The List (13 page)

argo arrives at school with ten dollars for her dance ticket and a picture of the homecoming dress she ordered last night on the Internet. She hopes Rachel and Dana like it. She hopes that it doesn’t clash too badly with whatever dresses they bought.

It is emerald green, short, sleeveless, and fitted, with a trail of little fabric-covered buttons running from the collar down to the small of her back. It is maybe a bit sophisticated for homecoming, but Margo, who bought it while balancing a dinner plate of spaghetti on her lap at the computer desk, figured that was probably a good thing. She was a senior now, a month away from turning eighteen. Plus, she planned to wear the dress again, maybe to a sorority function if she decided to pledge next year. She paid a fortune for overnight shipping, almost as much as the dress itself, but it was more than worth it, as the dress was pretty enough to get her excited about going to the dance again. She’d wear her hair down, probably. And her black peep-toe heels, the velvet ones she found on sale after last Christmas. It would be the first chance she’d had to wear them.

She felt back to her old self, for a while anyway.

When she didn’t hear from Dana or Rachel after their trip to the mall, Margo called Vines on Vine florist shop and ordered three wrist corsages, clusters of baby red roses with lemon leaves. Maureen had done the same thing for her friends
last year. The flowers would be an apology to her friends for acting weird about Jennifer ever since the list came out.

She is still a little paranoid about what Jennifer may have said about her during the shopping trip, but Margo tells herself not to be. What happened that summer was old news, and in all likelihood, Jennifer wouldn’t want to bring it up. It wouldn’t make either of them look good.

Dana and Rachel sit at a desk near the main office, selling homecoming dance tickets out of a metal cash box. There’s already a line of people waiting, and Margo takes her place at the end of it. A few people promise Margo that they’ll be voting for her for homecoming queen. They show her that they’ve already written her name on the ballot, which is printed on the back of the ticket stub. Margo politely thanks them. She makes sure the people who should know about her party on Friday night do.

“One ticket, please,” Margo says with her best smile when she reaches the front of the line. When she hands over her money, she notices that both Dana and Rachel are wearing H
ELLO
M
Y
N
AME
I
S
labels. In the white space they’ve written
Vote Queen Jennifer
. There’s a stack of them on the desk, and Dana’s making up more with a pink marker.

“‘Queen Jennifer’?” Margo asks, her voice dripping with disbelief.

Dana looks down and starts working on another sticker. Rachel sighs and says, “Don’t take this personally, Margo.”

“My two best friends are campaigning against me. And campaigning for a girl they know I don’t like. I’d say that’s about as personal as it gets.”

“Look, if you had come shopping with us last night, you’d understand.”

“It was horrible,” Dana says solemnly, while dotting the
i
in
Jennifer
with a star. “Like, beyond horrible. It makes me want to cry just thinking about it.”

“I mean, she wasn’t even going to come to homecoming!” Rachel adds. “Four years, and the girl has never been to one single school dance. Jennifer needs this, Margo.” Rachel hands her a ticket and a V
OTE
Q
UEEN
J
ENNIFER
sticker. “Way more than you do.”

Margo slides the homecoming ticket in the back pocket of her jeans along with the picture of her homecoming dress. The sticker she holds in her hand.

It’s obvious to Margo what she should do. Slap the thing on her chest and be a good sport. That would certainly put an end to the tension between her and her friends. People would think she was a good person. No one could think badly of her, not even Jennifer.

But instead, she sets the sticker back onto Dana’s pile. Her palm sweat has smeared the ink.

“I can’t,” she says.

Rachel leans back in her chair. “You’re not serious.”

“Margo, come on,” Dana says. “Why are you acting like this?”

An itch crawls through Margo. The students waiting behind her impatiently shift their weight, and the whole hallway comes suddenly off balance. “I’m not sure it’s a good idea. You know, people could think you’re making fun —”

“Fine,” Rachel says and waves Margo away with a flick of her hand. “Whatever you want.”

“Rachel, let me just —”

“No, really. I guess I figured you’d want to clear your con
science more than anyone. But maybe you don’t feel you have anything to be sorry for.”

It wasn’t like that. Margo knows there are things she should feel sorry for. But severing ties with Jennifer had been difficult enough the first time around. She was not ready to open up that door again, even a crack. And she definitely didn’t feel the need to concede the homecoming crown as penance. After all, Margo wasn’t the only one to blame. Jennifer was as much a part of the friendship ending as she’d been.

Margo wants to defend herself. She wants to explain. But the sharp stares from her friends make her realize that anything she might say about Jennifer would be taken the wrong way. It wouldn’t be a defense; it would be Margo kicking the ugly girl while she’s down. So she backs away from the table and walks away without saying another word.

It seems like everyone she passes has on a V
OTE
Q
UEEN
J
ENNIFER
sticker. Those kids check her chest, expecting to see one, too. And when they don’t find it, their expressions quickly change. They duck their heads and whisper to each other. About Margo, obviously.

Margo had wondered about this last year, but now she knows for sure. Being the prettiest senior on the list isn’t always a blessing. Sometimes it’s a curse.

By the time Maureen graduated, things had definitely gotten weird. There’d been so many fights with her longtime friends, too many to count. Maureen bailed on the senior trip to Whipple Beach, even though their parents had already paid for her hotel room. She’d dumped her boyfriend, Wayne, right before prom for no good reason — Wayne who was hot and
whom she’d dated for two years and lost her virginity to (according to a love letter Margo had found in Maureen’s underwear drawer). None of Maureen’s friends showed up to her graduation party. Maureen got drunk and passed out in a pool chair in front of their grandparents, waking up every so often to burp.

It felt reckless to Margo, as she watched her sister systematically dismantle everything she cared about. The end of high school was about holding on, but Maureen wanted to let it go.

Maureen ended up selecting a college that was far away from Mount Washington. Margo had wanted to help her sister pack, but by then the two sisters were not getting along so well, so she just tried to stay out of Maureen’s way. There was always tension between them, tension Margo could only interpret as hatred. At Maureen’s good-bye dinner, before her mother flew with Maureen out to her college on the other side of the country, Maureen didn’t look at Margo once.

It was almost a relief to see her go.

After Maureen left, Margo went into her sister’s room. The pictures of Maureen’s friends, the ones that had once covered an entire wall, had been stuffed in the wastebasket.

Margo sat on the floor, carefully unsticking the tape and flattening the ones that’d been bent. Some were of homecoming — Maureen, her tiara holding back waves of her brown hair, dancing with Wayne.

It was hard to tell, because of how badly the picture had been crumpled. One fold went straight down Maureen’s face. But from what Margo could see, her sister had never looked so happy.

On her way to homeroom, Margo spots Principal Colby. She’s watching the students pass though the hallway, her eyes darting about.

What will Principal Colby think of this “Vote Queen Jennifer” charade? Either Margo participates, and she can be looked down upon. Or Margo doesn’t, and she’ll be viewed as even more suspicious.

She doubles back the way she’s just come, avoiding Principal Colby altogether.

he cramps are worse than the ones that come with her period.

Bridget presses her lips together and concentrates on the jagged graffiti scratched into the almond paint on the bathroom door. She’s in the girls’ gym locker room on the toilet. Her body is pitched forward, her elbows pressing into her bare thighs, her chin in her hands. A half-empty water bottle stands on the floor between her sneakers, the liquid inside oily and separated.

It is not a cleanse. It is a magic potion.

The need to go has hit at various times all morning, growing more and more pressing. This is the third time during gym class alone, and the urge was so intense that Bridget had to sprint off the volleyball court in the middle of a play, leaving her side down a setter. The cramps made it hard to walk, so she hobbled, her fingers pressing into her sides. She barely got her shorts down in time.

If only she were home, able to go in private. Maybe with a magazine or book to take her mind off the pain. Oh, god. What if one of her teachers decided not to give her the bathroom pass? She worries about the cramping, too. It doesn’t feel right. Like appendicitis or something.

No. It is nothing to worry about. The cleanse instructions had mentioned severe cramping as a possible side effect. It also said that she’d be crazy for food. Yesterday, it was madness how badly she wanted to eat. Not a craving for anything specific,
just food in general. Way worse than the normal days. But the instructions promised that, if she could stick with it, if she could stand up to that voice inside her telling her to eat, she’d plateau and the hunger would disappear. And it has, pretty much.

She needs to trust the process.

Another flash of lightning strikes her abdomen. Splashing sounds bounce off the porcelain bowl. Each time, Bridget is sure that there can’t be anything left inside her. But she is always wrong.

A distant whistle trills through the cinder-block walls. A few seconds later, the locker-room door swings open and the girls dash in to get changed before next period. Bridget quickly stands and looks down at the muddy water. As disgusting as the aftermath is, a strange sense of pride comes as she flushes away what had been clogging her, watching the toilet refresh itself with clear, cold water. She feels lighter, almost buoyant, despite her stomach being an overfilled water balloon.

Isn’t it nice, never feeling hungry?

It is. Honestly.

After washing her hands, Bridget heads to her locker to change. Most of her friends are already back in their school clothes and have lined up along the rectangular mirror that runs the length of the locker room. They talk straight into the mirror, their confessions bouncing cruelly back in their faces.

One girl groans. “I swear, I have the most disgusting skin in the whole school.”

Another girl pushes the first girl playfully. “Are you kidding? Your skin is beautiful! You don’t have any blackheads.” This girl leans in close, like she’s about to sniff the mirror. “My entire nose is covered in blackheads.”

“Shut up! Your nose is perfect. I’m begging my parents for a nose job for Christmas. Seriously. I don’t even want a car.”

“If you went in for a nose job, the plastic surgeon would laugh you out of his office. But he’d probably write an academic paper on me. I mean, do you know of any other junior in the universe who has wrinkles this bad?” The girl takes her hair and yanks it up toward the ceiling, pulling the skin on her face tight. Bridget can see the ridges of her skull and blue veins.

The last girl snarls at the mirror, peeling her lips back as far as they can go, baring wet flesh the color of chewed cinnamon gum. “I’d rather have your invisible wrinkles than my crooked teeth. I don’t think I’ll ever forgive my parents for not getting me braces. It’s, like, child abuse.”

Bridget pulls her white sweater over her head. She does it slowly, hiding in the woolly softness for a few seconds. Her friends always one-up each other with invented flaws, seeing who can top the next with phony self-hatred.

But she can top them all.

She grabs her brush and heads to the mirror. “You guys are
all
crazy,” she says, locking eyes with herself. “I’m the ugliest one here by far.”

She’d said this sort of thing before, of course. It was her go-to put-down, because it didn’t leave out any of her flaws. It covered absolutely everything. And she means it. Bridget has known these girls since kindergarten. She’s grown up with them. Watched them trade boyfriends, try new hairstyles, attempt smoking, get drunk on whatever liquor they could get their hands on, choreograph dances to stupid pop songs. They’re practically women now. She thinks they’re all beautiful. She’s the one who doesn’t fit.

Bridget lets her hair down from a ponytail and runs her comb through. Static sparkles like glitter in the black strands. She notices that the locker room has gone quiet. She turns and sees her friends staring at her.

“Oh, shut up, Bridget,” one of the girls says with a heavy sigh.

“Seriously,” someone else snarks.

“What?” Bridget says, a nervous buzz in her chest.

A collective eye roll spins in her direction.

“Right. You’re the ugliest.”

“Do you honestly expect us to believe you?”

Bridget is suddenly unsteady. This is a play that they’ve acted in a hundred times before, and now she suddenly can’t remember the words to her part.

“I … I …” Bridget trails off. She has thought about telling her friends. Sharing with them the strange things that had happened to her this summer. She didn’t because she didn’t want them to worry. To think she was broken inside. She didn’t want them to panic. It was why she had chosen not to invite any of them down for the summer. There would have been too much explaining to do. And anyway, she had been doing better.

“Everyone’s happy you made the list, but —”

“We’d all
kill
to be you, Bridget.”

“It’s kind of rude. You know. Because we’ve actually got things to complain about. You, well … everyone knows you’re pretty. It’s been, like, certified.”

Another cramp swings through Bridget as the bell rings. Her friends walk out together to lunch, and Bridget ducks back to the bathroom stall.

She’s about to undo her jeans when she notices that this urge is different. It is another sort of squeeze.

The cleanse rises up in her throat.

The sensation shocks her. Bridget has never, ever vomited. Counted calories, counted bites, counted swallows. But that’s it. And yet, the urge is twisting in on her. She feels the toxins bubbling up inside. Like it isn’t even her choice anymore.

She backs out of the stall. She reaches for her water bottle, but thinks better of it and cups faucet water to her lips instead. It is not cold. Just lukewarm and tasting the tiniest bit like rust.

Next period is lunch.

Bridget goes to the library. On the way, she dumps the cleanse out in the water fountain. The bottle stinks, and Bridget can’t imagine the smell ever washing out, so she tosses that, too. She is not drinking it anymore. If there’s nothing inside her, she won’t throw up. And though her logic is terribly blurry, she knows that’s a line she doesn’t want to cross.