Sparks Page 3

  I went back to staring at my sandwich, so I had no idea that Norman was walking up to the table until I heard him say, “Hey, babe.”

  Who in the hell actually calls girls “babe”?

  I mean, people talk like that all the time on Full House, but that was years ago. And I’ll bet people didn’t even really talk like that back then.

  Norman was wearing the shirt-and-tie combo he always wore—he said it was “the Christian way to dress,” which I’m pretty sure was a load of crap. As far as I could tell from the videos we watched in ACTs, the “Christian way to dress” is robes and sandals.

  I mean, what about that point on the end of the tie? Didn’t Norman know what it was pointing at ?

  Norman motioned for Angela to scooch over and sat down in her place, next to Lisa. I was sitting on the other side of the table, pretending not to notice that my foot was bumping against hers.

  “I was just telling Debbie we need to find someone for her, so we can double date,” said Lisa.

  “There are a some cool guys in the FCA,” said Norman. “Do you know Aaron Riley?”

  Aaron wore shirts and ties to school, too. But not because of religious reasons. I’m pretty sure he thought that if it ever came out that he’d ever worn something other than business attire, he’d be barred from working at a Fortune 500 company.

  I would rather date Hairy Nate.

  I didn’t say this out loud, of course. I just nodded while I counted to twenty-five in my head.

  “Riley’s a good guy,” said Norman. “He’s single now, too, since he dumped Gia Van Atta. You know she’s slept with four guys?”

  “Really?” asked Lisa.

  “So I hear,” said Norman. “That’s why he dumped her. And I’ll bet that means she’s given a you-know-what to at least, like, ten.”

  “A you-know-what?” asked Angela. “Why don’t you just say it, if we all know what it is?”

  Norman gave her a weird look.

  “Are you sure that’s even true?” Angela went on. I could tell she was kind of offended, since she’d probably given a you-know-what to a few guys herself.

  “I have it on good authority,” said Norman, confidently.

  This was why I couldn’t possibly talk to Lisa about how I felt at lunch. I couldn’t even hint at it now that Norman was there. If Norman had any notion that either of us liked girls, he’d tell everyone and people would be organizing “prayer warrior” meetings for us.

  “Ew,” said Lisa. “I don’t think it’s really that big of a sin to do, like, more than kissing before you’re married, but you should at least only do it with one person that you really love!”

  Then I saw Norman sneakily move his arm around Lisa’s waist and pull her in closer. She put her head onto his shoulder.

  With every fiber of my being, I wanted to jump up out of my seat, stand on the table, summon a bunch of spooky flashing lights, and shout “get your hands off her!” in a voice that would shake the windows and rattle the walls. I felt like the two of them had just reached into my chest, grabbed my heart, and squeezed it really, really hard, like it was a grapefruit and they were trying to make juice or whatever. My eyes went blurry and my stomach started to hurt so badly I thought it was trying to break out through my belly button.

  When I saw Norman leaning over to kiss Lisa on the cheek, I finally snapped.

  I picked up my brown paper lunch bag, swung it over my head, and slammed it onto the table. Hard. So hard that the bag ripped open and the container of yogurt inside of it cracked. Some pink yogurt goop spurted out and sprayed the table. Some of it bounced back onto my top, but it managed to miss Norman’s stupid shirt entirely.

  “God damn it!” I shouted.

  I didn’t wait around to see Lisa’s reaction. I got up, grabbed my purse, and stomped away from the table toward the hall.

  As I stormed through the cafeteria, I saw Emma, the weird girl, sitting at a table with Tim, the gay guy. She tried to get my attention as I walked past, but I didn’t even slow down. I marched clear out of the cafeteria, past the drama hall and down another hall, then into the last bathroom before the side exit to the parking lot.

  Inside of it, I slumped against the wall, intending to just stay there, but when I looked up I realized that I’d walked into the boys’ restroom. There were urinals. No boys peeing, thank God, but urinals.

  “God damn!” I shouted again, louder this time. I smacked my hand hard against the floor and felt the cold sting of the ceramic tiles against my palm. Then I smacked it again.

  What else could possibly go wrong?

  All those years of watching cheesy sitcoms should have taught me never, ever to think that.

  I got out of the boys’ bathroom and went into the girls’ room next door, kicked open the door to one of the stalls, and sat down on the toilet. As soon as I sat down, the crying started.

  I don’t think I’d cried like that, with all of the noises and wailing and stuff, since I was about four or five. If I’d ever wondered about it, I would have thought that I couldn’t do it anymore. But it’s like riding a bike, I guess. You get so good at bawling when you’re a baby that your body never really forgets how to do it.

  That boring asshole in the tie had stolen my imaginary girlfriend.

  I’d wasted my entire youth—from age eleven to age sixteen-and-a-half, anyway—for Lisa. Instead of going to parties or whatever, I’d spent my high school years watching cheesy old TV shows and trying to live like I was a character in one of them.

  I never even really expected her to kiss me, or sleep with me, or touch me, or any of that stuff. I was happy just to be with her. It was something. It was enough.

  Only now it was nothing.

  I had pretended to be religious for her. I had acted as if a little kid saying, “You got it, dude” or a second grader saying, “How rude” was the height of comedy. Even when I was on my own, I had avoided watching TV shows or listening to music that I didn’t think she’d approve of. I had never argued with her when she said people I kind of liked having around were probably going to hell.

  I’d even played along in a big ceremony where the whole group from ACTs put on these sterling silver rings that were supposed to symbolize a vow of chastity. I kept the ring on even though it was the wrong size for me.

  Now I took it off and dropped it into the toilet.

  Hell, part of why I’d stayed in Iowa with my crazy mom instead of going to Minneapolis with Dad was to stay close to Lisa. I liked it in Minneapolis. I liked his new wife, Reine, who I guessed was technically my

  stepmom.

  Maybe I could go live there, where no one knew a thing about me, and be a totally different person.

  I counted to twenty-five a whole bunch of times, but it didn’t change a thing. It never really did.

  A minute later, someone walked into the restroom.

  “Debbie?” a voice called out. “Are you in here?”

  It was Angela.

  I didn’t say anything, but I sniffed really loud.

  She walked up to the stall door. “Are you decent,” she asked, “or are you peeing?”

  “Decent,” I muttered. “Come on in.”

  She opened up the stall door. There was no point in trying to cover up the fact that I’d been crying. My face was probably as red as a monkey’s butt.

  “Oh my God,” she said. “Are you okay?”

  I just stared at her. I wasn’t going to dignify that with a response.

  “Jesus,” she said. “Are you that upset about Norman?”

  I shook my head.

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “You won’t be single forever. I’m sure I can find you someone better than Aaron Riley. That guy’s a douche.”

  “It’s not like that!” I snapped.

&nbs
p; She took a step backward. I’d never snapped at her like that.

  “Lisa wanted to come have a talk with you herself,” she said.

  I snorted. “She’d give me a speech about how we’ll always be friends, no matter what happens, and then we’d hug. There’d be slow saxophone music in the background and the crowd would go ‘Awww’ and everything would be all better.”

  Angela laughed. “Yeah, that’s probably exactly what she had in mind. What would you rather she do, though? You can’t just expect her to wait until you find a boyfriend before she starts seeing anyone herself.”

  “I told you. It’s not like that,” I said. I stared straight down at the toilet to keep from looking her in the eyes.

  Maybe she read my thoughts, or maybe she just put the pieces together.

  “Oh my freaking God,” said Angela. “You … ”

  I just nodded.

  Angela didn’t say anything for a second, so I spoke instead.

  “If you tell her, I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you so hard your parents will die, too. And your children’s children’s

  children.”

  For a second, neither of us said anything, but I got the impression that she was trying hard not to laugh.

  “Damn it,” I said, “will you stop staring at me? Haven’t you ever seen a lesbian having a panic attack on a toilet before?”

  She allowed herself to giggle a bit. “Not one with that much yogurt on her shirt.”

  I just looked down. I could still see the chastity ring at the bottom of the toilet bowl.

  “Sorry, Deb,” she said. “I didn’t realize … well, you know Lisa likes guys, right?”

  I nodded. I guess I was hoping she didn’t, really, and was just pretending to be so excited about Norman, but, well. You know. It still seemed like a remote possibility. I hadn’t completely given up.

  “I’ve been dumped before,” Angela said. “It sucks. But you move on. You rip up some pictures and you move on.”

  “I don’t think it’ll be that easy for me,” I said.

  “I’ll help,” she said. “You can come hang out with me tonight, if you want. I’ll get the kids I’m babysitting into bed early, and we’ll just hang out.”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  Nothing on Full House had ever prepared me for this. There were no hopeless gay crushes on that show, to start with. And the breakups were always really healthy.

  D. J. and her boyfriend walked up a mountain, broke up, and walked back down, and that was that. Danny’s fiance moved to New York and he was over her two episodes later. No one ever got all the juice squeezed out of their heart.

  “Come on,” said Angela. “Lunch is over. Fifth period is starting up.”

  I shook my head at her. “No way.” I said. “I’m not leaving. Not yet.”

  “You want me to stay with you?” she asked.

  I shook my head again. “Leave me alone, please.”

  “Fine,” she said. “But I’m coming to check on you. I’ll tell Mrs. Vanderbilt I have to go and that I might be a while. Okay?”

  I nodded. At least someone gave a damn about me. Angela had even offered to skip class to be with me, which was really cool of her.

  She walked out. I locked the door of the stall, and I was left alone.

  A few minutes later, I was officially skipping a class for the first time in my life. It felt like I had taken the first step on the road to a life of crime.

  And it was the best I’d felt all day.

  Four

  After about twenty minutes, I was calming down a

  little bit. I’d cried out everything inside me that was there to cry out. I’d even taken, like, a ceremonial pee so I could get that out of me along with all the snot, tears, and other gunk that was coming out. I symbolically flushed away every bit of the “old Debbie” that I could force out into the toilet along with the chastity ring.

  For several minutes after I pulled my pants back up, I sat there not thinking anything or feeling anything. The grapefruit that was my heart had been squeezed of its last drop of juice.

  Finally, I thought about my options for the rest of the day. Where could I go next? I certainly wasn’t going back to class. Not that period, anyway.

  But I knew that I definitely had to confront Lisa, and fast, even though it was probably hopeless. If not, I’d just have another breakdown every time I saw her.

  The best scenario I could imagine would be for it to happen that night, in the parking lot outside the movie theater. Maybe Norman would try to go up Lisa’s shirt during the movie and she’d get all upset that he was trying to go too far. She’d storm out and try to tearfully call me for a ride home, and I could say, “I’m already here, Lisa! Look up!” And she’d look up, and there I’d be, standing in the rainy parking lot holding up my phone so she could see the glowing screen, a light waiting to carry her home.

  That would be awesome.

  But it still sounded like the stunning conclusion to the season finale of a TV show, not real life. More likely, I’d just build up the nerve to talk to her right before the movie, on the way in, and she’d get all freaked out and I’d have another breakdown over by the box office. By the time I made it home, I’d be calling Dad to see if I could go live with him and not have to look Lisa in the eye anymore.

  Five minutes later, Angela showed back up in the bathroom.

  “Debbie?” she called.

  I stood up from the toilet and stepped out of the stall.

  “Hey,” I said, weakly.

  “Jesus, Deb,” she said. “You look like crap.”

  I shrugged and sat down against the wall. She sat down and joined me.

  “I never would have guessed you had a thing for Lisa,” Angela said. “Even though it was pretty obvious, now that I think about it.”

  “She never would have guessed either,” I said. I sniffed, trying to get some snot back into my nose. Some of it had already gotten onto my white shirt.

  Broken hearts are fucking gross.

  I almost said that out loud.

  “Somewhere in the back of my head, I thought that Lisa and I would be together forever in a house with a white picket fence, three kids, and hilarious neighbors.”

  “Everyone gets caught up in that modern day fairy-tale shit,” said Angela. “It’s programmed into our brains from day one.”

  “Everyone talks about how TV desensitizes kids to sex and violence and the A-word, but they never stop to think how badly you can be screwed up by stuff like Full House.”

  Angela laughed and pulled a couple of cigarettes out of her purse. “Smoke?”

  Now, look, I may have been a very stupid person—we’ve pretty much established that at this point—but I wasn’t about to get into smoking. Right at that moment, though, it seemed like just the thing to do.

  “Give me one,” I said.

  It was something the old Debbie never would have done, but having a cigarette meant that I would set fire to something. It could be, like, a symbolic burning away of everything that came before. I’d never have to smoke another one after this.

  Angela lit her cigarette, then handed me one and flicked the lighter in front of me. I took a puff and then proceeded to hack up a pretty good portion of my lung.

  Sheesh. More stuff to get out from the inside of me.

  I felt as though any minute now, Nancy Reagan or some other special guest star would burst into the room to warn me about the dangers of smoking and teach me to say no. It would be a very special episode of Debbie Woodlawn’s Stupid Life.

  Well, no. I wouldn’t have my own show. It would be a very special episode of The Wonderful World of Lisa that focused on a character who was being written out of the series soon. Maybe they’d kill me off to teach everyone else a lesson.

&nb
sp; Angela politely ignored the cough instead of laughing at me. I didn’t keep trying to smoke, though. I just held the cigarette. I’d already set fire to something.

  “Love sucks,” Angela said, exhaling.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I can’t believe Lisa said she’s okay with people doing more than kissing before they get married. We just went to an abstinence rally in Omaha a few months ago. And there were people there who do that courtship thing where they never even touch until the wedding, and she thought it was cool.”

  “She probably never felt this way before,” said Angela. “You can’t fight hormones that well in real life. Lots of people in ACTs think girls who go past first base are sluts until they actually get a boyfriend themselves. Then they find out it’s harder than they thought.”

  I just sighed and watched the thin plume of smoke rise from the end of the cigarette.

  “Look,” Angela said. “I know how bad what you’re going through sucks. Like you want to crawl into a snakehole and tear off every bit of your skin and set what’s left of you on fire.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I already symbolically flushed myself down the toilet.”

  Angela laughed. “Well, that’s a start,” she said. “If you want my advice, you need to just find a random girl and a comfortable back seat where you can work off some steam.”

  “I don’t think I know a single other gay girl in school,” I said. “Except for those ones who hang out in the drama hall.”

  “Half of them are faking it,” said Angela. “And some of them are really mean, too.”

  “I guess I could just close my eyes and sleep with Nate Spoelstra,” I said.

  “Yeah,” said Angela. “Uh, don’t do that. He’s so greasy you’d end up feeling like you were on a Slip-n-Slide.”

  I managed a weak smile. Or half of one, anyway.

  We sat in silence for a minute while Angela took a few more thoughtful drags on her cigarette.

  “Why do you go to ACTs, anyway?” I asked. “Do you believe in all that stuff?”

  She took another puff and shrugged. “Some of it, I guess,” she said. “I started going because of a guy, though.”