The Taming of the Drew

by Gurley, Jan

  “For example, there’s always one girl who dances by swinging her hair around. I call her Shampoo Commercial Hair Girl. If you see her, you check a box. You write down all the ones I can think of on your card. And if no one checks them all, the cash prize’ll go to the person who gets the most.”

  “Oh goodie,” Phoebe said, clapping her hands, “I love this kind of thing!”

  The whole room let out an audible sigh of relief. “Oh thank God,” I heard Tio mutter beside me.

  We set to work writing out eight individual cards as I dictated dancing stereotypes to everyone from my vast (one dance!) experience. Helena wrote out my card’s list as a favor for me because, while we did this, I took some time setting up accounts on the computer in my bedroom so I could do Mrs. Bullard’s daily text reports on the Dog’s behavior — not the least of which was paying for an upgrade to unlimited text and a data plan on my cell. The price tag hurt, and it didn’t sting any less when I got of list of extra options that went along with it — things I didn’t want or need. Officially you’re supposed to be over 18 to do this kind of thing, but Mom and I help each other stay on top of the bills, so I have access to all our accounts. But I’d never done something like this without asking before.

  I was just thinking about how my Mom was going to kill me after she found out when Mom brought in two hot, homemade cheese pizzas on cookie-sheets. She’s a genie that way — all I have to do is touch a guilty thought and — poof — she appears. She merely raised one eyebrow at me as she passed around paper plates and made small talk with my friends. I’d have felt better if she’d gotten angry about me sliding in and out of the house without explaining anything, or asked me in a fake-sweet voice to meet her in the hallway or demanded to know where we thought we were going that night. She had to know we were up to something. Her new silent treatment was somehow scarier, like I was balanced on a high wire without a net underneath.

  After mom left the room, Helena said, “You all right, Kate?”

  That’s when everyone realized, at the same time, that I wasn’t dressed yet. “Oh no,” Helena said, “there’s no time left and this is supposed to be all about helping Kate.”

  That’s when it really hit me. That I was going to meet the Dog and hang out with people who hated me.

  The butterflies in my stomach turned into wing-spreading, flapping pterodactyls. It felt like my body couldn’t possibly contain all the nerves I had. Just then, I couldn’t see the point of trying to look nice. It wasn’t like it would make anything better. But everyone had gone to all this trouble to come to my house and help me get ready. And they even wanted to go with me into a social inferno, where we all, along with our little bits of Phoebe-entertaining paper, were inevitably going to get burned..

  “All right, all right. Decision made,” I said. I took a deep breath and let it out. Heaven help us, I thought. Nothing was ever going to be the same. “Let’s do this thing.”

  At that, Alex and Robin together lifted and dumped an enormous black garbage bag of collected clothes, shoes, accessories, and styling products on my bed.

  ***

  We stood shivering in the dark in the line to go into the gym, waiting to pay our ten bucks and show our I.D.

  It had taken us a while to get here, but now, standing in line, I was glad the gang took the extra time to dress me up. I wore my best outfit — the vintage Breakfast At Tiffany’s sleeveless narrow black sheath with a skinny belt I’d discovered buried under the mountain of items at the Clothes By The Pound stall in the farmer’s market. Over it I wore a round-collared fuchsia short-jacket with elbow-length sleeves and pink and black striped ballet flats.

  There had been a quick but ruthless argument about my hair. Viola, Phoebe and Helena all voted for big and slutty. I wanted normal floppy frizz-curl because big hair made me feel like maybe this was some sort of date. I would rather die than send that message to the Dog and his teammates. Finally Alex and Robin, to everyone’s surprise, settled the argument by suggesting that I wear my hair in a tight, sleek, crown-of-the head ponytail, complete with one thick curl at the end. Then we had fun with the liquid eyeliner. End result? Except for the fact that I wasn’t hiding (under my clothes) painted-on waist-high panties and two anti-gravity nipple-less boobs, I was looking remarkably like vintage 1950’s Barbie.

  At least that’s how I felt until we got to the gym door.

  Celia had probably been tweeting the news since yesterday. An Academy dweeb and the Dog? Together at a dance? All because of some “deal” that nobody knew anything about??? It was just too juicy to not share. A crowd of girls hovered inside, near the gym door. The lighting was dim, but you could see they were all wearing Betsy Johnson thin, silk ultra-mini baby-doll halter dresses that swirled around them in bright coral-snake colors ($600 each — with as much fabric as three hankies). They had big hair, and lots and lots of cleavage and I could hear their needle-tall stiletto heels tink-tinking in anticipation as they shifted around, trying to get a better look past the shoulder of Mr. Whitworth, the ticket-taker.

  When Gonzo (the first in our group) handed over his money, a female voice behind Mr. Whitworth said, in the tones of someone announcing an impending plane crash. “Oh no. Tell me no. You are not going to believe this. She brought more of them.”

  One female voice from the door said, “Is she actually wearing someone’s old lady clothes? Ew.”

  Another voice started to answer, “You’d think she could at least get dressed up or something…” and then a riptide of conversation rose around me, threatening to drag me under.

  By the time I reached Mr. Whitworth, my tummy pterodactyls had woken up again and my hand was shaking so hard my money flapped like wings. Mr. Whitworth looked up at me and said, “Nice to see some new faces here for a change.” He had the kind of mega-overgrown gray eyebrows that made you twitch to get out a weed-whacker and prune them back. He waggled both his bristly hedges at me, leaned forward with a smile and said, in a voice that carried in the darkness. “Andrew Bullard asked me to pass along a message. He’s waiting for you beside the multi-purpose room. You’re not supposed to go in without him.”

  You could have heard a pin drop. The entire line behind me leaned to the right, in order to get a better view. The doorway to the dance sprouted zillions of heads, looking like a lift-you-off-the-ground-sized bouquet of balloons trying to escape the gym.

  Tio bumped me with his shoulder, which means he hit me in the ribs. “We’ll wait for you here, Kate.” The Greenbacks stepped aside to let others go ahead, but only one person reluctantly moved forward, then stopped before paying. No one wanted to go in now. No one wanted to miss the show.

  ***

  I tried to walk toward the multi-purpose room at a normal speed even though every nerve in my body shouted for me to run run RUN away. I must have been moving faster than I realized, because I careened around a brick corner and almost slammed straight into the Dog.

  “You’ve got some nerve,” he said. His eyes glinted with rage and his hair was spiky like he’d been shoving his hands through it over and over. “These stupid power plays of yours are over, as of now. You understand?”

  “Excuse me? Aren’t you the one who left a command with a teacher for me to come looking for you? Like I’m some flunky you can order around?”

  “Late.” He barked the word at me, “You show up late. In front of everyone.”

  “God, grow up! It’s not that embarrassing to arrive at a dance alone.”

  “You think you can twist things around? I’m not as dense as you think I am. You wanted to drive home a point tonight, now didn’t you? You know I’ve got no money. Not one penny.”

  Ah.

  “You’ve been hiding back here because you didn’t want anyone to know you couldn’t pay to get in.” I felt a soft surge of sympathy. But then another realization dawned on me. Did he really think I was supposed to get here early and hang around in the cold with bare legs, waiting for him, just to protect his ego? “Lis
ten, this isn’t all my fault. You could have called today to arrange to meet me somewhere.”

  “You never gave me your cell number,” he growled.

  “My home’s in the school directory. You could have come by and picked me up.”

  “I don’t have a car,” he roared. “You knew exactly what you were doing, waltzing in 45 minutes after the dance started. You can just stop right now — using that fake-innocent lying crap on me.”

  My head thrummed in anger. “Listen, Dog, I may be many things, but I am not a liar. It’s none of your business, but I had stuff to deal with.”

  He glared at me, cold and calculating. His V-necked sweater was pushed up tight on his crossed, bulging forearms. The tight cashmere fit like it was painted on and revealed every ab muscle so clearly I realized I probably could have taken a picture of him in it and sold that to Celia. He looked like he was sneering for an Abercrombie and Fitch ad. And then he ruined the effect by opening his mouth. “Well whatever you were doing, you certainly didn’t waste any time getting ready, did you? Couldn’t you at least wear something…normal?”

  For a moment, it was like I couldn't react. I teetered on a balance beam of shock, my emotions flailing. Tears filled my eyes and I swallowed them down, and the face of my skin prickled with fury. And then I knew I was too far gone, that I was going to lose it and fall to one side or the other — tears or fury. It's be either great gulping weeping sobs where I'd have to turn and put my elbow over my face, or a molten shaking rage where I spit words at him.

  But there was no way that he was going to see me cry. Not here, not where everyone at the dance would know, where I'd have to hide in the bathroom until I got myself under control and could finally clean up my face. Not when I'd have to leave my friends standing in that line, alone and wondering why I'd left them.

  So I chose–instead of teetering and trying to regain my balance, I leaped off my balance-beam of shock into rage. I unbuttoned my coat and tossed it, one-fingered over my right shoulder. I turned away, because I could feel the tears still trying to surge, then I looked back at him, my eyes narrowed, shoulders back in fury, “Let’s not keep you waiting a minute longer. All your friends are gathered at the door, eager to witness this momentous occasion.”

  When I whipped around to catwalk down the hall, he caught me by the elbow. “You really think you’re going to the dance with me wearing that? This is just another one of your attempts to humiliate me. Well I have more options than you think I have. You’re going to wait right here. My sister Bianca’s here with her friends — she can fix this, I bet.”

  “Let go of me.” He didn’t, so I yanked my elbow out of his hand. “This is me. Take it or leave it.”

  Under the hall fluorescent lights, his frown shadowed his face. There was a flicker of something in his eyes, a flash of some emotion, like he was also balancing between two choices. But then his face hardened and he said, “Give me your wallet.”

  “What?” I was so appalled, I almost forgot to be angry. “Are you robbing me?”

  “I’m not having you paying for both of us in front of everyone.”

  I could feel my upper lip shaking so I bit it and gave him a slow, patronizing jaw-shake of my pony-tailed head, one hand on my hip. “Well you better get used to it.”

  With that, I whipped off, leaving him to catch up if he wanted to.

  I stalked straight back to the front of the line, the Dog close on my heels. Silence fell. I said, “Two tickets, please” and I opened my wallet.

  There were only a few small bills.

  See, I never expected to be paying for both of us, but even worse, I’d forgotten about our Greenbacks dance-watching betting pool — the moment where I’d slapped my last twenty on my bedspread for dramatic show.

  Maybe I had enough money to get us both in. There was no way the Dog would ever believe I hadn’t planned this stunt. Or that my friends couldn’t help me out.

  The night air silenced even more around me, disturbed only by the distant boom-boom of the bass beat inside the gym. Mr. Whitworth waited, sitting on his altar of a stool, palm out.

  I stood (framed by the heads craning out the gym doorway, people crowding close all around, and the Dog rigid by my side) and I counted out my money for both our tickets in fives, ones, quarters, and then, eventually, from my Hello Kitty change purse, six dimes, five nickels and fourteen pennies. During the whole process, the only people who were bored were the Greenbacks, who didn’t realize there was anything unusual about paying this way. Heck we did it all the time.

  I was a penny short. Tio muttered, “who’s got a penny?” and Viola murmured, “I might,” while reaching in her bag. But after a lengthy search, I found my last penny in the bottom of my left fuchsia jacket pocket and, holding it up, announced, my voice too loud with stress, “I do.” The penny was sticky and mottled with fuchsia lint.

  By that time, Drew’s face was the same color.

  Mr. Whitworth gave me a smile with a nod like a blessing, indicating that the ceremony of paying was now over, and closed his fist around my wad of money. At that, the Dog nearly knocked him down, rocketing into the gym and scattering the clumped on-lookers like so many billiard balls.

  Inside, I took a deep shaky breath, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the dark and my ears to dull the deafening blast. Greenbacks slouched around me, and beyond them was a wide circle of empty gym floor. Lining the circle were staring University students. I noticed that most of the Uni students, now, were glaring at Alex and Robin.

  See, back at my house, Alex and Robin had a huge fight about whether they would both wear girl clothes, or both wear guy clothes. Things were so tense, none of us was willing to open our mouths and offer the suggestion that one could wear girl clothes, and one guy clothes. Besides, at the time, that option somehow seemed hopelessly complicated.

  Alex and Robin finally settled on both wearing poofy skirts, platform boots, and suspenders over polo shirts (but polo shirts in different colors — one pastel pink and one pastel blue).

  Hence the glares. Well screw that. I wasn’t paying twenty dollars to stand around and watch people sneer at my friends. “Hey, guys,” I said only a bit of huskiness in my voice to show that I was still fighting against the last of the tears, “want to dance?”

  We bopped and threw arms across shoulders and shouted jokes in each other’s ears. Phoebe kept her dance-watching index card out, and yelled whenever she saw one of the types, Helena and Viola roped Alex and Robin into a mini line dance, but I barely had time to get into the rhythm before I almost fell over Tio. He stood motionless, staring across the writhing mass of Uni students surrounding the dance floor.

  Give her credit, Bianca was breathtaking. No way would her mom (or Drew) let her leave the house wearing one of the silky crotch-skimming micro-mini halter dresses. Instead, Bianca wore a princess neckline, tight-waisted, dress with a skirt that just begged you to twirl in it, probably by someone classic like Dior.

  There was a guy who was clearly a senior, if not a college student (how many students have a five o’clock shadow at a dance?) at one of her shoulders, and another guy who looked more her age at the other shoulder. The younger one was holding open his wallet with a lot of green visible, offering to buy something. The girlfriends that Drew said Bianca came with were nowhere to be seen.

  She was going to notice Tio making a fool of himself staring if I didn’t do something soon. I was dying of thirst, and, besides, I probably needed to find out what the Dog was up to. I dragged Tio off the dance floor and out the side door into a sudden airlock of quiet hallway.

  A folding table loaded with custom-sodas, pricey mineral waters, organic tortilla chips, and home-baked cookies (among other things) sat against a wall, manned by an obviously Botox-ed, sinewy mom with highlighted blonde-ish layered hair and huge rings on her fingers.

  Down the hallway, the Dog and five guys let out a sudden burst of laughter. I looked over to see them glancing sideways at each other, or down at e
xpensive track shoes, or up at the ceiling — anywhere but in my direction. One of the guys shoved the Dog in the shoulder like he was congratulating him and Drew flicked a defiant glance my way. A group of four girls, teetering on their heels, came out of the gym door behind me, releasing a gust of hip-grinding music as the door opened. They bypassed the table, Tio, and me like we didn’t exist and went straight to the guys. Within moments, each of them held a thick upper arm in one limp hand, looking at or biting the edges of their nails while they stared, hostile and bored, back toward us at the table.

  “Can I help you?” the mom asked.

  “I, um, was wondering where the nearest water fountain is.”

  She looked up from her chair, first at tall me, then over and down at little Tio and then swung back to give my outfit a slow going-over, top to bottom. “You know,” she said with a hand on her chin, “I don’t think anyone’s ever asked me that before.”

  I thought I heard my name and turned. There was another burst of laughter from the group. One of the girls had tucked her shoulder behind the Dog’s, angling herself a little behind him so that her breasts straddled his triceps, the tip of his elbow pressed where her belly button would be. Everyone stared at me, still laughing, except for the Dog. He gazed off in some middle distance to the left, as if he couldn’t be bothered to care one way or the other.

  “Andrew,” said the mom in a piercing voice, “introduce me to your friend here.”

  We all realized at the same moment that she meant me, not the girl rubbing herself against the Dog’s right arm. My spine went back-brace rigid and I turned back to face the table. One guy sniggered and, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a girl glare him quiet. No one said a word.

  “This is Katharine.”

  “Katharine who?” said the woman. Her tone was nice, but it was also like she was correcting him.

  “Katharine Baptista,” he said without hesitating. He’d been doing some homework on me since yesterday.