Goth Girl Rising (23 page)

The thought makes my stomach all queasy and churny. Is this what victory feels like? I don't know. I've never really won before.

I think of that stupid comic book buried in my messenger bag. God, what the hell was he thinking?
Captain Atom.
What kind of stupid name is that? Does he know me at all? He deserves what I'm going to do to him. He totally deserves it.

In fact, I can't wait to get these pages home and do all my posters and Web pages and shit like that. I gotta start
now,
and fortunately Simone had that one good piece of advice last night.

I take a detour on the way to English. I don't learn anything in there anyway.

I duck into a bathroom. It's empty. Cool.

I call Fanboy's house on my cell. I know the trick you can use to block Caller ID. Sometimes it's cool to have a dad who works for the phone company.

After three rings, I start to panic. I guess I could just leave a message, but it would be better to actually talk to—

Someone picks up in the middle of the fourth ring. "Hello?"

Score! It's Fanboy's mom.

I clear my throat and try to make it a little deeper and slower, just in case she recognizes it. "Hello. Could I speak to..." I pretend I'm looking something up on a list and then say Fanboy's full name.

She hesitates. "He's ... he's not here right now. Can I, uh, take a message?"

"Oh, I'm sorry. This is confidential. I can't leave a message."

"Confid—"

I cut her off. "But if you could just ask him to call the clinic at Lowe County General Hospital for his test results, I'd appreciate it. Thank you."

Even though I'm tempted to stay on the line long enough to listen to her freak the hell out, I have to pretend I'm some kind of professional with a long list of patients to call, so I just hang up and laugh my ass off.

Simone and her movies rock.

I
MAKE IT INTO
E
NGLISH CLASS
like maybe two minutes after the bell, which—for me—is pretty good. Miss Powell frowns and shakes her head and tells me to get into my seat. Like, duh. What did you
think
I was gonna do? Stand here at the door all day? Idiot.

Simone takes off her jacket, making a big show of it while managing to look totally clueless. Her yellow-bra boobs get pushed up and out as she arches her back, and every single boy in the room watches and drools a gallon of saliva. Yuck. What a showoff.

"Simone, put your jacket back on," Miss Powell says.

"I'm hot." Simone pouts and some guy says "No shit" under his breath and there's an undercurrent of laughter that Miss Powell ends with a sharp "Gentlemen!"

But Simone gets up again and gets her jacket, making a show of bending over to get it so that everyone can see her thong.

And then something really weird happens. or maybe it's not weird. Maybe it's always been this way and maybe it's just part of life and I've never noticed it before. But this time, I
do
notice.

While Simone puts on her jacket, Miss Powell hoists herself up on her desk, a move that makes her skirt hike up halfway to heaven. At the same time, she lets out a big sigh that gets everyone's attention and then she starts playing with this stone on her necklace so that her hand is right up in her cleavage going back and forth.

Every guy in the room blows a circuit. It's like, nubile little teen slut or hot older woman?

Did she do that on purpose? Did she even know she was doing it?

I guess I should be sort of grossed out that Miss Powell—an adult—is competing with a kid for the attention of a bunch of disgusting horny teenage boys. But I'm not. Instead, I just sit there and watch and think about it. Is this what women are reduced to? Is this how pathetic we are? That we have to compete for who's sexiest, who's hottest, no matter what? Even when you're competing for a bunch of boys who would eff a
dog
if it had boobs?

It makes me proud of myself. Proud that I don't play those bullshit games.

"OK, let's get started," Miss Powell says, but I already feel like I've learned a lot today.

W
HEN
E
NGLISH ENDS, I PACK UP
my stuff and I'm almost out the door when Miss Powell says, "Kyra, do you have a sec?" all casual-like.

What the hell? I behaved in class today. Can she read my mind now?

"I'm sorry I was late—"

"That's not it." She smiles at me as kids leave all around me. Someone says, "Busted," real quiet, but I hear it. Someone else says, "The freak's in trouble."

Eff you.

I only have lunch after English, so it's not like I'm in a hurry, so I stand there and wait. Miss Powell does some stuff on her computer until everyone's gone, and then she asks me to close the door.

"Have a seat," she says, and points to a chair right in front of her desk.

Oh, shit. If she sits
on
her desk, right in
front
of me, and crosses those legs, I'm gonna scream.

We dodge the scream—she stays behind the desk.

"So, Kyra." She looks up at me and smiles.

"So."

And nothing.

"Uh, I'm really sorry I was late." I'm not, but I'm getting creeped out sitting here and I want to leave.

"That's not the ... Well, that is a problem. But that's not why I asked you to stay." She heaves out a big sigh. I figure I'm lucky that her cleavage doesn't overwhelm the power of the buttons on her shirt and send them flying. The buttons—heroically—hold.

"Kyra, how are you doing?"

What the
eff?

"Excuse me?" Believe me—I rarely say
that.

"I'm a little worried about you," she says. "I know you've been going through a rough time, and then this ... this
radical
change in your appearance. It's a signal, you know."

It's like she wants me to say something here, but I don't. I just press my ElecTrick Sexy lips together and imagine lightning buzzing there.

"I guess..." She sighs again. (This woman should get her lungs examined; I don't think she's breathing right. Maybe she has
lung cancer.
Would that be
ironic?
) "I'm just concerned, Kyra. And I'm thinking that maybe you could use, you know, a friend. Someone to talk to." She tilts her head to one side and smiles at me in what is, I think, supposed to be this way-reassuring manner.

So, I get it. She's one of Them: one of those adults who think kids need an adult who's "just like them" to talk to.

About a million mean, nasty things fly through my brain and only supreme willpower keeps me from saying all of them. I'm not going to let her get to me.

"I know there's a counselor here and everything," she goes on, "but she's kind of, well, old fashioned, you know? I was thinking maybe, I don't know, maybe just between us girls—"

Barf!

"—we could talk about things that are bothering you and, oh, I don't know, maybe figure out some things. Together."

Please, God, strike me dead right now.

She gets up. "It wasn't all that long ago that I was in your position, you know. I'm not
that
much older than you. I remember what it was like."

Oh, really? You remember your mom coughing up her life in blood? You remember your clueless dad shoving you into an institution a couple of times?

Still keeping my lips pursed. This would be two days in a row I behaved at school. Almost a record for me. Keep it together, Kyra.

She comes around the desk. If she touches me, I'll freak.

"You've been through so much. I totally get it, OK? I totally get it. I just hate to see you doing all these ... I hate this self-hating, self-destructive behavior."

My hair. She's talking about my hair, for God's sake. Like being bald is dangerous or something. Christ, bitch, that's not self-destructive. That's self-affirming, OK? The scars on my wrists? Now,
those
are self-destructive. Buy an effing clue.

"I see so many girls ... so many young women, I mean ... and they're just..." She spreads her hands out to the sky, like she's praying for an answer. "They're just
bombarded
with all of these mixed messages from the world, from our society, you know?"

Holy shit. Are you serious? Is she really talking about this?
Her?

But still I don't talk. I don't say anything. They can't give you shit or get you in trouble if you don't talk. And then she goes and she does it. She sits on her desk.

Crosses her legs. I have a front-row seat to her inner thighs for a second. How special for me.

"So, I was thinking," she goes on, "that we could just talk every now and then. If something's bothering you. You know. About life. Or school. Or home." She leans forward and grins at me with this shit-eating grin, like we're conspiring or something. "Or boys."

Don't do it, Kyra. Don't do it, Kyra. Don't do—

Ah, shit. I do it.

"All the boys want to eff you," I say, staring right in her eyes.

Her face freezes with that stupid grin. We're maybe a foot apart. I don't blink. I don't say anything else. I just look at her.

"I'm sorry?" she says. "
What
did you just say?"

And then ... and then it's like I can't help myself. I can't stop myself. When people are stupid, when they give me shit, I just can't stop myself. It's like I'm watching myself do it, listening to myself. And I just purge everything out of my body. I just puke up all the mean, nasty shit.

"All the boys want to eff you. That's what I said. They all want to eff you. They lust over you in class."

"Uh, Kyra, I—"

"It's really sick to sit here and watch it." I just steamroll right over her. I lean forward a little bit and she finally backs off and gets those tits out of my face. "Every day I'm in here and I watch them check you out like you're not even real, like you're Internet porn they just downloaded. And the worst part isn't them. The worst part is
you,
because you totally know it. You totally know that all the boys want to eff you because you
make
them want to, don't you? You wear your tight little skirts and your shirts with your boobs falling out and you sit up on your desk and you make sure everyone watches when you cross your legs. Everyone can see right up your skirt. Did you know that? I bet you did. You're wearing blue underwear today. See? I proved it. So you do that every day and all the boys drool and want to eff you and you
love
it, don't you? You love knowing that all the boys want to eff you and you encourage it. So don't tell me about self-hating and self-destructive and all that shit. don't tell me about girls and society. don't try to be my friend. I have enough sluts for friends!"

And I get up and grab my messenger bag.

God, it's like I just went to the moon! I feel
light!
I feel like I could fly! Like one of Fanboy's superheroes.

"Kyra!" She clears her throat and I look at her over my shoulder. She's gone all pale and she's off the desk now. "You can
not
talk to me like that!"

"Bite me. I already
have
a shrink, OK? And at least I know what's wrong with me. At least I'm not some Evelyn Sherman wannabe who gets her rocks off making a bunch of
kids
get boners."

And wow—Miss Powell is
ugly
when she's pissed!

"You—I'm trying to
help
you!"

"Don't want it. don't need it." I open the door.

"Go to the office!"

"Eat me."

I leave and slam her door on my way out.

God. God. God. That felt so good! That felt so so so so so
good!

I don't go to the office. Eff that shit. I go to lunch.

I sit with the usual crowd. The goth table, usually a sinkhole of black, now has a little salt to go with its pepper. Simone has napkins spread all over herself to keep from getting anything on her copycat white clothes.

"You're going Friday, right?" this kid Troy asks me. He's a tool for the most part, but he does have an awesome horseshoe through his nose. Every time I see it, I think,
I should totally pierce my nose again.
Because I've got the red stone through the left side, but having a horseshoe hanging from the middle would be awesome.

"Where?"

Simone sighs like she thinks there's an Academy Award in it for her. "The
party.
Don't pretend. I
know
Jecca told you about it."

I look around the table like I'm not sure I've chosen the right place to sit. "You all are going to a party at Pete Vesentine's house? He's a jock dickhead."

Lauri says, "So? His parents are gonna be gone and there's gonna be alcohol."

"You
have
to come," Troy says.

Simone saves me from having to answer: "What did Powell want?" she asks.

"She wanted to know where you get your bras and thongs."