“I don’t know why I’m crying.” And that’s the truth. I don’t know. This shouldn’t be such a big deal. Maybe a weird deal. But not a traumatic deal.
“Really, everything’s fine,” I say. “I’m just shaken up and dying from heartbreak like Ophelia, that’s all.” I smile. Everything’s fine. Everything’s fine. If I keep saying it, it’ll eventually be true, won’t it?
She asks me to lie back on the table because she’s going to do the swab and that’s it and I do, but I tighten my knees together and pull the paper gown over my thighs. She’s wearing little glasses now and glides her chair over to my feet. She places my feet in the stirrups and tells me she’s going to open my legs. I feel the silliest and weirdest I’ve felt in a long time.
Dr. Diaz’s hands separate my legs. Gently. She’s very gentle. She tells me when she’s going to touch me. I stare up at the turquoise parrot mobile that spins in a perfect circle above my head.
I close my eyes and get dizzy with all these weird images of people bending over and lifting their legs like they do in the Kama Sutra and Sean Nessel unzipping his jeans.
It’s possible that I’m a fake. That I duped Sean Nessel into thinking I was experienced. That I was complicit in what happened to me. That I was ready to drink vodka and go upstairs. That I was ready to take my clothes off. Maybe it’s my fault.
“Okay, all done,” she says, and closes my knees together, then hands two thin tubes to the medical assistant, who walks out of the room with them. Dr. Diaz covers my thighs with the paper gown and helps lift me so I’m sitting up.
“Sometimes you think you can love someone, but then they show their true selves,” she says. And I nod, her voice going in and out, mwa-mwa-mwa, like the absent grown-ups in Charlie Brown. “You’re entitled to the same confidentiality protections as an adult. Anything you tell me stays in this room, okay?”
I nod because I can’t speak, and she smiles, that warm smile, tells me to get dressed, then closes the door behind her.
I jump off the table, kicking one of the stirrups aside in the process. The metal poles clang against each other as they ricochet back and forth. I snatch my jeans off the chair. I don’t even put on underwear. I just shimmy my jeans on, hiking one foot into each leg and jumping a few times.
Zip up.
Button up.
Closed shut.
* * *
* * *
In the car ride home, I’m numb.
I have only a few words. Something happened to me. I want to say it to my aunt Marce, who’s telling me that it’s okay that I want to reschedule. That there are plenty of girls like me who get really scared the first time they go to a gynecologist. That it’s perfectly normal. That we’ll try again in a few weeks.
She reminds me that I can tell her anything.
That I’ll never be in trouble for telling the truth. That Dr. Diaz recommends counseling. That maybe there are other things going on.
Something happened to me?
Something happened to me.
13
BLYTHE
Come over, I text Dev. We go for a run. Nighttime. It all feels safe with him. Not crazy. At the same pace. Him turning to me. His smile. His warm smile. We stop at the old cemetery, both of us out of breath.
“Sean’s freaking out,” I say. It just sputters out of my mouth.
“Come here,” Dev says.
“I’m all sweaty.”
“Even better.”
“Dev, gross.”
He whines, making fun of me. “Dev, grossss.”
His neck tastes like salt and sweat. His body is so warm. I lean against the black iron cemetery gate and he presses into me.
“Nessel gets himself into these messes and you’re such a good listener. You’re so good at talking him down. And you’re so nice to all these girls. But you don’t have to be his caretaker.”
Over the summer, there was a freshman. Sean swore they didn’t have sex, but Dev asked me to check up on her. She looked confused afterward, disoriented, like she wasn’t supposed to be there. And what did I say to her? I asked her if she was okay. I told her she could call me. I pressed my hand against hers. Gave her empathetic eyes. She never did, not that I expected her to.
* * *
* * *
We walk back to my house. My mother’s in her room watching TV. My father’s home, in the kitchen drinking whiskey and reading. He waves and goes back to his book.
Dev is behind me on the stairs, rubbing my hips as we walk up to my bedroom. Sweat and slippery lips. I lock the door. I lead him onto me. Dev’s strong fingers dig into me. Usually I have to tell him to pull back, to calm down. But this time I want it harder. My body becomes this crushing wave. Everything lights up.
My eyes are closed the whole time as I think of Sean. Sean. Sean. I wish I could get him out of my mind. Does he do this with all these girls because of some unbridled love for me? This is ridiculous. I’m being ridiculous. But his face. I can’t stop imagining his face. I want to wrap my arms around him and make everything go away.
* * *
* * *
Dev’s running his fingers through my hair.
“All these strands. Just coming right from your head. And your lips. Where do they come from?”
“Science.”
He scoots into me, his shirt off, and I run my hand across his collarbones. His hair drooping over his eyes. It reminds me of the first time we kissed, just a few days after that party down the shore. At Cate’s house. He and I on Cate’s bed. Just talking and kissing. Just like that. He didn’t want anything. He didn’t try anything else. I told him about the Initiation that night. “You know about it, don’t you?” I said.
He nodded.
“Do you judge me because I did it?”
“Judge you? Of course not,” he said. Then his face scrunched up. “Lucky those guys aren’t still in this school. No, man, I hate that shit. I promise you that I’ll never do that Initiation. I’ll never be one of those guys. I don’t care how many guys are doing it—I won’t be part of it.”
“What if the girls want to do it? How about then? To get it over with. To hold the power, like Amanda Shire told us.” I don’t know why I said this. Maybe I was testing him. Maybe I wanted to know if he’d see me that way. The way those guys did that day. Looking down on me that way.
After the Initiation, I felt like people were staring at me. Not just because we were considered royalty all of a sudden. But because it felt like the whole school knew what I did. Like they knew what I was asked to do to those guys.