Not That I Care

by Rachel Vail

  “No,” I said. “I hate him. He walks like a chicken. Ew.” I caught up with Olivia and linked my arm into hers, whispering, “Come on, let’s go in.”

  twenty-one

  CJ turns carefully, now, as if she might break her body if she moves it abruptly. There is nothing CJ hates so much as speaking in front of the class. In kindergarten she barely said a word. In first grade she never managed to get her full two letters out—all she managed was the first sound, Se-se-se, over and over. My heart hurt for her every time she was asked her name. In fourth grade, after we were best friends already, she told me that she’d rather write a ten-page book report than say her name in front of the class once. When we were partners for a science project last year, I did all the talking so she wouldn’t have to, and I also did half the research, but I didn’t care if we split the work evenly. I’ve just always tried to be there for her, to be strong for her, help her stand up for herself whether it’s on the playground or to her mother, who totally intimidates her and runs her life. I’d do anything for her; she knows that. Oh, well. Anyway.

  CJ takes a big breath of air, the way she learned in speech class. She reaches into her bag and pulls out a toe shoe. Surprise, surprise. “I, I dance,” she whispers. Mrs. Shepard says nothing. I touch the ballet slipper in my bag. It’s small, left from fourth grade when I had such tiny feet. I never got on pointe, so I don’t have a toe shoe.

  The toe shoe in CJ’s shaking hand has faded brown satin peeling off from the toe area; they spray-painted her toe shoes brown last year when she played a bug in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. She was so good. I went to two performances, even though I had to beg Ned for money for the second ticket and clean his room for the month of February to pay him back. It was worth it. I brought CJ flowers I’d made out of tissues. I sat beside her parents in the orchestra, getting sick off the smell of the beautiful pink roses in her mother’s lap through the whole performance. Afterward, we went backstage, and I stood with my green down jacket hanging off my shoulders and my work boots spread in second position, as all the little bun-heads buzzed around me in their sheer pale pinks. CJ smiled so happy when she saw me, her cheeks flushed and her eyes sparkling. She was still out of breath, pulling on her leg warmers and her tight little sweater top. The Hurleys invited me out to dinner with them. In the car on the way to the restaurant, I dropped the tissue flowers in CJ’s lap and said, “These are stupid, but . . .” She whispered to me that they were way better than the live flowers from her mother, because they’d last forever. She even brought them into the restaurant with us and left the roses out in the car.

  Maybe one of those flowers is in her Sack. I see something pink in there, something that looks tissuey.

  Please, Saint Christopher, let it be one of my flowers.

  I dig into my Sack, looking for the Saint Christopher medal I stole from my father. There it is, sunk down at the bottom. I grab it, hold it between my palms, close my eyes, and pray.

  Please, Saint Christopher, please let that be one of the flowers I made for her, let her have chosen something to do with me in her Sack.

  She pulls out History, the stuffed dog she got for quitting sucking her thumb when she was two and a half. I almost expect her to tell the story: She stopped sucking her thumb, and as a prize her mother bought her this incredibly snuggly little dog, and suggested they call it Doggie, but CJ, in a rare moment of self-assertion, said, “No, his name is History.” I love that story. It’s so easy to imagine her all serious as a toddler, shocking everybody by her unexpected strength. People who don’t know her so well don’t realize that inside all her shy sweetness, there’s something tough as steel. I bet her new boyfriend, Tommy, doesn’t know it, and neither does her new best friend. I bet they don’t even know History’s name.

  “This is, was, um,” CJ starts, and I grip the Saint Christopher medal to pray for her. “This, this, this, dog . . .”

  I stop myself from running up to the front of the class and doing her presentation for her. It kills me to see her gulping air, struggling up there. I’m sure I could explain everything in her Sack. I wrap my feet around my chair’s legs to keep me planted.

  “This is, was, when I was, was a baby, I had this,” she almost whispers, and drops History on Mrs. Shepard’s desk. She closes her eyes. I close mine.

  Please, Saint Christopher, if you let there be something to do with me in CJ’s Sack, I’ll do anything. I’ll change. I’ll be nice about CJ choosing Zoe over me. I’ll get up in front of the class when it’s my turn and admit all this truth about myself. Anything.

  I open my hands and look at the medal clutched between them. I swear it, Saint Christopher—do this one thing for me, and I’ll change.

  CJ has one more item to present. I hold the medal and pray.

  twenty-two

  Exercise bands. “For ballet,” CJ says. The same thing she said about the net that holds her bun together during performances, the same thing she said about the pink tissue-y wrap skirt I had stupidly thought might be a crappy fake flower she probably tossed a long time ago. I would’ve. You don’t need old tissues looped with a Baggie tie gathering dust in your room.

  She lifts each thing soundlessly off the desk and places it back inside her bag without raising her eyes to us or Mrs. Shepard. I drop the Saint Christopher medal back inside my Sack. I never believed in him anyway. All that is just superstition.

  A noise startles me. I turn around to see Zoe Grandon clapping for CJ, breaking the silence in the room by applauding. She doesn’t even care that nobody else is joining in, she just claps and claps, her big goofy grin showing every white tooth in her mouth. “Awesome,” she says.

  I turn to see how CJ is reacting. Her head is bowed but under those thick brown eyebrows, CJ’s eyes peer toward the back of the room, and a slow, small grin fights its way onto CJ’s serious pale face. She raises her chin and smiles at Zoe.

  “Woo!” Zoe yells, pumping her fist in the air.

  CJ smoothes her hair back from her face and, smiling at Zoe, walks back to her chair. She turns in my direction but then right past me and whispers thanks to Zoe.

  My hand is in the air. “Can I go to the bathroom?”

  I stand up and head to the door, clutching my Sack. I can’t wait for an answer, I have to go, have to get out. Mrs. Shepard says something about leave my Sack. You don’t need to bring it, do you?

  But I am already out the door and I hear people laughing at me, behind my back, but I gotta go, gotta get out and I don’t care, laugh at me if you want. I hear Mrs. Shepard call Zoe Grandon to present next, but that’s the last thing I hear, because I round the corner and start to run.

  Bathroom. Or nurse. Maybe get sent home, but Mom would have to leave work to pick me up and she’d be all annoyed and who needs it? And I’m not sitting there getting my temperature taken by the nurse like she’s doing me a favor. I don’t want any favors, I don’t want anyone.

  It’s so pointless. I shuffle as fast as I can down the stairs to the first floor, just moving, just getting away. Pointless. You get attached and they leave, they dump you and there is nothing you can do, chump, nothing. That’s what I should have in this Sack. Nothing. I should just throw all this junk in the trash where it belongs and go up and present my nothing. Nothing and nothing and nothing. And if you don’t think that’s an accurate representation of me in all my various aspects, Mrs. Shepard, well, that’s because you have no clue who I am.

  I slam my fist into the door of the girls’ room, then lean the weight of my body against it to get in. There’s a silver trash can in the corner near the sink, and I cross the room in two steps. My Sack is upside down. “Out!” I say out loud. “Get out! I don’t want you! I don’t need any of this crap, just a bunch of garbage I’ve been hoarding as if it means something to anybody. Get out!”

  The branch is stuck. “Get! Garbage, that’s where you belong, you worthless . . .”
/>
  I shove, but it’s caught on the lid. I can’t even throw away trash. “Get in there you stupid fruitless—never grew a single pitiful cherry, you stupid, get in!”

  I yank the branch out to put it in straight. My finger touches something sticky. I look down to see what disgusting thing is now all over my thumb, is it bird poop or what, so typical it figures. What is this thing, black and sticky?

  Oh. Tape.

  I close my eyes and sit down on the cold green bathroom tile, next to the garbage can full of my stuff. I touch the sticky spot on the branch in my hand, remembering Mom’s face when she was looking out the kitchen window, staring at the cherry tree.

  It didn’t last, obviously, but for a minute she was happy. She believed, for that minute, that my tree wasn’t defective, that it had really managed to burst out in a thousand cherries. It was just a trick, not magic. I know, obviously, since I’m the faker, I’m the one who did the tricking. The only thing is, for a minute she believed, and that minute felt like magic to me. Real magic.

  Too bad if she thought it was stupid and a waste of money. It was worth eighteen dollars, seeing her so happy she was shaking as she stood there pointing out the window. She thought she was witnessing a miracle. I made that happen. And it was my eighteen dollars, so screw her. Best eighteen dollars I ever spent.

  I push myself off the bathroom floor.

  twenty-three

  The sealed box of red-hots.

  The little white box with my baby tooth in it.

  The spatula.

  The gummy eraser, its corner used up.

  The pale pink ballet slipper.

  The Barbie head, still pleasantly smiling.

  The medal of Saint Christopher, hanging from the chain.

  All fifty-two cards, bound again with the rubber band and wiped clean from the gook at the bottom of the garbage can.

  The branch from the cherry tree that did get cherries, and they were real, and my mother felt lucky to have them, at least for a minute. Maybe other people would think it’s stupid or pathetic, but it’s mine, this branch—like all the rest of the stuff I’m picking out of the trash and loading again into this brown bag. It means something to me.

  twenty-four

  Head down, I walk as quickly and quietly as I can up the aisle to my seat. Zoe is just finishing her presentation. “And, here’s the tenth thing: my shoelace.” She pulls a gray shoelace out of her bag.

  Mrs. Shepard asks, “A shoelace?”

  “Yes, because”—Zoe touches the frayed tip of the shoelace—“because I’m just barely holding myself together!” Everybody laughs, including me. I can’t help it. Even though she stole my best friend, she really is funny, and her smile is so broad. She looks at me. I try to decide what to do—smile back? Or let her know she can’t win me over so easy? Not after what she’s done. I stop smiling and just stare. She blinks a few times, then says, “Well, that’s me! In a nutshell. In a Sack. That’s it.”

  “Fine,” Mrs. Shepard says.

  Zoe shrugs and starts tossing her things back in her Sack. Even though I do have to hate her, I sort of wish I hadn’t missed her presentation. People are leaning back in their chairs like they just ate something good, watching her. I think she just put a piece of French toast in a Baggie into her Sack. What could that have meant?

  I clutch the wrinkled brown bag on my lap. My stuff, I remind myself. Maybe it’s not as good as Zoe’s or Olivia’s or CJ’s, but what can I do? You play the hand you’re dealt, as Mom would say.

  Zoe is walking up the aisle toward me and CJ. CJ smiles at her, clapping a little with her hands down by the edge of her desk. I look away, into my desk.

  There’s the crumpled note from Olivia. I smooth it out. As Zoe passes me, I’m reading it again.

  Sorry I’m such a moody mess. Tommy thinks he’s so great. Ha! I have to tell you something URGENT. Your best friend, Morgan.

  And then under that, in Olivia’s perfect script, Want to come over after school today?

  I pick up my pen and write, in script, Yes.

  Zoe sits down in her seat.

  I fold the note carefully into a little square and grip it in my palm, rubbing my thumb over it, deciding.

  twenty-five

  “Morgan Miller.”

  Clutching my bag, I walk up to the front of the room. On my way, I secretly drop the note on Olivia’s desk. Her thin hand darts out to cover it.

  At the front, I turn and face the class. I don’t want to look at anybody. Taking my cue from Olivia, I look straight at the bulletin board behind and above their heads. “So,” I say. “This is me.”

  I pull the spatula out of the bag. “A spatula.” I swallow. “Because, um, my hobby is cooking.” I glance at CJ, who is squinting. She knows I don’t cook. I look back at the bulletin board and add, “Also, I once flung it at my brother and cut his head open.”

  Somebody laughs, I’m not sure who. I smile and reach back into my bag. “This is a ballet slipper.” As I’m holding it up for the class to see, the Saint Christopher medal falls out of it, onto the floor. “Oops.” I pick it up. Now I’ve got the ballet slipper in one hand and the Saint Christopher medal in the other. “And this is a, it used to belong to my, it’s a religious thing, medal, because, thank God, I don’t have to dance ballet anymore. Ha, ha, ha.”

  I set them both down on Mrs. Shepard’s desk.

  “Here’s a deck of cards,” I say, pulling them out of my Sack. “They belong to my mother, and she taught me how to play gin, and I really like doing that. You know, sometimes. Because sometimes I beat her.”

  I’m about to put them down, but then I think of something to add. “Also, my mother always used to say, ‘You play the hand you’re dealt,’ which means, I think, that, you know, you get what you get, so you may as well try to win with what you’ve got, and that’s like, my philosophy in life. I think. Maybe.”

  I wish I hadn’t said that. It sounded better inside my head. I look into the bag quick for something less personal, but the hard thing is all my stuff is really personal. I choose the Barbie head, and pull her out by the hair.

  Swinging her back and forth upside down, I explain, “My mother didn’t want me to have Barbies when I was little, because they repress girls’ ambitions, or something like that.”

  I think Mrs. Shepard just nodded, but I’m not sure.

  “Well, I wanted one anyway, so I bought this one, and it didn’t do anything bad to me. It just, didn’t do much at all. So I popped her head off.”

  I swing Barbie’s head onto the ballet slipper.

  “What else,” I mumble, peering inside my bag. “Oh, this is a branch from my cherry tree. My parents planted it the day I was born.” I stand in front of them, touching the sticky spot, thinking how to explain.

  I shrug and place it beside the Saint Christopher medal.

  Looking inside the Sack, I take a deep breath and tell myself, Get it over with, fast. I pull out the red-hots and say, “This is for my sweet tooth.” I drop the box on the desk so quick it falls right off, crashes onto the floor, and pops open. Red-hots scatter everywhere. I feel my cheeks getting hot, and the tears welling up behind my eyes, but no way I’m going to fall apart. “Well, so much for that,” I say, trying to smile.

  “Finish,” Mrs. Shepard says. “You can sweep at the end of class.”

  “OK, sorry,” I mumble.

  I don’t want to look at her or anybody. Almost done, almost done, just survive it. I pull out the eraser. “I make a lot of mistakes,” I say. “Obviously.”

  I think Mrs. Shepard smiled.

  It gives me courage to look at the faces in front of me. Nobody is sneering or grimacing. Zoe is nodding, actually. Jonas has his head tilted sideways, like he’s really listening, and although Tommy is chewing on his thumbnail, he’s looking right at me. Olivia is leaning forward, her face
in her hands, smiling. I avoid looking at CJ. I’m just not ready. I place the eraser beside the branch and go back to the bag.

  The tooth jiggles inside the small white box as I lift it. I open the box. “This is the first baby tooth I lost. Because, it’s to symbolize, you know . . .” I close my eyes. Say something. “It’s for like, getting rid of the baby parts of me.”

  I open my eyes and look right at Mrs. Shepard. “That’s it.” I shrug.

  “That’s nine things,” she says.

  “Nine?” I start counting, but before I hit five I realize, Oh, no—the thermometer is in my desk. “Oh,” I say while my mind is going warp speed. Do I go get it? How do I explain a broken thermometer without starting to cry, without looking straight at CJ and in front of all these people saying, You are part of me, why don’t you want me anymore? How can you replace me so easily?

  Obviously I will never embarrass myself like that. What, then? Somebody shifts, I hear the bottom of a chair squeal against the floor. Mrs. Shepard taps her toe. Once, twice.

  “Because,” I say, thinking, Because what? Because what? “Because my tenth thing is . . .” Is what? This is a nightmare. “My tenth thing . . .” I look into my empty bag as if something might magically materialize. Nothing.

  “My tenth thing is nothing.”

  “Excuse me?” asks Mrs. Shepard.

  “It’s nothing,” I repeat, wondering where I’m going with this. “Not nothing like, poor me, I’m a nothing. That’s not what I mean. No, nothing like, the empty bag, because, the most important thing is, about me, is . . .” I’m talking so fast I have to suck in some air quick. “What I mean is, the future. You know, that I’m not done yet, the most important part of me, or the best part, maybe, is what hasn’t happened yet. What I haven’t made happen yet.”

  Nobody moves.

  “It’s hard to explain,” I say, loading my things back into the brown paper bag.