Poison Ink (9 page)

Sammi wasn’t alone. She reached into her back pocket and unfolded the paper, staring at Dante’s design.

“You still going out with Rachael Dubrowski?”

“Yeah, of course. What’s this about, Sammi?”

Rachael was two years older than Zak, but they’d had a thing going on for years. Sammi had gone to school with her younger sister, Anna, since the first grade.

“Rachael still has that tattoo shop downtown, right?”

how’d ur sleepover go?

The text from Cute Adam came through a little after nine o’clock that night. Sammi had just come back from the movies with her mother—Dad still celebrating a Patriots win—and when she got to her bedroom, it was a relief not to have to keep worrying about her shirt riding up to reveal the upper edge of the bandage on her lower abdomen.

kinda weird,
she texted back.
long story.

what @ ur date fri. nite? how’d that go?

Sammi smiled and burrowed down under her covers. The windows were open and the curtains billowed in the breeze. The rain had stopped and the night air smelled amazing.

pretty good, i think. he’s cute. smart. different.

u think u’ll c him again next wknd?

if he asks.

huh. got a feeling he will.

A warmth spread across her chest. She had only just met Adam, but she liked him. A lot. He was all the things she’d said, and clever, too. A little goofy, but she liked that, too.

i hope so,
she texted. A risk, but she felt daring.
g2g2bed. talk tmrw?

definitely. sweet dreams.

nite.

Sweet dreams. After last night, Sammi wouldn’t have thought it possible, but maybe she would have sweet dreams tonight after all.

The old school bus shuddered, engine groaning loudly. Sammi sat in back, next to a window, with a freshman girl next to her who didn’t say a word. She rested her forehead on the glass and looked out at the houses passing by, the thrumming of the bus making her skull vibrate. Her stomach felt tight as a fist; she hadn’t been able to eat anything at all this morning. A glass of orange juice had been all she could manage, and that only because her mother insisted.

The rain had cleared overnight, but the gray skies remained. The whole world had a muted, washed-out look, and Sammi had looked in the mirror this morning and thought similar things about herself. A gray girl on a gray day.

A knocking sound came from somewhere under the bus and for a second she held her breath, wondering if the old beast would just seize up and drop its engine right there on the road. All of these old school buses rattled and moaned and belched out thick exhaust. Either they weren’t street legal and no one cared, or the laws were more lenient on bright yellow tanks.

And why am I so focused on buses?

To avoid thinking about other things. Sammi knew that. In the eighth grade a bunch of other kids had told her that Kevin Mitchell wanted to ask her out. Every day for a week she had dreaded the prospect of running into him in the hall, both afraid that he would ask her out and worried that he wouldn’t. In the end, Kevin had taken her for pizza once, only to make them both realize they had nothing in common.

That week of dreadful anticipation had faded in her memory, but this morning it came rushing back. She felt that way again for the first time since.

The bus managed to lumber into the Covington High parking lot. Backpack slung over her shoulder, Sammi stepped off the bus last and joined the throng flowing into the school, trying to ignore the way her pulse throbbed in her temples. Tony Gregson, a hockey star who had been in her advanced English classes all through school, said hello as he passed. Sammi mustered a smile and kept it plastered on her face as she made her way up the stairs to the second floor corridor where her locker was located.

Weaving in and out of the crowd, the hall deafening with chatter, she spotted T.Q. ahead and hurried to catch up.

“Hey,” she said, falling into step beside her. T.Q. smiled. “Hey.” Then her smile faltered—the memory of Sammi’s betrayal rushing back—and a kind of sadness came over her face. “What’d you end up doing yesterday? Did you hook up with Cute Adam again?”

Sammi made sure her smile-mask did not slip. She arched an eyebrow. “Duh. What did I
say
I was going to do yesterday?”

“You went? You really did?” T.Q.’s face lit up with excitement and gratitude. Sammi had tainted everything on Saturday night, but it could be all right again, and it was obvious T.Q. wanted that as much as she did.

Sammi felt sick.

“I said I would.”

Lowering her voice to a conspiratorial tone, T.Q. asked, “Where’d you get it?”

They had slowed down, and now the flow of students passed around them, mostly freshmen and sophomores worried about getting to class on time. The juniors and seniors were never in quite as much of a hurry. Sammi glanced around guiltily, as if she were about to make some surreptitious drug deal.

With a meaningful look at T.Q., she patted her lower abdomen, just inside her right hip.

“Sweet. How big did you do it?” As she spoke, T.Q. idly touched the back of her neck where her hair hid her own tattoo.

Sammi led the way to her locker, worked the combination, and pulled it open. Shielded by the door and T.Q., she tugged down the front of her jeans to show the inch-wide tattoo. Her heart thundered in her chest, and her throat went dry.

T.Q. made a small squeal of delight and hugged her. “This is great. The girls are gonna be completely psyched.”

They shared the same homeroom, so after a stop at T.Q.’s locker they managed to beat the bell into the room. T.Q. seemed unusually talkative, impatient to learn if she had made the basketball team—the list would be posted by noon—and Sammi found some of her anxiety going away. Things were going to be all right now.

Between periods she saw Letty and Katsuko in the hall, but when she stopped to talk they were distant and made a lame excuse about needing to get to trigonometry early to talk to the teacher. Left standing by herself in the corridor, Sammi took a deep breath and brushed it off. It wasn’t as though she could have just flashed her tattoo there in the hallway, drawing all kinds of attention.

After third period, she threw herself into the tide of people moving down the central stairwell to the cafeteria in the basement. A couple of Las Reinas nodded in greeting, going up the steps against the flow. Her all-time favorite teacher, Mr. Geary, who taught history and had always encouraged her music, stood by the main doors directing traffic and making sure nobody decided to use the prelunch chaos to make a break for it and blow off the rest of the day.

The cafeteria was at the back of the school, its own wing, with three sets of metal doors propped wide open. The smell of today’s mystery meat made her stomach growl, and she remembered that she’d skipped breakfast. Her front right pocket bulged with the presence of her phone, and she hoped she’d have a few minutes before the girls showed up at lunch so she could text Adam. She needed a little reinforcement at the moment from someone outside her circle.

Letty stood between two sets of cafeteria doors, waiting for her. They spotted each other at the same time, and a happy smile blossomed on Letty’s face.

“Hey, chica.”

Sammi went up to her, nervous and wondering if Letty would notice. “Hey. I guess you talked to T.Q.”

“I did,” Letty said, falling into step with her. She bumped Sammi in the shoulder as they went down the five steps into the cafeteria. “I’d kiss you, but I’m not up for a scandal this week.”

“Nothing wrong with a little scandal,” Sammi said. “Besides, if the boys think I swing both ways, you know how much they love that.”

“Yep. The boys love lesbians. And they never seem to understand why that does nothing for us. What’s so hard to fathom about gay girls? Not really interested in entertaining guys.”

They got into the lunch line and picked up trays, already craning their necks to see what the glass cases revealed. They would choose the least repulsive meal, just to have sustenance.

“That’s why we hang around with you,” Sammi teased. “Gorgeous lesbian man-bait. You draw them in and the rest of us can snare them.”

Letty’s eyes flashed. “Glad to know I’m useful for something.”

Sammi rolled her eyes.

The lunch ladies said hello, familiar by now with most of the upperclassmen, and Sammi chose a chicken parmigiana sandwich. Letty went with steamed vegetables and rice, rarely trusting the meat from the cafeteria.

“That’s it,” she said as they filled water glasses, “I’ve got my life’s work ahead of me. I’m goin’ to culinary school and come back here and teach these ladies how to cook. Or I’m gonna have a show on a cooking channel and have every school in the country sign up and force the lunch ladies of America to watch it every day.”

Sammi nodded her approval. “It’s a commendable mission.”

By the time they walked back to the table, Caryn and T.Q. were in line. Katsuko had somehow gotten there early and already had a table waiting for them in the far corner where they always sat, in whatever combination shared a lunch period. Their schedules were such that Monday and Tuesday were the only days they were all together during lunch this semester, and those days were always cause for celebration.

Letty sat down beside Katsuko. Sammi slid her tray onto the table across from them.

Katsuko gave her a sly smile. “I hear you bit the bullet.”

“I couldn’t let you guys down.”

“What about your parents?”

Sammi shrugged. “I’m with you. We’ll just have to make sure they never see it. It’s in an intimate location. I won’t be flashing it around.”

“Except to Cute Adam,” Letty said, leaning back in her chair as though offering herself up. “Oh baby, I’ve got something to show you. Take a real close look. Closer. Closer. Cloooo-ser.”

Katsuko snorted a little when she laughed and then covered her mouth in embarrassment, as if the sound had come from there.

“Oh, please,” Sammi protested, grinning. “I only just met him. He hasn’t been promoted to tattoo inspector yet.”

T.Q. and Caryn joined them, sliding into seats on either side of Sammi.

“So, did you show them yet?” T.Q. asked.

Sammi rolled her eyes. “I’m not yanking my pants down in the middle of the cafeteria.”

“What’s stopping you?” Letty asked.

Caryn nudged her. “Come on. Let’s see.”

Sammi hesitated, but thought this might be perfect. Any nervousness, any blushing, they’d just chalk up to embarrassment. The table was in the corner anyway. She stood up quickly and refused to draw attention to herself by glancing around.

“Is anyone watching?” she asked in a whisper.

“No, you’re good,” T.Q. said.

The other girls’ attention was riveted on her hands as she slipped her fingers into the waist of her jeans. No way would she unbutton or unzip them. Instead, she sucked in her belly and just tugged them down in the front, far enough to let them see the top half of the tattoo.

“Good for you, girl,” she heard Caryn say.

Letty gave a low wolf whistle and a silent golf clap. But Katsuko’s smile fell and she frowned deeply, staring at the tattoo.

“It’s different,” she said.

Oh shit,
Sammi thought. Her skin prickled with warmth and her heart raced.

“What do you mean? It’s the same design,” she said.

Now all of them were looking more closely. She wanted to pull her jeans up and sit down but had to prove herself.

Caryn shook her head. “No, she’s right. The hole in the center is smaller and the waves dip more at the top.”

Sammi glanced around self-consciously. Some people were staring, and she made a show of reacting to being observed, covering her tattoo and returning to her seat.

“It’s not a big deal,” she said. “It’s the same design. You can’t expect him to do it exactly alike every time, like a machine or something.”

T.Q. had a crestfallen expression on her face. Sammi couldn’t look at her.

“Ours are all the same,” Katsuko said, pushing her curtain of black hair away from her eyes. “Identical. Did you really go back to Dante?”

Here it is,
Sammi thought.
Cards on the table.
How could she lie outright, to their faces? If they suspected a lie, all they had to do was have Letty drop by Dante’s and ask.

“Not exactly,” she began. “But what difference does it—”

“It’s not real,” Letty said sharply. Her mouth had turned into a thin line of anger and her eyes narrowed.

The others all seemed confused.

“Define ‘real,’ Katsuko said.

Letty sniffed in disgust. “She won’t show it to us again, or you could see for yourself. I didn’t even notice until you said it wasn’t the same, but Sammi just had this done yesterday? Where’s the swelling? Where’s the redness? Mine’s still healing, still going down, but hers looks fine. It’s gotta be henna, or airbrushed. In a week or two, it’ll be gone.”

On Saturday night, they’d been hurt and disappointed. Now Katsuko and Caryn only shook their heads and glared at her, mouths twisted in disgust and anger.

“Sammi?” T.Q. asked, gentle as ever. “Tell them they’re wrong.”

That moment was the worst; T.Q. still believing in her, still hoping. Sammi could only hang her head.

Letty stood first, the legs of her chair squeaking on the linoleum as she slid back, rose, and picked up her tray. One by one, the others got up as well. Sammi wished they would yell at her, so that maybe she could try to explain why she had done it. But they walked away, moving to another table, and left her in the corner alone.

All eyes in the cafeteria must have been on her, but Sammi did not turn to look. She kept her back to everyone, pushing her food around with a fork. She’d lost her appetite again.