The Other New Girl Read online

  I didn’t know what the movie was going to be that night. So there I was, hiding out in the girls’ bathroom, trying to decide what to do. If I said yes and we had nothing to talk about, it could be a disaster. If I said no, I would be blowing a chance to date one of the popular boys. And if I was honest with myself, I did have a little crush on him, which I’d been trying to hide.

  THIRTEEN

  The Dance

  I WORE A POWDER BLUE CASHMERE SWEATER AND A NAVY pencil skirt with little heels. Not the best dancing skirt, I admit, but I looked good in it.

  “Are you sure it’s okay?” Brady and Jan were helping me dress. It was like I was getting married and they were the maids of honor. Except it was only a stupid dance.

  “You look sexy,” Jan said. “Sexy’s good. I wish I could look sexy. When I wear a pencil skirt my ass looks enormous.”

  “How does my ass look?”

  “It looks good,” Brady stepped from behind me. “You look great. You need a necklace.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes. Something silver against the powder blue sweater.”

  “I have this.” I held up a linked chain necklace.

  “That’s good,” Jan reached out and helped me fasten it in back.

  “Aren’t you guys going?” I asked them.

  “Of course. We wouldn’t miss this for anything,” Jan said and stepped away to look at my outfit with the necklace. “Perfect,” she patted my shoulder. “You’re—like—ready for anything he throws at you.”

  I glanced from Brady to Jan. I must have looked worried because Brady laughed.

  “Relax,” she said. “When he gave me the note he smiled.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “How should I know?” Brady laughed again. “I’m not a mind reader. But if I was one, I’d say he has a major crush on you.”

  “Where’s Daria?” I asked. She would be able to tell me how to interpret all this.

  “She’s already downstairs with Tim. You know how he waits for her like a puppy dog. I wonder if they’re off having sex,” Brady said to no one in particular.

  “What?” Jan almost shouted. She flopped down on my bed. “You think they are? Now, before a dance?”

  Jan was an information pack rat who always wanted to know every little detail of everything anyone had heard. Come to think of it, she was pretty much a pack rat about everything. I was once in her room before inspection. When she saw the hall proctor coming down the hall, Jan would grab all the stuff all over her room—and there was always a lot of it—gather it up in a big wad and stuff it into her closet, shove the closet door as hard as she could, stand against it with her backside and push it closed with all her strength, then reach around while her weight was still against the door and turn the key to lock it and hold everything in. When she unlocked it later in the day, everything would fall out on the floor and she’d just leave it there and pick through it for whatever she needed.

  Jan came from Atlantic City and her father managed the hotel where the yearly Miss America pageant was held. Her family always hosted two of the girls competing in the pageant, which meant the girls lived in their house for Miss America week. That year, they were hosting Miss Montana and Miss Alabama. Jan adored Miss Alabama and her room was full of all kinds of autographed items from her, including the sash she wore when she got her state crown, autographed—To Jan, Miss Bama Loves You. Of course this was before pageants were under attack for being shallow and demeaning to women or before the girls who entered them had to be biophysics majors who could also belt out an aria from La Bohème.

  “She’s certainly passed around the key to the mattress room,” Brady offered.

  “That’s right,” said Jan. “I forgot about that. So they must be doing it down there. The little sneak. I’m going to get her to spill at the dance.”

  “So do I look okay?” I asked. My stomach had started flip-flopping again. “Because I have to meet him in ten minutes at Mrs. W.’s.”

  They surveyed me one more time and both agreed I looked perfect, which meant not too sexy, not too eager, but just enough to make him glad he was taking me to the dance. It was a precarious balancing act. I didn’t want to be like Juniper Barksdale who wore her skirts so tight you could see when she wasn’t wearing panties and turned her cardigans backwards so they stretched tight across her chest and you could see her nipples through her bra. But she got asked to dance a lot.

  Brady said maybe I should have worn a fuller skirt for dancing but I didn’t know what kind of a dancer Wes was yet, so it might be too risky to wear something that said I really wanted to dance. All I’d noticed was when Wes came to the dances, which wasn’t every week, he usually didn’t dance at all, unless some girl really pressured him. There were only a few boys who were great dancers and all the girls took turns with them. The other boys only wanted to slow dance anyway and anyone could do that.

  As I put on a little makeup, I started to get stomach flutters and tried to calm myself down by saying nothing important was going to happen. Just relax. It was just a Saturday dance. It wasn’t working and by the time I got my hair finished I was in a definite state. After we’d meet at Mrs. W.’s I’d have to walk over to the gym with him. What was I going to talk about? My French exam? American history? Then I remembered something my mother had told me once. She was sometimes completely on point, especially when it came to attracting men.

  “Just ask him a question and let him talk.”

  So that was what I would do. But what question? At least now I had something to concentrate on so my stomach settled down. Brady and Jan went off to get themselves ready and I locked my closet and was heading out the door when, out of nowhere, Moll appeared, looking even more nervous than usual.

  “You look really pretty.” Her voice trembled a bit and I wondered what was going on with her, but on the other hand, I didn’t have time to really get into it right then.

  “You’re so lucky.” She twisted her fingers in a funny way. “I mean to be going to the dance.”

  “Why don’t you go?”

  “Oh, I couldn’t. I’d be too embarrassed.”

  “About what?” I shouldn’t have asked that because I really had to go. But I couldn’t just walk away from her.

  “You know,” she began and faltered and shrugged one shoulder. “I don’t know how to dress or wear makeup or anything. I mean I just wouldn’t fit in.”

  “Well, do you want to?” I didn’t know why I asked that because of course everyone wanted to fit in.

  “I never could so what does it matter?”

  “Look, Moll,” I said. “Just throw on anything and come over. Nothing will happen. It’s not like public school here. You know, Quakers are all about being inclusive of everyone, about accepting everyone. And maybe you’ll get used to the dances and next time you’ll feel more confident about going. But, look, I have to run.”

  “You have a date, don’t you?”

  “Yes.” I started to leave but then . . . “How did you know?”

  “I heard some girls talking. They said Wes Ritter asked you. Anyone would want to go with him.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s only one dance,” I said, more trying to reassure myself not to expect too much than to make Moll feel better by letting her know it was nothing special. So people were already talking about me, as if Wes and I were a couple. “If you want, you can walk over with us.”

  The minute the offer was out of my mouth I regretted it. What would Wes think if I showed up with Moll trailing along like a bumbling baby sister? He’d probably think I didn’t want to be alone with him. Not exactly the best way to start whatever might happen between us.

  “Oh, no,” she said and blushed so red I thought she might explode all over my door.

  “Anyway I have to translate the second act of Oedipus Rex. It’s not the same as modern Greek. It’s much more complex and there are odd idioms and lots of footnotes. Well,” her voice drifted off, “I guess that doesn�
��t much matter. I don’t know what really matters anymore.”

  When I got down the hall from Mrs. W.’s, I couldn’t see Wes waiting for me and my heart took this little flop like a dying fish. What if he forgot or changed his mind? Then, through the glass panes of the double doors that led to the front porch, I saw him standing outside with some of the other boys. So then my heart took another flop only this time it was a flip up and a couple of pounding beats. I thought, Get hold of yourself or this is going to be a horrible night.

  He caught sight of me at about the same time and raised his hand in a little wave. One of the other boys fake punched him on the arm and they all started hooting at him, although I couldn’t hear it and could only just see them razzing him. He pushed one of them away and opened the door. When he was inside, he had this cute little smile on his face and I thought then that everything was going to be fine.

  “Are they giving you a hard time?” I asked, nodding toward the boys outside.

  “Nah,” he said. “They’re just being goofs is all.”

  “Well,” I said and stopped.

  “Yeah. Want to go over to the gym?”

  “Sure.” And then I added, “Want to go out the other way?”

  “You mean the north door, out the back?”

  “Yes. We wouldn’t have to walk right past them.”

  “Good idea. Fake them out.”

  So instead of going through the front doors, we turned and headed down the long hall of Fox Building, past all the offices, all of them locked up, giving the hall a deserted feel. Finally we got to the north door. This door was different from the other two. There was no porch here, only a small landing at the bottom of a fire stairwell that had been in-stalled because of new fire regulations, which was a joke be-cause if this old wooden building ever caught fire there would be nothing left.

  It was a massive metal fire door with a push bar and heavy metal hinges. It was locked every night at nine but I had heard about kids going out there at night and propping it open so other kids who wanted to sneak out could get back in. There was a night watchman who made rounds all night but it was easy to figure out his schedule and time your escape and return in between his rounds. It took him four hours to make the complete circle so he only checked this door twice a night.

  Wes didn’t say anything until we got to the fire door. Then he spoke.

  “You look really pretty.”

  I didn’t know what to say so I just said, “Thank you.”

  “You always look really pretty.”

  “You’ve hardly ever even seen me,” I said. I didn’t know why I said that and the minute it was out of my mouth it sounded stupid.

  “I’ve seen you,” he said quietly.

  We just stood there by the door. No one else was around. It could have felt awkward but it didn’t.

  “I’ve seen you since the first day you got here. When Joey Eisenstadt helped carry your stuff upstairs. I was jealous he’d gotten you.”

  “Really? Why didn’t you ever talk to me? I mean if you were jealous.”

  He shrugged and turned his head away and I realized he was blushing.

  “I guess I was afraid you might turn me down.”

  “I wouldn’t have turned you down.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure. I mean why would I turn you down?”

  He let out a big sigh then and took my arm and put his other hand on the push bar.

  “You never know. Maybe you liked someone else?” He pushed the door and it swung open and cool air came in at us. It was almost dark, a clear night. Stars had begun to appear and I could see Venus bright and steady above the horizon.

  “Look,” I said and pointed to it. “It’s Venus. Planets don’t twinkle like stars because they’re not on fire.”

  “I’m glad you said ‘yes,’” he said.

  “Me too.”

  FOURTEEN

  Advice About Boys

  AFTER THAT SATURDAY, I KNEW IT WAS GOING TO BE REALLY hard to concentrate on my classes. At the dance, we were glued to each other. I kept peering around Wes to scope out Bleaker but she was like a hound sniffing at Juniper Barksdale and Curt Brosius, a mattress room regular. Juniper had on her tightest white sweater and black skirt combo. Skirts were mandated to come at least down to the crack at the back of your knees. Juniper’s was really pushing it. Bleaker had been known to stand outside the dining hall with a yardstick to measure skirt length and push at the hem to see if the knee crack at the back of a girl’s leg was fully covered.

  I didn’t want to dance with any of the boys I usually danced with just because they were good dancers. Wes was pretty good. But it was not the dancing that kept me by his side. It was the way I felt. And there was also the acceptance factor. Instead of standing around with the girls who were there alone, we were surrounded by other couples. Daria and Tim of course, but also the other senior and junior couples. And I was the only sophomore. It was like I’d been inducted into the most exclusive club on campus without having to apply at all. To be with Wes was simply to be accepted. I didn’t question it or doubt myself. I didn’t want to know why or how. I wanted to be next to him forever.

  At some point during one of the slow dances, I came out of my trancelike state and happened to glance toward the gym door. Standing to the side, neither inside nor outside, Moll stared at me from the shadows. She was still wearing the same clothes she’d had on when I saw her on my hall. She hadn’t taken off her glasses or even fixed her hair. She looked as if she’d just traveled from a long distance on foot, weary and dusty, needing both cleaning up and rest.

  I pulled away from Wes.

  “What’s wrong,” he asked and looked down into my eyes.

  “Nothing,” I said but not convincingly.

  “Yes there is.”

  If it’s possible to fall in love at fifteen—and I think it is— and all in one instant, that’s when it happened to me. Because no one had ever sensed when something was bothering me or even had the determination to push past my assurance that everything was all right. And here was Wes, without really knowing me at all, understanding that I was upset. He understood it even before I did.

  “It’s just Moll over there.” I nodded toward her.

  “What about her?”

  “I saw her before I left to meet you. She wanted to go to the dance so much and I told her she should come over.”

  “She looks kind of out of place,” he said.

  “She always looks that way. I feel sorry for her.”

  “Why?”

  “Because she’s so lost, I guess.” But it was more than that. It was about my mother, really, about having this built-in need to rescue someone because not being able to rescue my mother had created so much misery in my life. There are so many ways of being lost. On the outside, Moll appeared to be fixable while my mother, as far as I’d seen, was irretrievably broken.

  It wouldn’t be until much later in my life that I could sort out the conflicting feelings my mother engendered in me. I hated her at times, pitied her at times, raged at her at times, feared her at times, wistfully longed for her love at times, avoided her at times, circled back to seek comfort from her at times, listened to her at times, and tried not to hear her at times. Any desire I had to rescue my mother was subsumed into attempts to improve the lot of certain people I perceived as potentially redeemable. Moll fit into that mold and she must have, in some imperceptible way, sensed my need was as strong as her need to be fixed. And I fit right into the Quaker ethos. The world could be saved from itself through peace and love.

  “We could go talk to her,” Wes offered.

  At that moment the night’s deejay, actually one of the AV boys, the one with bad acne and a scrawny frame that seemed out of proportion to his height, put the needle down on A Teenager In Love. I pulled Wes onto the dance floor so we could take advantage, and I had a feeling it would be designated as “our” song. We danced as close as we dared until it was over, both of us singing the w
ords softly to each other.

  “Okay,” we held hands going off to the edge of the gym. “We can go talk to her now.”

  But when we looked around for her, she was gone. I forgot about it for the rest of the night. After the dance and the movie, we hung around the front porch of Fox with a bunch of other kids until the bell rang and it was time to go to our dorm rooms. The night had gotten chilly and we all huddled together, drawing out the few moments we had left to feel unencumbered by homework or tests or term papers detailing the rift between the Papal See and Henry the Eighth over his serial divorces and remarriages. In those last few minutes on the porch, we all felt nostalgia for that moment in time. Maybe it was the approaching winter, or our own sense that our youth would not last long. Whatever it was, I felt intensely happy and intensely sad at the same time.

  Wes gave me a soft brush of a kiss on the cheek and our hands separated.

  “See you tomorrow.”

  He squeezed my hand one last time before taking the steps down from the porch two at a time. He looked so happy and I felt it to be such a bittersweet moment although, if asked, I couldn’t have said why.