“Look, I’ve had experiences too,” I say. “Experiences that I’m not so happy about. Do you know what I mean?”
But she’s blank.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says, and looks down at the floor.
“Uh, Ali, you ran out of the party like a crazy banshee—I mean, everyone saw you. But Sean’s a good guy. He doesn’t want to, you know—he doesn’t want you to be all freaked out.”
ALI
Everyone saw you. That’s what she said.
Everyone saw you. I don’t want to be known as the girl that everyone saw. I just want to be known as the cute girl. Or the hot girl. Or the cool girl. Or the whatever girl. Not the girl everyone saw with blood smeared on her jeans.
What does Blythe mean when she says, “I’ve had experiences”? What does that even mean? Was what happened to me an experience? Is that how they’re defining it?
I feel my legs tingle and my stomach cave. I hold my hand against the cool bathroom wall, and it’s the only thing that’s keeping me from completely passing out right here.
“You okay?” Blythe says.
Oh, yeah. I’m so okay.
Not.
And then the bell rings.
10
ALI
I race down the hallway to get to my physics class and my teacher, Mr. Chui, gives me a late notice, my third this month. I slip onto my stool next to Sammi.
Terrance Carter from the school newspaper sits on the other side of me.
“You smell like smoke,” he says.
“Wow, you must be a real investigative journalist,” I say, sneering. “You should get a hat that says scoop or something.”
He turns away. Terrance and I go way back. We were in an advanced reading class together in third grade. Now he walks around in this trench coat like he owns the school because he’s the newspaper editor. My entire relationship to the school newspaper is based on how they cover Sean Nessel. If Sean Nessel was in the paper, I’d bring it home. I’d cut it out. I’d stick it in the collage book.
Sammi opens up her notebook and starts scribbling to me.
Where the hell were you?
C-wing bathroom
How??
Blythe Jensen.
“What the fuck?” she whispers.
I shrug because I don’t know, which is really the truth. I rub my stomach and groan.
“Is it hot in here?” I say to Sammi and throw my hair up in a bun, the back of my neck sweaty.
She goes back to the notepad.
I’m worried about you.
I know. We’ll talk after class. PROMISE.
Mr. Chui draws a rocket on the board. He says the rocket is going to launch a projectile with a strong velocity.
My body gets real hot. Like clammy-sweaty hot, and I can’t stop it, and then I launch my own projectile . . .
I puke.
* * *
* * *
I convince the nurse that I’m fine. Just a nervous stomach. I slap my cheeks. Look. I’m perfect.
“I have to call your father anyway. And if you feel at all nauseous again, you need to come right back here.”
“Fine,” I say. Anything to avoid going home. I don’t want my father eyeing me all afternoon.
* * *
* * *
Lunch room. Sammi doesn’t say a word to me in the lunch line. She waits until we get to a small table in the back. Just me and her. She gets in my face and does that yell-whisper. “What the fuck is going on? You smelled like smoke in class. C-wing? Then you puke?”
“Shhhhh.”
“Ali, what really happened with you and him?”
“This isn’t something I want to even admit to myself.”
She practically chokes on her tater tot. “What does that even mean?”
Sammi has been my best friend since second grade and telling her is like telling myself. That’s how close we are. That’s why I don’t want to say it out loud. I pull her face close and put my lips to her ear.
“Why are you breathing in my ear?”
“Shhh. Just listen.” I hear the echo of my breath against her earlobe. Back and forth. Breathe in. Breathe out. “Remember I told you about what happened with Sean Nessel?”
She nods. Her face frozen. Eyes bugging out of her skull.
“He forced me.”
She pulls her face away. Her eyes squint in that way they used to around that time my mother left and I would make up stories about where she was. My mother is exploring the moon, actually. My mother decided to be a rock climber. Anything sounded better than My mother went to rehab because she has the alcoholic disease and also she’s moving to this weird place in New Mexico.
He put his hand over my mouth, I want to tell her. But I can’t say it out loud. I can’t say any of it to her. If I say it to her, it’ll never stop. That voice in my head will keep going. I’ll relive that night on repeat. And I want to get it out of my mind.
So I pull my T-shirt down a little on the one side. Since we’re in the cafeteria, I hold back my tears; they’re choking me.
I hear her gasp. I know she sees it, the bruise above my collarbone, close to my shoulder.
I quickly cover it up. No one’s going to see that again. Sammi’s circling her eyes with her hands. Rubbing them.
She whispers, “Is that why you ran out of there?”
I nod.
“And you just left this information out when you were at my house last night?”
Her eyes tear up. Her face reddens. She covers her face with her hands. Tears stream over her knuckles.
“We are not telling anyone,” I say, breathless. “Not anyone.”
“Cherie? Can’t I at least tell her?”
“Oh my God, Sammi, especially not her. She’ll make me go to a protest with a uterus strapped around my head.”
“But you have a bruise on your shoulder. He forced you. I mean. This isn’t right, Ali.”
“I was drinking those tiny bottles of vodka. My stupid collage books?” Saying it out loud takes my breath away. I grit my teeth. “He was my target. Everyone saw me.”
“But, Ali—”
“You saw me, Sammi. You said it yourself. You saw me drinking with him. Everyone saw me drinking with him.”