My Beautiful Failure (6 page)

“I’m sorry, but I can’t give out personal information. Anyway, I’d rather hear what’s going on with you.”

You’re just a kid, aren’t you?

A man’s voice—smooth, like a radio announcer.

“How are things going?”

You sound really young.

“My name’s Billy. Would you like to tell me your first name?”

Are you wearing boxers or briefs?

My hand went instinctively to my thigh. “I’m sorry?”

Right now. Do you have on boxers or briefs?

“Do I . . . ?”

You know what I’m talking about.

“I have to go.”
Click.

I
continued for a few more calls. The handbook said I should get people to discuss their feelings, but two Incomings refused to name a single feeling, and I wasn’t sure they even had any. One said his major feeling was discomfort because he had never talked to me before. Another asked if she could talk to Margaret or Richie instead. When I finished that call, I looked at the clock. Eight forty-five. My phone rang.

L
isteners. Can I help you?”

Yep. It’s Jenney. I had a really tough day today.

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

I walked past Hawthorne State and I started thinking about all that stuff again, about everything I’m missing.

“Everything you’re missing?”

Yeah, the fact that I’m supposed to be in school now and I’m not. I just can’t face school in the condition I’m in. But I saw all these Staties on their way to a game or a rally or something, and they have big groups of friends and lots of ways to fill their time. They have everything I was supposed to have, everything I was going to have, but . . . My future got taken away from me.

I heard a soft clicking sound, like the feet of a cat on a hardwood floor.

“Jenney, are you crying?”

Yes . . . I’m sorry . . . I’m such a mess. Just give me a sec to pull myself together.

“Take your time. Don’t worry about crying. That’s what we’re here for.”

Okay. A little better now.

“Jenney, are you thinking about suicide?”

Oh, God—no. You don’t have to ask me that. Suicide is for weaklings. I’m a fighter, you know.

“That’s great. You sound like a really strong person.”

I really am strong, I think. I would have to be strong to go through what I’m going through.

“You should be proud of that, Jenney.”

I am.

“So, do you want to tell me what’s going on? What happened with school? You seem disappointed about the school situation.”

Because of all the stuff that happened with my parents, I didn’t—

“I’m sorry, what happened with your parents?”

You don’t know?

“No, I don’t.”

You must know. Everybody at Listeners knows what happened with my parents.

“Well, I don’t. I’m sorry to interrupt you, because you’re obviously upset, but I’d like to get more background if you want to tell me.

Wait a minute . . . are you new?

“Yes, I am. This is my first day, actually. My name is Billy, by the way.”

I can’t believe it. You’re
great
at this!

“I am?”

Yeah, I would never have thought this was your first day. I feel so comfortable talking to you.

“Really?”

I feel like I could tell you anything.

“Well, thanks.”

Margaret cleared her throat. I realized I was breaking one of the rules.

“It’s great of you to say so, but I’m not here to talk about myself. I’d much rather hear about you and school and everything.” Margaret nodded. She returned to her doodles and her Incoming.

All right. Well.
Jenney took a deep breath.
I’ve been through some changes lately. A lot of changes, and not for the better. Hello? Are you there?

“Yes. Go ahead.”

Okay, I was all set to start college, at St. Angus’s. Do you know St. Angus’s?

“Tell me about it.”

It’s an elite women’s college in New Hampshire. It’s often called the Eighth Seven Sister.

“Mm-hmm.”

My mother went there, and my grandmother and her mother, and so on from way, way back. It’s really selective, and the women who graduate from there often become very successful. My mom made friends there that she’s stayed in touch with for, like, her whole life. It’s in Molton, one of those perfect little New England towns with the white church steeple in the center.

“It sounds great. What happened?”

Well, I got accepted. I mean, they were really excited about having me come to the school. The admissions office was.
Because not only would I probably have gotten in as a legacy because of my mom and grandmom and everybody, but I got in on my own merits. I think that’s really important, don’t you?

“You got in on your own merits.”

You’re repeating me. Don’t you think that’s important?

“It’s important to you. That’s what matters. So you got accepted.”

Right. They offered me a partial scholarship because of my swimming.

“You’re a swimmer.”

Yes, I have a trophy and everything. Did you go to Hawthorne High?

“You have a trophy.”

I have a trophy in Hawthorne High, in the case in the front lobby. Because my grades were great too. I can say that to you because you seem pretty smart yourself, and you won’t think I’m conceited. So I actually got in to all three of my top schools that I applied to.

“And you decided to go somewhere else?”

I didn’t go at all.

“Why not?”

Because I started freaking out. The summer before school. I had a kind of . . . breakdown. Like a meltdown.

“That sounds awful. I’m so sorry.”

Well, it was awful. It was terrible. . . . It was a nightmare.
The soft clicking sound started again, a shutter moving in the back of her throat.

“Take your time.” I didn’t know what else to say.

Okay.
Jenney’s voice was clear again.
It was late July, early August. I was getting ready for school—e-mailing my
new roommate, buying odds and ends for the dorm room—and I suddenly felt like I was somewhere else. I got disoriented, and I panicked, like something really bad was about to happen. I didn’t feel like Ms. Successful College Student. I felt small and helpless, like I was suffocating, and I could barely see the four walls around me, which were in my bedroom at home.

“You felt small and helpless. Why do you think you felt that way?”

Because I was having a flashback. To my childhood. I was horribly abused as a child.

“By who?”

By my parents. Both of them.

“Your mother, too? Your mother who went to St. Angus’s?”

That’s right. My mother who went to St. Angus’s. Who did everything right and was a big success story and a famous social butterfly. My mom who wrote books and my dad who owned a TV station. But the two of them, nobody knew it at the time, but those two were hurting me all along. These two supposedly great parents turned out to be the most evil people on the planet.

I looked at the clock—8:52. I had to end the call, but I had no idea how. What would I say? What Jenney’s parents did was wrong. No parent had the right to hurt a kid. People like that shouldn’t even have kids. That’s what I would have said to someone else. But that was my opinion, and we didn’t give opinions at Listeners.

“I’m so sorry, but I have to go in a minute.”

I know you have to go. You have to go just when I pulled
off this scab that covers my heart. That’s what they all say at Listeners.

“I can give you one more minute,” I said. “I’ve really enjoyed talking to you. I hope things get better and I hope you call again.”

All right,
she said as the clicking began again.
That’s the thing about Listeners. You expect us to turn our emotions off and on like a faucet.
I waited, and the clicking stopped.
All right, that’s enough for tonight. I’m sure I’ll be okay. You know, talking to you about all this made me feel a little better.

“It did? I’m glad. I’m really glad you called, Jenney. I mean, we’re really glad you called.”

I do feel better. Talking to someone who believes me. You’re a great guy, Billy, did you know that?

“Thanks. Good night, Jenney.”

I can’t believe you’re new. You’re practically the best one over there. ’Night.

D
ial tone. Now I knew what Richie meant about the planets, because Jenney’s world disappeared and I was back in the office. My replacement, a college student named Vince who would be covering the overnight shift, grasped the back of my chair.

I told him I was a little freaked out and needed a minute. I ran one hand over my hair and face. My skin felt damp. I wasn’t sure what Jenney meant when she said she’d been abused. My parents had never hit me or Linda. I knew that kids got sexually abused, but I never knew anyone who said they did. And a kid in my neighborhood who moved from place to place often because his parents were in the military had a black eye a few times and his arm in a cast. My mom was disgusted and wanted to say something to his parents, but they moved away before she could say anything. What kind of hurting was Jenney talking about?

A
t the end of the shift, Margaret, Richie, and I took the elevator to the first floor of Cabot Insurance. Their parents picked them up while I unlocked my bike.

I found myself conjuring a face to match Jenney’s voice. What would she look like? She was a swimmer and her parents were rich, so she was probably at least average. Athletes usually look good. And rich people can fix all the defects that poor people live with. She wouldn’t have weird teeth or an odd-looking nose. A picture swam into my mind: a slim girl in a one-piece Olympic-style bathing suit, with wavy wheat-colored hair in a damp braid. But then I told myself that as a Listener I talked only to the inner person, so Jenney’s looks didn’t matter.

In high school everyone says how cool it is to be different or unusual, but most of your friendships are based on being alike, and the people who are most like everyone else seem to get the most friends. You can pick them out on sight, Generic High School Kid, because they’re
always either laughing or on the phone or both, and the fact that they’re never left with their own thoughts makes everyone want to be their friend.

I was never that guy, and if Jenney had ever been that girl, she wasn’t anymore.

M
y school is famous, or at least freakish, for having the only regulation football field in the United States that’s below sea level. A deep canal was cut along the outer edge of the field, so we students get used to looking up from an English essay and seeing a sail appearing to coast through the grass, or a group of tourists lining the rail of a whale-watch boat and looking into the classroom with their binoculars. The clock tower above the administration building is a landmark for sailors and appears on many navigational charts, and all our sports teams are called Schooners.

The Monday after my first talk with Jenney, I locked my bike in front of the main doors and kept my eyes straight ahead as I passed the trophy cases. Just as Jenney’s looks were none of my business, her last name and year of graduation were not my business either. Signs leading from the cases to the athletic department exhorted
SUCCESS DOESN’T COME TO YOU—YOU GO TO IT
and
BE LIKE A
POSTAGE STAMP: STICK TO ONE THING UNTIL YOU GET THERE.

In history of music, Mr. Gabler assigned us a five-page paper on the instrument of our choice. “That’s five pages, five sources,” he said. “The sources can be any type you want—blogs, TV shows, documentaries, YouTube videos, recordings—as long as you document them properly. For our next class I want you to give me your choice of instrument and your five sources.”

Gordy walked to lunch with me after class. “How was it?” he asked.

“Kind of a letdown,” I said. I looked at him for commiseration. “Nobody was actually suicidal.”

“That’s good, though, isn’t it?” He stopped walking and watched my face. I could see he wanted to strike the correct tone but was confused.

“No, you’re right. I’m glad no one was considering offing himself. But you know my neighbor who became an EMT? How he was all, like, puffed up when he got a medic certificate and came home in that uniform? I expected to feel like that. To get an adrenaline rush from saving lives.”

Gordon stopped at his locker for his insulated lunch bag, and I wondered what was in it. A crowd of students came toward us. Andy walked behind a girl and imitated the sway of her butt, in an effort to make Mitchell laugh.

“Do me a favor, okay?” I asked Gordy, turning my back on the oncoming crowd.

“What’s that?”

“Let’s not tell the other guys what I just told you. I couldn’t stand to have them rag on me again.”

D
ad ripped off his necktie as soon as he parked the car. Then he came inside and changed into his painting clothes.

“Nothing,” he said as he cut through the house toward his studio. “Not one word.”

“What’s wrong?” Linda asked, following him into the kitchen. She wore a geriatric golf shirt and skirt. Jodie trailed behind, a purple plastic barrette hanging on a lank piece of hair in front of her eyes. As she trotted along, she swatted it back against the freckles on her cheek.

“I want my paintings to be seen, but no one’s giving me encouragement. I wrote to the Institute of Contemporary Art, the Peabody Essex, the Cape Ann, the galleries in the South End and on Newbury Street, and the Rocky Neck artist-in-residence program. I even e-mailed some of my old classmates who have gallery connections. No one invited me to submit work. Sure, I can fill out applications and send slides. But mostly the galleries already
know which artists they want, and go after them. And I don’t have time to wait around.”