Hungrily, I scan the syllabus during introductions. We’re doing poetry first, and I hate poetry. Mr. Howard hands out poems about cabins and farm animals by some old white men with beards, Robert Frost and Wally Longlegs or something.
“Twenty minutes of quiet reading while I have my coffee,” he explains. “Sorry, did I say quiet? I mean completely and utterly silent.” He laughs at himself, and no one else does.
I shoot up my hand. “Mr. Howard, this is gonna be a weird question.”
Someone lets out a sinister snicker and says, “Of course.” I don’t even turn to look. Whatever—these people don’t read.
“Yes, ma’am?” Mr. Howard takes a sip of his coffee from a mug that says No thank you. He has a squirrelly face—if he were a cartoon, he might be a villain, but in person it kinda makes him look trustworthy.
“Can I sit on the floor while I’m reading? It helps me think.”
“Whatever makes you happy.”
After the summer I’ve been through, the least of my worries are the eye rolls spurred by my request, everyone laughing it up at me, the weirdo. Morgan, runner up for Class Clown, tied with the other black girl for Loudest, and sole original owner of the superlative Most Unique (not otherwise specified).
I don’t care; now is about getting happy and comfortable, moving forward. I’ve looked into the face of the end of the world, and guess what? No one from school was there.
PART WHERE I DO NOTHING SUGGESTED
Another thing that annoys me about this high school inside a PacSun inside a church: glorified Sunday school teachers posing as experts in the scientific method or British literature telling me it’s time to “Get Serious,” that I need to “Prepare for the Future.” Meanwhile I’m like, Um actually, what I need to do is stop wanting to die.
Everyone in the junior class is required to meet with the college counselor, Mrs. Martinez. (Last year she was the school nurse. I need explanations.) My appointment Friday morning lasts basically ten minutes—she tells me I should “consider the Christian colleges right here in Southern California!”
Another thing I hate about it here is how almost every classroom is decorated with some version of that poster with the footprints on the beach, which I know is supposed to be inspiring but has always creeped me out. (What is the difference, seriously, between angels and ghosts? Why are we supposed to be afraid of one and cool with the other? And actually, same question goes for heaven and hell.) Mrs. Martinez has one of those posters right behind her desk, and I read the bad poem over and over while she talks.
“A degree from a Christian college isn’t the Ivy League,” she says like a freaking infomercial, “but it’s nothing to sneeze at. You don’t have to sacrifice your walk with God for a rigorous education.”
I nod. I will be doing none of what she suggests.
When I am spit back into the empty hallways after her little brainwashing session, I take my time meandering to my locker. I really want to text David, but I don’t know the rules about who’s supposed to text who each day. Whatever. I go for it.
Hello please save me I hate it here
(His reply is instant!)
hey
DID
YOU
WATCH
FIGHT
CLUB
YET
????????
LOL
Ok so
I did, OMG! I will never hear the Pixies the same way again!
Was I supposed to understand the ending?
isn’t it craaaaazy?!
I have some theories
Heading to bio
Oh cool
Talk later?
I type Yeah! Then Yeah. Then Sure sounds good. Then I just send a K.
Down the hall, James and Meg are parked on some benches outside the library. They wave, so I go over and plop myself next to them, as if I have nothing better to do. I sort of don’t.
“What’s up?”
“We’re in ‘study hall,’ ” Meg says, making air quotes and rolling her eyes.
“What are you guys up to for the rest of the day?”
James is picking all the chocolate chips out of a bag of a trail mix. “Isn’t there a pep rally?”
I forgot about it because I was planning on faking debilitating menstrual cramps and hiding in the yearbook office. There’s no way I can endure, like, three hours of pretending to laugh at our teachers throwing footballs or whatever. “But we should…not go to that, right?”
“You mean skip?” Meg looks skeptical. I raise my eyebrows at her, and James joins in with a devilish grin.
“Eh? Eh?” He pokes her shoulder like a little brother, incessant and playful.
She gives him a look, trying not to crack a smile, and sticks her finger in his face. “Okay, but you’re driving.”
* * *
—
I, straight-A student, well behaved and mostly afraid of hellfire, have never ditched school, so I never realized how easy it would be. There is literally no security at school, just some eternal angelic presence that’s supposed to make us feel guilty enough not to do anything wrong.
When we get to the gravel parking lot, I take out a Parliament and light it, because why the hell not.
“Good idea,” says James. Then, after selecting a baby-blue Nat Sherman from a silver cigarette case, he gestures at a dirty white truck with a ladder on its roof and some unidentifiable tarp-covered objects in the bed.
“By the way, you guys, I’m driving my dad’s work truck. Hope you don’t mind the absence of glamour.”
“Oh jeez,” says Meg. “I suppose we can do without glamour just this once.”
But it does feel glamorous to escape, to be in charge of ourselves.
Up until now, everything has been commandments: Don’t have a conniption. Do take the SAT practice test seriously. Do not question your faith. Do not ask questions about politics. Do vote Republican. Do not have sex before marriage. Do smile. Do pray.
Junior year feels different. I decided to keep being alive, so I have to decide how to do it.
Now I’m picking the music.
JESUS, ETC.
For the record, I don’t not believe in something. I guess I’ll just figure out later what “something” is. If you look at things from the other side, any option seems ludicrous. A magic surfer guy in Birkenstocks; the randomness of gas flickering in the sky; chimps becoming people. (I picture Eve the rapper as Eve from the Bible, holding an unidentifiable fruit in front of her paw-print-tattooed boobs. Hilarious. Sign me up for that religion.)