The Female of the Species (13 page)

Sara is looking at me like maybe I might break, spontaneously shatter on my own bed, and then she'll have to explain to my mom and dad why she needs to borrow the Dustbuster.

“You're sure you're okay?”

“Yeah, I actually am,” I tell her.

I'm not, but I can't explain that to her. I love Sara, but something was taken from me at the church, something that she can't relate to. Every time I walk outside I think maybe someone is going to grab me. I take a sip of a glass of water I got out of my own tap and swish it around in my mouth first, like maybe it's a threat. And I'm starting to understand why Alex always walks on the balls of her feet, why her back muscles are always tensed,
like a cat ready to spring.

She knows. She gets it. So that's why I'm going to tell Sara that I'm okay and leave it at that.

“So . . .” Sara looks down at my quilt, tracing the pattern with her finger. “Should we call that Nolan guy, do you think?”

She's not the first person to bring it up. Five or six girls sent me their pics of the cop's cell and email, even though I still have my own. I've looked at it a couple of times, wondered how I would phrase that email, or what I would say on the phone. Mom and Dad want me to press charges, but I told them I don't remember anything, or who the guy was. Which is totally a lie, but it's not like it's the first one I've told them.

Just the biggest.

“I don't know,” I tell Sara. “He'll ask questions. He'll want to know who was there so he can talk to them, and then I'm giving him a list of people who were out at the church partying. I don't think anyone will thank me for that.”

“Yeah, but wasn't that kind of what he said at the assembly?” she says. “You're too scared about ratting out your friends to report a crime so it doesn't happen and he just gets away with it.”

“He hardly got away with it,” I point out, and Sara looks away from me.

“I'm kinda wondering if we should report that, too,” she says.

“What?”

Sara starts tugging on the fringe of my quilt, like unraveling it will help piece this conversation together. “Alex is . . . I know that you've gotten to know her working at the shelter and all that, but . . . have you ever seen the way she watches people? It's not normal, okay?”

“No,” I shoot back. “Not okay. Maybe if you had a sister that was torn into pieces by another person you might not be normal either. And maybe I'm glad she watches people because if she
didn't
, I'd be sitting in a clinic choking down morning-after pills right now.”

“Fine,” Sara says. “But she tore part of a guy's face off like it was nothing. You didn't see that, Peekay. I did. Girl didn't even flinch.”

“I wish I did see it,” I say, and Sara shudders.

“No, man, you don't. I'm not saying he didn't deserve it, but . . . God, I don't know.” She looks up at the ceiling, tears sitting in her eyes. “It was fucking awful. He kept screaming like he couldn't stop. You remember that time your cat caught that mouse and he played with it for like an hour before killing it?”

“Yeah,” I say. “We tried to take it away from him so he freaked out and actually bit down.”

The noises that mouse made as it died were impossibly
loud, a panicked sound of incomprehensible pain that faded as my cat ran off to the field with it twisting in his mouth, still trying to free itself even though it was obviously too late.

“Ray sounded like that mouse,” Sara says. “I couldn't hear that coming from a human being and not feel like something bad just went down. Something wrong.”

I think about Alex's bathroom and pouring rubbing alcohol on my crotch. I probably sounded a lot like that mouse, too.

“I don't want to talk about this anymore,” I say. Because it doesn't matter how much we talk about it; we're not going to agree, and I don't know if there is a right answer anyway.

“Fine,” Sara says, but it's not, and I know it. We sit together in silence a little longer, pretending everything is fine.

I'm sitting in Branley's driveway, counting out the beats for the new marching band routine because that's easier than going up and knocking on her door. I may be grounded, but when I told Mom and Dad that I had some apologizing to do, that seemed to lift the ban momentarily. I drove into town with the playlist for the fresh show on repeat, and I'm sure I am going to be stuck walking in four-four time for the rest of my life if I don't get out of this car in two seconds.

Branley lives in one of the old houses in town, the ones that people built expecting their great-grandchildren's grandchildren to live in. It's all brick and has a porch that looks like someone should be sitting on it reading a classic novel at all times. Even once I'm in front of the
door I don't take the final step of knocking until I force myself. I'm not the hot girl. I'm not the smart girl. I might not even be the funny girl. I'm just the preacher's kid. But I do have my pride, and this is one crow pie I'm not looking forward to eating.

Branley's little sister answers the door. She's got chocolate in her eyebrows, which seems like an accomplishment, and a freshly painted rainbow on her cheek that smooshes together when she smiles at me.

“Hi,” I say. “Is your sister home?”

“Bran,” she yells over her shoulder, before bounding away. “For you.”

“Coming,” I hear Branley yell, and then the door is pulled open wider. It takes a second for me to recognize her. It's a Saturday afternoon and she's fresh-faced—no makeup, no eyeliner, no layers of mascara that make her look like she's auditioning for manga porn. Her usually smoothed and perfected hair is up in a sloppy ponytail, her typically designer-clad body wearing nothing more revealing than a sweatshirt and pajama pants. And she's got face paint splattered on her fingers from decorating her little sister's cheek.

But she looks like a million bucks. Like the girl next door who will play touch football, then slam a beer and doll up a little bit to go out to dinner. Why can't she just have one obtrusively large pimple right in the middle of
her face like everyone else?

“Hi,” she says cautiously.

“Hey,” I say. “Can I talk to you?”

“Um, yeah, sure,” she says, but she doesn't open the door any farther, so I don't ask if I can come in. She's like the people who will feed a stray cat all summer but not let them in their house when winter comes.

Those cats die, by the way.

“Okay, well . . . Alex said that the other night out at the church that you helped her”—
no, that's not right
—“that you helped
me
. And I wanted to thank you for that. So . . . thank you.”

“You're welcome,” Branley says.

“I was kind of surprised, honestly,” I admit, when she doesn't add anything else. “After I . . . well, after what happened in Hendricks's room.”

“When you almost punched me?”

“Yeah.” I drop my eyes. “Sorry about that.”

“It's okay,” she says. “You're not the first girl who's wanted to punch me.”

I doubt I'll be the last either, but I don't say that.

“It wouldn't have mattered who it was, just so you know,” Branley continues. “It could've been your friend Sara, or one of my friends, or some chick I don't even know. I would've helped. My cousin went to college last year and . . .” She lets the sentence die, the awkwardness
between us growing thicker. “I would've helped,” she says again.

I think about how I felt that night, watching Branley with her perfect body on display for the boys to ogle and the girls to envy. I wonder if I'd seen her being carried out if I'd have interfered, and I just don't know.

“So your friend Alex . . .”

“What about her?”

Branley watches me closely before going on, one hand on the doorframe, her finger tapping as she thinks. “You know what she did after you passed out?”

“Yeah.”

“That's all you're going to say?”

“I also know what those guys were going to do to me.”

“I think she's crazy,” Branley says.

I feel my blood kick up a notch, my heart skipping a couple beats when I think of Alex, unquestioning in her own bathroom doorway as I lay crying in my underwear. “She's not crazy,” I say, keeping my tone as level as I can.

And then I spot the edge of a hickey peeking out of Branley's sweatshirt, perched precariously right on the edge of her collarbone. The same place Adam always liked to leave them on me.

“You just don't like her because she's got Jack,” I add,
throwing some of the hurt that just bloomed in my belly onto her.

Her eyebrows shoot up, the relaxed girl-next-door face sliding away as every muscle she has tenses and the Branley I know comes out. Eyes half slit, a little color high on the cheeks, nose a centimeter too far in the air for the commoners to try to approach.

“Why would I care about that?” she asks. “I have Adam.”

It's a challenge, and she's got her chin stuck out, begging for me to crunch it back into her teeth. And I want to. I want to pop that perfect jawline out of place and tear some of her hair out by the roots and inspect them to see if that's natural color she's flaunting or if there's some chemical assistance at work. But that's not who I am, and I know that playing the fantasy out in my head and actually doing it are two very different things.

And it's also not why I came here. I unclench my fists.

“Hey, you know what, Branley?” I say, and her eyebrows go up even farther, waiting for whatever cut I've got next, her own response probably lined up and ready to fire as soon as I finish.

“You're really pretty,” I say, and her perfect mask falls in a pile of confusion.

“Seriously,” I go on. “I always thought your looks were all in the makeup, like you try too hard or whatever. But
you don't need it. You're naturally really good-looking.”

“I . . .” She just kind of stands in the doorway, mouth hanging open as if I'd informed her I'm pregnant with the next Jesus. “Thank you,” she finally says, eyes slipping back into slits as if expecting a backhand tacked onto the compliment.

“That's all. Thank you for the other night,” I add quickly as I head for the porch steps, back toward the safety of my car and the predictability of four-four time. I've cracked the driver's side door when Branley calls my name and I turn to see her standing on the porch, barefoot, arms huddled against the cold.

“I'll see you Monday,” she says, her words sapped of all energy by the time they cross the distance between us, the frigid bite of the air stealing any intended warmth.

But she still said them.

“Yeah, see you in school,” I say.

And maybe on Monday I won't feel like punching her.

And maybe she won't try to make me.

I have a boyfriend.

I have said the word aloud only once, at Anna's grave. I went to tell her because she's someone who should know. Claire knows; Jack knows. My circles don't extend farther, so I stalled at the end of my run, picking my way through the monuments until I found hers.

I haven't been back since the funeral, since the day my dad called me a
firecracker
and reduced my wrath into an adorable nickname. I know that the parts of Anna's body they could recover are six feet below, as sheltered as can be from the worms and the ruin, resting on satin and in an utter darkness that even I can't contemplate. But I know that's not her. Whatever makes us flew from her with only one witness to the moment, someone who
should have never known her at all.

But I told her anyway, pronouncing the word
boyfriend
carefully, like it might break in my mouth, or chip my teeth on its way out. Her stone stared back at me, blank and uncomprehending, which I imagine is exactly what her face would have looked like in real life if I were able to tell her in person.

I laughed at the thought, the sound echoing in the cold evening, bouncing off rocks whose names have been rubbed out by time, silent testament that someone lived and died, but we no longer know who. My laugh came back at me from the snow-covered ground, frozen beneath my feet, the bare trees with black fingers reaching toward the darkening sky.

It echoed back off the stone from a grave behind me, one that I filled, the sound breaking across my shoulder blades accusingly. I stopped laughing, the sound cut short by my throat closing over the fear.

I ran. I bolted from the cemetery and back to my path, my pace bearing nothing of a runner's stride, no calm, measured beat to my steps. I ran like one pursued, with the conviction of my unworthiness fast on my heels.

The conviction that I don't deserve this.

Alex Craft is my girlfriend.

This is a statement that has to be examined, turned over carefully, and marveled at even as the days we've been together accumulate into weeks. Alex is my girlfriend, but the word doesn't do justice to what is between us. It's been applied to other girls—okay, lots of other girls—and it's always been appropriate, an indication that this is the female I call or text, the one whose hand I hold in the hallway, and the name that gets tossed around in the locker room when we're talking pussy.

Alex and I are past that. Alex and I have never been there.

I have things to say with her, things I want to share. I call her because I want to hear her voice, especially the
cautious way she says
hello
, like she's trying not to care too much that it's me. I liked the guarded way she controlled her enthusiasm at first, unsure about making the leap. But I like even more that it's gone now, the quick uptick in her tone when she answers telling me that her heart just skipped a couple of beats when she saw I was calling, just like my fingers still shake a little when I dial. There is nothing routine about having Alex Craft for a girlfriend, and I'm not just logging my time when we talk.

The guys take their jabs in the locker room, for sure, but they're more careful than they have been in the past. I don't know if it's out of respect for what happened to her older sister, or if enough of them remember what Alex did to Ray Parsons to know better than to pry me for details about getting any.

And I'd be lying if I said it wasn't something that I'd thought about. I'm her first boyfriend. I haven't been somebody's first boyfriend since Branley and I moved on from sharing candy bars to sharing mouths, and even then I don't know exactly what our relationship was. But I know what Alex is to me, and I hope I know what I am to her, and if that means I'm not going to be getting laid for a while, that's okay.

And the best part is that's something I can just say to my girlfriend and she doesn't try to pick apart my
sentence and find an insult in there to get pouty about. In fact, she laughs.

“I know it's okay,” she says back to me.

We're at Park's house. His mom and dad are gone for the weekend, so he had some people over. Not a ton, a couple of guys from the basketball team, couple of girls from their team. Peekay is roaming around, and I know Branley is here because she squeals somewhere upstairs and asks who dropped an ice cube down the back of her shirt.

Her high-pitched yelp pierces right through drywall and cinder block, right down to the basement, where I've finally got Alex to myself. We're cozy on a beanbag, the lights are off, and I told the guys we were going to
watch a movie
, which everyone knows means leave us the fuck alone for at least two hours. And for some reason I interrupted our heavy makeout session to tell her that if she's not ready to do it, that's okay.

“I know it's okay,” she says again, totally confident in being a virgin. And damn if it isn't the sexiest thing I've ever heard her say.

I worried that Anna would be with us whenever we were alone, a shadowy voice of caution that would put itself between us anytime I tried to get closer. If Anna is there, I think she's more in my head than Alex's, because my girlfriend likes to touch and be touched. But I've
gone slow, still reveling in the fact that this girl, who was an utter mystery to me at the beginning of the year, lets me kiss her now, whenever I want. I know her body, maybe not thoroughly but definitely more than anyone else, and when I touch her I feel how strong she is, yet I can't ignore the voice insisting over and over:
don't hurt her.

Right now her hands are all over me, and mine on her, and with any other girl it'd be time to bring out the condom, but with Alex I don't even consider reaching for my wallet. Instead I pull back to put some space between us. Because I'm not exactly thinking with my heart right now, and my dick is trying to undo my zipper from the inside.

Another girl might ask me what's wrong, a little bit of a whimper in her voice like she hasn't lived up to something I expected. Instead of that I get Alex's palm, flat against my bare chest, an unspoken question in the amount of pressure she exerts.

“Need a minute,” I tell her. Honestly, I need about a year and six feet of bricks in between us to keep myself under control, but I go for the next best thing.

“I think you should meet my parents.”

She laughs again, this one coming out in kind of a snort that might embarrass other girls, but not Alex.

“Why is that funny?” I ask her.

“It's not a situation I ever imagined myself in,” she says, her own breath still coming a little heavy. There's a naked bulb at the top of the staircase and enough light reaches us that I can see her breasts going up and down, the ridge of her bra pressing against them.

“Well, imagine it,” I say, pulling my eyes back up to her face, which is flushed and happy. I made it that way, and that's enough to keep my gaze from wandering.

“Okay, when?”

“There's a home game next week. Maybe after that?”

She nods, her cheek going up and down on my chest. And that little bit of friction gets me riled again, that and the fact that six months ago if you would've told me that a girl agreeing to meet my parents would give me a boner from hell, I would've punched you in the face. But if Alex is willing to do that, Alex who still pieces together her sentences very carefully even when we're alone, it means she's taking this as seriously as I am.

And that's fucking hot.

Once I asked my dad how you know when you're in love. He said you just know, and that if you have to ask the question then you haven't been in love yet. And he's right. Because there aren't words for this. No combination of letters could ever represent what she is to me.

But the flip side is that now I worry about losing her. I worry that I'm going to screw it up, that the Jack who
was in the woods the night they found Anna's body is going to reassert himself. That guy was nowhere near classy enough to be with Alex. She is refining me every day, changing me from the person I was into someone better. And I need to be good enough.

Because I'm Alex Craft's boyfriend.