Addie on the Inside (6 page)

That's my grandma, there, with her hair gray
in a braid down her back, dancing to her music,
her Joni, her Joplin, her Country Joe and the Fish,
her bare feet brushing the kitchen floor
as she puts away the dishes.

I wish I'd lived in the Sixties.
I would have made a good hippie, I think,
except I would have kept my clothes on and,
well, those boots were entirely impractical.
But that was my grandma's time and this is mine.
If there is ever a museum about my life, I wonder
what will be in it. What moments will it freeze,
and what will live on, free of photos and memory,
live on in my hair and my hands and my knees
dipping, feet brushing
shush-shush-shush
across a kitchen floor at twilight.

Grandma and her music, her music, her music,
always humming under her breath or listening
to her iPod out on her walks or the radio on top
of the refrigerator, her CDs, her vinyl, her eyes
shut, her eyes open and wet with tears, her feet
tapping, her hips swaying, that wisp of a smile.

“What are you listening to?” I'll ask and she'll
tell me, “Love songs, honey. All songs are love
songs because they're written by people in love
with life.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”
Royal Wilkins asks,
tugging at my backpack,
tugging at my backpack
on the way to gym.
“That button there,
what's it supposed to mean?”
“It
means
,” says Tonni,
bumping elbows with Royal
while Becca and some other girls
squeal the Omigod Chorus
somewhere up ahead—
“It
means
,” says Tonni,
“that if you think for yourself
you might just
act
for yourself,
you might just shake things up.
Right, Addison?”
“Right, Tondayala,” I say,
shrugging my backpack
back on my shoulders,
shrugging my backpack
on the way to gym,
while up ahead, Becca
and some other girls
run their perfectly
manicured fingernails
through their perfectly
straightened hair.

Sometimes she acts
like she's my best friend.

Sometimes she acts
like she doesn't know my name.

Sometimes she says,
“Addie, you're so smart!”

Sometimes she says,
“Addie, why you have to all the time act
like you're so damn smart?”

Omigod, did you know?

Omigod, I hate him so!

Omigod, I love your dress!

Omigod, your hair's a mess!

Omigod, like like like like . . .

Omigod, she's such a dyke!

Omigod, he's such a fag!

Omigod, I love your bag!

Omigod, does this school bite!

Omigod, I know, right?

Omigod, I need to shop!

Omigod, I love that top!

Omigod, do I look fat?

Omigod, what's up with that?

Omigod, I hate my thighs!

Omigod, I ate those fries!

Omigod, don't be a freak!

Omigod, that's so last week!

Omigod, is that your phone?

Omigod, I love its tone!

Omigod, text message me!

Omigod, I hate this tee!

Omigod, I could just die!

Omigod, who's that hot guy?

Omigod, he's kind of punk!

Omigod, he's such a hunk!

Omigod, don't be a slut!

Omigod, keep your mouth shut!

Omigod, you're my best friend!

Omigod, until the end!

Omigod, we are so fun!

Omigod, we're number one!

“In what ways do we devalue the English language?”
Mr. Daly asks a class of vacant faces and hidden,
texting hands. I shoot my hand into the air. Mr. D
smiles at me as he moves his eyes across the sullen
seventh-grade landscape. “Does anyone
other
than
Addie have a thought on this? Does anyone
know
what I mean by ‘devalue'?” Now my hand takes on
a life of its own, wagging like an eager puppy.
Me,
me, me
, it whimpers as I try to ignore the snickering
around me.

“Yes, Addie?”

Snickers turn to sighs and groans and cries of
Here
she goes.
“It's when we use empty euphemisms,” I begin
(Jimmy Lemon mumbling, “What's a youthanism?”),
“or overuse a word or phrase until it's meaningless.”

“An example?”

“‘Oh my god,'” I promptly reply, to which Becca replies
under her breath, “Omigod.” “Shouldn't that phrase
be saved for religious expression or an occasion
of great emotion? I contend”—here Bobby, my
friend
, drops his forehead into his waiting palm—
“that overuse of a word such as ‘like' or a phrase
such as the one I've just cited, devalues it. Another
example is—”

“Thank you, Addie. Let's

give someone else a chance, shall we?” Mr. D winks
at me as if we're in this together, and I sit down.
(Funny, I don't remember standing up.)

Other hands are in the air now as Becca's hand
reaches across the aisle and slides a note under my
binder. I don't look at it until after class. “You
need a makeover in more ways than one,” it says.

Now she brushes past, her elbow bumping my shoulder.
“Omigod,” she says, “so, like, sorry.” Other girls
giggle, and Jimmy Lemon coughs an insult into his
hand. “You're not funny,” I tell them, tearing Becca's
note neatly down the middle. Bobby waits for me
as I gather up my books. He gives me a sympathetic
look, one that says he understands what it feels like
to be devalued.

It begins with me opening my big mouth,
which last time I checked was not a sin, but
according to the Gospel of Saint Middle School,
unless you have something dumb to say:
Keep Your Mouth Shut!

So the newest version of Let's Get Addie is in play.
Let's call it Let's Get Addie: Version 2.0, although
believe me when I tell you there have been way
more than two versions. This new version goes
something like this:

Omigod, like, hi, Addie. Addie, like, omigod.
Hey, Addie, like, how's it, omigod, going?
Oh, it's going just
fine
, thank you. I just
love
listening to your little mouths spout
their little meannesses.

I guess we can't all be geniuses, but can
someone tell me why I should be punished
for having a brain and using it, for opening
my big mouth and speaking a big thought?
Oh my god, I'd really like to know.

in the girls' room on the second floor
I hear Royal Wilkins talking to Sara Jakes.

“Uh-huh, that's what I'm sayin'.
Why we got to sit at the same table,
all cuz she's DuShawn's girlfriend,
and lemme tell you this, girlfriend,
I do not know
how
she got DuShawn
to go out with her, seein' as how
she ain't exactly what you'd call pretty
or cool or nothin'—'cept smart,
I'll give her smart—
but, ew, girl, she got some kind of mouth on her,
always flappin' away havin' somethin' to say,
even Tonni can't keep up with her.
Now why you think DuShawn gone
and fall for a thing like her?
I'll tell you this, uh-huh, DuShawn is her
ticket out of
Un
-popularity, that's right,
and
that
is why she is with him.
But what
he
is doin' with
her
?
Mm-mm, that is anybody's guess.”

Sara Jakes uh-huhs and mm-hms
her way along until she asks Royal,
“How's my hair look?”
Royal says, “Pretty as a picture,”
and then adds, “I contend.”

They both break out laughing,
not bothering to wonder
who might be in the stall
with the closed door,
and if it might be someone
who often says “I contend”
and never knew two little words
could be quite so

hilarious.

Sometimes I hide
in the girls' room
on the second floor,
hating myself
for all that I'm not.

or so my grandma says. “And
that goes for hating yourself
as well as others. Stay soft inside
as the center of a chocolate crème.
Even if your outside is hard,
let it be less bitter than sweet.”

Some days it really gets to me,
the laughing and mocking, and then
I'll see one of my friends walking
down the hall in my direction, maybe
not even seeing me at first, maybe
busy in his own head, but then
he'll look up and say hey, or smile,

and seeing him gives me back
a part of myself that got lost
for a while. Like today, when Joe
caught me looking mopey and
called out, “Chin up, Beulah Mae!”
It was ridiculous. It was
the perfect thing to say.

the headline reads, and here I stand waving the newspaper
over my head in social studies, trying to get someone
other than Ms. Watkins to hear what I am saying:

“He
hit
her! And then there's this fangirl going, ‘I don't think
he'll hit her like that again.' Oh. Really?
Really?
What is
up
with this fangirl? Is she
excusing
him because he's cute
or hot or whatever it is she thinks he is and she's got his poster
up over her bed and his music bouncing around her head
24/7? Does she think—
does she actually think
—that cute
or hot or whatever they are boys don't hit their girlfriends
again? Or is it because he's a star and stars don't hit,
or at least not more than once?

Hello, fangirl,

he didn't just hit her, he bit her too and nearly choked her.
Did you hear that part, did you think it was a joke?
Do you really mean it when you say, ‘She must have made
him mad for him to act that way. If she was dissing him, then
she brought it on.'

Are

you

for

real?”

This is where I take a breath and become aware of Sara Jakes.
Her glazed eyes stare at me. Her face, frozen like a death mask,
thaws slightly as she slides her tongue over her gloss-slicked
lips and prepares to speak. “I think she's right,” she says.

“Thank you, Sara.”

“Not you, Addie. The fangirl. I mean, why would a big star hit
his girlfriend unless she was asking for it? Besides, she forgave him
and they're back together. So it's over. And what's it to you, anyway?”

And
this
is the part where I should probably count to ten or simply
sit down and shut up, but when I see Ms. Watkins' encouraging look
and the sea of nodding heads, most of them belonging to the girls,
I can't take it, I have to say:

“Why does it matter to me what some pop star does to his girlfriend?
I'll tell you why. I'm a girl too, and I don't want some guy—
any
guy—
believing that just because I open my mouth and say what I think
that I'm asking for strong and crazy hands to be the voice
that answers.

And I want to know why you don't think he'll hit her like that again, why you don't think he shouldn't have hit her like that
in the first place, why you don't think everyone should be safe from
being hit or bitten or choked. Why

you

don't

think.”

And Sara Jakes says nothing
and the bell rings
and everyone heads for the door
and Ms. Watkins looks over the top of her glasses
and nods and says,
“Good for you, Addie,”
and I say, “Thank you,”
and stuff the newspaper
into my backpack
and gather up my books
and wonder why
I even

bother.

“Women who love women,”
Becca says.
“They're made for each other.”

“But Ms. Watkins is engaged,”
says Sara.
“And Addie has a boyfriend.”

“So what?”
Becca says.
“They're both feminists.

“And anyway,”
says Becca,
“look at Addie. Just look.”

“Look at what?”
Sara says.
“What do you mean?”

“She may as well
be
a boy,”
says Becca,
“with that flat chest.”

“She did start that gay group,”
Sara says.
“Why would she do that if—”

“She wasn't gay!”
says Becca.
“How's my lipstick?”

“Totally kissable,”
Sara says.
“Oh, but no homo—”

“Omigod,”
says Becca,
“you're one too.”

“Omigod,”
Sara says.
“Gross me out.”

Both girls laugh
while I remain hidden,
waiting

for the bathroom door
to shut and the laughter
to die away.

Thinking that Ms. Watkins is brilliant
and beautiful and amazing and wanting to be
just like her and loving the way she dresses
and how the heel of her right shoe slips off
when she sits on the edge of her desk and
crosses her right leg over her left
and watching her bounce her right leg
up and down and wondering if it will
make her shoe fall off
doesn't mean

that I'm

a lesbian.

If I started that gay rights group,
I must be gay.

So if I start an animal rights group,
what does that make me?

A giraffe?

Unbelievable. Inconceivable.
That Mr. Kiley would say no
to the first effort of the Gay
Straight Alliance. I say:

Defiance! He may tell us we
can't have our Day of Silence
but silence is a form of free
speech, I contend,