Dumplin' (15 page)

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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There are a few things—like the swimsuit segment—I didn't consider before signing up for the pageant. But what I really didn't prepare myself for was the group dance number.

Me, Millie, Amanda, and Hannah sit in a row against the back wall of Dance Locomotive, the only dance studio in Clover City. I know this doesn't look easy, but it can't be much harder than walking in choreographed circles.

My mom stands at the front of the room in a dance skirt, a leotard that's working a little too hard, super shimmery nude tights, and black character dance shoes. Flanking her are Mrs. Clawson, in her turquoise wind suit that swishes every time she breathes, and Mallory Buckley, in her white yoga pants and petal-pink sports bra. I catch my mom eyeing Mallory several times with the slightest bit of contempt, and it gives me a sick satisfaction.

Everyone is toned, tanned, bleached, and in matching workout gear. Whereas I wore the same pajama pants I slept in last night. Amanda in her soccer shorts and Millie in her matching sweat suit are slightly more prepared, but
Hannah rounds us out in black jeans and a black T-shirt.

“Let's stretch it out, ladies.” My mom sits down in front of us with her back to the mirror. Everyone falls into their preferred positions. Including Mrs. Clawson, who is doing standing windmills. Her face puffs red as she counts her breaths with each rotation. By some miracle, her perm doesn't move an inch.

My mom sits with the bottoms of her feet touching and her legs bent into a butterfly position. “This year's theme is “Texas: Ain't She Grand?”

“Yes,” mumbles Hannah, “because grammar is make-believe.”

Amanda laughs, and Millie kicks her in the shin with her tiny little Keds-wearing foot.

I reach forward to touch my toes, but my stomach and boobs stand between me and my thighs.

“At the end of rehearsal, you will each be assigned a Texas landmark to plan your opening number outfit around. Everyone is asked to wear a denim skirt, plaid shirt, and cowboy boots. Beyond that, you are welcome to create whatever you like in homage to your landmark. For example, if you were given our state flower, the blue bonnet, you could wear a headpiece made to look like blue bonnets. This is an opportunity for the judges to get a taste of your personality and see how well you do with an assigned task. Take advantage, ladies.”

Ellen sits in the front row with Callie, who is of course competing in the pageant. They wear matching workout gear with Sweet 16 stamped on their hips. We haven't
spoken in two entire weeks. The last time I went two weeks without talking to Ellen was when her parents rented an RV and took her up along the West Coast. I wrote her a letter every day she was gone and left them in her mailbox. I went mad without her, and when she got back, both of our moms let her spend the night for two nights in a row.

This is so much worse. Because she's right there. She's at the other end of the room, and if I call out to her, she won't answer. I've almost apologized so many times, but I've waited too long now. And a part of me still thinks—no, knows—I'm right.

We all stand up to learn the routine. Millie leans over, standing on her tiptoes, and says, “You should talk to her.”

“What are you talking about?”

She pushes up the sleeves of her sweatshirt. “Ellen.”

“Grapevines!” says my mom over the twangy music. “Five counts left. Five counts right. Bekah!” she calls. “Come up here, so the girls can see your technique.”

Bekah blushes, but obeys my mother. Just looking at her annoys me, and really I've got no good reason. She's good at everything. She's pretty, too. And she's humble.

I spend the next hour tripping over my feet, trying to keep up with the endless grapevines and turns as we all weave in and out of one another. I catch my mom watching me in the mirror as I trip over Amanda's platform shoe and have my ass handed to me by a hardwood floor. In the end, my mom was right to call Bekah forward, because she knows what the hell she's doing.

At the end of rehearsal, I am sweating in places that I
didn't know could sweat.

Millie's got this crazed look on her face and a huge sweat ring around her neck. “That was so cool,” she says. “What landmark did you get?”

I hold up the slip I drew from the bowl. “Cadillac Ranch.” A place I've only ever seen in pictures. Something you gotta understand about Texas is that it's freaking huge. I know tons of people who have never even left the state. I remember hearing that, depending on where you start, you could drive for a day and still be in Texas. “What about you?”

She grins. “The Stockyards. Up in Fort Worth.” Only Millie could turn a livestock market into a pageant-worthy headpiece. If her optimism were contagious, I'd be betting on myself to win this whole thing.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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I've heard that at bigger schools, dances aren't really a thing anymore. There are too many students, I guess. But, unfortunately for me, dances are very much alive and well at Clover City High. And, outside of prom, the hottest shit in town is the Sadie Hawkins Dance. Because a sister can't just ask a guy out like it's some normal thing, girls have gone to great lengths to make sure that their Sadie Hawkins proposition is the most elaborate.

Then three years ago Macy Palmer reinvented the wheel when she asked her boyfriend Simon to the dance by employing the Twelve Days of Christmas. I am not kidding. Every morning this kid came to school and was greeted by anything from three hens to twelve drummers drumming. And the guy was already her boyfriend! It's not like he suspected she'd ask someone else. (Let the record show that they both graduated. She was four months pregnant while he had one foot out the door thanks to a golf scholarship.)

After that, it was no longer acceptable to ask a guy to Sadie Hawkins by baking him a plate of cookies or by
wearing a T-shirt with his football number on the back. Now, not only do you have to muster the courage to ask a guy out in the first place, but you've got to do it with style.

Freshman year wasn't so bad because Ellen hadn't started dating Tim. Last year I faked sick. But this year, with everything that's happened, I don't notice the banners and the signs announcing ticket sales.

After a full five hours of walking through a minefield of Sadie Hawkins proposals—including a cheerleading pyramid during lunch—I have one hour to go. I slide into my desk next to Amanda.

She looks up from her phone. “So did you ask anyone?”

“No. You?”

She shakes her head. “Nah. I figure let the chips fall where they may and see who's left tomorrow. I wouldn't bother, but we're gonna have to ask a guy to escort us at the pageant. Might as well cross two things off my list.”

I drop my head into my hands and moan. I forgot about the escorts. My desk jolts like someone's kicked it. I whip around to see Bo walking to his seat at the back of the class.

I secretly love seeing him like this, in the clothes he chooses each morning from his closet. I wonder if he's deliberate. Or if he's one of those people who gets dressed in the dark because mornings are such a total violation. Or maybe he gets up super early and goes for a run or eats eggs or some other thing that morning people do.

Or maybe it's none of your business anymore
, I tell myself.

“Millie asked Malik. From the newspaper,” says Amanda. “He's kind of hot if you can get past the unibrow.
Or if you think unibrows are hot.”

I turn back to her, grateful for the distraction, but suddenly very conscious of exactly how I'm sitting. Maybe if I sit up straighter, my back fat will disappear.

“How'd she do it?”

She laughs. “She sang to him. With a ukulele.”

I cringe with embarrassment for her. Everyone probably laughed. “What happened?” I whisper.

“Well, he said yes.” She says it like,
Duh, why would he not?

“Wait. Seriously?”

“He's doing the pageant thing, too. It was sweet. And he kissed her on the cheek. More action than I've seen.”

Class drones on and I wonder how much of a jerk it makes me to expect that Millie would've been humiliated. If she had asked my opinion beforehand, I would've told her what a sweet idea it was, but I would've done everything in my power to stop her from going through with it. And it's not that I don't think she deserves to go to the dance and have an escort. I just don't want her to be the butt of anyone's joke. I would never wish that on anyone. And, yet, Millie's been there. She's been the punch line.

But there she is, doing her thing, not giving a toot what anyone else thinks.

It almost hurts to know that she's putting herself out there so fearlessly. It's like seeing an old friend you've drifted from and remembering all the shared experiences you used to have.

Class lets out and I'm pushed out the door in a current
of students. I can hear Bo talking back and forth with José Herrera about calculus and then about a party.

In the hallway, a wall of girls stops us. They stand with their hands joined, like a game of Red Rover.

“Sorry for the delay,” one of them says.

“This will only take a minute,” adds another.

Bekah Cotter stands behind the row of girls in a pair of tiny denim shorts, gold flats, and an oversized white T-shirt that's been tied into a knot at the small of her back. In iron-on letters the shirt reads
Go to Sadie Hawkins with me . . .
She spins a baton between her fingers, waiting for the crowd to settle.

Amanda stands behind me, bouncing on her toes. “Just looking at those shorts gives me a wedgie.”

Bekah takes one deep breath and, without announcing herself, she spins the baton in the air, throwing it over her shoulder and catching it as she does gymnastics so sharp and quick you can barely keep up with her. It's amazing, and still, it's nothing nearly as involved as I've seen her do at football games. Her pageant talent is going to kill.

She throws the baton in the air and does some sort of crazy spinning flip, then she lands with her back to us and catches the baton as it's about to hit the floor. With her ass in the air, it's clear who she's asking to the dance. On each pocket of her denim shorts, in glitter paint, are the letters
B
and
O
.

The guys from World History push him up to the front of the crowd. He smirks and I can barely watch him as Bekah takes his hand. Bo glances to his side, and I know
he sees me. But there's no second for decision or thought. He nods. And now they're Bekah and Bo. Bo and Bekah.

I push Amanda out of the way and move against the flow of students heading for the parking lot. Keeping my eyes on the ground, I watch the sea of feet until I've found a bathroom. I sink down to my knees and dig through my backpack, looking for something. My phone? A grenade?

At the bottom of my bag is a permanent marker. I uncap it and, like the totally sane person I am, begin to write on my face.

I didn't actually consider the logistics of getting from point A to point B when I was scribbling across my face. After looking myself over in the mirror, I realize that there is no turning back. Even if I want to. I guess it's called permanent marker for a reason.

Walking to the parking lot as quickly as I can, I flip my hair over my head like Cousin Itt and rely on whatever sight I have through the strands, praying to Baby Jesus that I don't get hit by a car.

And there he is. Walking to his car.

“Mitch!” I yell. “Mitch!”

This is a bad idea. I think it's actually safe to say that all my ideas are bad ideas.

He turns. “Will?” Deep concern lines his face. “Did something happen? Are you okay?”

When I'm within a few steps, I flip my hair back, letting him see my face.

His concern fades into confusion. “snikwaH eidaS ot
oG?”

“Shit,” I say. “I wrote it in the mirror.”

He glances down, trying to hide his smile from me as he twists his toe in the gravel.

“So you wanna?” I ask. “Go to Sadie Hawkins?”

“I don't know.” His cheeks swell. He's a boy struck with relief because I haven't forgotten his birthday. I am a hideous person. “Are you gonna wear a dress?”

“Are you?”

He slips his hands into his pockets. “Yeah, I'll go with you.” He reaches forward and rubs my forehead with his thumb. “That's permanent, isn't it?”

“Forever,” I say.

His eyes flood with light.

I should've added, “As friends.”
Go to Sadie Hawkins as friends?
But it's too late now. I won't ruin this for him, though I worry I might have only done it for me.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

It's Friday night and I'm spread out on the couch watching a daytime talk show I'd recorded about second cousins claiming to be telepathic.

Mom's in the kitchen dyeing a tablecloth for the judges' table.

The announcer on the television show gives the cousins some kind of test, asking them questions they should be able to answer with their “abilities.” The first twin goes fifty-fifty and blames it on the time zone change and her jet lag from flying in from Louisiana to New York.

When the show goes to commercial, my mom sits down on the love seat and unhooks her apron from around her neck. “Woo,” she says. “Gotta let that sit for a bit.” She picks the remote up and mutes it.

“Wait,” I say. “Pause it. I don't want to accidentally see what happens.”

She fumbles with the remote for a minute before passing it to me to pause. “Let's talk for a minute.”

This is going to be about the pageant, and how I'm not taking it seriously enough. Or how she thinks I'm going to
embarrass myself somehow.

“Since Lucy passed, we haven't had her disability coming in.”

So
not what I was expecting.

“And her life insurance wasn't much, but it was floating us these last few months.”

I sit up. It takes me a moment for my vision to adjust. “Are we selling the house?”

“No, no. Nothing like that. This place is paid off in a few years. I think I can make things work until then. I don't want you worrying about that.”

“Okay . . .”

“But I can't afford to get your car fixed.”

There it is. My heart sinks. I know it's stupid to worry about something like a car when there are obviously other things like food and utilities to think about. Especially when we don't technically need that car. But that little red thing is my freedom in physical form. Clover City feels even smaller and more removed without my Jolene.

“I'm sorry, baby.”

“How much is it going to cost?”

“About three thousand dollars.”

I nod. That's at least a year of working at the Chili Bowl.

“Maybe we can start a little jar? Like, throw the day's pocket change in.”

I lie back down, and hit play on the TV. If I were a better daughter, I would tell her it's fine and that I understand. I may not be the daughter she expected, but she never lets me go without.

The cousins are back on. Audience members laugh quietly as they so obviously get question after question wrong.

My mom stands and pulls the apron back over her neck.

Before heading to bed, I sit down at my desk in my room with Riot curled into a pile in my lap. My emails are mostly junk mail, but buried beneath that is one from Lucy's address.

My stomach twists like a corkscrew. I open the email.

But it's spam. Some piece of junk about interest rates.

I sit back in my chair and let my body exhale. If I'm getting junk mail from my dead aunt, then maybe other people are, too.

I log out of my account. It takes a few tries, but I finally guess her password.
DUMBBLONDE9
. One of her favorite Dolly songs and her favorite number. I'm about to shut down her account, but I find myself distracted by the months of messages just sitting here. This in-box full of unopened messages is the truest reminder that we are temporary fixtures in a permanent world.

I click through a few. There's nothing that really catches my eye until the fifth page. The subject line reads: DOLLY PARTON NIGHT.