Scarred

by Joanne Macgregor

  “This is Sloane Munster,” she announces, wasting no energy on smiles or enthusiasm.

  “Sloane Monster, more like.”

  It’s a whispered comment which comes from one of a group of girls I recognize from English class. There are four of them, fashionably dressed and carefully made-up, with perfect hair and unscarred faces, and they are clustered at the back of the room, riding their chairs. The wisecrack is met with a few smug giggles. The girls are reassured by my obvious disqualification from the beauty stakes.

  “Hi.” The girl seated in front of me has turned around and is smiling at me. “I’m Sienna.”

  She is tiny. She looks too small to be a senior. She has a heart-shaped faced, mocha skin, round brown eyes and a halo of corkscrew curls which bounce when she nods her chin in the direction of the girls.

  “Don’t mind them. They’re a bunch of no-talents who only signed up for art class because they thought it would teach them how to apply their make-up better.”

  “Hi, Sienna. Sloane,” I say, pointing a thumb at my chest.

  Miss Ling calls the class to order and is about to close the door when a boy walks in. He takes up most of the doorway and when he sinks into a chair a few desks in front and to the left of me, he overflows. He’s big. Not fat, exactly, but bulky and somehow out of proportion. His hair is cut very short around a face with a doughy pallor, and his head seems too small for the massive body beneath. He wears jeans, heavy Doc Marten boots and a red plaid shirt.

  “I’m a lumberjack and I’m alright, I work all day and I sleep all night.” The girls at the back sing the chorus softly.

  “No singing in this class,” says Miss Ling. To the boy, she says, “You’re late.”

  He doesn’t reply. He drops his bag on the desk with a thud that makes me jump. Loud noises still do that to me, as do the sounds of breaking glass and screeching brakes. But I am not going to allow the pressing memory into my mind right now.

  The Shrink taught me that staring hard at an object is a useful way of staying grounded in the present, so right now I focus on the big boy’s bag. It’s a plain, gray, rectangular bag, with a single shoulder strap. A peace symbol, which looks like it’s been wrought from barbed wire, has been sketched in black ink over the whole of the front flap. Written underneath the graphic, in rough lettering, is, “Give peace a chance”.

  Miss Ling walks between the desks, handing out sketch paper and chalky pastels in a range of earth colors. The big, dough-faced boy says nothing, merely looks down at the paper that is deposited onto the desk in front of him. He picks up a dark umber-colored pastel and draws a series of crossed lines over the back of one hand.

  Miss Ling places a narrow earthenware vase on the table. It is filled with stalks of dried wheat and barley. She removes a few of the stalks and drops them carelessly alongside the base of the vase.

  “I would like a sketch of this still-life by the end of this double lesson,” she says. “Pay particular attention to shading and cross-hatching. And try to keep the noise down.”

  She sits behind her desk, plugs in the ear-buds of an iPod, and closes her eyes, resting her head against the back of the chair and putting her feet up on the desk.

  “Laziest teacher ever,” says Sienna. “But at least you can do what you like in her class. She doesn’t ever actually teach, but she doesn’t interfere either, and she always passes everyone.”

  I sketch a few lines of the vase and glance around the class to see what the others are doing. The girls at the back are drawing vases of flowers – childishly doodled roses and daisies which bear no resemblance to the vase of dried grasses. Sienna is right, they are not artistically gifted. To the left of me, a pale boy with dark hair and long sideburns quickly draws a tiny vase with cramped, narrow strokes in the bottom corner of his sheet, then he flips the paper over and rapidly doodles a series of big, bold Anime cartoons of the kids in the class. He gives me flowing straight red hair and oriental eyes, but I recognize myself from the slashed line across one cheek. The girls at the back of the class are all hair, teeth and boobs in his rendering.

  The big boy’s drawing looks nothing like Miss Ling’s vase, but it shows real talent. He has made the vase angular – a series of jagged, spikey slanted lines like the broken-mirror pattern of lights that crosses my vision when I get a migraine. He has drawn the wheat and barley as articulated chains of nuts and bolts and nails.

  “He’s good,” I say to Sienna, nodding at the mechanical graphic.

  “Yeah, he’s got skillz,” she replies.

  “Hey, El-Jayyyy,” calls one of the girls from the back. “How’s your drawing coming on? Wouldn’t you rather be, like, chopping trees?”

  This provokes giggles and a fresh round of the lumberjack song.

  “What’s his name?” I ask, speaking softly.

  “L.J.”

  “How do you spell that?”

  “Like the initials, L.J. Don’t ask me what they stand for – because nobody knows and he’s not telling. Even the teachers have called him that ever since he started high school here.”

  “We call him Lumber-Jack,” says a busty blonde girl from the back. She makes no effort to keep her voice down.

  “Why?”

  The girl looks at me like I’m stupid. “Have you seen how he walks?”

  I get it then. He lumbers. The red plaid shirt doesn’t help either, I guess, if he’s not trying to look like a frontiersman. Apparently, I am not the only freak in this school. I wonder if Luke glares at this boy, too. I look back at L.J. His wide shoulders ripple and twitch as if he is trying to dislodge an irritating fly, but otherwise he does not respond to the taunts from the back of the class.

  Sienna’s sketch is coming on well, but she is dissatisfied.

  “I’m not that good at drawing and painting, if you want the truth. Photography’s my thing. I know a good picture when I see it, and it’s easier to capture it in pixels than pastels.”

  “I just got a digital camera,” I say, smudging the shading on my vase with the tip of a finger. “I’m having fun with it, but I don’t really think I know what I’m doing. It’s hella complicated.”

  “I can give you a few tips, if you like,” volunteers Sienna.

  “That would be great.”

  “There’s also a photography club here at the school – maybe you’d like to join that? It meets on Friday nights at the Pizza place down the road. They’re a nice crowd. You’d like them.”

  I hesitate. I’ve avoided clubs and groups since … well, for most of the last year. I don’t know that I’m brave enough yet to plunge back into a full social life.

  “Are you a member?”

  “Nah, it’s a bit basic for me. Sorry – that sounds really arrogant – it’s just that I’ve been doing this for years, and the club is more for people just starting out.” Sienna grabs my paper and holds it up to admire the sketch. “Hey, you’re good, too.”

  “It’s okay,” It’s no Van Gogh, but at least my wheat stalks don’t look like kindergarten daisies. “So do you do the photography for something in particular, or just for fun?” I ask Sienna.

  “I have an online blog – it’s called Underground West Lake. The school has this really boring e-newsletter here, called the West Lake News. It’s a weekly newsletter, but it’s written mainly by the staff and it’s just sports events and results, and rah-rah pep-talks about building character in difficult times, and don’t forget to bring canned soup for the next charity drive. Riveting stuff like that. So I started the blog. It’s supposed to be subversive, but it’s mostly a lot of gossip, and some humor. Keith here –” she gestures to the boy drawing the Anime cartoons and he waves an absent greeting at me, “does cartoon panels for us. We have ‘10 best and worst’ lists, and it’s linked to a twitter feed. I’m the web-mistress-slash-editor, but I also do a lot of pics, photographic essays, sneak-shots – just to give a feel of life at the school, you know?”

  “It sounds amazing!”

 
I am impressed. How does anyone have that much energy? It takes everything I have just to get through each day.

  “I think it’s pretty cool, if I do say so myself.” Sienna grins. “You should go online and check it out. www.undergroundwestlake.com. Let me know if there’s anything you can contribute – an article or maybe some photos. You could bring a fresh perspective. You know, a noob’s view of this place.”

  “Maybe,” I say.

  So far, my day confirms my belief that this place is pretty much like any place. This could be Somewhere High, Anywheresville. There are the usual mix of people: nice, nasty, pretentious, humble, lazy, talented and weird. There’s only one unpleasantly abnormal person here. And it’s not L.J. Or me.

  The rest of the day passes quickly in a confusion of various rooms, different teachers, crowded halls and new classmates. Today, Luke was only in my English and Math classes, but I haven’t had all my subjects yet. Tomorrow I’ll find out if he’s in any of the others. It’s a possibility that makes my stomach clench.

  Back at home, I take my vitamins, check my temperature – normal – and then go online. I have a Facebook page on which I never post. I use it to spy on others – it makes a nice change from having everyone stare at me. It takes me a minute or two, but I find Luke’s page. At least, I think it’s his. The profile picture is of a hand reaching out above the blue, rippled surface of a pool, but the face and body are under the water. I click on timeline, about, photos, but strike out. His security must be set to maximum, and I don’t dare send a friend request.

  Then I remember Sink-or-Swim, the website that we all used to hang out on, when I was still swimming competitively. I haven’t been on it for ages, not since the day I got the scar, so it takes a few tries to get my username and password right. Then I’m in and staring at his profile. His handle is Not_A. Not a … what? It was one of the things I wanted to ask him before, but I never got the chance. The photo is a close-up of him staring seriously into the camera. I think it’s different to the one he used to have up. He used to be smiling in his profile pic, I’m sure of it. And there’s a way I can check.

  At the bottom of the hall closet, under a jumble of flippers, kickboards, hand paddles and swimming caps, is a large cardboard box, covered with doodles and stickers. I called it my memory box and used to keep little mementos like concert ticket stubs, birthday cards, and notes from friends safely inside. That was when I still had memories I wanted keep. These days, I’d like to have a memory trashcan.

  I open the box and just below a couple of photographs of old friends, I find what I’m looking for. The printed swim meet program is puckered and smudged where water once dripped on it – I only kept it because his hand had touched it. Underneath it is my old cellphone, the one with photos taken at meets, and screenshots of his profile on the swimming website. Predictably, its battery is totally dead, so I plug it in to charge, and go back to examining every detail about Luke I can find online.

  Under his profile pic on Sink-or-Swim is the briefest of bio’s: “Swimmer, son, survivor, cynic”. There’s a feature where you list your favorites. His favorite song: Pompei by Bastille (I’ve never heard of it); his favorite movie: Inception; food: Mexican; animals: puppies (aww!). Under personal motto, he has, “Vivere commune est, sed non commune mereri”. I look it up on Google. It means, “Everybody lives; not everybody deserves to”. Okkaayyy, then.

  I check his swimming times in the meets for the past year. Seems like he had a slump for a while there, but his times are improving steadily. Then I click through to the forums, but I can’t find any comments from him on any recent topics. In the archived section, I find an old thread that makes me smile.

  Not_A: Great race today!

  WaterBaby: You were watching? O_0

  Not_A: Watching you? Sure!

  WaterBaby: :D

  Not_A: Saw you win the 100m Butterfly – nice one! Personal best time?

  WaterBaby: Yeah, but didn’t break the record. L

  Not_A: Yet …

  WaterBaby: :D :D

  Not_A: Gotta go. Mom’s calling dinner-time, and she freaks out if we’re late to the table. See you at the meet on the 17th?

  WaterBaby: Definitely.

  Not_A: J J

  Not_A: Bye (Water)baby.

  WaterBaby: See you later.

  I sigh and check the phone, but the battery’s only at 2%. Perhaps Luke is on Twitter. I sign on, seek and find. His handle is @LukeSkyWater, the bio is the same as on Sink-or-Swim, the photo the same as from Facebook. It’s a puzzling picture. Is it the hand of someone waving, or drowning?

  I scan his tweet-stream. It seems he doesn’t tweet often, but there’s one from today:

  That moment when you can’t believe what you’re seeing. #Disgusted #Angry

  Have I just been sub-tweeted?

  Is he talking about me?

  This is ridiculous. To distract myself, I close the social sites and check out Sienna’s alternative school blog. It’s hilarious. I wish my mom was here tonight to see it. It’s exactly her kind of thing – clever and witty and edgy. There was nothing like this at my previous school.

  Memories threaten, but I push them back and down, breathe deeply three times and force myself to concentrate on the screen in front of me. There are sketched caricatures of the teachers, Keith’s Anime cartoons (the one of me in art class is already up), informal news articles and a gallery of photographs of students, teachers and scenes of school life. I examine these carefully. It’s several minutes before I realize that what I’m actually doing is searching for a picture of Luke. I realize I’ve been cyber-stalking him all evening.

  Clearly, I’m an idiot. My scars, apparently, are the least of my defects.

  5

  Luke

  She’s here. Here! At West Lake High. In my English class.

  Same ruby red hair, freckles and big blue eyes as that last day I saw her, when I almost learned her name. Well, I sure know it now: Sloane Munster.

  What I don’t know, is what she’s doing here. Did she know I was at West Lake? Is that why she came? Does she want something from me?

  I could tell she recognized me immediately.

  She doesn’t look exactly the same as she used to, though. She’s taller and thinner, and there’s a look in her eyes like she expects to be kicked. And of course there’s that scar everyone’s talking about.

  That scar!

  I don’t even know how to look at her.

  6

  Back in the water

  It’s day two of my life out of the camouflage closet and I get my driver, Ed, to take me to school early. Ed is fiftyish and friendly, an all-round good guy, and he gets well-paid by the trust to take me wherever I need to go. But he nags me too often about when I intend to learn how to drive myself, even volunteers to teach me. I tell him he’s crazy – if I learn to drive then he’ll be out of a job. I tell him that he’s lucky I’m too lazy to learn how to drive. I’m not sure he buys it.

  I need to start the things I have resolved to do, before I lose my nerve. And so, today, I have to get back into the swim of things. West Lake High has its own pool – one of the reasons I chose this school – big and deep and, thankfully, heated. At this hour of the morning, as I hoped, it’s also empty. I slip off my sweats, put on my cap and goggles, and dive into the still water. My every splash sounds loudly in the cathedral-like silence. Steam rises off the water, condenses on the insulated roof above and falls back in cold drops onto my face as I swim my twenty lengths of backstroke. It’s good to be back in the water. My arms and legs cleave cleanly through the silky softness, the water hides my face, my goggles fog up, insulating me further from the world beyond my cocoon of movement, and my mind is focused only on the next stroke, the next breath, the next length.

  I’ve done my breast-stroke and am deeply in the zone of my freestyle set when there’s an explosion of bubbles and shifting water next to me. In surprise, I breathe in some water through my nose and stop, mid-stro
ke, coughing and looking around. What must be the entire swim team has arrived for morning training. They are noisily snapping towels at each other and dive-bombing into the water. It’s my cue to leave.

  I swim to the side, lift the goggles off my eyes and onto my head and, still coughing, pull myself awkwardly out of the water. Sometimes, like now, my knee sticks and won’t bend properly. I’m like a stranded water creature, clumsily hauling myself onto the brick surround and then scrambling awkwardly to my feet. As I stand, dripping, my eyes follow up the muscled legs, green towel, toned midriff and wide shoulders of the boy who stands in front of me, blocking my way. It’s him, of course, captain of the swim team and sneerer-in-chief. He looks like he looked a year ago, beside a different pool, but he also looks – I don’t know – more. I look away from his curled lips and harsh eyes, focus instead on his ripped abs and muscled arms. This is not too much of a hardship and I could probably stand there, dripping wet and feasting my eyes all day, but my gaze is drawn back up to his and a ball of hurt knots tightly in my stomach. His eyes seem more gold than green today, and there is no relenting softness in his look.

  “Um, excuse me?” I try to step around him. I’m cooling down rapidly and my skin is tightening all over with goose bumps. I cross my arms over my chest.

  “So you still swim?” he asks, making no move to get out of my way.

  “Yes.” This confirms it – he does recognize me from before. “Just for fun, I mean. I don’t race anymore. I …”

  My voice trails off under his withering glare. It irks me that I have to look up to meet his gaze. Normally it’s a novelty when a guy is taller than me, but right now it would be great to be able to look down on him – literally.

  “How nice for you,” he says, and his voice sounds bitter. “That you can still have fun.” He makes it sound like a dirty word.

  “Look –” I begin, annoyed and determined to challenge him on his rude and inexplicable attitude.