelids. “What did you want?”

  “A pass.” I gnaw off my final fingernail.

  “Where?”

  “To the computer cluster.”

  “Oh, sure,” says Mr. Moony. “Why didn’t you say so in the first place?”

  The computer cluster is one of Brewster’s favorite bragging points. It’s a well-lit room on the ground floor. All of the school’s promotional literature drones on about “state-of-the-art equipment that will situate every student on the cutting edge of contemporary technology.” Translation: twenty computers, twenty ergonomic chairs, and a lot of Web surfing during free periods.

  The room is more populated than usual. I hand my pass to Krishna. He’s the NYU student who works part-time overseeing the computer cluster. He’s a nice guy if you can look beyond his pock-marked skin and thrasher band T-shirts.

  “Your favorite computer is still available,” says Krishna, pointing to the tangerine-colored Macintosh in the back.

  I glance at a group of guys clustered around the newest Mac. “What’s going on?”

  “They’re fooling around with some graphic design program,” says Krishna.

  I study the jumble of baseball caps and skateboard duds and scuffed sneakers. I recognize several of the kids, fellow sophomores. And then, in the center of the action, there’s Froggy Welsh the Fourth. He’s leaning toward the monitor, one hand on the keyboard, the other gripping the mouse.

  Oh god. Now Froggy’s totally going to think I’m stalking him.

  Krishna continues. “It’s mostly the guy with the blond hair. What’s his name? Frog?”

  “Froggy,” I say in a hushed voice.

  “Yeah, Froggy. Supposedly, he’s this huge graphic design whiz.”

  “Really?”

  “They say he’ll be a millionaire before he’s twenty.”

  I peek over at Froggy. I wonder what he could ever see in me. He has his group of friends. He has his trombone. And now he’s this budding computer genius, the next Bill Gates. The last thing I want to do is park my big butt at a neighboring computer, which would present two miserable, pathetic options:

  Miserable, Pathetic Option #1: Froggy would feel sorry for me and give me a pity wave.

  Miserable, Pathetic Option #2: Froggy would ignore me, making me feel like a loser with a capital “L.”

  I know about the Fat Girl Code of Conduct, but this whole ride-moped-in-private arrangement makes me feel awful sometimes. In movies people fool around without giving it a second thought, so I always thought it would be easy. But with Froggy, I’m getting a little attached. I mean, I can still feel his lips on my lips, his fingers stroking my cheeks. So how can it be that four days later we barely say hello to each other? And, come Monday, we’ll most likely be rolling
on my rug again?

  I need to get out of here. Normally I’d hide out in the second-floor bathroom, but I’ve been avoiding it ever since the Bri-girls episode. Then I remember Ms. Crowley’s offer to help grade freshman vocabulary tests.

  “Krishna?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Can you give me a pass to Ms. Crowley’s office?”

  I take the back staircase. Less chance of running into anyone as I huff to the second floor.

  This is one of the many things I hate about Brewster. The thousands of stairs we must mount on a daily basis. There’s actually a creaky elevator, but it’s only used for carting desks and chairs and Mr. Moony. Students are expected to ascend multiple flights on an hourly basis without so much as leaking a drop of sweat. Because the Model Brewster Student is a lean, mean, stair-climbing machine.

  That’s another thing I hate about Brewster. The Model Brewster Student. They’re always talking about the MBS at assemblies. They even give out MBS awards every fall. The MBS is “worldly and active and humanitarian,” so they say. They also like to ramble on about how the MBS is “generous and kind, embodying the qualities of our esteemed founder, Theodore Brewster.” The truth is, if you want to be an MBS, you have to dress a certain way (preppy/urban/chic) and look a certain way (white/skinny/flawless skin). Except, of course, when Brewster is taking pictures for their promotional booklets. Then the MBS is black/Asian/Latino/Indian/biracial, but still skinny and without a zit in sight.

  It’s all such a crock. First of all, Brie Newhart won an MBS award last year, and she’s definitely not “generous and kind,” at least not to the regular or dorky kids. But what’s really ironic is that Theo Brewster was a tough-talking rumrunner during the Prohibition era of the 1920s. That’s how he made his fortune. He smuggled rum from sugar cane plantations in the Caribbean to booze-thirsty ports in the Northeast.

  That’s why every spring, on Brewster Day, they serve us piña coladas and strawberry daiquiris, just without the alcohol. The seniors sneak in miniature bottles of rum, spike their drinks, and spend the rest of Brewster Day singing pirate songs.

  At least that’s what Byron told me happened when he went to school here.