Kings, Queens, and In-Betweens

by Tanya Boteju

  “See ya.” Winnow waved her hand at me and gave me that same pitying smile.

  I shut the car door, and as she drove off, I wondered if we really would see each other again.

  CHAPTER 10

  By the time I got home, I’d had plenty of time to replay the events of the previous night over and over again. Each time, I was able to remember some detail that made the whole situation even more horrifying. Winnow’s twisted mouth when she realized I’d barfed right next to her. Boyd slipping one of the two guys who ran the place an extra twenty bucks for the trouble of cleaning up. The piece of chicken I found perched in my bra strap as Winnow hosed me off. As I walked in the patio door around noon, I’d compiled a lengthy laundry list of dirty items to wallow in.

  Dad wasn’t home, which was perfect. I didn’t feel like facing questions about my big night out.

  I left a note on the kitchen counter saying I wasn’t feeling well, and that I’d be upstairs, napping. And then that was exactly where I went to sleep the day away.

  The next morning, to add to my misery, I got a curt text from Charles saying, I need my chem notes back for my online course. When I texted him to ask if he wanted to meet up for some ice cream or something, he never responded. So there was that.

  Things just escalated from there.

  Dad kept trying to get some dirt on my night at Winnow’s, and even though I kept giving him my very best don’t bother me face, he’d ask something every time we crossed paths.

  “So . . . where’d y’all go?”

  “Did Deidre go too?”

  “What’d you do?”

  “Forgot to ask—how old are these folks, anyway?”

  It got to the point that I just stopped crossing paths with him—I stayed away from the house almost all day Sunday, and by the time he got home from work Monday and Tuesday, I’d already left to strategically wander around town until he’d gone to bed.

  Unfortunately, nowhere was safe. I had another choice run-in with Gordon midweek. This time I’d walked over to the Fast Pick to grab a few items, and he was outside smoking, one indolent arm hanging around Tessa’s neck.

  It’s not like I expected him to bring up Davis’s asshole performance at Tessa’s house, but I don’t think I expected him to be even more of an asshole either. Yet after our run-in at the art room, I guess he’d decided that the best defense was a nasty offense, because he stared right at me, like a dare, and said, “Well, well. Check this out, Tessa—ever seen a queer before?”

  Tessa’s eyes registered something between confusion and surprise before she aimed them at her feet.

  Still reeling from my horrifying night with Winnow, unsure of what to do about Charles or my mom’s letter, and exhausted from the lack of sleep all these things caused, I had very little energy left for Gordon Grant, even if I was still curious (and maybe even a little concerned) about him.

  But that didn’t stop my cheeks from instantly lighting on fire at the word “queer.” “Dyke” and “queer” just hadn’t been words I’d grown accustomed to yet—maybe I would eventually. But I guess I’d always just considered myself a girl who was into other girls—I hadn’t sorted out any labels yet. And I’d never had anyone label me either—certainly not in public in front of practical strangers—until this past couple of weeks. Part of me wanted to respond with, “So what if I am?” and part of me wanted to tell him to eff off for trying to brand me with his own names for whoever he thought I was.

  I did neither.

  “No snappy answer, Clark? Must mean it’s true,” he added, glancing at Tessa and laughing a deliberately obnoxious laugh.

  Man, it was obvious he was trying so hard to be a jerk. After my own performance the other night, I wondered what kind of deficiencies his act was concealing.

  I finally found my tongue. “Nothing wrong with a little truth, Gordon.” I held his gaze until he sniffed and looked at his cigarette like it had suddenly grown confusing to him.

  Curious, I directed at Tessa, “I didn’t know you two were a thing.”

  She leaned into him a little more and shrugged, looking to him as if for some affirmation that they were, indeed, a thing. When he looked away and placed his cigarette to his lips, she faced me and replied, “Yeah, well, we’re just having some fun. You know.” Halting titter.

  I wish I knew what a little fun was like. Maybe being an a-hole was the answer to all my problems. But probably not.

  Gordon blew his smoke at my feet, then moved his arm from Tessa’s shoulders to her waist and squeezed her in tight. “Come on, babe, let’s go have a little fun, like you said.” His smarmy smile spread across his face, but it wasn’t matched by his eyes. I was beginning to realize that the indecipherable trace of “something else” I’d seen in them before was always there—even when he was being his crappiest self. Was it possible to decode whatever it was? Did I want to?

  As if in response, he flicked the butt at my feet and turned to go, bringing Tessa along with him. I heard her ask, “What’d she mean by the truth?” as they walked away, and I wondered how he would answer.

  I spent the next day trying to keep myself busy so I wouldn’t think about any of the shambles my life was currently in. I did text Deidre to see if she could spread a little of her magic sunshine my way, but she said she was swamped with work and would get back to me ASAP.

  Staring at my very familiar room and the photo collage above my desk, what I did find myself thinking about after a small hiatus was Ginny. I couldn’t really explain why. Maybe it was because—besides the general, ongoing pain she’d caused over the past three years of my life, which was now more like a dull ache than the excruciating humiliation I currently felt over Winnow—things had been relatively normal between us. Relative to all this other nonsense, I mean.

  I guess I was just looking for some normal as I walked through the doors of Old Stuff that afternoon, hoping to find an old friend and some old clothes to make me feel better.

  I hadn’t seen Ginny much since the festival, except at the car wash and once while I’d been running some errands for Jill in town. I must have been a little preoccupied with thoughts of Winnow, because for once, I didn’t trip over myself each time I saw Ginny. But I doubt she’d noticed, seeing as she was always surrounded by people wanting her attention.

  I did feel a little nervous as the bell above the door announced my entrance, though. Part of me really missed her—and I don’t mean just her freckles, either—I missed her cheerfulness, her simple, friendly nature. The only complication about Ginny was how I felt about her—she herself was an open book.

  Ginny was standing behind the counter eating a sandwich when I walked in. When she saw me, her whole face smiled and that, along with the tiny dab of mayo at the side of her mouth, made me suddenly feel like crying. My face fell apart, and embarrassed once again by these uncontrollable crying fits, I covered my face with my hands and just stood there, sobbing. God. When would this effing well run dry?

  I felt Ginny’s arms wrap around me and we just stood like that for a minute or so, until I gained control of my face and body. Ginny moved away momentarily to place the BE BACK IN 20 sign on the door and flip the lock. Then she grabbed my hand and led me toward the changing room at the back.

  Once hidden behind the curtain, she said, “Hey, you. What’s going on? I feel like I haven’t seen you in ages.”

  Not quite ready to look at her yet, I stared at our feet, which were toe to toe between us. “Yeah, things have been . . . weird. I don’t even know where to start.” Trying to keep it light, I added, “Also, I need some clothes.”

  She placed the tips of her sandaled feet over the top of my sneakers and tapped them lightly. “Well, I want to hear everything, but I feel like this changing room might not be the best place for a heart-to-heart. I’m off at two. How about we focus on the clothes part, and then chat when I’m done?”

  I nodded, wiping my face.

  We spent the next half hour rummaging through the store. O
nce I’d told Ginny that I was looking for comfortable, classic Nima-wear (jeans and T-shirts), she, in classic Ginny form, began choosing the exact opposite of that.

  “You need a change, Nima. Something to spice up that mood,” she said, handing me a pile of very bright, very furry, very glittery clothing.

  Glitter and change. These were complicated things. But she was right. I needed them both. Badly. And wouldn’t it be a plot twist if Ginny was the one who helped me get both?

  She kept the BE BACK IN 20 sign up the whole time, giving us some privacy, which was nice. But she also forced me to try on every item of clothing she chose in a variety of combinations and perform a little model-walk in each outfit so she could decide what worked and didn’t work, which was not so nice. I went along with it, though, since she was doing me a favor, and because I thought maybe a makeover could bring me closer to a Nima exciting enough to spend time with.

  But at one point, she had me try on this complicated shirt with more straps and openings than I was used to, and true to form, I managed to get stuck trying it on. Too embarrassed to ask for help, I just made it worse and worse until I had to give in.

  “Ginny?”

  “Mmm?” she replied from outside the changing room, where she’d been sorting through boxes of donations in between my model walks.

  “I think I’m stuck.”

  I heard her chuckle and then the curtain flew aside. She took one look at me and laughed out loud, then quickly covered her mouth. “Sorry,” she said between her fingers, “but this is pretty cute.”

  I was in my jeans, with bare feet, and the shirt was pulled tightly across my midriff, pinning my left arm to my side. One of the several straps also looped around my neck and my other arm. Ginny moved into the changing room and began gently pulling at various parts of the shirt, unlooping and loosening like she’d unraveled hundreds of people from complicated shirts like this before.

  As she carefully untangled me, her hands kept brushing against my stomach, arms, neck. Predictably, these moments of skin-to-skin contact made my heartbeat quicken until I thought she might actually be able to see it through my chest. Finally she managed to get the shirt loose enough that she could pull it off, and I was left standing in a tight space, with only my jeans and a sports bra on, across from Ginny Woodland—the starting point of many, many fantasies I’d had over the years.

  She just stood there with the shirt in her hands for a moment, fiddling with a strap but also, I noticed, sneaking glances at my torso. I just stood there awkwardly, not sure what to do. Finally, after what seemed like millennia, she said, “Here” and placed the neckhole of the shirt over my head. I remained still, my face now hidden inside the fabric. “Raise your arms, silly,” she instructed. I did. She guided them through the armholes, her hands grazing my arms and armpits as she did, then the sides of my torso and stomach.

  When the shirt finally dropped from my face and fell about my body the way it was meant to, Ginny’s face was only a few inches from my own and her hands remained on my hips. We looked at each other. She swallowed. My eyebrows rose. She tucked a strand of my ever-escaping hair behind my ear and let her finger glide down my jawbone and come to rest at the side of my neck. I could feel a heart attack coming on.

  Her eyes traveled from my neck, to my own eyes, down to my mouth. “You’re really beautiful, Nima, you know?”

  I blinked. Was this actually happening, or was I about to wake up in my own bed with Gus licking my face? “I’m not,” I said.

  She leaned in, her mouth a fingertip’s distance from mine. “You are,” she whispered. The warmth of her breath tickled my lips. Prickling heat rose across my neck as Ginny closed her eyes and pressed her mouth to mine.

  No sound, just the silence of two soft things coming together, the heartbeat ceasing for a moment, the stillness of a body suspended in astonishment.

  Then: a quiet whoosh of air from our noses as we breathed out. The muted thumping of my heart pumping again. A gentle pop of lips parting for a moment before reconnecting.

  Ginny Woodland was kissing me. Her hand remained on my hip and the other was still at my neck and her stomach brushed against my own and her mouth was pressed against mine. After a brief moment where I couldn’t get my lips to work, I pushed them back against hers, hoping this was what you were supposed to do.

  The past three years of longing for this moment crashed over me like a landslide, and my knees almost buckled under the force. I placed my hands on Ginny’s arms just to remain standing. I guess she took that as a sign to keep going, because her lips parted ever so slightly and she leaned into me a little more. I let my lips fall open as well, partly from wanting to feel her tongue against mine and partly from shock, I think. Uncertainly, I nudged my tongue into her mouth and allowed hers to shift and slide against it, a current prodding me this way and that.

  The velvety wetness sent a shudder through me and my eyelids fluttered. My tongue pushed into hers. My body, hot and shivery all at once, suddenly took over and my hands pulled her closer. Every single part of me felt like burning-hot liquid and I just wanted to melt over her, consume her, swallow her. I wanted it all, I wanted—

  “Wait, wait, wait.” She pulled back, and I felt her hands pushing against my hip and chest. “We can’t.”

  I watched the words come out of her mouth, and all I could think of was kissing her again. I leaned forward to try.

  “Nima, no. I’m so sorry. I just—I got caught up in the moment. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—to confuse you . . . or mislead you or anything.”

  I let my hands fall away from her body and took a step back. Something in my chest ripped open. “But didn’t you like it?”

  “I did. I mean, it was nice. You’re a good kisser.” She smiled at me, a consolatory encouragement. “But it’s not what I want. We’re friends. And I like guys. I just—felt close to you and I guess I was a little . . . curious?”

  Nice. Not what I want. Friends. My heart plunged into my stomach and shattered into fragments. I couldn’t believe I’d let myself think this was going anywhere good. That I’d somehow find consolation or affirmation here. That someone might actually want me the same way I wanted them—least of all Ginny. That’s it, Nima. Keep making the same mistake over and over again. What a champ.

  “Awesome. I’m glad you could satisfy your curiosity.” I thought about tearing off the shirt and storming off, but I doubted I could get it off on my own and then Ginny would have to help me, which would ruin the overall effect of my fury. So I whipped open the curtain, squashed my feet into my sneakers, grabbed my own shirt from the floor, and walked across the store, yelling, “I’m keeping this weird shirt and you can suck up the cost yourself!”

  “But—Nima! Don’t you want to talk? We can still talk, right? Like friends?” she called after me.

  I didn’t stop. I just shook my head and scoffed as I banged out the front door. I threw my T-shirt over the handlebars and climbed onto my bike, wishing that Ginny would burst out of the store at that moment, run to me, and beg me to come back—tell me she was wrong, that I was too irresistible, that she did want to be more than friends—and then kiss me hard and long right in front of the store.

  But she didn’t.

  I pedaled furiously home, threw my bike down to the ground in the front yard, and stomped straight up to my room. Knowing there was no way I’d get this shirt off by myself, and also knowing I’d never be able to wear it again without thinking about that changing room, that moment, that abrupt ending to the very first kiss of my life—I took a pair of scissors from my desk and started cutting the stupid straps, the fabric across my stomach, the sleeves—indiscriminately shredding it to pieces and letting the scraps flutter to the floor.

  Fragments. Tatters. Just when I thought a thread of something new and real and wonderful was being woven into my story, rejection stripped it from the seams. Maybe new and wonderful just weren’t part of my pattern.

  By the time I’d finished, a swir
ling vortex of fabric lay at my feet, and I felt trapped in the eye of a storm I couldn’t escape.

  CHAPTER 11

  In the early evening, after I’d spent an hour systematically removing any reminders of Ginny from my walls and letting Gus sniff and trample them on the floor, my stomach let out a hollow growl. I gathered up the photos, wrestling one from Gus’s sharp little teeth, and dumped them into the wastepaper basket on the way out of my room.

  Feeling no less confused, hurt, or angry, but trying to focus my attention on the simple task of throwing something together for dinner, I swung open the refrigerator door only to have the kitchen door swing open behind me. Expecting it to be Dad, I mumbled, “Hey,” and continued to sort through our pathetic fridge contents.

  “Well, well, well. There you are, stranger.” Jill’s voice, way too perky, rose up behind me and instantly my neck prickled. Considering how mad I still was at her, I found her perkiness just plain rude.

  At this point, I kind of felt like I’d missed the moment I should have turned around, so I just kept shuffling jars around in the fridge.

  “Come on, Nima, we’re going to the Two Suns for dinner tonight.”

  Normally, I’d be all for dinner at the café. But tonight, all I wanted to do was lock myself up in my room with a grilled cheese sandwich.

  “I’m not that hungry,” I lied, probably sounding like every ornery teenager who ever lived. Still not gonna look at you. Still gonna aimlessly search through this fridge, even though I just said I wasn’t hungry.

  “Great. You’ll be a cheap date then. Get a sweater. It’s cool out,” Jill said in her no-nonsense voice.

  I knew that voice and it would do no good to argue with it. I heaved the heaviest sigh I could into the empty, cold abyss and did as I was told.