Dumplin'

by Julie Murphy

  Still, I owe him an apology.

  “Will!” he calls after me.

  I don’t turn around. As I take the corner, I hear: “Oh, hey! Dumplin’!” Patrick Thomas drags each letter out. He grins as he points over my head. “And Mitch! My man. Finally met a lady your own size.”

  I’ve been teased enough in my life to know that there are several ways to react to a bully. It only took me crying once in the second grade to realize that tears only lead to more bullying.

  Lucy always said to ignore bullies. That they thrived on attention, and if you paid them no mind, you took away their fuel. I think that, for the most part, this is true. But Patrick Thomas is one of those jerks who needs no reason to keep talking. He likes the sound of his own voice that much.

  Slight shock registers on Patrick’s face as I take deliberate steps toward him. I think of him making oinking noises outside of Millie Michalchuk’s car. I remember how he decided that Amanda Lumbard’s corrective shoes made her look like Frankenstein. No one stands up for themselves to Patrick Thomas. Not even Hannah Perez, who is as rough around the edges as they come. The guy gives you a nickname and it sticks. But I won’t be called Dumplin’ by him. Nope.

  Patrick is totally unprepared when I knee him square in the nuts. His expression transforms, all the blood draining as it heads south. He howls, but it’s more like a small screeching dog. I clap my hands over my mouth.

  I’m as shocked as he is. I had pictured it in my head. I saw myself walking up to him, shaking my finger in his face as I told him what I really thought of him. But then my body took over and this primal defense mechanism, said, No, we will not stand for this.

  Mitch pulls me back by my shoulders. Teachers swarm the scene, and I’m carted in the opposite direction.

  This is probably bad.

  TWENTY-THREE

  My mother is livid. And mortified. And many other things. But I have stopped keeping count.

  Her fingers squeeze the steering wheel so tightly that I’m surprised her nails don’t pop off. After leaving Mr. Wilson’s office, she walked to the visitor parking lot like it was a race. I ran to keep up.

  We drive home in silence. Mom barely slows the car as she turns into the driveway and comes within inches of the fence.

  The car isn’t even in park and I’ve got the door open and am off for the backyard. I slide the glass door shut behind me even though she’s only a few feet behind.

  I plop down on the couch and it’s mere seconds before Riot is curling into a circle in my lap.

  “You’re grounded.”

  My mother has never grounded me. Ever. No spankings. Nothing. I’m no angel, but I’ve never really done anything worthy of punishment.

  I pick Riot up and place him on the cushion next to me before standing. I don’t want him to get in the crosshairs of whatever is about to go down.

  “For what?” My voice is too big for our house. “For biting back after some guy called me that hideous nickname you’ve been calling me my whole life?”

  She wraps her arms around her waist and shakes her head. I notice a rash of white hair at her temples that I’ve never seen before. “You’re being so sensitive about this.”

  “Maybe, Mom, you haven’t noticed, but this is about so much more than that dumb nickname. You’ll never come out and say it, but I know you can’t stand that your daughter looks like this.” My arms flail wildly.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Don’t play dumb. I see it every time you turn on a weight-loss show or tell me about your friend who lost a ton of weight on the latest fad diet or when you inventory our pantry every time you come home to make sure I haven’t eaten the whole goddamn thing.”

  Her chin quivers and the possibility of her crying at this exact moment fills me with rage. “I want you to be happy.”

  “I am happy,” I say, every syllable perfectly even. I don’t know how much truth there is to that, but I can’t imagine that fifteen or even fifty pounds would change how much I miss Lucy, how confused I am by Bo, or the growing distance between me and El.

  “But that’s what you think ’cause you don’t know better. You’re missing out on so much.” She takes a step toward me. “Boys and dating. That kind of stuff.”

  I scrub my hands down my face. “You have got to be kidding me. News flash, Mom: a man will not cure my troubles.”

  “I just—” She stops herself.

  “Mom, I do want to date. I want to have boyfriends. I deserve that. Even if you think that I don’t.” I want for it to feel as true as it sounds.

  She throws up her hands. “You’re doing what Luce used to do when we were girls. You’re taking my words and turning them into something else.”

  My head shakes back and forth without hesitation. “No, Mom. All Lucy ever did was show you how ridiculous you sounded.”

  “This has nothing to do with Luce, all right? She’s gone and it’s no thanks to the way she lived her life. I wish you wouldn’t idolize her so much.” Her eyes fill with tears that don’t quite spill. “She’d still be here, you know. If she’d just lost the weight.”

  My body is the villain. That’s how she sees it. It’s a prison, keeping the better, thinner version of me locked away. But she’s wrong. Lucy’s body never stood in the way of her happiness. As much as I will always love Lucy, it was her own decision to stay locked up in this house.

  “I was a big girl, too. You know that. Me and Luce both were.”

  “I’ve heard it, okay? I’ve heard all the stories about how you trimmed down before high school. Good for you. You entered a small town beauty pageant and won. Quite literally your crowning achievement. Forget college or getting a job that doesn’t require you wiping old people’s asses. Never mind that. Because you slimmed down enough to score a fake-ass crown! You must be so proud.”

  A tear trickles down her cheek and she says, “Well, I think that’s more than you can say for yourself.” She wipes away the tear.

  “Lucy was more a mother to me than you’ll ever be.”

  Her lips squeeze together. “No work. No going out. Not until your school suspension is over. I’ll be home at six.”

  I take off upstairs and Riot follows at my heels. On my bed, I curl up on my side and listen to the sound of my phone vibrating against my desk as I get text after text. All from El I assume. I take the Magic 8 Ball from where it sits on my nightstand and hold it with all of its answers to all of my unasked questions tight to my chest.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  I stay in my room all day. Our old pipes notify me as Mom begins to do the dishes after work, and the floorboards announce her as she climbs the stairs. Before locking herself in her own room, her shadow hovers at mine, darkening the gap between the closed door and the floor.

  Riot stretches his legs, pushing his paws against my chest, before jumping off the edge of my bed and rubbing himself against my bedroom door. When I don’t move, he meows, letting me know that his sympathy has run short.

  I crack my door and let him out as I flip on the light.

  In the mirror, I find a drooping and smudged version of myself. I grab a pen from my dresser and jot down a note on my forearm to call Alejandro and tell him I won’t be in for the next couple days. Judging by my first few shifts, I don’t think my absence will be such a burden.

  Careful not to make any noise, I navigate my way downstairs in the dark and swallow down a tall glass of water in three gulps. It feels silly, but my mother has conditioned me to need water any time I cry. That was always her remedy. Calm down and have a glass of water, Dumplin’. Like, I might need to refill my well of tears before I run out.

  Upstairs, the Magic 8 Ball lies on my bed, right where I left it. My phone vibrates, so I pick it up.

  ELLEN: Oh my God. Are you okay?

  ELLEN: I’ve called you like eight times and you know I hate talking on the phone. CALL. TEXT. SMOKE SIGNAL. MORSE CODE.

  ELLEN: Is it true about Patrick Thomas? I told Tim to k
ill him.

  ELLEN: He said he might after dinner.

  ELLEN: Okay. Really freaking out now.

  Fine, I type. Just—

  I stop and hit the damn call button because all I want right now is my best friend. The phone doesn’t even make it through a full ring before she picks up.

  “Holy shit. Oh my God. Holy shit.”

  “Hey,” I offer, my voice scratching against the receiver.

  “Are you okay? What even happened?”

  I sigh into the phone and it feels so good to not be chastised for it. Then I tell her. I tell her about Mom calling me Dumplin’ in front of the carport, with all the freshmen and Patrick Thomas standing around, waiting for the first bell to ring. I tell her about the incident in the hallway, and how I’d never been made to feel so small for being so large. She curses and coos and does all the things that make calling her the right decision.

  She goes off on a tirade about “piece of shit ninth-graders and their tiny peens” and how Patrick has failed his driving test so many times he can’t try again until he’s eighteen.

  I tell her about the argument with my mom. “And I’m suspended for the rest of the week. Hopefully that will give everyone at school enough time to forget and let this whole thing blow over.” The noise from my mom’s television stops abruptly. “Also, I’m grounded.”

  “Wow. Okay, so this is the worst day ever, right? But the good news is that since this is the worst day ever, tomorrow can only be better. Even if it’s by a little bit.”

  I laugh. It feels good. “I guess we’ll see.” A yawn pushes up from my chest. “I don’t get how crying can make you so tired.”

  “Adrenaline or something.”

  “Smart.”

  “Hey, you probably don’t want to talk about this right now, but you have given me zero details on your date.”

  “Yeah, well there’s not much to say. It was incredibly . . . unremarkable.”

  “Aw, man. I had high hopes for Mitch.”

  “I’ll talk to you in the morning.”

  “Hey,” she says. “I love you. Listen to some Dolly. She’ll make you feel better.”

  TWENTY-FIVE

  I waste the days of my suspension on the couch. After school, Ellen comes over with my homework before my mom gets home. We watch television in silence and although I want to ask her about school and if she’s heard anyone talking about me, I don’t. Tim drops her off and picks her up, but he never comes in. I like Tim, but I like him even better for not inviting himself in and for letting me have El for these few hours.

  At first, my mom and I operate on our own schedules and in the evenings it’s like someone’s come in and divided the house with red tape. When I leave my room, she stays clear and when she leaves her room, I stay in mine. But slowly, our paths wind closer and closer until Saturday morning when she says, “I’ve got an all-day pageant planning meeting today. We’re gearing up for open registration. There’s tuna salad in the fridge.”

  It’s not a truce, but it breaks the silence.

  Mitch texts me a few times, telling me he’s sorry for the scene he caused and that Patrick has a big mouth. I tell him I’d rather not talk about it, but I know it’s me who should be doing the apologizing.

  El works all day Saturday and is going to a party afterward, so I am left alone. I have been stuck in this house for so long that I think the wallpaper is moving.

  I hate that there’s never anything good on TV on Saturday afternoons. It’s like even the networks are trying to get you off your ass and have a life. I guess whoever does the channel scheduling has never been grounded on a Saturday.

  Maybe it’s the boredom, but Lucy’s room calls me like a siren.

  Her bed is perfectly made with Gram’s homemade moss-and-cream-colored quilt folded up at the foot of the bed with my mom’s steamer in the corner.

  In Lucy’s nightstand, I find more newspaper clippings, but these are mostly of Mom. Mom’s in the Clover City Tribune all the time. I think she even dated the editor for a while, but he ended up marrying the girl who did his dry cleaning.

  The stack of clippings is thick with grainy photos of Mom in her crown and dress. The same dress every year, posing with a different Miss Teen Blue Bonnet. I dig deeper in the drawer, coming up with a weathered gallon-sized bag of documents. Contracts, pamphlets, bills. Until I stumble upon a totally blank pageant registration form. Dated 1994, three years before Mom won in ’97. Mom would have been too young to enter. But this can’t be right. Lucy thought the pageant was a joke. Or I thought she did.

  My aunt wasn’t a timid woman, but even at her slimmest, I can’t see her ever entering this pageant. The blank form feels like empty promises of what could have been. I look over the application and imagine her handwriting there. The form asks for the usual: name, DOB, and address. But it asks for things that make me cringe like height, weight, hair color, eye color, career ambition, and talent.

  I try to mentally piece together this puzzle, but it’s useless. There is no answer.

  The only thing left in this particular drawer is a red velvet box with a Christmas ornament inside. A white iridescent globe with puckered red lips wrapping around its circumference alongside Dolly’s signature in gold. A souvenir from Dollywood—a place Lucy had always wanted to visit. El’s mom had won a set of airline tickets at work, and she immediately offered the second ticket to Lucy. They would go to Dollywood, like they’d always dreamed.

  They made plans. They looked at hotels and rental cars. They drove the three hours to the closest airport only to find that Lucy would have to purchase an extra seat on the plane because she wouldn’t fit in one. The airline was kind, she’d said, but firm. In the end she was too mortified, and decided to go home rather than take up two seats on the plane. Mrs. Dryver brought home the ornament for Lucy. You knew it was expensive because instead of a metal hook, it hung by a red velvet ribbon.

  I shuffle back to my room with the old pageant registration form and the ornament. I spend the rest of the afternoon studying the form and am surprised to find that the only real requirements are that the contestant be between the ages of fifteen and eighteen and that their parents give consent. For all the requirements I’ve made up in my head, I can’t wrap my mind around how simple it is to compete in the pageant and how many girls are actually eligible.

  An obscene thought crosses my mind, and before it becomes anything more, I stuff the registration form away in the bottom drawer of my dresser.

  My mom’s voice fills the house as she comes in through the back door. “I don’t think she’s in the right state of mind to be an active member of this committee. I’m sorry, but this town is not ready for an opening number set to Beyoncé.” I can’t help it. I laugh when my mom says “Bay-yonsay.” “Even if it is one of her tamer songs—or so she says—I am not taking the flak for that.”

  I plop down on my bed. Riot trots in from downstairs and spreads himself out in front of me until I scratch his chin.

  “Well, ready or not, registration opens this week,” Mom says.

  I grab my Magic 8 Ball from my nightstand and give it one good shake.

  Signs point to yes.

  TWENTY-SIX

  On Sunday morning, I’ve got this major emotional hangover. Last night I made a decision—a really stupid decision. I tell myself that I don’t have to hold myself to anything because no one else even knows about it except me. If I chicken out, I will be my own sole witness.

  It’s kind of like when you see someone drop their lunch tray at school, but no one else notices. Nobody will know if you don’t help them. But you’ll know.

  I flip-flop back and forth all day, not even really paying attention to the fact that my mom and I have been sort of civil today.

  After dinner, I lock myself in my room to catch up on some required reading. But instead I find myself looking over the registration form again. I can’t imagine it’s changed much since 1994. The idea of me in a poufy gown, gliding across a st
age like I own it is ludicrous.

  There are so many things that Lucy never did. Not because she couldn’t, but because she told herself she couldn’t and no one made her believe otherwise. I won’t lie to myself and say that Lucy was the picture of health in the last few years, but that’s such a horrible reason for her to have deprived herself of the things she wanted most. It’s not even that I think she wanted to compete in the pageant so badly. But it’s that, even if she wanted to, she wouldn’t have.

  I pick up my phone and hit the call button.

  “Hey! Your sentence is almost up,” says El.

  “I need to tell you something.”

  “Okay.”

  I could chicken out now and tell her never mind. Or I could tell her about Bo and how some parts of me can’t let him go. Even now when my head is full of so many other things. But instead, I say, “I’m entering Clover City’s Miss Teen Blue Bonnet Pageant.”

  The line is silent for a second, a second almost long enough for me to say, “Just kidding!”

  “Oh. Hell. Yes.”

  “You don’t think I’m crazy?”

  “Well, you’re totally nuts, but this is going to be awesome.”

  “I don’t know about that.”

  “Have you told your mom?”

  I rub my forehead. “Christ. No. I haven’t really figured out the logistics. I just know that I want to enter the pageant. Not like I can hide it from her.”

  “She’s going to freak.”

  “Yeah, well, she’s always been embarrassed by me. Why not give her a good reason?”

  Ellen doesn’t say I’m wrong even if she thinks so. “We need to game plan. What are you doing tomorrow?”

  “Working, but I don’t think Alejandro will care if you come and hang out.”

  “Okay. Me. You. Tomorrow night.”

  I hang up and put the old form away. Now that I’ve told El, she won’t let me back down.

  I try to sleep, but not even Dolly does my nerves any good.