Of course, there’s no Banned Books section—that would just be ridiculous. You’d be asking for trouble if you made such a section in an American high school library. However, she took me on a tour of the library and pointed out The Catcher in the Rye, To Kill A Mockingbird, Slaughterhouse-Five, Of Mice and Men, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, The Color Purple, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Bridge To Terabithia, The Kite Runner, and The Things They Carried—just to name a few. I can’t say that I adored all of the books she suggested, which she completely understood, but reading those books was an escape from my life. An escape out into the world at large—to people and places and situations I had never been allowed to meet, visit, or experience. My love for Banned Books was cemented. Mrs. Clark became kind of a friend. Which was nice, because I don’t have many. Not many people even acknowledge me, to be honest.
So, I was a little shaken up when the guy in the library pushed past me, even though he said, “sorry,” afterward. When it comes to confrontations, I’m definitely not what a person would call confrontational. It wasn’t my personality to say something snappy or passive-aggressive to him. Especially since he probably hadn’t even seen me there.
I just said: “No big deal.”
A lot of people don’t see me. I’m the girl in the far corner desk in the last row in each class. The girl sitting in the cafeteria with an empty seat on either side and across from her. Other students bump into me a lot in the halls because I’m just that invisible to everyone. When I raise my hand in class because I actually know the answer to a lot of the questions, even teachers seem to overlook me. If I made no noise whatsoever, I’d probably be completely transparent, roaming school halls and my house like a ghost. Sometimes that would be preferable.
When other students at Long-Moore notice me, it’s usually because of my skirts and long sleeve blouses. My long, nearly waist-length hair that hasn’t been cut since I was a kid doesn’t help, either. Other girls at school wear makeup and jewelry, but I don’t. The most extraordinary thing about my appearance is how ordinary it is. Sometimes that gets me noticed for the wrong reasons. Not that any of the other students at my high school would be really mean to me about how modestly I dress—the teachers would put them in detention until they were out of college—but they aren’t exactly nice to me, either. No one talks to me in class or in the hallways. No one walks with me from one period to the next. I’ve never had anyone walk up and sit down next to or across from me at lunch in the cafeteria. Ever.
If I was really invisible to the other students, obviously they would sit next to me at lunch because they wouldn’t notice I was there to ignore. So, I guess I’m not invisible. I’m avoidable. People choose to ignore me or avoid me so that they don’t have to be friends with the girl who is obviously in some religious cult or something. I’m not just making that scenario up in my head. I’ve heard the whispers and innuendo in classrooms and hallways. So far, no one has been cruel enough to say anything to my face—not really—but I see their smirks and side glances after they whisper something in one of their friends’ ears.
My mom and dad are kind of religious. Okay. They’re absolutely religious. Of course, my dad’s a pastor, and my mom is the quintessential pastor’s wife, so by proxy, I’m simply a pastor’s daughter. I don’t even fit the stereotype of all pastor’s daughters being hellraisers. I don’t know how other pastor’s daughters get away with raising hell, but my parents would have coronaries if they found me sneaking out, wearing make-up or revealing clothes or—gasp—talking to a boy when I was not being supervised. Under my parents’ thumbs is usually where I am when I’m not in school, and even then, I’m kind of convinced that they have spies at the school watching my every move. Yeah, that’s probably paranoia, but they always seem to know when I haven’t been their perfect little angel. They always seem to see right through me, though that is probably just a trick on their part to keep me in line. No one can know what’s going on inside another person’s head, so their stern looks and piercing gazes were a trick to keep me a “good girl.”
Obviously, that trick never dissuaded me from checking out and reading my favorite books from the library at Long-Moore. I was just extra careful when I did it—which was often. I lived my life like a smuggler and hoped that my career would be a long one. The main problem with loving one type of book, something from a very limited niche grouping, is that you will eventually read them all. Or, at least, you will read all of the ones available in the one place you are able to procure them. After three years at Long-Moore High School, there wasn’t a book from the Banned Books lists that I hadn’t yet read.
As I stood in front of the shelf, still a bit unnerved by Nate running into me, I realized that I would have to branch out with my reading proclivities. There was no point in asking Mrs. Clark for more recommendations because I knew that there wouldn’t be any new books before the end of the school year. We were too close to summer for her to have bothered ordering new books. With a sigh, my eyes darted back and forth on the shelf before me, searching for anything that might hold promise. When my eyes landed on a book called The Preacher’s Daughter by an author named Brian Rail, I felt that it was fitting. I didn’t even bother pulling the book out so that I could read the blurb or check-out the cover. It didn’t have one anyway—it was bound in blue cloth and had the title printed in embossed gold on the spine and the front. That was it. Nothing extraordinary, though its ordinariness made me think that the book was designed to not draw attention to itself. That meant that inside there might something scandalous, which made my spine tingle and my lips curl up into a smile. Finding a new book that certain people would consider scandalous always thrilled me.
When I stepped away from the shelf, I noticed some kid—probably a freshman since I had never seen him before—staring at me from one of the tables nearby. He was smirking, looking me up and down in a “look at this freak” type of way. I’m used to it. A lot of the boys at school stare at me like that because I don’t dress like other girls. Not that I don’t want to wear shorts and t-shirts or put my hair up and experiment with make-up, but I would be grounded for life. The boy continued to stare at me, his eyes wandering over my body, which made me uncomfortable, until his focus was drawn away, and his eyes landed on something else. He looked shaken, his head immediately lowering, and he returned his attention to the book that was open on the table before him. He looked like he’d seen a ghost. When I looked in the direction his focus had been stolen to for that brief moment, I could tell he had been looking into one of the pathways into the shelves—but there was nothing there. With a shrug and a deep breath to shake off the uncomfortable feeling of having been leered at, I headed over to Mrs. Clark’s desk.
Mrs. Clark was entering books that had been returned into the computer system. When I approached and laid the book gently on the desk before her, she looked up from her work. A smile that reached her eyes bloomed on her face, and she reached out to pull the book towards her.
“Good afternoon, Katina.” She stated in her hushed yet cheerful tone.
“Good afternoon, Mrs. Clark.” I returned.