The Spaces Between Us Page 7

  The new principal’s opening speech at the assembly in the auditorium is rousing. The cure for all society’s ills is in our hands. We have to start doing our homework, she scolds, and go to college. I look around, but I don’t see Grimshaw anywhere. Mrs. Pentz launches into the importance of making good decisions, about trusting your thinking instead of your feelings. “Even at the height of passion,” she says, “your brain is still working. Use it.”

  Then the bell rings and classes start. Still no sign of Grimshaw, and I start to wonder if she did quit school. My first period of the day is free, and I spend it on our bench, alone. It feels like it’s going to be a long, quiet year. Sitting there, looking up at the school, I make the first decision of the rest of my life: I’m going to follow the principal’s advice. I’ll have myself my own future, a real one, complete with all the middle-class accoutrements. I go to the guidance counselor’s office. I switch my classes around so that now I’m in physics, calculus, and French IV, as well as AP English.

  The people in Guidance don’t really want to let me change my schedule so drastically, since I have no prerequisites in place, and of course there is the small matter of my GPA. Guidance shows it to me, and we look at it together. There it is, the GPA of doom, the smallest number anyone has ever seen. But I bring up the fact of my near-perfect SAT scores and drop my-mother-the-new-principal’s name casually into the conversation enough times, and how inspired I was by her speech, that obstacles to my ambition start to melt away like ice cream. Except for Western Civ, which I still have to repeat, they don’t care who my mother is.

  My French teacher, Mlle. O’Shea, is so happy to see me that she cries when I walk into her classroom. My other classes are full of middle-class strivers who look pretty sour to be sharing their station in life with the girl in the Red Army hat. They don’t think I’m real competition. That’s okay. Chiang Kai-shek thought the same thing about Mao. I eat lunch with a pile of textbooks for company. It’s not so bad to be alone.

  After lunch comes Western Civ, with Mr. C. as sarcastic as ever. Then who breezes in but Melody Grimshaw, chatting and laughing with Claudette Mizerak and Angel Ciaramitaro like they’ve always been best friends. When she sees me, she comes over and stands in front of my desk. She’s wearing high heels and a skirt that’s so tight it looks like it was duct-taped on.

  “I thought you were going to be in Consumer Concepts with us,” she says. “We signed up for it, remember?”

  I shrug. “I switched all that up for physics and calculus.”

  “No way!” Grimshaw looks genuinely excited. “You know I always thought you should be taking that stuff.”

  I shrug again. “I’ll probably fail them, anyway.”

  “No,” she says. “You’ll work hard. I’ll make you do your homework. Then you can go to a good college, and I’ll come visit and scope out the cute college boys for you.”

  I shrug again. “Whatever.” I yawn so hard my Red Army cap falls off my head.

  “Wow.” She reaches out and touches my hair. “Your hair really grew out. I forgot how blonde it is.”

  I pick my cap up off the floor and pull it down low. “I was out in the sun a lot this summer. I should take care of it.”

  “No. Leave it alone. It’s beautiful.”

  Then this awkwardness opens up between us, like we have forgotten how to talk to each other. She drums long, crimson fingernails on my desk. The bell rings, and Mr. C. rises up from behind his desk.

  “Sit,” he greets us. There are no empty spaces around me, so Grimshaw leaves and sits near Claudette and Angel. Junior Davis doesn’t seem to be in Western Civ. Mr. C. turns his back to us and writes on the board. He turns around. “Five-paragraph essay.” People moan. “For a quiz grade. What is Western Civ, and how did it affect my summer vacation?”

  * * *

  At the end of the day, Grimshaw isn’t waiting for me on our bench, so on the first day of my senior year, I ride the bus alone, an ill omen if there ever was one. Even Aaron has friends who drive now. It’s just Serena Velasco, a senior, and a wild horde of brand-new seventh graders.

  When I get home, I hop on my bike, and just for the heck of it, I ride the long way to the cemetery. Mizerak’s corn has grown so high I can’t see the gravestones from the road anymore. I swing off my bike and push it up the weedy path. Up on the Helmers’ pedestal is my old friend Melody Grimshaw, practicing cheerleader jumps.

  I sit on Mr. Sprague’s bench and pick burrs off my socks. “I knew I couldn’t trust you.”

  “Serena, get over yourself,” she pants.

  I watch her execute a straddle jump. “What did you write on your essay?” I ask. “About your summer vacation.”

  “It’s private,” she says when she lands. She does another jump. “Did I point my toes?” I turn my back to her and face the wall of corn.

  “I think you picked up a virus from those cheerleaders. I hope it’s not contagious.”

  “We’re going out for cheerleading,” Grimshaw says primly.

  “What? Who’s we?”

  “We is us. You and me. There are two spots open on the varsity squad. The Decker twins moved away, and the alternate quit. Angel and Rack are coming to coach us.”

  “Angel and who?”

  “Rack. That’s what everyone calls Claudette Mizerak.”

  “Oh.” I squint up at Grimshaw and try to picture her bouncing around in school colors, a purple and gold phoenix rising up out of the junkyard. I shake my head. Not a Grimshaw, not in Colchis. I can’t imagine the conditions under which that would happen. But there are some things you don’t say, even to your best friend. “Why?” I ask. “I mean, what’s the point?”

  “Fun,” she says.

  “Fun,” I repeat.

  “We don’t have enough fun,” says Grimshaw. “It’s our last year of high school. Why not have some fun?”

  I’m trying to think of a delicate way to phrase to Grimshaw that being a cheerleader really doesn’t signify much these days, and it’s not worth risking the inevitable rejection. She’s still poor, I’m still smart, this is still America, and we’re not going to be cheerleaders.

  “I just wonder if we’re really cheerleader material,” I say finally. She climbs down from the Helmers and sits next to me on Mr. Sprague.

  “I know it’s not dance,” she says suddenly. “But it’s movement, it’s performance.”

  “Choreography,” I provide helpfully, just to be sporting.

  “Exactly!” she says. “It’s a start, it’s something. I mean, I have to work from where I am.”

  “Okay,” I say slowly. So the notion might have some merits, at least for her. “But why does this need to involve me?” The instant that I say that, I remember earlier today, how the straight-D student signing up for Honors classes probably violated every notion Guidance had of people who deserve nice things, but the fact that my mother is now their boss made all those objections melt away, even though they were Mrs. Pentz’s new standards I was violating. Privilege. The word just comes to me. I have it, and she wants to borrow it. I was just a tourist in Foundations.

  “I’ll think about it,” I tell her. “You have to give me time to get used to the idea, though.”

  “I need an audience,” she says. She starts telling me about her idea of starting a dance team at the high school, that she thought about it all summer, and that if she’s a cheerleader, it’ll be more likely to work, as she’ll have more visibility and credibility. People will take her seriously. She worked at Monique’s Dance Academy, she says, teaching the kids, so she had to get really good at technique.

  “You taught at Monique’s?” I repeat. “How did you get there?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” She waves my question away. She was going to offer yoga, too, but Monique thought it was satanic, so that didn’t go anywhere. But since my mother is the principal now, she might offer a class in yoga, too. I watch her as she talks and try to pin down the difference I see in her. She has definit
ely learned some things over the summer. She moves differently, with more intention, somehow. Maybe it’s confidence. “It’s not really about cheerleading,” she says. “It’s about the same thing it’s always been.”

  “Dance.”

  “Yeah. I was ready to give up on it, but it was because of what you said, at the beginning of the summer.”

  “What did I say?”

  “You said that if we wanted a future, we needed a plan. So—now—we have a plan.”

  “So you mean those two—”

  “Yeah,” she says. “I’ve been hanging out with them all summer, off and on, starting pretty much right after you left for Maine. They’re not so bad.”

  “I thought they hated us. Because of Junior Davis.”

  “Serena, just let that whole Junior Davis thing go, okay? Rack and I worked it out. Anyway—” She looks around to make sure the deceased aren’t eavesdropping. “He doesn’t really love her”—she puts air quotes around the word love—“but he needs her. This is his fourth time taking algebra, and he needs to pass if he wants a football scholarship. She has organizational skills. And a car.” She talks about all the pieces Junior needs to put together if he wants to go to college next year.

  I narrow my eyes at her. “You didn’t make any kind of a bargain, did you? Like, you’ll leave Junior alone if she—”

  She cuts me off. “It doesn’t matter. They like us, those two. They think we’re interesting.”

  “Do we get to decide if we think they’re interesting?”

  “Just go with it, okay, Serena? For once in your life? Angel and Rack get a kick out of you. They think you’re funny. And the boys think you’re kinda cute, so—”

  “What boys?”

  “See?” she says. “You’re interested.”

  At that moment, an enormous pickup truck comes bumping up the cow path toward us, taking out a row of corn on either side. “Help us, Jesus!” I throw up my hands. “We’re being invaded!” Claudette Mizerak is driving.

  “That’s her dad’s truck,” Grimshaw explains.

  “It’s her dad’s corn, too.”

  They pull up and stop. Claudette Mizerak’s head pops up through the sunroof and says, “Hi, cheerleaders!”

  “Here’s a quiz,” says Angel, hanging out the window. “What’s the most important ingredient in the making of a cheerleader?”

  “I give up,” I say.

  “Beer!” the two of them cheer, tossing silver cans at us. Angel gets out of the truck and picks her way through the thistles in a miniskirt and high wedge heels, but Claudette just mows through them, talking a mile a minute. Claudette is big—well, big-boned, anyway, and Angel is tiny with glossy olive skin. Claudette has big ears and thin, bleached blonde hair and a loud honk of a laugh that you can hear all over the school. Angel has a curtain of dense black hair that hangs to her waist. Her eyebrows look like butterfly antennae. Her nails are two inches long. They seem to know their way around our dead and buried friends, so I take it they’ve been here before.

  Talking at the same time, Angel and Rack report that Nanci Lee has empowered them to run the practice and to pick the replacements.

  “She says she’s giving us ownership of the team.”

  “She says it’s all about leadership, that she wants us to pick girls who can represent the town.”

  “Like we’re senators.” Rack guffaws.

  We discuss the plan of us becoming cheerleaders, and they are all for it. Nanci Lee is the only obstacle they can foresee. She won’t like it if they let people walk in off the street and be cheerleaders, or at least not people like Grimshaw and me. Apparently, Grimshaw has filled them in on the details of my home life, and they know that Nanci Lee is not my staunchest ally.

  “Nanci Lee is my aunt Teresa’s friend,” says Angel. “They went to high school together.”

  “Is she the one who has the bridal shop?” I ask.

  “So is Nanci Lee hot for Serena’s dad?” Rack asks her.

  “Stepdad,” I correct them. “A subtle, but important, distinction.”

  That stops the cheerleading conversation dead for a minute. “You have to stop talking like that, Serena,” says Rack. “It makes the boys think you’re stuck-up.”

  “But what if I am stuck-up?” I ask.

  “Just ignore her,” says Grimshaw. “That’s the only way to deal with it.”

  Rack laughs midswig and coughs up some beer. Angel and Grimshaw pound her on the back. “Oh my God,” gasps Rack. “It’s four o’clock. I forgot to take my pill.” She runs down through the weeds and thistles to her truck.

  “What pill is this?” asks Grimshaw.

  Angel shakes her head. “The four o’clock one is so she can do her homework at night, even though she never does it.” Angel sighs. “You wouldn’t believe the pills that girl is on.” Rack comes puffing back up and sits down heavily on Mr. Sprague. She puts a little pill in her mouth and washes it down with Lite beer. A burr sticks to her sweater and there are more on her socks and pant legs. Angel and Grimshaw start picking them off her.

  “Ack,” Angel says. “Now they’re on me.”

  “It’s not just ADD,” Rack pants. “It’s for depression, too. Then I’m on tetracycline for my skin, and don’t tell anybody, but I just started birth control pills, too. I’m still technically a virgin, but I have a feeling I won’t be for long. Junior is really, like, hot for me. All the time.”

  “Do you want to?” Grimshaw asks.

  Rack shrugs. “It’s inevitable when you’re in love.”

  It seems to have been decided that we’re all going to be pals, which I would prefer not to go along with, although even I find it challenging to hate people who laugh at my jokes. Besides, Grimshaw has this nonnegotiable look about her, which I know enough not to mess with, for the time being. But—our years as plankton in the social food chain of Colchis High are not going to be overcome by a few jokes in the cemetery, and I’m sure by tomorrow life will be back to normal.

  “Anyway,” Angel says, “I know Nanci Lee and your stepdad went out in high school. They were king and queen of homecoming back in the day.”

  “They say your first love is forever,” Rack says dreamily. “I know it is for me and Junior. Don’t you feel that way about Mike?”

  “Mike?” I demand. “You mean Lyle? Is he still hanging around?”

  “Why don’t you like him?” Angel asks me. “He’s always so nice to us.”

  “She doesn’t like anyone,” says Rack. “That’s why she’s so funny.”

  “You guys always look so happy together in that car,” says Angel. They start to chatter about what a cute couple they are, about everything he’s done for her and how much time they spend together. Mike and Melody, even their names sound good together. And it’s so sweet, how he calls her Mel. Rack wishes Junior had a nickname like that for her. I have to admit, I had sort of forgotten about Mike Lyle over the summer. The sound of his name hits me in a surprising way, with a little shock.

  “Riding around in a rusty Corvette, though, talking about a Viper—what a loser.”

  “He’s getting the Viper,” she says.

  “He’s not getting a Viper. Unless he’s dealing something.”

  “He’s not dealing anything, Serena,” Grimshaw says tightly. Then she scrambles to her feet. “You guys, teach us some cheers.”

  “No, no,” Rack says. “I think we should sit right here and work out our issues.”

  Grimshaw looks down at her. “Finish your beer, Rack,” she says. “Then drive us home.”

  * * *

  Rack drives me home in time for me to help make supper. Wednesday nights are our night to eat together as a family, and it’s always been a pretty tense affair, a weekly cease-fire between me and Scot, usually brokered by Allegra. But Allegra is not here, and Scot and I have not seen each other since the blowup before I went to Maine.

  “Do you know Mike Lyle, Mom?” I ask as I walk through the door. She’s frying chicken le
gs. I seize a pot of boiling potatoes, stab them, and drain them.

  “Wash your hands,” she says. I wash my hands. She’s impaling the chicken legs with a long-handled fork.

  “I changed my classes around today,” I tell her. “I added physics, calculus, and a fourth year of French.” I watch little drops of grease hop out of the skillet and bounce across the stove. The one thing my mother cannot do is cook. Before she married Scot, she was a vegetarian.

  “I know,” she says. “Guidance wasn’t very happy about your high-handed attitude.”

  “Well…” I mash the potatoes contemplatively. “I just wanted to see what it would feel like to do a little better, you know, to challenge myself.”

  “You’re not used to that. Do you think you can handle it?”

  “I can try.”

  “Well, I approved it.”

  “Thank you.”

  “As a new principal,” she says, “I only have so much capital. I don’t want to use it all up on you on the first day of school. Guidance thinks you’ll fall flat on your face. In case that motivates you.”

  “I think I can come up with my own motivation,” I tell her.

  She actually smiles at me. “I’ll look forward to that.”

  “So do you know Mike Lyle?” I ask her.

  She sighs. “Unfortunately,” she says. “Why?”

  “What’s he like?” I ask.

  “Sullen. Rude. Lazy. Why?”

  “Do you think he’s potentially lethal, or just another harmless loser?”

  She considers. “The latter. Basically.” She collars Zack as he runs by and leads him to the sink. Then Scot comes in and takes over washing Zack. We don’t make eye contact.

  “Isn’t Mike Lyle wanted in about twenty-five states?” he asks my mother. “That’s what I heard.”

  “Wanted for what?” I ask.

  “Fighting, I guess,” Scot says. “Disturbing the peace. He played semipro ball for a while after he got out of the army. When he worked on the crew, he used to brag about all the people he messed up.”

  “I know his father was pretty rough,” my mother says. “Mike senior.”