Beneath the Skin

by Kyla Stone

  “Well—this is Michigan. Isn’t this place known for temperamental weather?”

  “I’m leaving. Don’t follow me.” I turn on my heels and head the other way, toward the exit.

  I duck into the restroom before they see me. I lean against the sink without glancing in the mirror. I don’t want to look.

  A minute later, the bathroom door opens. Jasmine Cole walks in, still focused on her phone.

  My stomach drops down to my feet. “You following me, now? You have some weird obsession with listening to me pee?”

  Surprise flits across her face before her features settle into a sneer. “Hell no.” Jasmine pulls a tube of lipstick from the pocket of her purple skinny pants and peers at herself in the mirror. She slits her eyes. “You’re really something else, you know that?”

  A fissure opens up inside me. Painful memories lodge in my brain like splinters. Jasmine with her loud, honking laugh and constant chatter that could almost fill up all the empty spots inside me, who could make me feel normal through the force of her exuberant will alone. I remember that summer after eighth grade, when I biked to her house almost every day. Only a mile away and her neat, tree-lined neighborhood felt like another planet. Her house was always clean and bright. It was like being transported into a happy-ending movie, where her mother made us crunchy cucumber sandwiches and we lounged in her pool until we were sun-crisped or sprawled on her bed, me sketching in my notebooks, her concentrating on pinning her butterfly wings.

  “What’s your deal?” she says, glancing at me in the mirror’s reflection.

  “I could ask you the exact same thing. You’re the one who unleashed your attack dog on me.”

  She rolls her eyes. “What? You mean Margot? You brought that on yourself. You think nobody’s going to care if you punch an innocent sixth grader?”

  “Innocent? What’re you smoking? You always hated him anyway.”

  Something like bewilderment passes across her face, like she’s completely forgotten I used to know all her secrets. She clears her throat. “Whatever. That’s so not even the point.”

  She applies a fresh layer of crimson lipstick and presses her lips into a pout. I look for something I recognize, some part of her that still exists from before. She has the same thin, flat eyebrows, the divot in the center of her nose from a gymnastics accident in fifth grade, the same squinty green eyes.

  “What happened to you?”

  She straightens. “Nothing happened to me. Hello? People change.”

  I want to believe it was Margot who stole her from me, but the reality is we were already pulling away from each other that summer after eighth grade. She didn’t understand why I stopped laughing. Why I started inhaling food like it was air, more and more, as much as I could force into my bloated stomach, why I needed an armor of fat to shield me. Most of all, she didn’t understand why I cut.

  I remember the look on her face when I first risked showing her. We were lounging in chairs beside her pool. My hands trembled as I slid up the hem of my swim shorts. I needed her to see me. I needed to show her what was happening inside me, my bones splintering into shards. But I couldn’t speak the words. I could only show her, desperate for her to understand, desperate for her to see the pain I wrote on my skin was only the surface, only the beginning of a dark terror I couldn’t begin to describe.

  Her expression when she saw my legs was a mix of confusion, shock, and revulsion. She leapt to her feet like I’d turned into a cockroach. “My mom wants me to finish up some chores,” was all she’d said as she wrapped herself in a saffron towel. We never spoke of it again. That was the last time I was ever invited over to her house. Within a few months, we were barely speaking. By Christmas, we were strangers.

  I blink back the memory with hot, stinging eyes. “We both changed.”

  She stares at me in the mirror, like maybe she’s remembering, too. “Yeah, I guess we did.”

  “It doesn’t have to be like this.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Your brother bullied Aaron,” I say, my voice trembling. “That’s why I did it. Remember Aaron? The scruffy little kid who ate crayons all the time? He’s eight now.”

  She blinks. “That doesn’t change anything.”

  “Jackson gave him a black eye.”

  She adjusts her creamy off-the-shoulder sweater. “I don’t care, okay? That’s not my problem.”

  I flinch. “Just tell your attack dog to leave me the hell alone.”

  “In case you haven’t noticed, Margot does what she wants.”

  “Trust me, I’ve noticed. You should watch your back. Getting close to that one is like cuddling with a rattlesnake.”

  “She’s not that bad.” But her gaze slides away in the mirror.

  “Yeah right. If you think that, you really are an idiot. Everyone’s entitled to be stupid, but you’re abusing the privilege.”

  Something shifts in Jasmine’s face, like a door closing. “I almost feel sorry for you. Almost. You nearly broke Jackson’s nose. My mom cried. You’re just—you’re a psycho, a freak. You deserve whatever you’ve got coming to you.” She turns and flounces out of the bathroom.

  I stand there, the sound of my heartbeat echoing off the tile walls. The pain burns through me. I want to be numb, want a heart carved in stone. Instead, I feel like someone’s pressed a lit cigarette to my skin.

  7

  In AP Government, I sit in the back, in the seat closest to the bank of windows. You can’t see the river through the trees until the leaves drop in November. A few of the red maples are beginning to turn, their leaves blushing reddish-pink.

  “As we prepare for our test on Friday, let us contemplate our economic relations with foreign nations, including NAFTA, tariffs, foreign aid and sanctions,” Mr. Cross drones. He’s an ancient guy in his 60s who slicks his three remaining strands of hair over his gleaming scalp, still wears three-piece suits to work, and should have retired five years ago. He literally just reads from the textbook, and his gravelly, monotone voice puts half the class into an after-lunch stupor. Some people play Candy Crack on their phones beneath their desks. Others are flat-out napping with their heads resting on their folded arms.

  “I hope you have already noted the date in your syllabus, but our collaborative ten-page issue analysis paper is due in only a few short weeks, people.” He always says “we” and “us,” like he isn’t exempt from the piles of homework drivel he divvies out.

  “But I’ve got a test in Chemistry!” someone moans.

  Mr. Cross ignores the complaints and drones on.

  I doodle around the edges of my notebook. I sketch a Silvery Blue, forming her antennae, the curl of her proboscis, the folded praying mantis-look of her segmented legs. Then the thorax, the abdomen, and the wings, the branched veins, the transparent membranes shingled with tiny, flat scales. Though I don’t have my colored pencils, I imagine the shining, powder blue of her wings. I darken the black outline along the outer margin of her forewings and hindwings. I crosshatch the dark areas with my pencil, digging harder and harder until the paper rips.

  “I understand not everyone has chosen a partner yet,” Mr. Cross says. “It would behoove us to do so post-haste. There are twenty-four students exactly, and I have the same sign-up sheet on my desk that’s been sitting here for the last week. Sign up before you leave class today or I’ll be forced to dock grades 10%.”

  Everyone groans. The noise level quickly reaches a dull roar as people pair up. Three fourths of the class find a partner in five seconds. They grab their backpacks and notebooks and pile out of the classroom, yelling and laughing and pushing each other. I slouch deeper into my seat. There’s no way I’m collaborating with any of these douchebags. And the fact that I don’t have a choice makes me grind my teeth and imagine destroying things. Taking a chainsaw to Mr. Cross’s desk would be a nice start. I rip the drawing out of my notebook. I’m about to crumple it up and throw it in the trash when a shadow
falls over my desk.

  “That’s actually really good.” Arianna Torrès hugs her textbook to her chest and eyes me warily. “Like, professional artist good.”

  “Are you surprised? Were you expecting stick figures from a trailer trash freak? Or maybe sketches of impaled body parts, stabbings, and other disturbing material?”

  “Oh never mind.” She starts to walk away. Stops. Turns back around. She chews her lower lip like she wants to say something.

  “Spit it out.”

  “Do you need a partner?”

  I look at her and I see Jasmine. I remember four years of a loneliness so deep it’s like a constant, savage ache in my chest. I can’t let myself feel that pain. Whatever this girl’s game is, I’m not going to fall for it. Not this time. Not ever again. There’s no room inside me for more heartache. “I don’t need anything.”

  “But do you have a partner?”

  “What do you think?”

  Arianna sighs heavily. By this time, the classroom is empty, except for Mr. Cross slumped at his desk. “Look. This isn’t open heart surgery. My friend Lin-Mae asked me, but I said no.”

  My head snaps up. She feels sorry for me, that’s it. She’s doing one of her goody-Christian charity things to get more stars on her crown, or whatever. That’s the last thing I need. “I’m not your pity case.”

  “I know. Of course not. I thought—” She frowns, and I can tell she already regrets whatever she’s trying to do. “But you need a partner.”

  “Look, I don’t have the time or the crayons to explain this to you. I don’t want to be your partner. In anything. Ever.”

  She flinches. “Well, it’s too late now. We’re the only ones left.”

  I crush my drawing into a ball and stuff it into my backpack. Once again, I don’t have a choice. “Whatever. I couldn’t care less.”

  “Is that a yes?”

  “Just sign the damn sheet.” I scoop up my backpack and escape as fast as I can.

  8

  After school, I head to my shift at Bill’s Bar and Grill. Bill’s is a small, red-brick restaurant just off the main thoroughfare into town. It’s got about two dozen tables and traffic cone-orange booths with ripped stuffing. The inside walls are brick and decorated with a couple hundred old license plates and framed black and white prints of Marilyn Monroe, James Brown, Elvis, James Dean, Nat King Cole, and Ray Charles.

  “Hey, Bill,” I say as I walk back into the kitchen area. The cook station contains a grill, fry pit, cutting counter, and stainless steel sinks. The cracked tile floors and stained counters have seen better days.

  “What’s up, kid?” Bill Beauvais, the owner and manager, flips burgers at the grill and chops red peppers on the cutting board simultaneously. Bill went to MSU with Frank back in the 90s, both on football scholarships. Frank—tall, lean, fast with good hands—played wide receiver. Bill was a linebacker. They both came back home sophomore year. Frank lost his scholarship due to poor grades. Bill tore his ACL clean through. He walks with a slight limp, but he still looks the linebacker part—big and meaty, thick-necked, with huge ham-hands.

  “Same old shit,” I say, tying on my apron. “How’s the afternoon crowd?”

  “Slow,” Bill says with a sigh. He’s Haitian, with a full, bushy beard and long dreads tied back so they don’t interfere with his work.

  The locals crowd in on the weekends, but it’s usually quiet before six on the weekdays. Bill never puts me on weekends or gives me prime hours. He knows he’d lose customers. When I used to waitress, I may have yelled at a few rude ones, purposefully spilled their drinks, or delayed their orders. That didn’t work out so well for the customers or Bill’s bottom line, so now I bus tables. It’s nasty work, collecting the dirty plates and dishware, scraping the half-eaten scraps into the industrial trash bins, scrubbing down greasy, sticky tables. I refill drinks, too, and sometimes deliver the dishes to the customers if the waitresses are busy.

  Today is quiet, only a half dozen customers. I do my work without speaking to anyone else, smiling only when I have to. It keeps my hands and my mind busy. When it’s slow, I slip into the cook station and steal battered curly fries or boneless chicken wings from the fryer when no one is looking.

  The smell of food is overwhelming. It’s on my skin, in my hair. It makes me want to eat everything in sight. I grab a handful of hot fries and shove them into my mouth, swallowing them in three gulps. They burn on the way down.

  The bell over the door rings in the front. I grab a paper towel from the hand sink and wipe the grease from my lips. I slip the order pad into my apron pocket and head out.

  I stiffen. It’s Lucas, the messy-haired new kid with acne. Occasionally Brokewater High students make their way here, but mostly they hang out at Chili’s or Delia’s Ice Cream Shoppe, or they drive to the beachfront restaurants 30 miles west. Eli Kusuma never comes in. So what is Lucas doing here?

  He sits in the corner booth, elbows on the table, the hair on the right side of his head all smooshed and spiking up on the other side, like he’s just woken up from an afternoon nap. He’s playing with something in his hands.

  “Why are you here?” I ask. It comes out sharp.

  He looks up at me, the beginnings of a grin puckering his mouth. “I came for the food and the pleasant atmosphere. What are you doing here?”

  “I work here.” I cross my arms over my chest and glare at him.

  “I know.”

  The hairs on my arms prickle. What the hell is wrong with this guy? “Are you stalking me?”

  “No! I told you, I’m here as a customer.”

  “Fine. Then what do you want?”

  “Something to drink?”

  I sigh and roll my eyes. “Whatever. You want pop?”

  “What’s that?”

  Is he playing me? Setting me up for some sort of trick? “Don’t be thick.”

  He squints at me. “No. Really. What’s pop?”

  “Um, hello? A fizzy drink full of sugar that will rot your teeth out.”

  “Oh. You mean soda. I’ll take a Mountain Dew.”

  “Fine. But it’s pop. Nobody’s called it soda since the 50s. We don’t wear poodle skirts anymore either.”

  “I’m from Florida, from a town called Bushnell. We call Mountain Dew and Coca Cola and everything else soda.” He smiles this big, lopsided grin that makes him look young and earnest. It’s almost adorable. It also makes me want to punch him.

  I shrug. “Good for you.”

  “But if they call it pop here, then pop it is.” He rubs whatever he’s holding. It’s a silver lighter decorated with a pink rhinestone skull.

  “Don’t flash that around school or you’ll be labeled a queer. Or worse. Not that I have a problem with it, but some people sure seem to. Just giving you fair notice.”

  He furrows his thick, dark eyebrows and stares at the lighter. “Notice taken. It’s my mom’s.”

  “Sure it is. If pink sparkles are your thing, you’ve got bigger problems than I thought. Brianna will take your order in a minute.”

  I head to the back, grab a straw and a tall glass, fill it at the drinks dispenser, and bring it back to the table. “Here you go.”

  Lucas is still staring at the lighter. He’s not smiling anymore. “My mom gave it to me before I left. She’s—she’s dying. Stage IV breast cancer.”

  In spite of myself, I feel a prickle of sympathy for him. “Life sucks.”

  “That’s why my dad shipped me up here. Back home, I’m about as useless as tits on a boar.”

  That’s a good one, but I don’t tell him so. I file it away in my brain for future use.

  He clears his throat. He drums the lighter on the table and looks up. “So there’s a party in a few weeks, second Friday of October. It’s near Silver Beach. Xavier Jones-Gray—do you know him? He’s on the football team with Eli. His grandparents own a beach house. They’re antique shopping in Muskegon for the weekend or something. Xavier’s throwing a huge bonfire shindig. Food
, beer, whatever.”

  “Whatever,” I echo. What does he want? Why does he keep talking to me? It’s making me itchy, uncomfortable. I’ve had about enough of this bizarre conversation.

  “So . . . do you wanna go with me?”

  My blood runs cold. I freeze. “What did you just say?”

  “I asked if you wanted to go with me. Like a date. Or not a date. Whatever. I’m flexible.”

  I stare at him. My face heats up. It must be a trick. Yet, his eyes seem so sincere, so serious. Some small part of me whispers what if . . . I shut the thought down as quickly as it enters my head. No one has asked me out in nearly four years. Not for real, anyway. I’m alone. It’s what I do, who I am. My heart is a closed fist. It has to be. “No thanks.”

  “Okay, well. You sure you don’t want to reconsider? I’m excellent company, I promise.”

  “Whatever you’re doing? You need to stop. Don’t confuse me with someone who cares.” I force myself to walk away before he can react.

  An older couple leaves, and I grab my tub to bus their table. The place isn’t crowded, but it’s busy enough that I can avoid Lucas. Still, I feel his gaze on me as I work. I nearly break a plate as I slam the dirty dishes into the tub. I toss in the crumpled napkins and half-finished cups. My gaze blurs. I rub the heel of my hand against my eyes with my free hand. It’s a trick anyway, him pretending to be nice to me. Probably something Margot and Jasmine cooked up. I just want to be left the hell alone. It’s better this way.

  It’s almost 5 p.m. when he finally leaves. I bus his table. He ate the entire mushroom burger he ordered, and the table is free of crumbs and trash. There’s a ten tucked under his empty cup. I give it all to the waitress, Brianna. I may need money, but I don’t need his pity. Or his pathetic puppy-dog shtick.

  His table is my last. Finally, I can clock out.

  “How’s your mom, kid?” Bill asks as I strip off my dirty apron.