by Marnie Lamb
“Really? Why not?”
She shrugged. “The last time I tried to get help, no one would help me. But I’m so glad you weren’t afraid to speak up.” She frowned at me. “Are you O.K.? I’ve been worried about you.”
I bit my lip. “I’m better now. But yeah. Things have been pretty tough the last few weeks. It’s just been really hard not having any friends.”
She looked puzzled. “What about Lynn?”
I stared at her. “I thought you knew.” I explained how Lynn had stopped returning my calls. “So I guess we’re not friends anymore.”
Kallie looked like someone had told her she’d failed all her classes. “I had no idea. I thought you were still friends with her. Now I’m ten times as sorry for what I did! I’ve been just like a … a Pippipalian!” She slapped her thigh in frustration.
Suddenly I remembered something I’d wanted to ask Kallie for a long time. “What happened that time you and Lynn were alone at my house?”
The hurt was replaced by confusion. “You mean when you invited us over? Nothing.” She picked at her nails. “But I guess I didn’t try very hard to be her friend. I was too jealous.”
“Jealous? Of who?”
“Of you and Lynn. You guys had been friends for so long. I don’t have any friends like that. Plus everything you told me about Lynn made me think we were as different as a star and a meteorite. I just knew we wouldn’t all end up being friends.”
I had no idea Kallie was jealous of me and Lynn, but it did explain a few things.
“So it’s all over?” asked Kallie. “You’re not friends with any of those people?”
I shook my head.
“But you wanted to be part of that group so badly.”
I shrugged. “I guess I just decided to stop being like them and start being like myself.”
She smiled. “I love how you stood up to them.”
“It was kind of fun,” I said. “But you stand up to them all the time. How do you do it, Kallie? How do you make it not hurt?”
Kallie lowered her gaze. “Well, it does hurt. Sometimes I think maybe they’re right and I am a loser. But if I don’t keep telling myself they’re wrong and standing up for myself, they’ll defeat me. That’s what happened with Sheila.”
“How can you make yourself believe that when they keep picking on you?”
She lifted a shoulder. “I don’t know. I’m still figuring it out. But one thing that helps is to hang around with people who don’t think you’re a loser. People like Chu Hua. And you.”
I smiled wanly. “You said I wasn’t a real friend.”
“Oh, Hil, I didn’t mean that. I was just really upset. You’re a great friend. You’re the best friend I’ve ever had.”
I didn’t bother to squeeze my eyes shut this time.
“Are you doing anything tomorrow?” she asked.
“No. Why?”
“The orgs have been stuck in the Forest of Om for the last few months and I can’t get them out. I wondered if maybe you wanted to help them?”
I felt a smile stretch from cheek to cheek. “Yeah, I would.”
Then, at the same time, we leaned forward to hug each other.
After that, things pretty much went back to normal. Well, not really back to normal because they’d never been normal. Let’s just say things settled into normaldom. Kallie and I sat together at lunch, took the bus home together, and were at each other’s houses so often my dad joked he would’ve decorated a bedroom for her except he was fresh out of black paint. Chu Hua sat with us, too. I tried harder to understand what she was saying, and I found if I listened carefully and noticed how she used certain words, it wasn’t so difficult.
Mr. Finn did follow through with his plans. The teachers separated Chanel and her friends and made sure they didn’t pick on us in class. Monitors started patrolling the hallways and lunchroom. We even had some guest speakers give us anti-bullying talks. I wish I could say this was a magic elixir that cured all the teasing and made everyone at Mackenzie love each other. It didn’t. Chanel and her gang still found subtle ways of laughing at us. But it was way better than before. And even if everyone else thought we were losers, we each had two people who didn’t. That’s when I started to understand the advantages of being a geek. Kallie made up a name for our group, the Intergalactic Supergeeks.
Oh, one more thing about that year. One day, Chu Hua and I were talking, and she started telling me about Tiffany. It turned out Tiffany had attended the same Chinese school as Chu Hua the year before (and not in grade two like she’d said). And — get this — her real name wasn’t even Tiffany! It was Ushi, which meant “ox”! She only called herself Tiffany because she was embarrassed by her Chinese name. I couldn’t believe this.
“It’s true,” said Chu Hua. “That’s why she doesn’t like me. She doesn’t want to hang around with Chinese people. It remind her too much of herself, how she couldn’t speak English good. I hate people like that!” she said so violently I started.
Chu Hua continued, “She thinks she better than me. Why? Because her parents have more money, so she can go to private tutor and her English improve. So now all Chinese people with accent are like garbage for her. It’s not fair!”
“You’re right, Chu Hua,” I said angrily. “It’s not fair.” But I had a plan.
After school, as Kallie and I were trudging towards the bus stop, our boots punching holes in the crunchy January snow, I told her about my conversation with Chu Hua. “We finally have it, Kallie,” I said excitedly. “Ammunition! We can fire back and expose Tiffany as a liar and an imposter. We can embarrass her just like she embarrassed us. And who knows? Maybe her embarrassment will rub off on Chanel.”
Kallie stopped walking and gave me a look. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
My jaw dropped. “Well, we can’t just let her insult Chu Hua and get away with it!”
“Why do you really want to do this?” she said.
I blew out a breath that turned to smoke in the minus-twenty wind. “O.K., I want Tiffany to suffer for what she did to me. But it’s not only for me. You guys are my friends. I’m doing this for all of us.”
But Kallie only repeated that she didn’t think we should plot revenge.
“Why not?” I demanded. “Sometimes I don’t understand you, Kallie. It’s like that time Chanel called you a hippie bitch, and you didn’t say anything. It’s like part of you wants to be walked on.”
She looked across to where students were shoving each other in hopes of being the first on the bus. When she spoke, her voice had that faraway sound. “I didn’t say anything to Chanel the first time because I figured she was just blowing off steam. But when it was obvious she wasn’t going to stop picking on me, I had to start defending myself.” She turned back to me. “But there’s a big difference between defending yourself and attacking another person. And this revenge thing … it’s just not the way to go.”
“Why not? I mean, we’re only attacking them because they attacked us first.”
“No offense, but that sounds like something a six-year-old would say.”
I bristled. “Oh, I see. It’s O.K. for you to get revenge on me, but it’s not O.K. for me to get revenge on Chanel?”
She sighed. “I know I was mean to you, and I’m sorry. But I just want all this to stop. I’m so tired of people hating each other. Besides, it’s bad enough we have to see those people every day at school. I don’t want to spend my spare time making some plot against them.” When she saw my downcast eyes, she said, “People like Tiffany and Chanel will get what’s coming to them someday. In the meantime, let’s just forget about them. They’re not worth it.”
I hated arguing with Kallie. Everything she said made so much sense.
-19-
The Chapter Where I Tell You What Happened to Everyone
So I guess you want to know what’s happened since then, in the last five years. Did Chanel realize the error of her ways, throw herself at my feet, and b
eg forgiveness for all the stinky, underhanded things she did to me? Get real.
Chanel and her gang kept teasing us. The people who laughed with Chanel kept laughing, but not as much as before. When Kallie or I fired back some sharp response, these people were just as likely to laugh at Chanel as at us.
After a couple of years, though, things changed. Suddenly the Intergalactic Supergeeks were so far beneath the notice of the cool gang we weren’t worth picking on. But long after Chanel stopped teasing me, I considered her an enemy. Even though Kallie had convinced me to suppress my vengeful urges, they sizzled deep inside me, like a secret underground stream of lava. I used to hunt for scandalous gossip about Chanel and then imagine what would happen if I exposed these juicy tidbits over the PA system at school. Like the time I finally figured out what her brown eyebrows meant — that she wasn’t even a real blond!
Then one summer, I discovered an even bigger feast. I looked up Chanel’s mom in the phone book and rode my bike past their house. When I pulled up next to the pink rhododendrons out front and peeked through the leaves, my jaw nearly hit the pedals. Chanel’s “mansion” turned out to be a bungalow painted the colour of a dead fish. The front lawn was overgrown, and the sweet smell of the rhododendrons couldn’t hide the rank, decaying odour, like stagnant water left out for weeks. I parked my bike and crept into a rhododendron. If I could just get a few feet farther, maybe I could see the backyard. Wet leaves slapped my face and bark scratched my bare arms as I pushed on from shrub to shrub. But I got my reward when I finally peeked into the backyard.
The famous swimming pool wasn’t some sprawling in-ground pool with slides and a bar. It was an above-ground one hardly bigger than a bathtub. And a tennis court? You’d be lucky if you could fit a ping-pong table in that scrawny yard. My laughter made farting sounds against the hand I held to my mouth. So Little Miss Chanel wasn’t so rich after all. I knew my promise to Kallie meant I couldn’t broadcast this discovery, but I felt a delicious thrill of victory just for having made it.
I don’t do childish things like that anymore. I just use Chanel as the model for the villains in my stories.
People talk about forgiving and forgetting, like it’s so easy. Here’s what I think. A few weeks after the art fair, I noticed Miss Stephanopoulos was being nicer to Chanel. She started calling on her in class and praising her for some poem she wrote. She even asked Chanel to stay after class one day. Well, that was the last drop of mascara as far as I was concerned. So I eavesdropped. I didn’t catch what Chanel was saying, other than a few yeses and noes, but I heard Miss Stephanopoulos say, “If you ever need anything, remember that I’m here.”
I was outraged. She’d used the same line on me! How could she betray me by offering to help my mortal enemy? For weeks after that, I was cold to her.
Then one day after class, she asked why I was so upset with her. After I explained, she pressed her lips together, then said, “I know you don’t like Chanel, Hilary, and you have every right not to, but she’s hurt, too. That’s why I offered to help her.” She frowned. “But she hasn’t come to see me.”
And she never did. I know because I asked Miss Stephanopoulos later. I remember thinking, if Chanel never came, then she’s not really sorry about what she did to me. Otherwise she would’ve admitted to Miss Stephanopoulos that she was wrong and needed help. So why should I forgive her?
But then I started to realize maybe forgiveness doesn’t depend on the other person being sorry. Maybe it depends on understanding where they’re coming from. Sometimes, when I can bury the stream of lava deep enough, certain pictures form in my mind: a father waving goodbye, a house the colour of a dead fish, people with empty faces smiling, a pair of eyes like a mirror painted black. But that doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven her. Maybe I will. Someday. But forget? Never. It would be like forgetting a piece of me.
And then there’s Lynn. After the cool gang turned on me, our friendship was over. She didn’t call me, I didn’t call her. It would be easy for me to judge her, and for a long time I did. For about three years, I hated her. I was convinced everything she’d done, including going to California, was part of a plan to betray me. I started to look for signs she’d been plotting this betrayal for a long time. It all became part of an elaborate scheme, like a spider web descending on me, ready to choke the life out of me. During these times, I wished Chanel would make a plot against Lynn, so she could see how it felt to be lured into friendship and then torn to pieces by a bloodthirsty tarantula.
But then sometimes I thought Lynn was caught in Chanel’s web. One day I overheard the cool girls talking about clothes. Lynn was going on about how the coolest clothes were in L.A. and how The Limit was, like, nothing compared to the stores there. Chanel’s facial muscles got tighter and tighter like a psychotic doll’s until she snapped.
“Would you shut up about L.A. already? We know you’re so hot because you went there.”
Lynn looked like someone had just pulled the plug on her. The others cackled.
At times like these, I wanted to shout, “Why are you hanging around with these people? Don’t you see how they’re treating you?” But I never did.
So what do I think of Lynn now? I feel like she’s frozen in a picture. I remember seeing this picture in her photo album once. She was around eight, and she was sitting in a blow-up swimming pool, wearing a yellow bikini, grinning at the camera. When I think of her, that’s what I think.
Who else do I need to tell you about? Oh yeah. Marcia.
For months after Marcia left, I felt bad for the way I’d treated her. Mom told me I should write her a letter apologizing, but I wasn’t enthusiastic. I tried writing, but everything came out fake or mushy. So I never finished the letter.
But Kallie kept in touch with her, and last year, Marcia came to visit. We were all going to meet at the movies. I arrived early, so I sat down outside the theatre. Suddenly someone touched my shoulder.
“Hilary?”
I turned around to see a pretty girl with bobbed blond hair and deep blue eyes. I’d never seen her before, but her eyes were so familiar, like a strip of the Caribbean Sea…
“Marcia?” I gasped, feeling like I’d slammed into a brick wall and fallen on my butt.
“Yeah, it’s me,” she said, smiling. “Guess I look pretty different, with the hair.”
She sat down and we started talking. To say I was surprised would be like saying I sort of liked The Dress. It was like she was a different person. She was wearing light-coloured lipstick and eyeshadow and perfume that smelt of the ocean. Why had I ever thought she stunk? Oh yeah. Because of Chanel.
A plaid shirt, jeans, and hiking boots had replaced the long, loose dresses Marcia used to wear. Her new clothes didn’t make her look like a boy, though. I realized now that she was prettier than most of the girls in my grade, and while we were talking, two guys walking by looked at her.
But the change went way beyond looks. She laughed and smiled and didn’t bow her head once. I heard all about her life in Vancouver. She went to an arts high school, which she loved, and she was a member of the drama club.
After we talked for a while, a little voice in me said now would be a good time to apologize. So I took a deep breath and did it.
When I finished, Marcia said softly, “That’s all right. Kallie explained things to me. I didn’t realize it, but I guess things weren’t easy for you either. The important thing is we’re friends now.”
I smiled, and without thinking, burst out, “I just can’t believe how much you’ve changed since you went to Vancouver.”
“Yeah, but in a way, it all started here, with Kallie. She was the first person, besides my mother, who believed in me. She was so nice to me, and she made me realize that people would like me. That helped a lot when I had to start over in a new city, especially after everything that happened here. Kallie’s an amazing person.”
“Yeah, she is,” I said.
You won’t be surprised to learn that this amazing pe
rson was the one who suggested I write my autobiography.
As for me, I’m happy. Not beaming or over the moon, but happy. My weight doesn’t worry me as much anymore. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I think I’m really hot stuff. And sometimes I can still hear the snarly voice telling me I’m fat. But I just tell it to shut up, and I try not to let it bother me.
I should get going. I have to meet Kallie and Chu Hua. We’re going to spend our hard-earned grass-mowing money on a disco bowling competition. (Hey, I got tired of waiting for the babysitting gig to happen. And I figured, why should only guys cut grass?)
I can’t believe I’m actually finished my autobiography. I’m really going to miss you out there, even though I don’t know who you are. Can you believe it’s taken me almost a year to write this? Sometimes it’s been fun. Sometimes it’s been scary. Sometimes I wrote all night. Sometimes I had to force myself to type the first letter of a sentence. But I did it. I finished the marathon, and I’m proud.
I guess the only thing left to do is to choose a title. Something catchy and fun, but also something that describes what the story’s about. Hmm. The Autobiography of Hilary Laura Boles? Too boring. The Fantastic Adventures of an Intergalactic Supergeek? That’s trying a little too hard. I know! The History of Hilary Hambrushina. What can I say? I like the letter “h.”
Acknowledgments
This book grew out of a short story that I workshopped in my graduate creative writing seminar at the University of Windsor. I am grateful to professors Di Brandt and Wanda Campbell and to all of my fellow seminar students for commenting on that early version. I also thank my thesis committee — Alistair MacLeod, Louis MacKendrick, and Sandra Paivio — for shaping the first draft of the novel.
Thank you to Natalie Jano of Colborne Communications, who did a manuscript evaluation of a later draft and thereby helped me fine-tune important plot and character points. I owe a great debt to Greg Ioannou for his ongoing faith and encouragement starting from the time that I first contacted Colborne about an evaluation, and to the entire team at Iguana Books for their enthusiasm and support.
