Feeling out of sorts, I head out back behind the gym, where some of my crowd cuts and smokes cigarettes. I find Sunny there, dressed in the red gym uniform that we all hate. It always bunches too tight at the waist and makes us look as boxy and ugly as possible. Well, most of us. Sunny somehow still manages to look pretty. She leans against the back wall and puffs on a cigarette.
‘Hey,’ she says.
‘Hey,’ I answer.
The two of us have probably the least to say around each other. If Juanita is my closest friend in our pack, Sunny is definitely Connie’s. Sunny almost matches Connie note for note in loudness and boldness, even if she cares about her looks a lot more than Connie does. And she’s probably the least scared of Connie, even when Connie goes after her for being a ditz. But she never crosses Connie. Ever.
I don’t tell Sunny about Diane and English class. It’s like I’m not sure I should just yet. And I don’t really want to. I don’t want to try and figure out how I feel about Diane. I don’t want to talk about Diane’s tears and how anxious I got over how easily she shed them. Something tells me if I let myself feel too much, I might never stop feeling. And I don’t think that would take me anywhere good.
If it was Juanita, I would probably say something. We might try to make sense of it together. Maybe. But Sunny isn’t Juanita. Instead we just smoke and hide out until at last she says, ‘You know, that was a pretty tough move in the park yesterday.’ She doesn’t look at me when she says it. She just stares out at the empty football field and the black asphalt track surrounding it.
I know she means standing up to Connie. I shrug.
‘It just seemed like the right thing to do, I guess,’ I say.
Sunny drags her blue eyes toward me, slow as molasses. Even through her mascara and eyeliner, they sparkle. ‘You’ve got something special, Evie,’ she says. ‘I don’t think you realize it.’
I frown, confused. What do I have that Sunny or Connie or Juanita don’t have? If anything, they’ve always been the older ones. The more experienced ones. I’ve always been the tagalong.
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ I say at last.
‘There aren’t many girls at Eastside High who would dare talk back to Connie Treadway,’ she tells me. ‘I love Connie. You know that. But you were right to stand up for Diane. Even if she does look like Miss America. Only … I don’t know if I could have done it. And you did.’
I let Sunny’s words sink in and feel my cheeks flush in what might be pride. But then the bell rings for lunch, saving me from having to respond. Not that I would have known what to say. We stab our smokes out against the brick wall of the gym.
‘Hey,’ I ask Sunny, ‘why did you change into your gym uniform if you were only going to cut?’
Sunny peers down at her red romper and her mouth opens in a perfect O of astonishment. Then she swears in frustration.
‘I forgot I’d put this on!’ She rolls her eyes at herself, and I can’t help but laugh. Sunny is a ditz lots of times, but the truth is she’s smart in her own way.
‘You want me to come to the locker room and wait for you while you change?’ I ask.
‘No, that’s all right,’ says Sunny. ‘Besides, I have to hurry and find Ray before lunch. He’s probably cutting class with Dwight and Butch. So I might not see y’all in the cafeteria.’ She grimaces as we walk in the direction of the locker room. ‘You know how he is. Meet me here. Meet me there. Sometimes I get sick of his orders.’
‘Have you ever told him that?’ I ask. Juanita and I have whispered sometimes about how Ray treats Sunny, but we’ve never said anything to her face.
She shrugs. ‘No, never. But maybe I should. Sometimes I wonder if having a boyfriend is worth it.’
I think about Mom and Grandma wishing I’d end up with the right kind of boy. Not a boy like Ray Swanson, mind you. But a boy nevertheless. A boy like Cheryl’s husband, Dennis, who enlisted in the army and can provide a stable sort of future. Pick a man who’ll stick around, my mother likes to say, even if he isn’t handsome or clever. Just pick a man who’ll stay. Not a man like my father is what she really means. Wherever he is.
I say goodbye to Sunny and head to the cafeteria, thinking of meeting up with Diane. There are lots of times my crowd doesn’t even eat in the cafeteria. The boys rarely do. Sometimes we spend the lunch period in the parking lot or getting yelled at by Mr Samperi of Samperi’s Groceries, a little store by the school where we sometimes buy Dr Peppers and candy necklaces and then hang out for too long in the parking lot. But today Connie and Juanita and I gather at one of our tables, in the corner the farthest away from the lunch monitors. I take my cardigan and fold it up, putting it on the seat next to me to save it for Diane.
‘So,’ Connie says, letting her tray hit the table with a smack. She wrinkles her nose at what looks like tuna casserole, then eyes my folded sweater. ‘Diane’s got dibs on that seat?’
‘Just keeping it for her,’ I say, unwrapping my lunch and starting with dessert. I’ve tried to get her to stop, but Grandma insists on packing my lunch for me, and today, like always, she’s included one of her homemade chocolate chip cookies. Sometimes the cookie makes me feel like a little girl again, and this makes me both pleased and sad. I scan the entrance at the back of the cafeteria, trying to spot Diane in the crowd.
Connie doesn’t react, just sighs, leans back, bounces a bit, and says, ‘I’m saying it again, just so you all hear me. I don’t like her.’
Uncomfortable, I pretend I didn’t hear Connie’s proclamation and instead peer out at the sea of people. At last I spot her. Diane. She’s standing at the entrance of the cafeteria, looking out on the mess of kids yelping and shoving one another. I watch her, wondering if I should try to get her attention, but she spies us at last and waves with enthusiasm.
‘Jesus, she looks like a cheerleader,’ Connie says, rolling her eyes. Connie’s right, and the truth makes me cringe, but I don’t say anything in response.
‘Hey, you can sit here,’ I say to Diane when she arrives at our table. I scoot my cardigan off the seat next to me.
‘Hi,’ Diane says, carefully folding her skirt underneath her as she sits. She swallows, forces a smile, looks around at all of us.
‘Hi,’ Juanita says at last. She takes a loud crunch of her apple. I shoot her a quick smile of thanks for cutting through the awkward tension. She returns the smile, but then her eyes jump back to Diane and Connie, curious about whatever will happen next.
Diane has a small sack lunch in front of her. She carefully takes out a sandwich in waxed paper, an orange, and a thermos. She folds her paper sack down into a neat rectangle like a place mat, smooths it out, and lines the three items up carefully. When she’s finished, she peers up at us.
Connie stabs at her mystery school lunch and stares at Diane. There’s a thick silence. At last she says, ‘I didn’t tell you my name this morning, but I’m Connie. Connie Treadway.’
At this a strange look crosses Diane’s face, a ripple of awareness. I wonder if Juanita notices it, too. I have no idea what to make of it, but I put a pin in Diane’s expression. Something tells me it’s a clue of some sort, but to what?