by Laura Goode
Twilight has settled around the cold midday and that frozen-eardrum feeling starts to set in; I don’t want to go home, but it’s getting time to stop in somewhere and thaw out. My favorite diner, Home on the Range, is a few more blocks north, and my pace quickens as visions of bottomless chicken noodle soup dance in my head. Minnesota: the only place on earth that’ll give you free refills on pop and soup. The green-and-pink Art Deco sign beckons and I have a rush of hoping I don’t run into anyone I know. The bell jangles as I duck in out of the cold.
“Just me,” I tell the fifty-something waitress in the white button-down dress, holding up one finger. “I can sit at the counter.”
“Any place you want, honey,” she says through her gum, ripping off a ticket and slapping it next to my knife. I plop down, seizing in a thaw-shiver as I unwind my scarf and coat. The diner’s been alive in Holyhill three times as long as I have and has a pleasant old-timey tone: cue the red-and-white plastic checkered tablecloths, cue the Everly Brothers on the jukebox. The weekday crowd is brimming with young families toting boxy bags of hockey gear and early-bird seniors stirring steaming mugs of decaf. I see a pair of old ladies sharing a spotted cow milkshake and laughing in a booth by the window, and it shoots me through with missing Rowie. Mom took me here for my birthday breakfast right before she left. All I remember is that she had oatmeal with Craisins.
“Somethin’ to drink, doll?” Her name tag says Marjean and she has what you’d call kind eyes behind her bent wire glasses.
“Can I have a Coke, please?” I reply as she tries to hand me a menu. “No, thanks, I don’t need it. Could I just also please have a bowl of chicken noodle soup?”
“You bet. Want some crackers with that?”
“Yes, ma’am. And could you put an orange slice in the Coke?”
She looks up from her pad and smiles. “Sure thing, honey. Back in a jiff.”
I rummage around in my backpack for a book. I can’t remember what I’ve got in here today. Catching the edge of something, I grab it and pull out. It’s Mom’s grimy old copy of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Eureka! I thought I’d lost it, but it turns out it was just buried in this old bag, which I haven’t used in a while. Salt-and-peppery Marjean returns with my Coke and orange, but I barely look up, immersed in my favorite passage of ATGIB:
It was at Thanksgiving time that Francie told her first organized lie, was found out and determined to be a writer.
It wasn’t until a few years ago that it hit me how obvious it was why I loved books like this and the Annes (Frank, Green Gables) in my early years of loving books: they all had that telltale smack of autobiography, of authors re-envisioning themselves as little girls lost in their imaginations who dream of growing up to be writers. I think it’s strange that Francie can’t figure out how to tell the truth in writing. I can’t figure out how to tell the truth without it. I copy the passage down in my notebook, not wanting to lose it again.
“Soup’s on!”
Marjean interrupts my trance with a steaming bowl of luscious noodly broth and whips a fistful of saltines out of her apron. I hear the bells over the door clanging behind her as she sets down the bowl and I thank her. A familiar peal of laughter floats through the entryway, and in the mirror above the grill I’m facing, I see Tess and her little brother, Anthony, stripping their winter gear, the right arm of Anthony’s flannel shirt hanging slack beside him. Even though my back’s to them, there’s no way I can avoid her; she’s ten feet away from me. I see her freeze in the mirror as she recognizes the back of my head. I meet her eyes in the mirror, acknowledging that we’re both here and we both know it. She takes a few steps toward me.
“Can’t stop running into you lately,” she says, straining to make it sound like a joke.
“Hey,” I reply, not having come up with anything else yet.
“Hey, Esme!” Anthony waves to me with his good arm, which is to say his only arm. “I haven’t seen you in forever! How are you?”
I have a serious soft spot for Anthony; I always have. He’s thirteen now, in the same class as Lakshmi Rudra.
“How’s it going, little G?” I low-five him. “You keeping it real?”
“You know it.” He grins. “Come eat with us! We’ll get a booth and you can bring over your soup.”
Tess and I are caught in silence for an awkward moment.
“Anthony, didn’t you say you had to go to the bathroom?” Tess says.
“Uh — yeah. Be right back.” He doesn’t know what he did wrong, and his face flickers in confusion before he obeys, disappearing. Another moment passes before either of us speaks.
“Join us,” Tess says. “I’ve been thinking about you all day.”
“Naw, that’s okay,” I say. “I’ve kinda got my own little jam going here.” I hold up the book.
“Don’t be like that,” Tess says. “I feel terrible about busting in on you guys like that last night. I had no idea what was going on, or that it would — blow up so hard.”
“I know. It wasn’t your fault,” I say. “Have you talked to her?”
“Not really,” Tess says. “She barely looked me in the eye today.” She winces. “Look, I gotta tell you something, and I feel really wretched about it.”
My stomach sinks. “What?”
“I — um. I went to Bible study today because I wanted to say a prayer for you guys, and Mary Ashley cornered me afterward.”
“And?”
Tess takes a deep breath. “Dude, she told me that Nordling thinks that 4H was behind the whole day of goats and Crisco, that we like did the whole thing ourselves just so we could get on TV, and I was like, that’s ridiculous, and she was like, yeah, but how do you know and why are you trying to protect a bunch of lesbians, and I was like, because they’re my best friends, and she was like, oh, so you’re saying they are lesbians? Is that why you were praying for them? And I was like, no, well, and I sort of stuttered, and she just sort of caught me and was like who’s gay in your group? Is it Esme Rockett? Who’s she hooking up with, it’s gotta be either Marcy Crowther or that weird Indian girl, it’s so obvious, and I was like, why do you always assume Marcy’s gay, it’s so narrow-minded of you, and she was like, so it is that Indian girl! And by that time I was so confused that I just paused too long, and she was like, I know it’s Esme and that girl Rowie, everyone knows they’re hooking up, tell me if it’s true and I’ll tell Nordling the whole day of chaos wasn’t your fault.” She runs out of air as I struggle to comprehend what she’s telling me.
“So — did you tell her?” My stomach feels like it’s going to drop out of me.
“I didn’t exactly tell her. She was just talking so fast, and I’m so bad at lying when people ask me direct questions, and she just sort of — guessed, I guess.”
Home on the Range suddenly becomes as claustrophobic as a beehive, alive with lunatic buzzing. “Jesus. I — look, I’m sorry, but I really can’t deal with this right now.” I take a five-spot out of my wallet and throw it on the counter.
“Please don’t bail,” Tess sputters. “Just come finish your soup with me and my brother. There has to be a way for us to talk this out.”
“I can’t believe you told Mary Ashley,” I sputter. “That’s like the same thing as just putting it in the newspaper.”
“I didn’t mean to!” Her eyes start to well up and my need to bolt increases. “Esme, I don’t care that you’re gay, or that Rowie is, if she even is. You guys have been totally distant, and I didn’t know what was going on, and I just felt kind of — I don’t know, kind of left out in the dark or something. I tried to talk to Rowie, but she just shut down. I was — I was really overwhelmed, okay?” She’s red-faced and emotional, and a few curious early birds are starting to watch us.
“It was overwhelming for you?” I stammer in disbelief. “I tell you what. Why don’t you go back to Bible study and puzzle over other people’s lives until you’re blue in the fucking face. Because the person I love is gone, and thanks to you and y
our gossiping little bigot friends, there’s absolutely no chance that she’s going to come back, and frankly, I really don’t feel like talking about it anymore.”
I start to huff myself into my coat and scarf, knowing she doesn’t really deserve this, pretending not to notice her eyes brimming over with tears. I hear a little boy throw down his fork and whine, “Mommy, why we come here?” Tess doesn’t seem to hear.
Anthony returns. He gives us both a searching look. “Are you guys okay?” he asks uncomfortably.
Tess tries a smile for him. “A-train, why don’t you grab a booth and order your cheeseburger. I’ll be over in a minute.”
He pouts. “You guys are acting weird.”
“Sorry, kiddo,” I say.
“Hey, Esme?” he asks timidly.
“Yeah, Anthony?”
“It sucks to be different sometimes, huh?” I turn, astonished, to him, and regard his empty sleeve.
I sigh. “Yeah, babe, it does.” Maybe we don’t actually understand things better as we get older. Maybe we understood them more clearly before.
“I don’t care that you’re gay. And I’m sorry Rowie decided she wasn’t.”
I gape at Tess. “Even he knows?”
“Anthony, go get a table,” she snaps.
“Fine,” he groans, making himself scarce again.
“I get that you’re mad, and confused, and scared,” she says. “And I’m so sorry about everything. Just — please don’t shut me out like this.”
“I’m not,” I say dumbly, fumbling to get my backpack together. “I just — I need some time to think. I’ll call you.” The clamor of the doorbells alarms me as I stumble out into the first snow of the season.
The next day at school, it takes me approximately one hour to figure out that the big gay cat is out of the bag. It’s like that nightmare where you get to school and realize you’re buck fucking naked, like all the locker crowds are whispering your name. Between first and second periods, some mousy girl whose name I don’t even know ambushes me in the commons.
“Are you Esme Rockett?” she asks.
“Yeah,” I reply hesitantly.
“You’re totally gay, right?”
“I don’t see how that’s any of your —” I run out of words, confounded. Fuck it. “Yes. Will you go away now?”
“Yup!” she cries gleefully, scampering back to her crew of tittering cronies.
Mrs. DiCostanza has been majorly cracking down on cell phones in her class lately, so secret messages have to be conveyed through old-fashioned note writing. Thursday’s third period is shitty with them; they’re flying back and forth with more audacity than most people usually dare in front of Mrs. D. None of the unsubtle glances in my direction escape me, and neither does Rowie’s iron-fixed stare at the whiteboard. Exasperated, I finally grab one of the pieces of paper as it passes from Mary Ashley Baumgarten to one of her minions and read it. It seems to be a collaborative list of sorts, in four different handwritings:
HAVE YOU BEEN MACKED ON BY ESME ROCKETT?
She totally checked me out while I was changing at the Holyhill Pool once.
She tried to kiss me at Tess Grinnell’s birthday party in seventh grade.
She and Marcy Crowther once asked me if I wanted to go lesbo threesies.
Everyone’s watching for my reaction. I won’t give way. None of it’s even true.
“Esme?” Mrs. D. asks gently. “Give that here, please.”
Not knowing what else to do, I dumbly hand over the note. She reads it, her face tensing.
“Anyone else I see passing notes,” she says in a low, seething voice, “is going straight to the principal’s office with my recommendation for an immediate suspension. Now, quit it with the emotional subterfuge, girls, and read.”
The rest of the class passes like a funeral, long and surreal. The bell sounds and I bolt out of my chair.
“Esme,” Mrs. D. calls after me. “Hang back for a minute.” The bitch clique explodes into a rash of giggles, dashing out as I slump in place. I watch Rowie slide out with her head down and my heart feels like it’s being suctioned out of my chest. Tess makes a call me motion with her fingers as she walks out. Mrs. D. waits until everyone leaves, then turns to me with the most genuine look of compassion I’ve seen all day.
“Do you want to talk about anything?” she asks, placing a hand on my shoulder.
“Um.” I try to find something to say. “I’m gay.”
She nods, not reacting. “How did they find out?”
“I don’t know.”
“How are you feeling about it?”
I’m at a loss. Like I live in the zoo? Like a girl in a cerulean sari broke my heart? Like God shat on my face?
“Out,” I say, throwing up my hands and turning to leave.
On my way out at the end of the day on Friday, I’m pumping my bike through the parking lot when I hear a lilting voice call my name. I look over and see Yusuf and Jane Njaka waving at me from a blue Buick rust bucket, and roll over to their window.
“Hey,” I greet them dully.
“How’s your day been?” Jane asks sympathetically, like she doesn’t really need to ask.
“Oh, well — fucking awful.” I look down at my filthy Chuck Taylors.
“Get in, girl,” Yusuf instructs me.
“I better get —”
“We weren’t asking,” Jane insists. “Get in. We’re not going anywhere.” I lean my bike up against the Buick and crawl in the back. The car stanks of weed.
“Here.” Yusuf hands back a bowl.
“I shouldn’t —” I start, then fail to come up with a compelling reason why I shouldn’t. “Fuck it. Thanks. It’s been one of those weeks.”58 He lights it for me and I take a long hit, then cough. I offer it to Jane.
58. Text from Tess: Girl, where you at??
“No, thanks, I don’t dabble.”
Yusuf swivels to face me. “Hate parade getting you down?”
“Christ on a bike,” I marvel. “I feel like this story’s already hit the West Wind. Does literally everyone know?”
Jane and Yusuf nod in unison.
“Hate to be the bearer of bummers, girl,” Jane admits, “but — yeah.”
“This is bad,” I say, reaching for another toke.59
59. Another one: Can we talk?
Jane searches my face. “So you and Rowie, huh? I can’t believe she started seeing that loser Prakash Banerjee just to convince everyone she isn’t gay.”
The buzzing takes over my head again.
“What did you say?”
“I said I can’t —” The realization of her mistake, the magnitude of it, spreads across Jane’s face like gathering clouds. “Oh, my gosh, you didn’t know. Esme, I’m so incredibly sorry. I had no idea — I thought you’d heard. I thought you must have heard already. I’m so sorry.”
“Rowie’s — Rowie’s with Prakash Banerjee? We broke up, like seventy-two hours ago.” The shaking starts at my center, radiating outward like the shock waves of a pebble upsetting a lake.
Jane claps her hand over her mouth. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to —”
“I have to go.” There’s no fight left in me, only flight.
When I get onto my bike, it’s starting to snow again and I’m blind all over. Rowie’s getting with Prakash Banerjee? Prakash of the Magic cards, Prakash of the very Bible group that outed her? It has to be reactionary. I mean, she has to be dating him just to convince everyone that she isn’t gay, because unless Prakash’s packing some major Hindu heat in those khaki Dockers, ain’t no other reason to hit that. I don’t know how I manage to make it home, but by the time I do, I’m soaked through with snowmelt.
“Kidlet, what’s wrong?” Pops asks in the kitchen, seeing my disastrous state.
My vision is blurring. “Rowie’s dating some douche-bag just because he has a dick,” I warble, losing it.
Pops sinks into a chair in sympathy. “Oh, honey. Did you finally talk to her?”
“No. I had to hear it through the fucking grapevine. Listen, I know you wanted me to get a high-school degree and all, but I am never going to school again. My life is over.”
“Calm down,” he says, pulling me into a seat and hugging my head as I sob. “Shh. It’s gonna be okay.”
“No it’s not,” I insist, disintegrating further. “I got busted out of the closet without my consent, and everyone else treats me like I’m a fucking leper. All the girls act like I’m just some big lesbo perv who’s going to hell for trying to mack on them all damn day, everyone knows more about my love life than I do, and the only girl I’ve ever loved would rather date some ugly knock-kneed freak dude than be with me in public. Can I please go to college now?”
“Baby, you have to breathe.” Pops strokes my hair, his chest lifting as he guides me through a breath. “Good. Take another one.” Inhale. Exhale.
“How can I go back there?” I whimper. “I’m serious. I can transfer my AP credits to the U and finish the rest of the classes I need for the equivalency test there.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” he says gently, sighing. “I was so afraid this was going to happen.”
“What do you mean?” I sniffle.
He hesitates, searching for the right way to say it. “Ever since you told me it was her you were seeing, and that she didn’t want anyone else to know, I was always a little afraid that Rowie would never be able to love you the way you deserve to be loved, and that you’d get hurt.”
