Authors: Barry Lyga
Like, in
Sandman,
Morpheus falls in love with Thessaly, who's this total bad-ass witch. And she leaves him and he's all depressed, and because he's the Lord of Dreams, the whole world gets bad dreams.
Who needs that?
And then, later, there's this bit with Nuala, the little faerie girl who's in love with Morpheus. And Morpheus is in trouble because the Kindly Ones are coming to kill him and Nuala sort of blurts out to her brother, "Morpheus is in dire need and he doesn't love me!" And her brother is all like, "Well, would it be better if he was in dire need and
did
love you?" That's just great. That's one of my favorite panels in the whole comic because it's so true. It's like, have some perspective, you know? Whether or not Morpheus loved you, he's still going to die. Love doesn't stop the world. Love doesn't change the world.
Love just makes you think that the world can
get
better or
be
better.
My phone beeps at me. I flip it open and there's a text from Jecca:
want 2 come over?
I close my eyes for a second. Just a second. Sometimes I wonder what it would be like. With Jecca. To go farther. To be naked with her, maybe. What would it be like to feel her skin? Her skin against mine? What would that be like? To let her—maybe to ... to let her go down on me. What would that be like?
I shiver. It's effing freezing in this car!
I know what Jecca wants. I'm not going. Not after all of that crap about
Brad
before.
I'm all cold and shivery, but I'm also burning up because I'm pissed. I'm twice as pissed as I was before. I'm mad at all of them—Jecca, Roger, Mom ... but Fanboy especially. Oh, yeah.
Mrs. Yingling has a little notebook and a pen in one of her cupholders. I tear out a sheet of paper and write something quickly. Then, before I can change my mind, I hop out of the car and walk to Fanboy's house.
The wind picks up and my head feels like a dome-shaped ice cube, even under the scarf and hat.
There are no lights on at Fanboy's house. Three cars in the driveway. That's new. One of them is new to me—an old junker from, like, the nineties. That must be Fanboy's. He turned sixteen while I was away. Someone got him a car.
How sweet.
Maybe I should forget about the note and just key the hell out of his car instead...
Nah. He wouldn't even be able to tell. And I want him to know. I want him to know someone was here.
I look at the note again: "I know what you did!—D.J."
D.J. Dina Jurgens.
That ought to mess with his head.
Unless...
What if Dina found out about him using her in
Schemata...
and didn't care? I mean, if someone had based a character on
me
and then drew that character in lingerie and having sex with her husband and did all kinds of stuff exploring sexuality and fantasy ... I would be
pissed.
But what if Dina thought it was
flattering?
Oh my God. Is that even
possible?
No. No way. What are you thinking, Kyra? Dina is hot and popular. When you're hot and popular, you're not flattered by geeks who lust after you. You're
disgusted
by it. I see how the hot girls look at the non-hot boys—like they're rats or mice or cockroaches or other gross things.
I tuck the note under his windshield wiper and then run like hell back to my temporary car.
This isn't going to do it, though. Leaving him a note from Dina will mess with his head, yeah, but it won't punish him.
I don't have any choice. If I really want to hurt him, I
have
to become his friend again.
I
CLIMB INTO BED AND FALL ASLEEP
and five seconds later my alarm goes off and I have to be up for school.
I dress in my new white clothes and leave my head exposed. Roger says nothing to me when we bump into each other in the kitchen. He's nicked himself a couple of times shaving and he looks like he barely slept at all last night. It's a whole new expression: beyond Sad, Tired and all the way to Exhausted and Crushed.
Since he's not saying anything to me, I don't say anything to him, either. I just eat some toast—with napkins all over me so that I don't get anything on the white clothes (wearing white is hard!)—and then get out of the house.
On the bus, I get all kinds of stares. It's like I've gone back in time or something, back to when I first started the whole dyed-hair/bleached-face/black clothes thing. I remember the looks I got
then,
too. Looks and little whispered comments, like right now.
I don't care.
When I was a little kid, I always thought that people who made themselves look different, who stood out, were freaks. The navel rings and the pink hair and the tattoos and the nose rings and the buzzcuts and the strange eyeshadow. Why would anyone want to stand out? I was shy—I just wanted to be left alone.
Then Mom died...
I realized something one day, pretty much by accident. I realized this:
Standing out ... sometimes it makes people stay away. They might laugh or gossip, but they stay away and that's what I wanted.
That's what I've always wanted.
Like right now. People are talking, but they're staying away. They're not asking questions. And that's good.
It lasts pretty much until I get to school and connect with Simone in our usual spot near the lunchroom.
"Whoa! Kyra! What the hell?"
Simone is decked out in her typical "no, really, I'm a goth" outfit—black pleated skirt, torn fishnets, chunky boots, and a halter top that would totally get her sent home to change clothes if she weren't also wearing a denim jacket over it. (Simone loves to play layer games at school, peeling stuff off for as long as she can, then covering up when a teacher bitches.)
"What the hell! Check you out," she says. She doesn't even ask for permission—she just reaches out and rubs my head. "Smooth."
"Yeah, I know." I duck away from her hand. "It's still kinda sensitive."
"Sorry. So, like,
why?
What the hell were you
thinking?
"
It's like she's my dad. Wish I had an answer to that one. I do a lot of stuff without really thinking about it ahead of time. "I just felt like making a change."
She takes a step back and tilts her head to one side. "Damn. You look
bih
-zarre, Kyra, with a capital 'Bih.' Doesn't she, Jecca?"
Jecca comes around from behind me, her eyes wide. "Holy shit, Kyra!"
I can't help it—I'm kinda psyched to get a rise out of her, after all the Brad talk.
"What the hell?" Like Simone, she goes for the head rub, but I'm ready for it and I duck. I don't want her touching me.
"It's a little sensitive," Simone says, as wise as the world.
"What is
with
you? This is really different," Jecca says. She can't stop staring at me. "Hey, have you ever worn that shade before?"
Who calls white a "shade"? And then I realize she means my lipstick—I'm wearing the really deep red. It's called Vital Vermeil.
"Yeah, a few times."
"Your boobs look bigger," Simone says, eyeing my chest like she's at the meat counter.
"Great. Just what I needed." I sort of slump forward and hold my books over my chest.
"Kyra, when you've got 'em, you gotta use 'em." Simone throws her shoulders back and Jecca does the same and a boy walking by almost trips and collides with the guy he's walking with. Simone and Jecca laugh.
"I didn't realize the white wouldn't hide things as much," I tell them. "I need to get the next size up next time."
Simone's eyes light up. "Hey, I'll drive us to the mall after school. You can get something there."
Jecca checks her watch. "We have time for a smoke before the bell."
"Yeah, I gotta go, though—I have something I have to do." She looks sort of disappointed, which makes me happy because of
Brad.
And then I'm off, looking for Fanboy.
P
EOPLE
I
DON'T KNOW AND PEOPLE
I do know suddenly have something in common—they all stare at my bald head as I thread through the halls. A bunch of people reach out to touch it, like they're in a horror movie and my head's some alien egg they found somewhere.
Hands off, assholes!
I don't just
think
it.
I find Fanboy at his locker. It's total luck on my part—I'm headed for his homeroom and I happen to see him.
I feel all sorts of shit welling up inside me. I'm angry at him. Pissed that he never tried to get in touch with me while I was away.
But there's something else, too. I can't help it—my heart kind of does a little flippy-floppy thing, and I don't know what to do with that.
I should say something, but my mouth doesn't work. So I just stand still and watch him. He's gotten a little bit taller, which just stretches him out and makes him ganglier. But it's cool because there's something
new,
too. I don't know what it is. His shoulders aren't slumped as much. It's like he's growing up.
He shuts his locker, spins the combo lock, and looks over at me. There's absolutely
nothing
in his eyes except for that quick assessment guys do, that fast little dart up and down. I still have my books over my chest, so he's getting nothing there.
"Uh, hi," he says, and flashes me a little grin before turning and starting to walk away. He has no idea who I am.
"Hi yourself," I tell his back.
He stops dead in his tracks. Turns to me.
"Holy..." His eyes get real wide, searching me all over, like he's looking for me in fog. "
Kyra? Kyra?
"
"Who the hell else did you think it was, Fanboy?"
"Oh, my God! You look ... you look
amazing!
"
I grin at him and his face splits in a huge smile as he rushes to me. I figure he's going to try to manhandle my dome, like everyone else, but instead he throws out his arms to hug me. There's a second when I'm ready to let him do it, too, when I'm ready to let him put his arms around me and hug me and—who knows?—maybe make me feel as comfortable and as safe as I do with Jecca.
But I can't let that happen. I step back.
"Hey, watch it. Who said you get to touch?"
"Oh. Oh." He catches himself and stands there for a funny moment, his arms still out, before dropping them to his sides. "I'm sorry. I just ... I just ... Wow. You look ... Well, you look
awesome,
Kyra. Different. But amazing."
"Don't sling the bullshit my way, Fanboy. I look like a freak."
"No. Uh-uh." He shakes his head like a spaz. "You look
awesome.
Seriously."
"It's OK. I
like
looking like a freak."
He gives up. "When did you come back to school?"
"A couple of days ago."
His smile goes away. He looks like a puppy that's just been kicked. "But ... why didn't you call me? Or text me? Or come see me?"
I force myself to keep grinning. I want to grab him by the shoulders and throw him against the lockers and shout, "Shut the eff up, you asshole! Why didn't
I
call
you?
I was gone for
months
and you didn't send me so much as a single effing e-mail!"
But instead I remind myself of my mission: Get close to him. Destroy him. "Been busy. Getting back into shit. Catching up."
"Oh. Sure. Yeah. I get it. I've been busy, too."
Before I can say anything, he flashes me a smile. It's totally ... disarming. I didn't expect it. Not from
him.
He was always sort of cute in a shy, geeky way, but now it's like he doesn't hate himself or something. It's like he's not afraid to smile at someone, and that just totally
smashes
my brain.
"I'm really glad to see you!" He practically shouts it, and I can tell by the way he's twitching that he wants to hug me so bad. And I have to admit—I want him to. It really sort of surprises me, how bad I want it.
It's a great moment. It really is. He wants me and I want him to want me, and that's terrific and liberating, so of course—of
course—I
go and ruin it, because that's what I do.
"So, still got three things you want more than anything?" I ask him with a sneer. (I know I'm sneering because my lip ring always bumps my cheek when I sneer.)
It stops him cold. "Well, gosh, Kyra..."
"'Gosh, Kyra...' Shut the eff up."
He doesn't react the way he's supposed to. He doesn't go all quiet and timid and Fanboy-y. Instead, he just ... grins. He
grins
at me.
"'Eff'?" he says. "What the hell. Are you afraid to say—"
"Shut up! I don't say that word!"
And we stare at each other. How the hell did this happen? How did
he
end up questioning
me?
How did I end up on the defensive?