Dear Teen Me: Authors Write Letters to Their Teen Selves (True Stories) (39 page)

Cynthia Leitich Smith

Dear Teen Me,

You’ve had enough of the quarters game in the kitchen, the “Pink Floyd” album in the rec room, and the whispers and stares everywhere else. A girl on your high school newspaper staff just told you he was here. You have to get away. You’re not ready to see him yet.

It’s more than that actually. You’re not ready for everyone else to dissect how you two interact…or don’t. Maybe that sounds superficial, but this is social theater, and you’re the leading lady of the week. You’re not about to let them see you crumble.

What are you doing here anyway? You barely know the girl whose parents (currently out of town) own this place. Maybe your best friend had a point: Moping at home wasn’t helping, but offering yourself up as the focus of tonight’s drama wasn’t the best idea either.

For the first time, a boyfriend has told you that he doesn’t want you anymore. You’ve been together for months. You’ve gone on countless variations of his preferred date: dinner at a chain restaurant followed by the yogurt shop or miniature golf. You’ve been to church with his family, and he’s celebrated the holidays with yours. Your parents like him, especially your dad. They connect over football.

Was it because you’re a virgin? Is that why he dumped you? He never pressured. He never even brought it up. But that’s what your gut says.

In your suburban high school, it seems like a cheerleader gets pregnant every single year. You’re horrified by how people turn their backs on those girls, and you’re determined that it won’t happen to you. Could he sense that?

The split-level house is crowded. You squeeze past drunken kids to reach the second floor. Someone asks if you know he’s there, and you pretend not to hear. Couples are making out in the bathroom and in the bedrooms you pass. You slip into the master, where coats and purses are piled on the bed, and shut the door.

You need a few moments to pull yourself together. It’s already late. You consider hiding out there until your friends are ready to leave.

Then the door opens. Of all people, it’s the girl who’s been bullying you from the day you first moved to this district, back in fourth grade. She spray-painted the word “Bitch” on your driveway, and mocked your discount-store clothes.

That’s why you’re a cheerleader. You tried out for the wardrobe that came with it. Who would’ve guessed you’d take away her spot on the squad?

After that, she faded into the background. Until tonight. Has she been waiting for the opportunity to attack? You feel exposed, vulnerable.

“You’re too good for him,” she announces, and you assume it’s a trick.

You brace yourself for the punch line. You brace yourself to
be
the punch line, like you had been for many years before. But it doesn’t come. She’s sincere.

Has the world turned upside down?

“Why are you, of all people, being nice to me?” you demand with more spirit than you’ve ever shown her, toe-to-toe, before.

She blames the past on jealousy. She tells you how much you wow her.

It’s a small miracle. If she can change, then you will, too. No more hiding. You go downstairs to confront the boy. To ask what went wrong.

Years later, you won’t care enough to remember what he said.

In the end, that won’t be the conversation that mattered.

Jessica Spotswood

Dear Teen Me,

You are a truly whimsical being. You wish upon a star every Christmas Eve (and on fireworks during the Fourth of July). You read Victoria Holt and Judith McNaught and
Gone with the Wind
, over and over again. You’ve never been kissed, but you write sprawling historical romance novels filled with flirtatious banter and spirited, thinly veiled Scarlett O’Haras.

You want to fall in love.

All of your best friends are dating. You’re simultaneously envious of and annoyed by their constant PDAs. When their romances are going well they don’t need you; but when they fall apart, your friends get all devastated and depressed and make very questionable decisions. Their entire sense of self-worth seems hinged on these relationships, and you don’t ever want to be like that. You swear that when you fall in love, you won’t lose yourself.

Your stepmom says you’re the type of girl who will marry her first serious boyfriend, and you know what? She’s right.

It will take a while for you to find him, though. Right now you’re going through a succession of crushes on boys who only see you as a friend, and who therefore don’t think it’s at all awkward to confide in you about their crushes on other girls. It’s mortifying. But in college you’ll make some amazing girlfriends—the kind who won’t drop you when they get boyfriends or husbands or jobs or anything. You’ll make out with a few boys. You’ll also have more wild crushes, which will make you feel small and stupid when they are not reciprocated. You’ll become as cynical as you are capable of being (which is not very, because you’re inherently optimistic). You will want to murder anyone who calls you
cute
, because
cute
seems naïve.

The boy who will become our husband, the Playwright—he is brilliant and witty and he never says what you expect him to. It’s maddening; you can’t decide whether you want to kiss him or kick him. When you’re almost twenty, you’ll be in a play together, and after every rehearsal and performance you’ll stand outside the theater talking together, and your friends will suspect long
before you do that you like him. I won’t tell you how you finally realize that you’re interested in each other. Some things are lovely surprises.

The Playwright never makes you feel small or stupid or calls you
cute
in that condescending way. In fact, he once tells you that you’re like Cruella de Vil and the Dalmatians rolled into one person. You will be bizarrely delighted by this.

You will fall in love, but you won’t lose yourself. You won’t be one of those couples who are attached at the hip, who always speak in
we
’s. He will have rehearsals, see experimental plays that you hate, and be mildly obsessed with fantasy football. You will go on writing retreats and girls’ spa weekends and have a standing Tuesday dinner date with your best friend. You’ll still be an independent girl, but you can be braver and stronger and better once you’re confident that you are loved.

Teen Me, I know we’re not very good at patience. But he’s worth waiting for.