My Invented Life

by Lauren Bjorkman

  The next morning, I enter homeroom with fear in my heart. When Carmen smiles at me, I know that Felicia has granted me a second reprieve. But for how long? Eyeliner Andie distracts me from my worries with her style du jour. Her cheeks are contoured with blue blush—if you can call blue powder blush—and her pigtails have been moussed into insect antennae. She’s holding hands with Nico, who has a fat rubber band around his wrist like a bracelet. This must be part of her scheme.

  “Everyone quiet for announcements,” Mr. Beltz says.

  When Nico whispers to me, “I don’t believe in announcements,” Andie snaps his rubber band. “Ow,” he says.

  Andie puts her notebook in her lap, scribbles on it and tilts it toward me.

  Jonathan survived the visit with parents so far.

  I flash her a “great news” smile. Though the news IS great, jealousy interferes with my happiness. Jonathan used to be my friend, whereas he and Andie barely know each other. Why did he tell her and not me? True, their characters fall in love and get married in the play, but off-stage they’re practically strangers. Why am I always the last to know every single significant thing? Maybe the TV commercials are right. Everything would change for the better if I just switched brands of deodorant.

  Me (quill in hand): is he coming back?

  Her: yes

  Me: great!

  Her: great for us, sad for him

  Me: poor J

  Her: sigh

  Me: coming to my house to rehearse after school?

  Her: yes *smiles to show large teeth*

  At lunch I take the chance to worm into Felicia’s good graces by actually volunteering to feed the dishwasher—a device like a mini carwash—a chore I’ve done only once before when she ordered me to. Women pay top dollar for spa treatments like this, I tell myself as the steam from the boiling water lays open my pores. My hard work catches Felicia’s attention.

  “You’re stacking the trays too high.”

  “Sorry,” I say. “Have you decided? About the play?”

  The sparkle in her eyes softens from diamond to granite.

  “A health inspector will be by tomorrow. I’m organizing a cleaning party for tonight. Seven P.M. to midnight.”

  The line between opportunity and threat can blur. “See you there,” I say.

  When I slip out the back entrance of the cafeteria while rubbing lotion into my poor chapped hands, Bryan jumps out from behind a stack of boxes and pulls me against him. His breath warms my ear, and my neck skin begs for his lips. I yell at my body to behave itself, but it refuses to obey.

  “You to my love must accord, or have a woman for your lord,” he says. Translation? He wants to lord it over ME.

  “Lordette,” I say.

  “I broke up with Eva,” he says.

  I wriggle out of his arms. “You’re such a player. She broke up with you.”

  “Because she knew I was about to break up with her,” he says, kissing my palm. “Girls like it when you give them the power.”

  I have relived each moment in the peach orchard with Bryan without my golden lenses and soft-focus delusions. Multiple times. Despite the ugly events of that day, I can’t purge him from my system. I hate that in a boy. He’s worse than static cling. I push back the sleeves of my top. My body-art has faded in the shower, but he can still read it.

  He kisses the soft underside of my forearm where the letters are the clearest. “See, I’m right. You care about me.”

  I yank my hand away from him. “I cared. Past tense,” I say. “Until the veils were lifted.” Thankfully, he can’t hear the pounding of my traitorous heart.

  After school I zip home to don my new black dress and freaky makeup. RoZ goeZ Goth. My parents went to a music event in Sacramento. I have the house to myself. Except for the ghost girl in room two, but she’s not likely to come out from her compound to interfere with my plans. The black-leather studded wristband I bought turns out to be big, so I turn it into a collar for Marshmallow. Should I add a leash to the ensemble?

  When Andie arrives, she gives me the once-over.

  “You look different somehow,” she says.

  “You said you’re into Goth girls,” I say.

  “The writing on your legs is original. A new kind of mesh stocking?” She removes a little pipe from her purse and packs it carefully with marijuana. “Do you mind?”

  “By the window,” I say.

  She hangs her head outside to exhale, and the smoke from her mouth mingles with the fog. She offers the pipe to me.

  “No, thanks,” I say. “My grandma died of lung cancer.”

  “From smoking pot?”

  “It gives me a headache.”

  She takes a second hit and passes the pipe to me more forcefully this time. I inhale so she’ll stop acting like a pest. After a few more tokes between us, she stashes the pipe in her bag, squirts a blast of air-freshener into my room, and offers me a mint. “That’s better,” she says.

  Marshmallow curls up in my lap, shedding hair onto my dress. I’m guessing Goths don’t have white cats for a reason. I push her off me and ramp up a playlist I burned earlier.

  “Do you like the Butchies?” I ask.

  Andie giggles. “Never heard of them.”

  I laugh too. “They sound butch,” I say.

  The song goes “caught in an ice storm, caught in your eyes, and I’m losing my mind, but I’m winning you.” Andie’s eyes are rimmed with a wide swath of shimmery copper, outlined in dark blue, with a curved end-point like a belly dancer’s. We are lying next to each other on my bed almost touching. The colorful fish in my mobile blend into one another. I roll onto my side and look into her eyes.

  “Can I kiss you?” I ask.

  “Looking for lesbian cred?” she says.

  “What?”

  “I know you’re faking it.”

  I roll onto my back away from her. “You do?”

  “Not on purpose, maybe. It could be that you’ve faked yourself out. Either way, your vibe isn’t right.” Andie leans back on her elbows. “I have this theory about you.”

  “Oh yeah,” I say. I’m the one with the clever theories. Her having a theory about me makes me nervous.

  “You’re only attracted to the unavailable.”

  This surprises me so much I forget to be mad. Could it be true? My past crushes and boyfriends parade through my mind, doing the long runway walk you see in fashion shows. I consider each one in turn. Andie’s theory would explain my short-lived interest in Eva’s ex-boyfriends. And in the seventh grade I flirted obsessively with a cute bagger at the supermarket, a high school student with his ear pierced in a dozen places. When bagger-guy kissed me behind a wall of sodas one day, he turned into a sucker-fish. I didn’t go back to the store for six months.

  And my obsession with Andie fits the theory like a Lycra tank top, hugging every curve. I pursue her only when she makes it clear that she’s not into me. I want what I can’t have. Worse still, I don’t want what I CAN have. And worst of all, I don’t know what I want.

  “You might be right about me,” I say. “Can I kiss you anyway?”

  Her face gives me no clues to her feelings. “Yes,” she says.

  Chapter

  21

  She said yes. When I breathe in, the straps of my dress pull tight across my back and clamp my rib cage. I hear the threatening ping of stitches giving way. Eva could barge in on us at any time. The black “lipstick” cracks on my lower lip. I smooth it with my finger.

  “But you have to promise me something first,” she says.

  “Okay, what?”

  “I won’t tell you what it is. But you have to promise anyway. I’ll collect later.”

  Classic Andie. She could ask for anything—a promise not to tell, a promise to tell everything, or a vacation for two on the Island of Lesbos.

  “I promise,” I say.

  “That style looks good on you,” she says.

  I keep my breaths small on account of the dres
s and gaze into her eyes until the little flecks of green make me dizzy. “It is the east, and Andie is the sun.” Translation? However crazy the circumstances, and no matter how strange this feels, I’m a hopeless romantic through and through. If only Bryan had tried that line on me.

  She keeps her eyes open as I close the distance between us. I let our lips touch before moving to her lower lip. She kisses my upper lip, and I stop breathing entirely. I can’t tell if my heart palpitations are from nervousness or excitement. Marshmallow jumps onto the bed, climbs over me, and wedges herself in the tiny space between my body and Andie’s. I ignore her plaintive mew because I’m concentrating on what to do with my tongue. Before I figure it out, Andie pulls back laughing.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “It’s funny, that’s all.” She scratches Marshmallow between the ears and then reaches across my cat to brush a tendril of hair off my cheek. “Since you’re so into labels . . . ,” she begins, “if I had to label myself . . . I’d call myself a no-sexual.”

  The song ends, and I jump off the bed to stop the music before the next lesbian love ballad begins. Vigorous physical action provides a good cover for feelings, whatever my feelings may be—rejection, relief, uncertainty, or some combination of the three.

  “I like you,” she says. “Like like. But I’m not that big into physical expression.”

  My next intake of breath pops a few more stitches. One kiss didn’t provide any big answers to my questions. I decide then and there that uncertainty is a good thing. I’ll call myself a maybe-perhaps-a-little-bit bisexual. Either that or I was a lesbian in a past life and my current life is the echo.

  When Nico arrives, Andie hangs on to his arm like he’s her favorite exhibit in the Weird Boys Hall of Fame, a lot of touching for a girl who’s not that physical. Nico avoids looking at me. I feel like the Medusa until I catch him peeking at my bodice, which is literally bursting at the seams. Apparently ogling below the chin doesn’t turn a person to stone. After running through three scenes, the pounding techno-funk headache I predicted becomes reality. I kick both of them out.

  I pace from room to room around the house. If only Eva would come out of her tomb, my dress could spark a conversation between us. At dinnertime I graze on leftovers from the refrigerator. Goth types strike me as flesh-eaters, and that’s how I justify munching down a cold breakfast sausage and half a pork burrito. After dinner I change into some old sweats for my cleaning date at the cafeteria. Wardrobe is everything. I could be the star of a modern Cinderella story in reverse. Except I’m meeting a scary woman half my height instead of a prince. Oh well.

  When I get there, Felicia greets me with a bucket and a scrub brush. She assigns me to an oversized oven. My arms get sore just looking at it.

  “Directing a play gives you management experience,” I say.

  “You never give up, do you?” Felicia says. “Carmen is my family. I want the best for her.”

  “Exactly,” I say.

  I’ll wear her down with elbow grease. The inside of the oven is coated with black gunk. Hard work gives a person time to reflect. Now that my head is clear, I think way, way back to the events that led up to this afternoon. True, faking my sexuality on a dare could be seen as shallow. Some might say shallower than a pond in a drought. But I had other reasons. I thought that my coming-out would create a new bond with Eva, a shared experience. In retrospect that reason was dumb, though not exactly shallow. Some people go to Europe to broaden themselves. I just took an alternate route. Inventing a girlfriend let me explore new lands, make new friends, and learn a few things, all without the expensive airline ticket.

  Just at the moment I start feeling pretty good about myself despite the fumes from the oven cleaner and the crick in my neck, I hear a voice that sends shivers down my spine. Carmen. Maybe if I work on the back wall of the oven, she won’t spot me.

  “What are you doing here?”

  Pixie butts are inconspicuous. Amazon butts are not. I emerge from the oven and baby-step in her direction to give myself time to think. Unfortunately, I wouldn’t be able to explain away my presence if I had a hundred years to think up a good lie. Felicia stands at Carmen’s side with her arms crossed over her chest.

  “Helping,” I say.

  “She thinks if she gets on my good side, I’ll let you stay in the play,” Felicia says.

  I risk a quick look at Carmen. Her color is high, but I can’t tell anything from the strange expression on her face.

  “And it’s working,” I say boldly.

  “Maybe,” Felicia says. “I’ll tell you after the third oven is spotless.” She dismisses me with a wave of her hand, and I go back to my post. Scrubbing off stubborn grease turns out to be great for channeling nervous energy. I stop now and then to rest my sore muscles and check on Carmen’s whereabouts. She leaves before I can get her alone. Eons later, I present my three shiny ovens to Felicia.

  “You can go home now,” she says. In Felicia-speak this means that I won. I refrain from expressing jubilation until I get outside.

  When Eva doesn’t come out of her room for breakfast on Thursday morning, I put a cup to the wall between us. She’s been languishing from fake-out flu for three days now, setting a new Peterson record. I know all the tricks from years of experience. Warm the thermometer to 102 on your computer. Rub the bottom of your nose vigorously to redden it. Leave crumpled tissues scattered about on the floor. Moisten your face. Crying lends authenticity to the look, but a wet washcloth will do in a pinch.

  I hear a drawer in her room scraping open. She says, “I’m not feeling well,” several times, each version more clogged up than the last. After a short silence, she says, “Hey, Carmen. I won’t be at rehearsal. I’m still not feeling well. Sorry.”

  So I’ll be facing Madam Director today on my own. I’ve already chewed my nails to their nubs. Just as I’m about to stop spying on Eva to better chew on my sleeve, she speaks aloud again. This time her voice projects with vigor and emotion.

  “To you I give myself, for I am yours.”

  I drop the cup and succumb to a full-blown freak-out, a quiet one, involving much chest clutching and rolling around on my rug. I ball my hands into fists to protect my nail nubs from my teeth. Eva’s holed up in her room rehearsing Rosalind’s lines. My lines. She means to steal the lead from me somehow. I need Andie. Now. She will think of something to avert a total nervous breakdown. But her cell is turned off.

  When I charge into homeroom—out of breath and sweaty from maniacal scooting fueled by outrage—the first thing I see is Andie’s empty seat snuggled up to Nico’s empty seat. As the minutes dribble past, the truth dawns on me. She and Nico ditched homeroom without inviting me. I could summon her by telekinesis, except I’m more psycho than psychic. Carmen’s seat is empty too, so really I should be thankful. I sit on my hands, pretend my feet are nailed down to avoid unseemly knee bouncing, and gnash my teeth as quietly as possible until the bell rings.

  Andie shows up at rehearsal flushed and happy. Nico trails three feet behind her. He’s her new pet iguana trained to heel. Carmen has yet to arrive, and I breathe a sigh of relief.

  “Where were you today? I needed to ask you something,” I say to Andie.

  Nico hangs out next to her with his back toward me, which looks pretty weird, to be honest. What’s his freaking deal? First he stalks me and now he ignores me. More than ignores me. Shuns me.

  “I’ll grant you three questions,” Andie says with a bow. I swear she’s part genie and part Sphinx. “Choose carefully.”

  “Girl talk,” I say to Nico, swatting him away. “Leave us.” He stumbles twice in his hurry to get away.

  “Were you getting physical with Nico this morning?”

  “Wrong question,” she says.

  That has to mean yes. I decide not to dwell on how this makes me feel. “I overheard Eva rehearsing Rosalind’s lines. Do you think she has a plan up her sleeve to off me so she can play Rosalind on opening night?”

&
nbsp; “That’s way outside the AndieZone. You’ll have to ask her yourself. Last question.”

  “But you haven’t even answered ONE.”

  “It’s not my fault you’re wasting them like a fool in a fairy tale.”

  “Why has Nico stopped liking me?”

  Andie flashes her International Woman of Mystery smile. “Because I told him to.” She makes to walk toward the stage, but I block her path.

  “Did you tell him to like me in the first place?”

  She taps my temple gently with her yin-yang-painted nail. “Hello? Anybody home?”

  Carmen arrives and calls us to begin. I’m nervous in her presence because I can’t predict what she’ll do to me. She has to be furious that I revealed her secret involvement in the play to her mother. But she also knows I went to great lengths to make up for it. And I know a secret about her she doesn’t want out. In fact, she won’t breathe the word cafeteria around me for the rest of the school year. But she could try something more subtle. Like pricking me with her poisoned hairpin.

  We rehearse the final scenes of the play, where everyone has fallen in love with someone who’s fallen in love with someone else. Romantic entanglements haven’t changed much in the last several centuries. Downtrodden shepherd Nico loves haughty shepherdess Carmen, but Carmen loves me disguised as a man. Bryan pretends to woo the mannish version of me, but loves the absent womanish me instead. Despite all the confusion, I promise all will marry on the morrow. I lose myself in the scene.

  Nico slumps his shoulders and says, “Love is to be all made of sighs and tears; and so am I for Phebe.”

  Carmen makes doe eyes at me. “And I for Ganymede.”

  Bryan drops to his knees and grasps my masculine hand. “And I for Rosalind.”

  I adopt Andie’s impossible-to-read smile. “And I for no woman,” I say.