Exposed (4 page)

He’d been tapping his head—
tap, tap, tap—
with both hands, knobby elbows flared.
I caught the shot in between taps,
just as his hands left his head.

Hands too far from his skull—
questioning.
Hands too close—
confusion.

But midway,
midway it worked.
It did what I wanted it to do.

It captured emotion.
Pure exhilaration.

Like a Bird

I’m floating up
flying high
swirling around
soaring
out of my mind
with glee.
Until it hits me,
midair,
that the person
I most want to tell
has flown away.

Second Most

I head to the gym at the end of the day
to catch Brian before track practice.
He comes out of the locker room
and I run to him
to tell him what Mrs. Pratt said.

“That’s great, babe!” he says,
and gives me a hug.

I pull the picture out.
“This one?” he asks,
taking it from me.
“It’s nice.”

My stomach muscles clench.
“Nice?
”

“No! I mean, it’s really good!” he says,
trying to recover.
“I’m proud of you.”

The coach blows his whistle,
and the guys head over to the bleachers.

“I gotta go, babe. I’ll see ya later. Okay?”

“Yeah. Sure,” I say
as he squeezes my hand
then sprints away.
“That would be
nice.
”

Third Time’s the Charm

When I get home
I tell Mom what Mrs. Pratt said
and she calls Dad at work,
has to shout
over the blare of the ferry horn.

Dad shouts back,
“WAHOO! That’s my girl!”
says “That’s my girl!” again,
louder, even though
the horn has stopped blowing.

Family Pride

Dad’s always been proud of me.
Whether I was playing a potato
in the Fabulous Food Groups play,
or skimming my Sunfish sailboat along the shore,
or winning a hot-dog-eating contest
in junior high.

Mom’s proud of me, too.
Though I know she wished I were the apple,
wished I spent less time on the water
and more time on my homework,
wished the prize was not a month’s supply
of artery-clogging wieners.

Start Your Engines

In the morning, before school,
I see Kate in the parking lot.

She raises her eyebrows,
opens her mouth
like she wants to call out to me.

But then a car backfires
and she spins on her heels and zooms away,
widening the distance between us.

Phone a Friend

Amanda calls on Friday night.

“Kate seems okay to me she said she’s just had a lot going on
lately with school and dance and I asked her why she’s mad at
you and she says she’s not so stop worrying.”

I snort into the receiver and roll my eyes
as she pauses for a much-needed breath.
“Thanks, Amanda. That explains everything.”

“No problem! Glad to help!”

Amanda’s dad is a psychologist
and she wants to go to college
and follow in his footsteps.
God help us all.

Toppings

I get off the boat in Vineyard Haven
after six hours of stocking napkins,
wiping counters,
ladling clam chowder into
Styrofoam cups.

I walk past the Welcome Center,
not empty, because it’s a mild Saturday,
but not teeming with day-trippers
waiting for buses or cabs
or a ticket back home.

I head up the street
half a block
and cross over to the other side
so I can get a wide shot
of a girl in ripped jeans,
tattoos and piercings, sitting,
knees up, head back, eyes closed
in front of Crazy Cows Ice Cream Shop—
weathered shingles, windows shut,
padlocked door—
sign next to her reads
F
LAVORS OF THE
W
EEK
.

Distraction

Calvin James,
pitcher for the Shoreview Sharks,
throws great parties,
and Kate’s at a dance competition in Boston
so there’s no danger of seeing her here,
no danger of me
crowding her sacred space.

She’s not returning my calls.
She’s making plans without me.
She’s pretending she doesn’t see me
when I pass her in the hall.
I’ve been too consumed with her.

So I go
to be okay without her.
To be with Brian
and be okay
without her.

And except for a few times
every few minutes,
I hardly think about Kate
at all.

In Calvin’s Kitchen

“Now I know, now I know,” Amanda sings,
giddy from beer
and wearing a stupid grin.
“I know why Kate won’t talk to you.”

This knowledge is fun for her,
but my icy stare lets her know
I’m in no mood for games.
She hops up on the counter
and bumps her heels
against the wood-grained cabinet.

“Callie told Dee Dee that Mike told Tanner that he and Kate
were doing the wild thing at your house last weekend while
you were asleep.”

Now I know.

Once Upon a Time

When we were six
Kate told me
that when we grew up
she would marry Mike
so we could be sisters and best friends
at the same time.

When we were twelve
I found his class picture
in her desk drawer—
a heart drawn on the back
in pink pen.

When we were fourteen
Kate’s body started changing
and she’d laugh when Mike said,
“Looking good, Katie.”

Did he say that this time?

This time,
did she do more
than laugh?

Some Nerve

“I can’t believe you,” I say,
standing at Kate’s door Sunday morning.
She looks at me,
confused.

“When I said you should dump Trevor,
it wasn’t an invitation to mess around with
Mike.
”

Her eyes grow wide.
Her face pales.

“I’m not thrilled, Kate,
but it’s nothing to freak out about.
It’s no reason to treat
me
like I did something wrong.”

She moves, barefoot,
onto the cold front steps
and closes the door behind her.
“Who said I messed around with Mike?”

“Mike told Tanner and—”

“Mike told Tanner?”
Her eyes bug out of her head.

“He said something about a wild night.”

Kate bites hard on her lower lip,
so hard it turns white.
I can tell her mind’s racing,
but she doesn’t say a thing.

“Well, did you?” I ask.

She looks like a rabbit frozen in light.
“We didn’t have sex.”

“Fine, but something happened.
Did you guys kiss?”

She closes her eyes and I know it’s true.
“I’m sorry, Liz. I can’t …,” she says.

I’m mad
she fooled around with my brother.
I’m mad
she’s been treating me like crap.

But I push the anger inside
because big, fat tears
are rolling down her cheeks
and I can count on one hand
the times I’ve seen her cry.

“It’s okay, Kate.
No big deal.”
I reach out to touch her arm.
“I’ll tell everyone
Mike’s delusional.”

If I wasn’t so relieved
to finally know what’s wrong,
I might be offended
as she pushes my hand away,
tells me she has to go,
and heads back inside.

“You’re an Ass”

You have reached Mike and Jordan
.
We’re too busy studying
to pick up the phone
.
Please leave a message at the beep
.

Homeroom, Monday Morning

“Did you talk to Kate?
Is Mike the reason she broke up with Trevor?”
Amanda’s wearing that dumb old smirk
and shifting her eyebrows up and down.

“She broke up with Trevor?”

“Yesterday,” Amanda said.
“He said he’d forgive her and she broke up with him anyway.
I hope the night was worth it.”

“Get a life,” I say.
“Mike has an active imagination.”

She opens her notebook
but won’t let it go.
“I hear Kate’s pretty active herself,” she says,
and I know she’s joking but I’m not in the mood.

I lean across the aisle
and her notebook falls to the floor,
revealing a long list of guys’ names
written on the back
(some with one heart, some with two,
some scratched out completely).

“Leave Kate alone,” I say.
“She doesn’t want to talk about it.”

Amanda bends over, grabs the notebook,
and mumbles loud enough for me to hear,
“Maybe she just doesn’t want to talk about it with
you.
”

Big Men in a Small Town

This wouldn’t be such big news
if Kate hadn’t cheated on
the dream date of so many
gossipy girls.

Trevor’s got his fan club here,
and if they trash-talk Kate,
maybe he’ll notice them.

This wouldn’t be such big news
if Mike weren’t so fast on his feet,
but his trophies and photographs
and clippings from the
Cape Cod Times
line a display case in a hallway
of Shoreview High.

He’s got his props here,
making it all look so easy.

Trouble is, now his big head
and his big mouth
make Kate
look easy, too.

Fanning the Flame

I am the firefighter,
putting out tiny rumors
before they have time to grow and spread.

“Kate did not sleep with Mike!”
“She doesn’t own a lacy bra!”
“My parents didn’t barge in on them!”
“She is
not
a two-timing slut!”

But whenever Kate sees me
she proceeds to the nearest exit
like I’m the fire.

Trippin’

Mrs. Pratt clucks her tongue and tells us
that on Sunday, November 16,
the School of the Museum of Fine Arts
is hosting National Portfolio Day
at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston.

This is a huge event where college recruiters
will look at our portfolios
and give us tips to make our photos pop.

I’ve had the day circled
on my calendar for months.
Still, my heart skips a beat
as she says the date out loud.

“I’ve arranged for transportation
for those who plan to go,” she says.
“It’s a great opportunity to see
what schools are looking for.”

The bell rings like a starter gun
and an image plays out in my head:
college recruiters hurdling over tables,
knocking kids to the floor,
to grab what they’re looking for—
my portfolio.

Footwork

I stepped up to the plate on Monday,
stepped on the rumors since then,
careful to step around
my friend’s bruised ego.

Now it’s Thursday
and I thought things would be better,
but Kate’s still avoiding me,
and walking on eggshells isn’t easy to do.

My shell cracks when she pretends
she doesn’t see me as she heads down the stairs.

Letting Her Have It

“Get over it, Kate!
Let it go already!”

We’re at the bottom of the stairwell,
near the emergency exit,
my body now positioned to keep hers
from flying back up the stairs.

“Everyone will stop talking about it
if you stop letting them think
it was such a big deal.”

Letting Me Have It

She’s silent
for a long minute.
Then she looks straight at me,
straight through me,
and tells me
why
it was such a big deal.

Mike

My brother is a track star.
My brother is a partier.
My brother is a bit of a chauvinist pig.
My brother, even when he annoys me,
is someone I love.

My brother is not
who Kate says he is.

My brother
is not
a rapist.

“Mike Raped Me”

Her words bring white-hot pain,
like my gut is being sliced open by a doctor
who forgot to give me drugs.

I want to scream at her
because she must be lying,
but my voice is small and far away
and all I can manage is,
“What are you
saying
?!?”

And she is small and far away
and she says,
“I can’t.”

And she tries to move past me,
but I need more.
I deserve more.
I won’t let her go.
“Talk to me!”

She looks to the staircase
then over her shoulder toward
the emergency exit.
She runs for it,
my
“Please!”
drowned out
by the shrill of the door’s alarm.

Under the Stairs

Under the stairs that lead
from the upper level of my house to the landing
and down again to the den in the basement,
there’s a closet.

Behind a rack of musty-smelling coats,
out of size, out of style, or both,
and suits that Dad hasn’t worn in years,
that closet curves around to a sloping crawl space
too small for storage, but just the right size
for a little girl.

When that little girl was me
I would bring my dolls or my crayons or,
when she wasn’t looking,
Mom’s Divine Rouge lipstick
to that secret space.

I’d pull the string, with the knot on the end,
that hung from the bare bulb,
and push past the garments
that separated my real life
from my imagination.

More than anything, I wish
I could fit into that closet now.

A Not-So-Simple Question

“How are things?” Mom asks
when I come in the door.

What do I do? WhatdoIdo??

I want to tell her but I’m freaking out
and having her freak out now, too,
would only make things worse.

Luckily, I don’t have to tell her
because she’s not waiting for an answer.
“Mike left a message for you,” she says.
“Said to tell you he was calling you back.”

I’ll figure out how to tell Mom and Dad later.