Among Friends (6 page)

I say to Emily, “Okay, Christmas. Spirit of love and all that. Joy. Hope. The whole thing. Got to be nice to Jennie, Star of the East.”

Emily says, “Luckily I’m Jewish and don’t celebrate Christmas.”

We laugh insanely.

I say, “Spirit of Hanukah?”

Emily says, “Oh, yeah. Okay, let me write down what you said. Spirit of love, joy, and hope.”

I say, “Why write it down? You afraid you’ll forget the answer when the test comes?”

Emily says, “Listen. Just being with Jennie is a test these days.”

And oh, it’s true. We’re talking a girl who no sooner finishes three performances of her own original musical than she gets A plus in all exams and demonstrates an original laser project in physics.

Emily says, “Stay calm, Hillary, two more days ’til Christmas break.”

“Let’s call it a Jennie break,” I tell her.

We laugh: and The Awesome Twosome links arms and walks down the hall.

Every time a teacher announces that she is truly impressed with me, I lose a friend.

In physics we had to turn in our projects. I’ve been doing that experiment with the laser, and the teacher had me demonstrate it to the class. And Emily said, “A laser? You can’t be a normal person and look up something boring in a library book? You have to come up with some dynamite experiment involving a laser?”

But the teacher says, “Emily, Jennie always reaches for the stars. It’s a joy for a teacher to have a student like Jennie. Nobody else would have come up with this experiment.” Emily’s mouth forms a little
o
of rage and the teacher, who clearly thinks she has made us all feel better, turns to me, smiles gladly, and says, “Jennie, I’m truly impressed.”

Emily rolled her eyes, yawned, looked out the window, and never glanced my way again.

I remember once when The Awesome Threesome all took clarinet lessons. I don’t know why we picked the clarinet. Anyway, I was good, and Em and Hill were crummy. Hillary quit early on but Em played for years. She was never good, and she never much cared. “I like band,” she would say, shrugging when she sat in the back with the beginners year after year.

“How can you stand it?” I said once. “Being ordinary at it?”

Emily was amazed. “Who cares?” she said.

Oh, why can’t I feel that way? Why can’t I just do something because I like it? Why do I have to be a winner at everything? How I envy the kids who don’t even remember to study! What would it be like to live inside a body that’s careless about things?

So after school today I went home alone because Em and Hill wouldn’t wait for me.

I don’t have much experience at being alone: not after a lifetime of The Awesome Threesome.

Piano practice, horseback riding, copying over my English paper—okay, you can do those alone. But Christmas shopping, alone? And try a phone call alone. There’s another fun activity.

In the evening I had my harmony lesson. Music is like math, but it has more shape on the page. I love harmony. Tomorrow another test, an interview with the paper about being a young composer, jazz dancing class, and an evening rehearsal for
The Messiah
production.

We’re going to visit Aunt Catherine on Saturday and on Sunday we’re having a party for another set of people. Mother’s theme isn’t even Christmas: she’s using pink. Pink? In December? I can’t stand it when Mother gets trendy. I like tradition, nothing but tradition.

Mrs. Lang came over to lend Mother her large coffeepot. I don’t think she knows that Hillary doesn’t speak to me anymore. I miss Hill so much I was all but clinging to Mrs. Lang.

My mother began to get nervous about all the things I still had to get done that day. “You mustn’t hang about, Dunstan!” she cried. “Here’s your list! Let’s get cracking.”

Mrs. Lang laughed. “There is only
one
thing you
have to do,” she told me, tossing my full-page list aside. “You have to take the garbage out.”

It was my turn to laugh. Only
one
thing I had to do? There were four hundred things I had to do. And I had to do them all well, too.

“Darling,” said Mrs. Lang. “Spare time is the best time of all.”

I’ve never even
seen
spare time. There is nothing my mother and father despise more. Starting with nursery school, they packed my life full, and since junior high, I’ve done my own packing.

In gym we had athletic event tests: 400-yard dash, long jump, that kind of thing. Coach asked me again to go out for sports. God, how I’d like to! I feel so much better when I’m racing, or pulling, or even doing push-ups, or something. I’m all muscle, no thought: I don’t worry, I don’t remember, I don’t even care: I just exist.

I didn’t even answer him.

Someday it’s going to start spilling out of me. I have this terrible fear it’s going to be someplace public, with dozens of kids listening, and I’ll be partly insane, and it’ll pour out of me, every sordid detail, and I’ll be this piece of public property, they’ll all know every ounce of me.

I used to just stay quiet.

Now I try not to look at anybody, either. Meet their eyes and I feel myself starting to go.

Rumors spread so fast in this school. And somehow in the cafeteria Paul Classified got cornered. Really, it reminded me of animals: it was so primitive! It was exciting, like a hunt—and horrid, horrid. We should all have been shot ourselves.

Jared’s been gossiping with some boys in gym (although Jared claims only girls “gossip”—boys “talk”) and these guys have decided that Paul’s family are spies: CIA, or something, and they cornered Paul and demanded to know what his parents do for a living. I mean, here’s Paul having cream of tomato and a toasted cheese sandwich with four chocolate milks (all the boys drink these unbelievable amounts of milk) and there are six guys hunkering down around him, saying, “So, Paul R. Smith. So what exactly
are
all these secrets, anyway?”

And everybody is fascinated, and they start to get closer, so they can hear, and the cafeteria turns into a mob, half chanting, “So, Paul R. Smith. So who are you, Paul R. Smith?”

Paul stands up.

There isn’t room for him to stand, so he shoves the whole table forward, catching three of the boys below the belt with the table rim. They yell, and Paul shoves the table harder, turning it over and spilling a bunch of lunches. Instantly we’re all taking sides, shrieking for the side we like to fight, to win.

Even me.

Today I was part of a mob. I loved the wildness of it: the push and shove of it.

This is why the ancient Romans liked gladiators.

Fighting.

Animals. The animals you watch … 
and the animals you become
.

When it was all over, and both the principals were in there, dragging Paul off his attackers, the people who were hardest to control were us—the ones staring and gaping and pushing up closer.

My skin was crawling.

Me. Ansley Augusta. Paul was attacked and I was a cheerleader to keep the violence going. I’m no different from any other creep.

Perhaps it’s worth keeping a diary just to find that out.

Now I have to find Paul R.

And apologize.

Home: Dad is finally back from L.A. and the addition is started. They’ve decided to go to Colorado for a week over Christmas, but we’ll be home in time for the New Year’s party Ansley and I want to give. Mother isn’t too thrilled about forty guests, but Ansley’s parents agreed to help chaperone. Now I’m the one who isn’t too thrilled. Oh, well.

Car: Got a speeding ticket. Makes it very hard to argue about chaperones at parties. I couldn’t help driving fast. That Porsche engine roars under my foot and I go all crazy. Dad said maybe an old rusted four-cylinder beat-up olive green Plymouth is what I should be driving. Great, I said, I can trade cars with Paul Classified.

Weather: Winter. First snow didn’t last. Second snow turned to rain.

School: Emily got a haircut. Very short. I like it. You see more of her face. Paul Classified got a three-day suspension for fighting. I swear to God Paul jerked up the table at exactly the angle to spill everybody’s soup on my shirt. The whole thing was my fault, and I knew it and Ansley knew it and Paul Classified knew it. Ansley made me telephone him to apologize but thank God the guy has an unlisted phone number and I was saved from that little duty. The things a girl asks of you. Now she wants to celebrate a “Janiversary.”

Paul Classified: Who would believe that some guy I don’t even like would rate an entire diary category? But then who would believe that I am still trying to follow him? Billy Torello found out two facts. One, he has a little sister named Candy. Two, the little sister used to go to Talcott Hill Elementary School but she stopped going. Torello made this sound like a state secret.

“She probably just transferred to Country Day School,” I said. Ansley would kill me if even more gossip got going and the guys had another fight with Paul.

“Party pooper,” Hillary accused me. “I bet his sister Candy was kidnapped. Paul’s parents are CIA agents, and they’re being blackmailed by the KGB, who are holding Candy hostage until Mr. and Mrs. Smith obey their orders.”

Great. That’s the kind of rumor that started the cafeteria fight.

“Taken by the other parent in some vicious custody fight,” guessed Keith, who has been there.

“Eaten by alligators,” I said wearily. Anything to change the subject.

Misc.: Saw Jennie’s pageant closing night. Her parents threw a magnificent party afterward. Everybody was there. Everybody except Paul. Of course Paul never goes anywhere except into hiding. I didn’t see much of Hillary and Emily—they checked in and left. They must have a term paper due or something. But Mrs. Weinstein made the punch, and Hill’s parents were there, and all seven kings and their families, and Miss Clinton, etc., etc., etc. Em’s little brother Trip got a Polaroid camera for his birthday last week—he specialized in catching people chewing. Got a great shot of me choking on a celery stick—cream cheese all over my cheek. Ansley’s going to frame it. I love you, too, I said to her.