“Maybe that’s why Sean hangs out with Dev and looks up to Dev. Because he wants to be more like him.”
But I have no idea if that’s true at all. It feels like it could be.
“You guys have never seen him cry like I have. You’ve never seen him spilling his guts like I have.”
“About what? His hair?” Suki says.
“His SAT scores?” Donnie says. “He has a soft side. You guys don’t understand.” Donnie, mocking me.
“That soft side is his pretty face,” Suki says.
I slump down into the back seat, my knees up against the passenger side. I close my eyes. I can see his face right in front of me. The way he looked that night. I would never hurt anyone.
He wouldn’t, would he? Not purposefully. Right?
16
ALI
It’s been two weeks since I first met Sheila the She Woman. Two weeks since that night.
My dad wants me to meet her again. The right way.
“You mean, not with her ass sticking out?”
I try not to laugh. I love teasing my father. It means everything to me.
“Alistair.”
“Dad.”
“You seriously have got to get a handle on that mouth of yours.”
So Sheila is coming over for dinner. My father is cooking. This means he bought a rotisserie chicken and is microwaving frozen broccoli. If he really wants to charm her, he’ll open a can of beans and chop up some cilantro.
Sheila comes in with flowers for me. A dozen orange roses, which is sweet actually.
“They’re from an organic farm in West Jersey,” she says.
“I thought roses came from a florist,” I say, deadpanning.
“Jesus, Ali. Give it a rest!” my father yells from the kitchen.
“Your father told me about your great sense of humor,” she says. She’s smiling. She’s not so offended.
* * *
At dinner Sheila wants to know about my interests.
“Boys.”
This used to be a funny joke in my family before Sean Nessel. Before my father thought I was a slut. Before I had to go to a gynecologist. Before my aunt delivered Plan B to me. It slipped out of my mouth too fast. My father stares at me like he’s going to slap me from across the table.
“New answer,” he says, gritting his teeth.
I sit up in my seat. Serious now. “I write a little. I also make collages. I guess I do a lot of things.”
She tells me that she writes too. That she used to be a journalist. Now she just teaches more than she actually writes.
“What made you become a journalist?” I say.
She perks up. Surprised that she caught my interest.
“I saw a movie on Woodward and Bernstein. Ever hear of them?”
I shake my head.
“They’re the journalists who uncovered Watergate. The reporters who found out that President Nixon had hired his men to break into the Democratic National Committee offices that were in the Watergate building to steal information. That he lied to the country and then resigned. They ended up uncovering layers of Washington secrets about the president that no one was willing to talk about.”
“It was a defining moment in history,” my dad says.
Of course I know about Watergate, but I don’t feel like explaining myself. Too much effort. So I nod. Watching her. Wondering what her articles were about. Why she started teaching.
“The only journalists I like are comedians,” I say. “At least they make you laugh while talking about how depressing everything is.”
“Apathy, apathy, apathy,” my dad says.
“Hey! Apathy! That’s on my PSAT.”
He shakes his head.
“Do you have a school paper or something? Do school newspapers even exist anymore?” she says.
“Actually they do have a school paper. Didn’t it win an award last year?” my dad asks.
“Yeah, we have a great school newspaper. And I know all about it because the boy that I used to be in love with was in it all the time. I used to cut his face out of it.”
More deadpan. My dad looks down at his plate.
“Are you interested in journalism, Ali?” she says. She’s not letting this go. She’s insisting on a serious conversation.
“I don’t really know what I’m interested in right now.” That’s the pathetic truth.
“Okay,” she says, uncomfortable. “Well, if you’re at all interested, maybe you could look at some places online. There are a lot of female journalists out there writing great stuff about college campus rape, eating disorders, abortion rights . . .”
I think of the first thing she said: college campus rape. Rape. My mind buzzes and buzzes as I stuff food into my mouth, nodding, Yes, sure, send me something, I think I say, my mouth filled with food because there’s not enough food, not enough of anything to fill me up and make this feeling like I’m disintegrating go away.
* * *
Later that night, I’m watching what seems like an endless stream of YouTube videos on babies who can’t see. A doctor places glasses over their little, confused faces and then their world becomes clear. Imagine your world so fuzzy. That you can’t see. That you don’t know anything is different about that fuzzy green thing hanging from the tree. Then it becomes shockingly clear: that fuzzy green thing is a leaf.
Blythe texts me: What are u doing?
Watching babies with bad eyesight see for the first time on YouTube
ALI
YES
Can I come over?
I look around my room. Some of my room seems so babyish. I bet Blythe’s room is glamorous. She’s got like silver wallpaper or something. A canopy bed with long white silk drapes hanging from each end. Some chic white chair in the corner with black fur pillows.
My room on the other hand. My desk is painted turquoise because my dad and I painted it together. My mirror is from the 1970s; it’s got tiny little daisies painted in clusters except for the center. My mother picked it up at a garage sale years ago. “When you look at yourself in the mirror,” she said, “you’ll always be surrounded by flowers.” There’s a Nirvana sticker in the corner that came with it, otherwise it would have
