The Truth About Alice (5 page)

Even though I know I did what I had to do, and even though lately Alice has completely disappeared from my life and into her big bulky sweatshirt and wherever it is she goes to eat lunch … even though I don't regret what I did and I would do it again, it's that memory that hurts the most when I think about how I dumped Alice.

 

 

So she was my best friend for over two years. So how come I can't believe her? I mean, isn't that what a best friend does?

Well, partly it's because I'm too afraid I'll become some sort of nobody again if I do. I'll never be popular again if I do. Like I've said, I'm owning that.

And partly it's because one of the guys she (may have) slept with at Elaine's party was Tommy Cray.

And partly it's because of last summer—the summer of The Really Awful Stuff—and because of something Alice did when she was a lifeguard at Healy Pool North.

Alice always made her own money. She babysat, walked dogs, anything. Once she even cleaned Mrs. Montgomery's house for a month while Mrs. Montgomery was recovering from back surgery. Alice always has to have her own money for clothes or magazines or makeup or whatever because her mother doesn't give her anything. Alice's mom is always complaining there isn't enough to go around with her being a single mom and all, but it doesn't seem to stop her from going out almost every night and leaving Alice to sort of fend for herself.

So the pool was like her first real job. One where she got a check she had to take to the bank instead of just a wad of rolled-up bills.

One of the perks of Alice's pool job was the free snacks Alice would sneak me. She didn't take total advantage or anything, but there'd be a Popsicle here or a candy bar there. I would sit on a stool outside the snack bar in the blue-and-white-striped bikini Alice had helped me pick out, and we would gossip and watch the boys swim, and I would help Alice make change when she got confused with the math.

The best perk, however, was the two high school seniors who worked there as lifeguards. Tommy Cray and Mark Lopez. They had just graduated from Healy High, and they were both so gorgeous. So totally gorgeous. The boys in our class still seemed like boys, but Tommy and Mark were men. At least that's what Alice was always saying.

“Why waste our time with boys when there are men right here at Healy Pool North?” she would say, admiring Mark's muscles or Tommy's grin.

I figured if any of my friends knew about men, it was Alice. She wasn't a virgin at that point and I still was. She'd lost her virginity freshman year to this junior named Tucker Bowles and then they'd broken up two months later, and this made Alice the expert in my eyes when it came to stuff like sex and boys. Or men.

I thought Tommy was gorgeous and had spent most of the summer secretly staring at him whenever I hung out at the pool, but I thought Tommy and Mark both sort of had crushes on Alice. I just didn't think either boy was interested in me. My problem basically was (and is) that I don't know how to relax around guys. I can't make that easy small talk with boys that some girls can. Girls like Elaine O'Dea and Maggie Daniels can do that weird, amazing thing where it looks like they're making fun of a boy on the surface, but somehow the boy always takes it as one big compliment.

Alice used to be good at that, too.

One night toward the end of that summer before tenth grade, Alice called me after the pool had closed and asked if I wanted to come down for a party. I told my mom I was going to go to Alice's to sleep over, but I had to convince her to let me go because she wasn't crazy about Alice (because Alice didn't have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ) and also because we had to go to the 8:00 a.m. service the next morning. (When I whined, she told me, “As for me and my house, Kelsie, I will serve the Lord.”)

I don't know what I was thinking would be going on, but when I hopped off my ten speed and walked into the guard house, I found Alice and Tommy and Mark. That was the party. They had some beers, and they smelled of bleach from bleaching out the bathrooms. Even though I'd been hanging out at the pool most of the summer, I still wasn't as tan as the three of them. I remember Tommy had little pockets on his shoulders that were peeling, and the skin underneath was as pink as a brand new eraser.

Alice was sort of drunk, I could tell, and she was sort of hanging onto Mark, cutting into his side with her elbow and laughing with him at some private joke.

“Let's swim,” Tommy said. I think he sensed Alice and Mark wanted to be by themselves. I was glad I'd worn my bikini underneath my clothes.

The pool felt so different at night without the shrieks of middle school kids screaming Marco! Polo! or the tweets of the lifeguard whistle. After a beer, I dove in without making a splash and sunk down to the bottom, letting my fingertips slide over the slippery black lane line markers. I broke through the water and dove down again immediately, wanting to stay there forever, enjoying the feeling of being slightly buzzed and underwater. Anyway, if I got out, I would have to talk to the heart-stopping Tommy. That seemed basically impossible.

“Where's Alice?” I asked, when I'd finally resurfaced. Tommy was sitting on the edge of the pool, his feet dangling in the water. He was sipping on a beer. He arched his eyebrows. He was gorgeous. Even now, after everything, I can still admit that.

“Where do you think?” he said, like I was slow.

I ducked back down under the water, wondering how long I should stay there or what I should say when I came back up. I loved Alice when we were alone together, eating ice cream or raw cookie dough or painting our toenails green or telling stupid jokes, but sometimes I felt left out whenever Alice was around a boy she liked.

Like I wasn't sure where I fit in.

And like I knew I'd never get a boy to like me in the same way.

When I resurfaced, I heard someone saying, “Hey, Kelsie, are you ready to go home?”

It was Alice, coming out of the girls' locker room, followed by Mark Lopez. Mark's face was a little red. Tommy gave him a look, and the two of them laughed. Alice tucked her fingers under the bottom of her wet green bikini and tugged on it, like she was straightening it back out. When she let go, it made a smacking sound on her rear end. Her body was perfect, and that wasn't the first time I'd noticed that fact with a lot of envy inside.

“Something happened with Mark, right?” I asked that night, the two of us alone in the dark of her bedroom, sharing her double bed. We'd been too tired to shower, and the sheets and the air and everything smelled of chlorine. I'd gathered up the courage to ask Alice that question because I knew I was going to be jealous of the answer. It was like I didn't want to hear it, but I couldn't help myself.

But Alice just laughed that loud honking Alice laugh.

“Oh my God, what?” she said, rolling over onto her stomach and turning her face away from me. “He's leaving in a week for college. We're just friends.”

I remember the way she laughed. The way she said, “Oh my God, what?” She said it the same way Tommy Cray had said, “What do you think?” earlier at the pool.

Like I was slow.

I was 99 percent sure she was lying, and this made me madder than anything. Best friends aren't supposed to lie to each other. Not about boys.

That next week I ran into Maggie Daniels—Elaine O'Dea's second in command—in an aisle at Seller Brothers when I went to pick up some toilet paper and a couple of other things my mom had asked me to get. We were talking about how we didn't want to start back at school and catching up on the all the gossip when Maggie said, “So what do you think about Mark Lopez and Alice?” she said.

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“Seriously? You don't know? I thought you guys were best friends.”

“Well, yeah, we are, but I don't know what you're talking about,” I said, nervous about seeming totally out of it.

“Just ask her about Mark Lopez,” she said, “because he's telling everyone.” She was laughing like she was in on a joke I wasn't. Which I guess she was.

I marched home, clutching the groceries, my candy cane–striped flip-flops flip-flopping on the sidewalk the whole way. I'd barely put the groceries away in the cupboard before I was texting Alice.

ran into maggie. what happened with mark l.?

Not two seconds later:

it was stupid.

what?

u can't tell anyone.

Just like always in Healy, everyone already knew, but I answered back:

u know i won't tell.

i'll be over in 2 sec.

“What?” I asked, yanking open the front door.

Alice's eyes darted around behind me.

“I'm home by myself,” I said. “My dad's at work and my mom and sister are at some church thing.”

Alice collapsed onto the family room couch and pulled her knees up to her chest.

“It was so dumb,” she said. “I don't know why I did it.”

“What?” I said, totally annoyed and envious at the same time.

Her voice dropped down low to a whisper.

“I gave him a blow job,” she said.

“In the bathroom?” I said, whispering, too.

Alice nodded. I remember she tucked her hair behind her ears and gave me this look like she'd been caught cheating on a test she hadn't studied for. Half apologetic and half irritated with herself.

“It was just dumb,” she said. “That's why I didn't tell you anything that night. It was just … it just happened. And we were drunk. I don't know. I mean, he wasn't my boyfriend or anything. And it's just … not that I'm saying that it was totally wrong or whatever. It was just … stupid.”

“Didn't you do that with Tucker?” I asked, thinking of Alice losing her virginity freshman year. Alice slowly shook her head no and she looked down for a minute, staring at her hands. I wasn't sure how Alice felt, but there was a part of me that thought giving a blow job seemed like an even bigger deal than having sex. But if Alice felt that way, why did she give one to Mark when they weren't even dating? I wanted to ask, but I got the feeling Alice didn't want to keep talking about it.

“So, are you, like, hanging out with him now or something?” I said. I couldn't believe how jealous I felt. I knew what Alice had done was stupid and sort of slutty even, but I was jealous she had a story to tell and, once again, I didn't.

And I was mad. I was mad she had lied to me.

“He hasn't called me or anything since that night,” Alice said, finally looking up. “And now he's left for UT.”

That made me feel better. I know it sounds crappy to say, but it did.

“Well why'd you lie to me?” I asked.

Alice took a deep breath. She looked like she was picking out her words really carefully. She got the same look when she was trying to figure out a math problem. “Kelsie, it's just … you know … you haven't, like … been with anyone … in that way. And that's … fine, okay? But … it's just, like … once you've had sex … I mean…”

“You lied to me because I'm a virgin?” I said. I gave her an insulted look because, well, I was insulted. She was talking to me like I was retarded or deaf or both. I was so mad I looked away and focused on the wall behind us. My mom had hung up a framed yellow sign that read “This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it!
Psalm 118, Verse 24
.” I wanted to throw something at that yellow sign.

“It's just … I mean…” Alice said.

“Forget it,” I said. “Forget it.”

I didn't, though. Not really.

After that, I don't think Alice ever hung out with Mark Lopez again, and I never really trusted Alice again. I mean, she was still my best friend, and we still spent most of tenth grade having sleepovers and staying up too late talking and texting people and blaming one another for our smelly farts and laughing so loud my dad would come down to the family room and start yelling at us to calm down and everything. And things were basically normal between us. The truth is, I still
liked
her.

But I can't say I trusted her.

Not 100 percent anymore.

I just kept thinking of how stupid I'd felt that night in the bed with her, Alice's room still stinking like Healy Pool North. How she'd turned her face away from me. How she'd laughed at my guess about Mark. How she'd told me I wouldn't get it. And I guess I didn't.

Not then anyway.

I guess that's why when The Really Awful Stuff happened to me later, not long after Alice lied to me about Mark Lopez, I didn't tell her about it. Even if she was my best friend.

I guess that's why when all the rumors started about Alice this year it was so easy to let go of her. So easy to say goodbye. It was as easy as a buzzed, nighttime swim at Healy Pool North. As easy as remembering all the song lyrics in
Grease 2
. As easy as anything.

Kurt

I've been watching Alice, ever since that day I saw her sobbing on the bleachers outside of the school earlier this fall. I've wrestled with myself, attempting to find some way to speak with her. As I've mentioned, I don't talk to girls much, or to anyone at school, really, and this state, while unusual to many, seems natural to me. I do make an exception for Mr. Becker, my Physics teacher. He is one of the few teachers at Healy High who seems more interested in the subject matter at hand than what was happening on the football field or at the pep rallies. I often wonder how someone like Mr. Becker ended up staying in Healy, not married, living in a garage apartment behind his sister's house (even though I'm sure he could afford something nicer). He certainly is a good enough instructor to move on to a bigger city school somewhere. Earn more money. Teach more advanced students.

He and I were sitting in his messy classroom yesterday afternoon discussing quantum gravity. Because of the Halloween holiday, everyone in Healy High had cleared out early to prepare for a night of debauchery and pranks. Everyone but me, of course. At one moment during our discussion, the conversation waned a bit, and I asked him why he hadn't moved somewhere else.