by Jo Ramsey
“Call after your appointment,” Holly said. “That way I’ll know whether to hate your father or not.”
“Feel free to hate him anyway. I pretty much do.” Evan started eating his slice of pizza.
El-Al and Guillermo joined us, and we started talking about more pleasant things, like El-Al’s annual family trip to the White Mountains for winter break and the letter Guillermo had gotten informing him he was eligible to apply for early admission to the state university. It was a little strange hearing him talk about college. We were only halfway through eleventh grade, and so far mostly only the real brainiacs were thinking about college applications.
It made sense, though. Guillermo would probably get a football scholarship. Holly and Evan both had good enough grades to get in wherever they wanted.
I didn’t even want to go to college. Aside from my grades not being all that great, I’d heard stories from my brothers about things that happened at college parties. It had always sounded like fun to me until I realized what some of the girls at those parties went through. And in college, guys were apparently even less likely to have consequences for doing those things than in high school.
Going to college didn’t have to mean going to parties, but it didn’t seem like there would be much point in doing one without the other. And I was getting tired of the whole classroom thing anyway.
We finished lunch and went off to finish the day. Things seemed to be going pretty well until I walked into my last block class and found a note on the chair where I usually sat.
Dear slut, hope you’re happy that Jim’s going to have the same thing done to him in jail that you claim he did to you. Way to destroy someone else’s life.
The moment I read the note, my throat tightened and the little I’d managed to eat for lunch threatened to come back up.
Whatever happened to Jim wasn’t my fault, though. I had to remember that. No matter what anyone else said, I wasn’t the one who’d broken the law. I’d turned him in, but he was the one who’d chosen to plead guilty. The judge was the one who’d decided Jim should go to juvenile detention.
It wasn’t my fault. None of it was my fault.
I took a couple of deep breaths. The bell hadn’t rung yet, so the room was still mostly empty, and there was no way to guess who’d written the thing. I didn’t recognize the handwriting. The only thing I could tell was it looked more like a girl’s than a guy’s.
The teacher was at her desk. I picked up the note and walked over to her. I refused to break down this time. The note was harassment, and I was going to take action. Even if no one ever found out who wrote it, at least I was taking control.
“What can I do for you, Chastaine?” she asked.
I held out the piece of paper. “I just found this on my chair.”
She took the note, and her eyes widened. Without a word to me, she picked up the intercom phone and asked whoever answered in the office to send Mr. Lawrence to our room.
“We’re going to find out who did this,” she said. “This isn’t acceptable by any stretch. We can’t prove it was meant for you, though.”
“We kind of can,” I said. “Aside from the ‘slut’ thing that half the school’s been calling me lately, it directly refers to Jim going to jail for what he did. The only people he did anything to that’s sending him to jail are me and Maryellen Rourke, and I think you’re aware she doesn’t go to school here anymore, so the note can’t be for her. It’s probably someone in this class, because I don’t think anyone in your other classes would know where I sit.” As I spoke, the lump in my throat melted away.
“You’re probably right.” She looked around the room at the other students who had shown up so far. “Why don’t you go sit down? Mr. Lawrence will be here in a minute, and then we’ll take care of this.”
There were a few other things I wanted to say, but I stopped myself. Throwing a fit about people putting me down all the time wouldn’t change anything, and I would probably end up getting myself in trouble for swearing. So I went back to my seat.
Mr. Lawrence walked into the room just as the bell rang. Everyone went to their seats, including Holly and Evan, who sat on either side of me and looked at me. I shrugged, grateful that they couldn’t ask any questions with Lawrence standing in front of the room. The teacher handed him the note.
Lawrence glanced at the note and shook his head. He cleared his throat loudly enough to cut through the quiet chatter. “Mrs. Jimenez called me down here because of a note a student found,” he said when everyone stopped talking. “I’ve just read the note.”
He held up the paper. I wanted to look around to see if anyone appeared guilty, but I didn’t. Enough people would realize I’d turned in the note without me drawing more attention to myself.
“This is not appropriate under any circumstances,” Lawrence said. “It’s bullying and harassment. Anyone who’s been the victim of a crime deserves to find justice regardless of what type of crime it was. I am all too aware of what two of our students have been putting up with since before Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, I didn’t become aware of how severe it was until last week.”
He paused. I had to be imagining the way his eyes glistened as if they were wet. He was a man and an administrator. He wouldn’t cry about some student who’d tried to kill herself because of bullying. At least, he wouldn’t cry in front of us.
“One student has already served a suspension for bullying and is being investigated for that and vandalizing lockers,” Lawrence said. “According to reports I received about an incident in the lobby this morning, that student will face further action.”
This time, I did look around. Gina should have been in the room. I hadn’t been paying enough attention to realize she hadn’t come in, but I didn’t see her anywhere.
Who had reported her? Plenty of people had been standing around when she confronted me. I hadn’t thought any of them, even my friends, would say anything to staff members. That wasn’t how high school worked.
“Whoever wrote this note would help themselves out if they came forward.” Lawrence held up the note again. “I don’t expect you to speak up in front of your classmates. I don’t even know if the person who wrote this is in the room right now. But if he or she is, I’ll be in my office until three.”
He turned to the teacher. “Thank you, Mrs. Jimenez. I apologize for the interruption of your class.”
“Thank you, Mr. Lawrence,” Mrs. Jimenez said.
Lawrence left the room, and we got started on the lecture of the day. Not that I listened too closely. I had more important things on my mind.
When the last bell rang, I was the first one out the classroom door. I hadn’t forgotten about Holly, but I didn’t want to stand around where everyone could look at me or get pissed at me for handing over the note. And I didn’t want to speculate about which of my classmates had written it. It could have been almost any of them, and if I tried to figure it out, I would only drive myself nuts.
Holly caught up with me at my locker. “The note was about you?” she asked.
“Yeah. Someone’s going off at me about what’s going to happen to Jim while he’s locked up, and that it’s my fault.” I shrugged. “People can say what they want. Yeah, I’m the one who reported Jim, but he’s the one who chose to say he was guilty. I still can’t even guess why he did that, and I don’t care. And yeah, I don’t want really crappy things to happen to him, because I wouldn’t want that for anyone, but I’m not going to be sorry that he was sentenced to more than just probation or whatever.”
“You shouldn’t be sorry about any of it.”
I hadn’t seen Guillermo walking up the hall. Heart pounding, I turned to glare at him. “Don’t do that!”
“Sorry.” He frowned. “I thought you saw me.”
“I didn’t. It’s okay.” I took a deep breath and opened my locker. “Just don’t sneak up on me again.”
“I won’t. I promise. Anyway, you shouldn’t be sorry.” Guillermo paused. �
�When I talked you into going to Mrs. Turnbull, I didn’t know how people would treat you. I’m not sorry I got you to report Jim, because I think that was the right thing to do, but I am sorry so many people have been hassling you about it.”
“Thanks.” Even though I’d blamed Guillermo plenty of times for making me come forward, I didn’t really hold him responsible for what other people said. I wasn’t quite sure how to say that to him. It should have been easy, but some things just weren’t. “Um, you didn’t make them do it, so you don’t have to apologize.”
“I feel like I do, but okay.” He smiled. When he looked like that, I could definitely see why Evan was into him. If the boy had been straight, I would totally have made a move.
I got my stuff out of my locker and went with Holly to hers. Once she was all set, we said good-bye to Guillermo and Evan and headed out of the building. If anyone said anything to me, I didn’t hear them. I didn’t want to.
Chapter 15
HAVING A silent house after school was rare. If Mom wasn’t home, one of my brothers was usually there. Sometimes Dad even came home from work early.
Today, the place was completely empty when Holly and I walked in through the back door. We dropped our bags beside the island, and I opened the fridge to see what we had for snacks and drinks.
“You know Natalia Borovsky, right?” Holly sat on one of the stools.
“Yeah. One of the Houseman kids, right?” Mr. Houseman taught the class for kids with autism and other learning issues. His students did gym, art or drama, and lunches with the rest of the school, but otherwise they stayed in their room. Most of them were pretty smart; they just couldn’t handle things like changing classes, noise, and crowds.
“Yeah.” Holly spun around on the stool. “Do you have diet soda?”
“Yeah.” I took out a bottle of diet ginger ale. “Will this work?”
She nodded. “Thanks. Anyway, Natalia was talking to me earlier. She said to tell you that you’re brave. Someone tried to, you know, force her last year, and she never told anyone. She wouldn’t tell me who it was, just that it wasn’t Jim or anyone else at our school, and she doesn’t see the person anymore.”
“Wow.” I didn’t know what else to say. I put the ginger ale on the counter and got a couple of glasses out of one of the cupboards.
“And there’s that Xan girl in tenth grade.” Holly hesitated. “You know who I mean, right? The one with the hair? She was in our grade until middle school, and then something happened to her and she stopped going to school for a while. Alexandra.”
“Yeah.” I’d seen Xan in the nurse’s office a few times. She was all piercings and weird hair colors, and half the time she didn’t talk to anyone. She wandered the halls a lot, too. She’d been part of my group in elementary school, but the summer after fifth grade, she’d vanished for a while. When she’d shown up again, she was a year behind me and wouldn’t tell anyone what had happened. I’d had suspicions, but even when I saw her around school, she wouldn’t say a word to me.
She mostly hung out with Alyssa Eagan now. Another girl who’d been one of my friends until the previous spring. She’d disappeared after April vacation, and I’d heard rumors about her having an abortion or miscarriage or something. At the beginning of the year, she’d shown up with most of her hair shaved off, wearing clothes that completely hid her body, with bandages on her wrists. And now, she only talked to Xan.
I’d known all along that Maryellen and I weren’t the only ones who’d been put through hell, but until now I’d never realized how many others there were just in our school.
“And Tony Demaria,” Holly said.
I almost spilled the ginger ale I was trying to pour. “What?”
“He told Guillermo that when he was eight, his babysitter did something to him. A female babysitter.” She bit her lip. “You and Maryellen got all the flak, but you aren’t the only ones who’ve… you know. Who’ve survived.”
“Yeah. Tracie said something happened to her too.” I finished pouring the soda and put the bottle back in the fridge. “Nothing happened to you, has it?” I couldn’t stand the possibility. If anyone had hurt her, I would want to kill them.
To my relief, she shook her head. “I don’t know why, but I’ve been lucky so far. I mean, other than Ray Ferreira trying to make me kiss him in fifth grade, but that was playground crap.”
“Still not right,” I said.
“Yeah, but nothing like what other people have gone through.” She ran her finger around the rim of her glass. “Some places have support groups. I mean, like on college campuses and stuff, there are groups for people who’ve been sexually assaulted. I think some high schools have them too, but I don’t know.”
I knew where she was going, but I pretended not to. “Ours doesn’t.”
“It should, though.” She looked at me. “Maybe if we had a group like that, Maryellen wouldn’t have done what she did. A group would be able to educate people not to be jackasses when someone’s assaulted, and how to help them instead. And survivors would have other people to talk to if they’re bullied or whatever.”
I didn’t answer. She had some good points. Most people felt better if they knew they weren’t alone. On the other hand, I didn’t know if I wanted to sit around listening to other people’s trauma when I was still struggling with my own.
I doubted there was any chance the school would let us have a support group anyway. Parents would probably freak if they found out about it, the same way a few parents had when the school first set up a Gay-Straight Alliance club. Even though the GSA kept the names of its members confidential so the kids who were in the club wouldn’t get in trouble, some parents believed it promoted homosexuality instead of just being a safe place where students wouldn’t be bullied for who they were.
“You’re plotting, aren’t you?” I said.
Holly nodded, though she looked uncertain. “I don’t know whether it’s something we should talk to the school about, but so many people have things like that happen to them, and some never tell anyone. I don’t mean they would have to talk about it in the group, either, but if they went to meetings they might learn how to cope better even if they stay quiet about what happened to them. And learn how to support their friends. Like, not everyone in GSA is homosexual. Not everyone in a support group would have to be a survivor. They could just be people who want to support survivors and wants to find ways to keep this from happening.”
“Maybe.”
“Am I being pushy?” She took a sip of her ginger ale. “I mean, you look pissed off. I’m sorry if I should just shut up about this.”
“It’s okay.” I smiled. “You want to help people. That isn’t a bad thing. I just don’t know whether the way you’re thinking would actually be helpful. It might make things worse for some people.”
“I just kind of came up with it after Natalia talked to me. I didn’t think it through.”
“It’s okay,” I said again. “It might be a good idea, but some survivors probably wouldn’t want to be part of the group. I don’t know if I would, to be honest. After I talk to my counselor, I usually feel worse than when I went to the appointment. Talking in a group might be the same.”
She nodded. “I didn’t really think about that. But like I said, it wouldn’t have to be a place to talk about the assaults people have gone through. Probably it would be better if people weren’t allowed to give details. They could just talk about, I don’t know.” She paused. “How to cope with it. How to report it if something does happen. How to deal with bullying and victim-blaming. What to do if a friend tells you they’ve been assaulted. That kind of thing.”
As she talked, she started sounding more excited. Obviously this was really important to her. I didn’t completely understand why, but if it made her happy to try to help others, I was okay with it.
That didn’t mean I wanted to plan out an entire support group right then, though. We wouldn’t have a whole lot of time alone before Mom got home,
and I was more interested in finding out whether Holly and I were on the same page about our relationship.
“Can we talk more about it another time?” I asked. “Maybe you should do more planning first. Then you and I can talk about whether to go to the school with the idea.”
“Yeah.” She grinned. “Sounds good. Or maybe I’ll decide it wouldn’t be worth talking to them, but you never know.”
“Right.”
We sat there without saying anything for a couple of minutes, until I felt too awkward to stay on the stool. I didn’t even know why I was having so much trouble coming up with words. She and I had already said we were together. Asking her what that meant to her should have been simple, but I was a little afraid of what I might hear. I knew she planned to keep pretending to date Nathan, which meant I should be free to see guys if I wanted to. Not that I wanted to, but I liked having options.
I didn’t know how to bring up any of that, though. When we’d talked at the mall, Holly had seemed upset about the idea of me seeing guys. Everyone knew I didn’t do exclusivity, so she probably wasn’t surprised. But I had the feeling she’d definitely been hurt.
I got off my stool and went back to the fridge. “Are you hungry? If we’re going to tackle homework, maybe we need fuel.”
“I shouldn’t eat anything.” She looked down at herself.
“Don’t start the fat thing again, because I’ll have to dump ginger ale on your head.” I went over to her. “You’re pretty. You know you’re pretty. Weight isn’t everything. I know skinny girls who are total bitches that I wouldn’t want anything to do with.”
“You’re skinny,” she said.
“Yeah. It isn’t a good thing. Lately when I try to eat, half the time I can’t keep it down.” I leaned on the island. “Between last summer and all the bullying now, a lot of times I’m sick to my stomach. I don’t do it on purpose. My counselor and I are working on it. It’s anxiety, not an eating disorder or anything, and I really kind of hate it.”
She tilted her head. “I didn’t know any of that.”
