Reconstructing Amelia (25 page)

“I thought you and your mom were really close,” I said.

“We are. My mom and I are best friends,” Dylan said, as if she had it memorized. “Her and Zadie and my dad, they’re the only people who know the real me.” I tried not to take it personally that I hadn’t made the short list. I hadn’t known Dylan that long. “Anyway, I’m glad your mom’s not here. It gives us a place to be alone.”

“Me too,” I said, a fluttery feeling rushing into my chest. “You know, I almost told Sylvia about us today.”

“Almost?” Dylan sounded surprised and a little nervous.

“Don’t worry, I only got to the part about me liking a girl,” I said. “Not which girl.”

“But that’s the most important part.” Dylan smiled up at me playfully, her blue eyes shining.

I let go of the breath I hadn’t known I’d been holding. I’d been worried that Dylan would be mad at me for even telling Sylvia that much.

“You are
definitely
the most important part,” I said, grinning back at her. “The funny thing is that Sylvia didn’t believe me anyway. She thinks I’m confused about being gay.”

Dylan lay back down and stared up at the ceiling.

“Are you confused?” she asked.

“No,” I said, wishing she would look at me. “Are you?”

“I don’t trust people,” she said, as if that answered the question. She also didn’t sound as if she thought this was a bad thing, just a fact I should be aware of. “All they want to do is to put a label on you. Call you this or that. Then that’s all you are, forever.”

I got the sense that she was talking about more than just us. Like her whole life she’d been trying to outrun people putting a label on her.

“No one gets to decide who I am but me,” I said. And, wow, did I mean it. I was actually kind of impressed with myself. I looked over at Dylan, waiting for her to turn toward me, proud of me, too. But she kept her eyes on the ceiling. “I don’t care what other people think. I only care about you.”

Dylan was quiet then for a long time, so long that it started getting hard to breathe. Finally, she looked at me.

“Okay,” she said quietly. More like she was trying to agree with me than that she actually did. But it was a start. “Me too.”

“Can I ask you something else?” I knew it was a dangerous question, but I had to know. Especially now. “Were you and Zadie ever, like, together?”

“Zadie? Are you serious?” Dylan laughed hard. “That’s so gross. We’re like sisters. We’ve known each other since we were five. Zadie’s the only person besides my parents who knows everything about me. She’s always been there for me, too, especially when I
really
needed someone, which sometimes feels like it’s all the time.”

“Oh,” I said, not feeling nearly as relieved as I’d hoped to. I wanted to ask Dylan what she meant about needing someone all the time. I sort of understood a friendship like that because of the one Sylvia and I had. Except I felt like Dylan was talking about something different. “That’s cool.”

“Anyway, Zadie’s into guys,“ Dylan went on. “She and I are just best friends, okay? She watches out for me, but that’s it.”

“Okay,” I said, smiling. Because even if I still didn’t totally believe her, I really wanted to. “Good.”

We hugged then, and I closed my eyes and breathed in the sweet smell of Dylan’s wild hair. Then I had the one bad thought I’d been trying not to think about for days.

“Ugh,” I said.

“What?”

“I just remembered that those pictures of me are supposed to go up on that stupid blog tomorrow,” I said. I’d been having major second thoughts ever since Ian had taken the pictures. And if I had Dylan now—for real—what did I even need the Maggies for? “I’m not psyched about gross old fat guys with sticky fingers sitting around in their underwear liking pictures of me.”

“Yum,” Dylan laughed. “You make it sound so delicious.”

“I’m serious,” I said, but I was laughing, too, making Dylan’s head rock back and forth on my chest. “Doesn’t it make you uncomfortable having that out there?”

When I looked at the side of Dylan’s face, her smile was fading.

“I guess,” she said. She shrugged. “But pretty much everything makes me uncomfortable.”

“Half-naked pictures on the Internet probably should.”

Dylan was silent. Her pictures were already up there. I’d probably insulted her.

“Well, anyway,” I said in a lame try at changing the subject, without really changing it at all. “I’m going to tell Zadie I don’t want to play anymore. That I changed my mind.”

“But she’ll kick you out of the Maggies,” Dylan said, jerking up to look at me. Her eyes were all jumpy and scared. “I mean, she
definitely
will.”

“You’re the only part of the Maggies I care about.”

Dylan lay back down and was quiet for an even longer time. It kind of sucked. I’d been hoping she’d say something like “Yeah, screw Zadie, we don’t need her!” But she hadn’t. She hadn’t said anything. We were still lying there, bodies threaded together, when I heard the front door open.

“Holy shit,” I whispered. “It’s my mom.”

We were both naked. Our clothes were all the way over in the vestibule. It was one thing to tell my mom about Dylan, but it would be totally different for her to walk in on us like that. I grabbed the throw from the back of the couch and tossed it on top of Dylan. Then I crossed my arms over my naked chest and bent forward, hoping to hide as much of myself as possible. I squeezed my eyes shut like a little kid willing myself to disappear.

“Well, well,” someone said. The voice was not my mom’s. “Isn’t this romantic?”

When I opened my eyes, Zadie was standing there in my living room. In one hand she held our clothes. In the other, she had her iPhone out. She was filming us.

“How did you get in here?!” I yelled. “You can’t just come into my house!”

“The door
was
unlocked,” Zadie said smugly, moving around like she was trying to get a better shot with her phone. Dylan pulled up the throw so that her breasts were covered and turned her face away. “You guys must have been in quite a rush because I don’t even think the door was really closed.”

I wanted to get up and grab my clothes from Zadie, but I didn’t want her filming me, walking across the room naked.

“What are you, like, a stalker or something? How did you even know we were here?!” I yelled at her. “You can’t be here! This is my house.”

“Stalker? That’s a bit harsh, don’t you think?” Zadie smirked. “But, if you must know, I did follow you. And then I waited and waited and waited outside,
forever
.” She pulled the phone away for a second, staring straight at Dylan, who wouldn’t look at her. “I have to give you two credit. You have stamina. But then I guess it’s different for girls.”

I waited for Dylan to scream at Zadie. To turn back into that girl I’d seen in Zadie’s basement that day. But she was just sitting there, dissolving into the couch.

“Get out!” I yelled even louder. “Get the fuck out of my house!”

Zadie let out a bored sigh as she turned the camera back on me.

“You know, this isn’t going to make a very good movie unless you guys do something, you know, interesting.” She walked closer, until the camera was only a couple of feet from my face. “You don’t get two million hits on YouTube just for being two half-naked girls. It’s totally been done. We need action. How about a kiss? Or somebody could maybe grab a boob or something?”

Then something in me snapped. I jumped up and lunged at the clothes under Zadie’s arm. She dropped them instantly, springing away so that she and her phone were safely out of reach. She kept filming the whole time, though, as I scooped my clothes off the floor and pulled on my T-shirt and jeans. When I was dressed, I spun around and shoved my face right up into hers.

“Get the fuck out of my house or I’m calling the police.”

“That’s cute.” She leaned in closer. “You’re defending her honor.” Then she shook her head with disappointment. “Tsk, tsk, Crazy Eyes, I thought you were supposed to be
extra
smart. Do you think Dylan actually gives a shit about you? You think you
mean
something to her? You don’t even know her. You’re
nothing
. And by tomorrow, you’ll be forgotten, like the stale skanky ho you are.”

“If you don’t leave”—my fingernails were digging into my palms inside my clenched fists—“I am going to make you get out.”

“Ooh, how very butch of you.” Zadie whistled, then leaned in to hold her camera up in my face. “Is that your thing? You wear the pants? I like it. It’s hot.”

“You fucking bitch—”

“Stop!” Dylan shouted suddenly from the other side of the room. When I turned, she was fully dressed, pushing her feet back into her boots. She looked ready to cry. “Please, just stop.”

“What are you doing, Dylan?” My voice squeaked, like a panicked little kid. “Where are you going? You don’t have to leave. Zadie’s going, right now.”

“Oh yes, sweetheart,” Zadie said, smiling viciously. Dylan was already shuffling toward the door. “I am leaving. And your girlfriend’s coming with me.”

I got back to school somehow. I wanted to find Dylan before she forgot what we had. I didn’t remember leaving the house, but the next thing I knew I was sitting in Liv’s class. She was standing at the front of the room talking. I could see her mouth moving, but the words were all garbled and faraway.

I realized she was talking to me only when I saw everyone staring.

“Amelia? I know that
you
know the answer to this,” Liv said. “Please enlighten the rest of the class.”

When I turned toward the sound of Liv’s voice, my head felt filled with wet sand. Like it might snap free of my neck and thud lifeless to the ground.

“Amelia? Are you okay?” Liv sounded worried. “You don’t look very good.”

Finally, my eyes focused on her. When they did, they filled with tears. Liv was still staring at me when the bell rang and all the other kids moved at once, the room a rush of color and flesh and sound. Except for me. I couldn’t move.

Instead, I sat there replaying it over and over in my head—Dylan lumbering like a zombie out of my house. She hadn’t even turned back to say good-bye. Then there was that look on Zadie’s face, so fucking pleased. The whole thing had turned out exactly as she’d planned.

“Do you need to go to the nurse, Amelia?” The classroom was empty, but Liv was at my desk now. She looked freaked. “You’re as white as a sheet. I could walk you down.”

I tried to shake my head, but it wouldn’t budge.

“Okay,” Liv said, sounding unconvinced. “But there is something wrong. I can see that. Do you want to talk about it?”

Did I want to talk about it? Did I want to tell my nice English teacher that the first girl I’d ever loved had just sliced open my chest and plucked out my heart?

“I just got my period,” I said instead. “I have cramps.”

“Oh,” Liv said, looking embarrassed that she’d pushed for details. “Are you still up for stopping by Mr. Woodhouse’s office? He asked me to send you down after class. But if you’re not feeling well enough—”

“No, it’s okay,” I said, because it was a thing to do, a place to be. A direction to move in. And maybe a tiny part of me hoped Woodhouse would do something to make Zadie disappear. “I can go.”

I sat in Woodhouse’s office waiting for him to get off the phone. I could see my legs against the seat of the chair, could see the armrests under my hands. But I couldn’t feel any of it. I couldn’t feel anything.

“Sorry,” he said when he’d hung up. He shook his head. “Alumnae can be insistent. Don’t be that way years from now. It’s . . . well, anyway, I don’t think you ever would be.”

I stared at him. I couldn’t even pretend to do anything else.

“Are you okay, Amelia?”

Fix it
, I screamed silently.
Throw her out of school. Have her arrested.
“I have a headache. A migraine.”

“Oh, okay, well then, I won’t keep you.”

He grabbed an envelope off his desk and held it out to me. I stared down at it.

“It’s yours,” he said quickly. “Open it.”

I stared at it a little longer before finally reaching for it. Everything was moving in slow motion. I felt the weight of the envelope in my hands, saw Woodhouse staring at me as if he’d just given me a present. I felt sure that inside was going to be an eight-by-ten glossy of Dylan and me rolled up together.

“Come on, I already know what’s in it. They called me,” Woodhouse said. He sounded giddy now. “Open it.”

My fingers were clumsy and thick as I tried to tear the envelope open. Inside was regular paper, nothing glossy like a photograph. I sucked in a little air as I tugged out a letter addressed to me, in care of the school. My eyes fell on the second paragraph: “This fellowship will cover the full cost of the conference, and an excerpt of your piece,
Today, I Am
, will be published in the accompanying anthology.”

“Liv feels badly because she submitted the piece over your objections,” Woodhouse said. “She didn’t want you to feel pressured to take it, so she decided not to be here.”

“Oh,” I said, staring down and trying to process that I’d won some fellowship I hadn’t even applied for.

But given what a huge mound of shit the rest of my life had become, it did make me a little happy. Not
happy
happy, but less dead, maybe. It was a good reminder that there had been a me before I’d ever heard of the Maggies, or Dylan.

“You should celebrate,” Woodhouse said. “You’re the first Mittlebranch winner Grace Hall has ever had. It’s a testament to your talent, Amelia. Really.” Then he took a deep, tired breath. “But Amelia, the fellowship is contingent on my writing a recommendation for you. And to be able to do that in good conscience, I need to know you’re out of the club. That you’re not a Maggie any longer. I’m also going to need for you to give me the names of the other girls who are members. I’ve been overlooking a lot, Amelia. You’ve left school grounds unauthorized at least five times in the past three weeks. I can’t write that recommendation unless you help me, now.”

“You’re
blackmailing
me?”