Stereotype

by Claire Hennessy

  Teacher grabs sleeve, rolls it up, to reveal wounded arm.

  I am silent.

  Teacher is silent. Stares at arm.

  “Can I go now?” I finally ask, pulling my sleeve down. Doing the whole I-can-cope-leave-me-alone routine.

  Teacher doesn’t know what to say. I am discussed in the staff room. Everyone is distressed, preferably bringing up the fact that they don’t understand how such a smart, mature girl could be doing this to herself. Add “pretty” to the list, even, if you want.

  Of course, if that actually happened, they’d call in my parents. I assume. If they would even care that a student is engaging in self-destructive behaviours. And then they’d know.

  And despite various brief fantasies in which I wave my cuts in front of their faces in a demand to be taken seriously, I don’t want them to know.

  They’d be disappointed in me, or disgusted with me, or something. They wouldn’t understand me. And it’s not like they understand me now, but they think they do. They think I’m a normal human being, someone they can connect with. Someone like them, someone who just gets on with life instead of whining about her feelings.

  And if they knew the real me, they wouldn’t love her.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Wednesday evening and I’m hanging out at Sarah’s house with her and Fiona. Why am I not at home being my usual introverted self, reading a book or organising my CDs into alphabetical order or fantasising about being on Oprah after I win a Pulitzer? Because Shane is coming over and she wants us there so that it’s not too intimate and possibly embarrassing. I think it’s ridiculous. She’s been with him alone before, but I suppose now that she likes him and thinks he likes her, it’s a little awkward.

  I’m glad Fiona’s here too, because at least then I’m not Third Wheel Girl.

  And I’m really hoping that Sarah was being truthful when she said that they weren’t going to talk shop, that they’re just hanging out. Because if they start discussing the band, I’m leaving. Diving out the window, if I have to.

  The Wonder Boy arrives. Says hi to us all. He still looks cute. If only I was pretty. If only I didn’t have this overwhelming urge to lock myself away from the rest of the world to protect them from my hideousness.

  We watch TV for a while, but once The Simpsons is over, there’s nothing good on. I jokingly suggest that we play Scrabble. Shane says, “Actually – that might be fun.”

  I smile. “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah. I love Scrabble.”

  I’m still not sure if he’s just making fun of me or not, but we wind up getting it out and playing the game. Scrabble. These are my wild teenage years. And I am playing Scrabble.

  I’m competitive at first and trying to impress Shane with my extensive vocabulary, and he’s coming up with all these big long words that Sarah insists on checking in the dictionary to make sure they’re real.

  “And it’s neck and neck between Abi and Shane as they battle for the title of Champion Scrabble Player!” Fiona says dramatically.

  “Shane’s going to win,” Shane informs her.

  “Shane’s not going to win.” I smile sweetly.

  He narrows his eyes. “You think you can beat me?”

  “I’m going to try,” I reply, equally solemnly.

  He grins. (I swoon. Well, not quite, but I am gradually transformed from cynical dedicated Scrabble player to weak-at-the-knees infatuated groupie.)

  Neither of us win. Sarah and Fiona, who are trailing behind, and who are fed up with the game at this stage, decide that cheating is the way to go.

  “There you go!” Sarah says triumphantly after she’s placed ten letters on the board.

  Fiona is sorting through the rest of the letters, looking for an M.

  “Here, have mine,” Shane offers. And thus endeth the game as an actual game, if you follow me. Which is good because this way no one wins, and anyway I was in the lead before it started becoming a joke.

  Not that it matters, of course.

  Just to me.

  And the best part of the whole night? Apart from feeling comfortable around Shane? And seeing him smile?

  He didn’t act too interested in Sarah. Maybe there’s still hope . . .

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  I find myself listening to mushy love songs and/or stalker anthems. Bob Geldof’s Crazy. The Police’s Every Breath You Take. U2’s With or Without You. The Goo Goo Dolls’s Iris. Oasis’s Wonderwall. Cyndi Lauper’s Time After Time. Savage Garden’s Truly Madly Deeply. A whole collection of songs that remind me of love, that make me sigh happily.

  Watch me be a ditzy teenage girl in love. Wait, not love. I’m not that deluded yet. It’s just a crush. But crushes are fun. They’re giddy and silly and melodramatic. You keep replaying moments in your mind. Like him smiling at me. There’s this little spark of hope that he likes me, and it’s enough to make me go around grinning like an idiot.

  It’s like someone’s turned on the light and illuminated everyone’s good points. Because on Thursday, my class don’t bother me. At all. I’ve been too harsh. They’re lovely, really.

  Of course I know that my semi-ecstatic state has been brought about purely by Shane, and that everyone hasn’t suddenly become much friendlier and interesting, but since I prefer being in a good mood, I’m not going to complain.

  Shane Shane Shane!

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.

  For every day spent being deliriously happily because you think you have a chance with someone, there must be a day spent feeling far too hideous to ever be seen as attractive.

  I feel ugly. More than that, though – I feel boring. Uninteresting.

  I’m out of my league, a little girl pretending to be grown-up. Sarah fits in perfectly with Shane and his crowd. I don’t. I’m dull. I spend too much time watching TV and reading and writing unreadable poetry. They’re out living life, doing something, and I’m watching from the sidelines.

  I don’t even have an interesting past. No childhood traumas lurking in my life, and it’s not like I want to have them, but I feel less – valid for having a moderately happy upbringing. Like I’m a spoiled brat with no idea about pain or problems or anything that people in the “real” world have to face, like I’ve been sheltered and therefore have no right to feel anything, like I’m naïve and stupid and completely, utterly self-indulgent if I dare to feel depressed.

  It’s like you need proof, otherwise you’re just being melodramatic. Of course, even when you get the proof, you still feel like you’re an attention-seeker. Only, an attention-seeker who doesn’t get any attention. An attention-seeker who’s so reluctant to be seen as an attention-seeker than she doesn’t seek it at all, but still wants it.

  Everyone else with problems has real problems. Sarah’s parents split up. Fiona took an overdose when she was thirteen. I want those problems. I want to have an eating disorder. I want to be diagnosed as having a chemical imbalance in my brain. I want to be told that I matter, that I’m not completely irrelevant.

  I want Shane to cradle me in his arms and to be my protector and/or therapist. I want him to stroke my hair and I want him to dry away my tears.

  You know that Sarah’s the only one who’s ever seen me cry? Not even my parents. I always hid from them when I was crying, racing up to my room before they could see tears fall. I couldn’t let them see. It was too personal, too private.

  Maybe it’s the way our culture views crying as a sign of weakness. Maybe I’m nothing more than a product of media-and-family-imprinted messages. Never cry keep it all bottled up don’t bother anyone else with your problems because no one wants to hear it.

  Maybe it’s just that I’m genetically doomed to be weird. I was born, and my parents knew I was different, but were in denial about it, because they were secretly hoping that it was just a horrible mistake and that I’d really turn out to be a normal, well-adjusted child. One who follows trends or on
e who plays sports. Not one who mopes about and spends far too much time dwelling on her life, which is a completely worthless endeavour, unless you’re trying to depress yourself further, in which case it usually works.

  Right. Quit moping. Think happy thoughts, like chocolate ice-cream and the fact that Frasier is on tonight.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Saturday morning, I feel like shopping. My mom’s going into town, so she agrees to give me a lift in.

  I don’t call Sarah or Fiona. I just want to go and buy books and CDs and then go home and enjoy them. Going into town with your friends means going for cups of coffee, chatting, hanging around. It’s a day-long activity.

  All I want to do is slink around the shops quietly and leave when I’m finished.

  Of course, you know what they say about the best-laid plans of mice and men.

  Actually, I don’t know what they say. No one ever finishes off that quote. But I assume that it’s something about the aforementioned plans being horribly derailed.

  Anyway. Shane is in town. I see him in HMV just as I’m about to leave and he smiles at me. I go and say hi.

  “What’re you looking at?” I enquire, hoping it’s not something too obscure.

  He holds up Jeff Buckley’s Grace.

  “Buy it,” I tell him.

  He grins. “Is that an order?”

  “Yes,” I smile. “No CD collection is complete without it.”

  “That’s what everyone seems to be telling me,” he says.

  “You should listen to them. Forget about individuality. Be a sheep! Buy it!”

  He laughs. “OK, I’ll follow the crowd. Just once.” Pause. “Are you meeting up with someone now, or do you want to go get coffee or something?”

  “Coffee sounds good,” I smile.

  (Yeah, you bet it does.)

  So much for me being anti-social. I silence the part of me that still wants to go home and curl up with a book, and listen to the part that’s telling me that this is my chance with Shane.

  If he’s even worth the effort. If any of this is worth the effort. If it isn’t just easier to hide.

  We go to one of those places with about a hundred different types of coffee on the menu, so many that it makes you dizzy just thinking about it. In the end I order tea, and he gets coffee. Plain, black coffee. It seems to confuse the waitress.

  “So,” he says, patting his HMV bag, “this is good, yeah?”

  I nod. “Yep. Brilliant. He’s got an incredible voice. Well, had.”

  “Such a tragedy he died so young,” he intones solemnly. “Although I’m sure it did wonders for the record sales.”

  I grin. “Probably, yeah. The tragic-hero thing always goes down well. But it is actually good music.”

  “What did you buy?” he asks.

  I hold up the CDs. Boys For Pele by Tori Amos, Disintegration by the Cure, Boy by U2.

  “I approve,” he smiles. “Especially the U2 one.”

  “Surprise, surprise.”

  Our tea and coffee are brought over. Shane watches, fascinated, as I pour the whole jug of milk into my cup.

  “Have you ever thought about just getting milk?” he asks innocently.

  “Oh, shut up.”

  “Aren’t we very defensive about our tea-drinking habits?” he teases.

  “Yes. I take my tea very seriously,” I inform him.

  “I can see that.”

  Pause.

  Ask him does he like Sarah. Go on. You know you want to. Or tell him that you heard he likes someone in your school. Or get onto the subject of who he’s interested in somehow. Without it looking incredibly obvious.

  Why can’t I just do this? Why can’t I just ask him, and find out, without making a big deal of it? Why do I feel so completely irrelevant around him? Maybe not even irrelevant, but just –

  Not cool enough. That’s it. So much for all my be-yourself-and-forget-about-what-anyone-else-thinks philosophy. When it comes down to it, I still think everyone else is superior to me and that I’m never going to be good enough.

  This realisation annoys me. A lot.

  “Do you like Sarah?” I ask him, my frustration at my own inferiority complex fuelling me.

  He looks surprised. “Why do you ask?”

  I shrug. “Just wondering. You seem to.”

  “She’s great,” he says. “She’s fantastic, she’s a really good friend and all, but . . . I don’t know. I never really thought about her in that way.”

  “Fair enough,” I nod.

  Stay calm, stay calm, try not to give into the urge to leap out of your chair and scream ‘I still have a chance!’

  Chapter Fifty

  We go our separate ways, Shane to see his friends, me to my bus stop. He asked me if I wanted to hang around with them, but I said that I didn’t want to intrude. Which was true, and which means that I now get to go home and be reclusive.

  And think about him. Should I have stayed in town with him? He did invite me to, but then again, maybe he was just being polite. He was really in there to see his friends, after all. But what if he thinks that I said no because I don’t like being around him? What if he thinks I hate him, and starts to feel resentful towards me because of it?

  I muse about these things on the way home, coming down from the high of spending time with him and ending up feeling – well, extremely depressed. I write Shane’s initials in the condensation on the window, then rub them off angrily.

  Is that Graham getting on? Oh, fantastic. Just what I need. Hopefully he’ll stay downstairs. No, of course he won’t, he’ll come up here.

  Told you.

  “Hey,” he says. “Can I sit?”

  I shrug. “Sure.” It being a public bus and all.

  “Are you OK?” he asks.

  And oh god, it’s stupid, but the way he asks, with this gentleness in his voice, makes me want to cry.

  “Yeah,” I say.

  “Are you sure?”

  I nod. “Positive.”

  “Look, if you ever need to talk . . .” He sighs. “OK, I know we’re not on the best of terms at the moment, but I still want to stay friends with you.”

  “OK, whatever,” I say quietly. I can’t do this now, Graham, I can’t argue with you. I’m just going to quietly agree with you and hope that you don’t press the issue, because I can’t handle it, I’m drained.

  “Whatever?” he echoes.

  “I’m agreeing with you, Graham, it’s a good thing,” I tell him.

  We sit in silence for the rest of the bus journey, exchange “see ya”s, and then return to our lives.

  I think about him asking me if I was OK, and how grateful I am to have someone caring about me.

  Even if it is someone so incredibly evil. I shouldn’t forget that. I really shouldn’t.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Help me.

  I find myself reading over my old journals, the diaries I kept when I was in Second and Third Year, before I became too lazy and unmotivated to continue. I read the one from when I first met Graham. The “wow” feeling of having such a great friend who you feel that you can trust completely.

  And we were good friends, you know? He always cared. That’s the thing about him. He cares. He really –

  What am I saying? This is Graham, the guy I’ve devoted so much time to hating.

  Could I have been wrong? Maybe I’m too cynical. Just because I’m selfish and self-absorbed and horrible doesn’t mean that the rest of the world is.

  People make mistakes. It doesn’t make them bad people.

  I turn the page.

  The sun started hiding behind the clouds, and I was getting cold, so he made me put on his jacket. I mean, he insisted. It was warm and soft and soothing, like being wrapped in a blanket. It made me feel safe and loved. He’d given me this feeling. It’s stupid, but I loved him so much at that moment. Not in a romantic way, because it’s Graham, you know, but in a friendly way, in the sort of way that tells me that I’m never going
to let him out of my life, that we’re going to stay close throughout school and college and marriage and children and all that crap. There are so few people I feel that way about, and it’s just amazing to have one more in my life, you know?

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  There are too many Mondays. And I think that if a scientific study was ever done, they would find that Mondays take far longer to get through than any other day of the week, thus explaining the way that by Monday evening it feels like several more days should have elapsed.

  On Monday afternoon I am doing something which I can’t believe I’m doing, yet seems to make sense.

  I’m going over to Graham’s house after school.

  I’m crazy.

  There must be a part of me that knows what I’m doing is completely stupid, because I don’t tell Sarah about it.

  Of course, it’s not like it’s a big deal, so why bore her with the details? Besides, it’s not like I have time to mention it at lunch or anything. Sarah and I sit outside with a big group, including Fiona, Caroline and a couple of the people who were at the party and who know the guys in the band. It’s fun. Emily, Hugh’s girlfriend, is one of those people who always have something intelligent to say but never make you feel inferior while doing so, and we talk about the human need to label people. She’s cool in that offbeat way that I long to emulate, and I get a kick out of the fact that we click right away. I start to feel like an interesting, worthwhile human being.

  Can this really be happening? Am I actually feeling something akin to happiness and contentment while in school?

  So between this and the thoughts of seeing Graham later, it’s a rather bizarre day.

  We agreed on half four. I’m five minutes late, deliberately. Because, with the crazy attitude there is in this country about time, being on time would be considered being early. In fact, being five minutes late is considered being early. But far more acceptable than actually being on time, if you follow me. I don’t want him thinking that I was desperate to see him. Casual is the key-word here.