Hello Groin (25 page)

“Uh-uh,” said Danny. “I’m going to be like Cam, the guy who ties little girls’ shoes. But hey, Dyl—what’s the big secret about
Foxfire
and
The Once and Future King
? Why don’t you just tell everyone they’re the censored titles?”

Right away I got a quick breathy feeling in my chest. But then I thought,
Get a grip, Goofus. This is just Danny. He’s not out to get you
.

“D’you know what
Foxfire
is about?” I asked.

Danny shook his head.

“Okay,” I said, taking a deep breath. “It’s about a gang of girls in the fifties, who do a Robin Hood thing and start robbing the rich to help the poor. We studied it this year in English. And, well, a lot of kids think the girls in the story are dykes.”

Danny’s eyes widened. “And you put
that
title,” he said softly, then paused. “Well...you know where.”

I shrugged. “Yeah,” I said, grinning slightly. “And then Brennan saw it and flipped.”

Danny whistled softly. “No wonder Len howled when I said
Foxfire
,” he said. “It was as if he’d struck pure gold.”

A sinking feeling took over my gut. “Yeah, I know,” I said dully.

Danny studied my face quietly. “Well, why did you do it?” he asked. “You must’ve known something like this could happen.”

I shrugged again. “You have to read the book,” I said. “It’s awesome, it made me feel like I could do things, be someone important. I mean, those girls thought for themselves and did what they thought was right. What does it matter if they were dykes or straights? Why does that matter?”

Danny shrugged back. “Okay,” he said agreeably. “I’ll read it. Have you got a copy?”

“Yeah,” I said, turning toward my room. “I’ve got my copy from English. I’ll get it for you. And Danny...”

I paused, looking back at him. “I’m really
really
sorry for jumping you like that,” I said fervently. “I should’ve known better.”

Danny nodded slowly. “Now you do,” he said, his dark eyes holding mine.

“Yeah,” I said, taking a quick breath. “I do.”

After giving Danny my copy of
Foxfire
, I went to my room, sat down on the bed and stared at the phone. As usual, my heart was doing its kick-ass thing, and my brain felt like the bell of doom, repeatedly tolling out a single thought:
LEN, LEN, LEN
. I mean, I had to call him, it was obvious. No way could I let what he did to Danny pass without comment, and no way did I want to have to make that comment to him in front of a watching audience at the Dief.

Slowly I reached for the phone, and just as slowly I pulled my hand back.
No point in rushing things
, I thought grimly. Not until I had what I wanted to say really clear in my mind.

Hugging myself tightly, I tried to figure out what that was, but the only thing my brain seemed to be picking up on was the megasonic thud of my heart. And the longer I sat, trying to come up with something specifically brilliant to say to Len, the more megasonic my heart became.

It’s kind of a dykish thing to do, isn’t it?
I remembered him saying while Julie grinned at me smugly.
I mean, for
you
to do.

Even though it was just a memory, my cheeks burned. It wasn’t so much what Len had said that was the problem now, it was the way he’d said it—so matter of fact and conclusive. As if there was no argument about it, the situation was case closed and nothing I could do, say or
feel
would ever change anything. And what
made things worse was the fact that, technically speaking, his accusation had been correct. Len Schroeder was the one who’d told the truth today at lunch, and I was the one who’d lied. But that didn’t give him the right to attack my brother. Danny had been standing up for me whether I deserved it or not, and now it was my turn to do the same for him. Because there was no question about it—
he
deserved it.

Hands shaking, I picked up my address book and flipped to Len’s name. Then I dialed his number. On the fourth ring his mom answered and called him to the phone. Footsteps thudded in the background, I heard a mumbled “Thanks” as Len picked up the phone, and then he was breathing into the mouthpiece.

“Hello,” he said.

“This is Dylan,” I said, fighting a tremble in my voice. “Dylan Kowolski. As in Danny Kowolski’s older sister.”

There was a pause at the other end of the line and then Len said carefully, “I know who you are, Dylan.”

“Good,” I said, trying to ride out the massive slam-hammering of my heart. “Because I want you to know exactly who’s saying this to you and why. Listen closely. If you
ever
go near my brother again, I will tell everyone in the entire fucking Dief that you told Danny to eat your dick. Just before one of your buddies practically twisted his arm off, that is. You got that, Len?”

He breathed in and out, in and out. “Yeah,” he said finally. “I’ve got it.”

Takes one to know one
, I thought, staring at the phone in my hand.
A coward, that is
.

I hung up. Then I just sat there for a while, staring at nothing while a hugeness raged around inside me. It wasn’t anything I could define, just a gigantic kind of energy, roaring away—a mix of gladness and sadness, pride, fear and absolute hysteria, making me feel ten times my actual body size.

Well, I thought grimly, at least one thing was clear. In spite of all the twisted crap going on in my life, my heart wasn’t stuck living inside
The Egyptian Book of the Dead
anymore.

With a tiny crouching smile, I went downstairs to help with supper.

The following morning was pretty much like the previous one, a
hello-how-are-you-I’m-fine-see-you-later
bike ride to school with Joc, then three endless hours in class, watching the wall clocks go round. Finally the lunch bell rang, and I headed to the library to do my weekly volunteer shift.

“There you are, Dylan,” said Ms. Fowler as I walked up to the check-out desk. “I’m so glad you’re on time. I have a meeting with the tutoring club in my office at twelve, and most of them are already here.”

“No prob,” I said. “No detention today—I haven’t been kissing any doors lately.”

Flashing me a small grin, Ms. Fowler went into her office, and I took up position behind the desk. The library was the usual scene—kids yakking over the tops of study carrels, the fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. Crouched down beside a filing cart, I was heavily involved in the alphabetizing process when someone let out a low whistle behind me. Turning, I saw Dikker standing on the other side of the check-out desk, holding a book.

“Hey, Dylan,” he grinned, setting it on the counter. “Sign me out this book, pronto.”

Reluctantly I got to my feet, swiveled the book around and looked at the title:
The Stage in Shakespeare’s Time
. “You can’t be serious,” I said. “This book has words in it, lots of them.”

“Mr. Tyrrell sent me down to get it for him,” Dikker shrugged. “Anyway, don’t pick on me. I’m already bleeding.”

“Bleeding?” I said, surprised at his plaintive tone. “Why? Did the book give you a paper cut?”

A bewildered look crossed Dikker’s face. “Paper cut!” he said. “Come on—more like my heart. It’s been three days and I’m still hemorrhaging.”

“Hemorrhaging?” I repeated. Now it was my turn to look confused. “Why would you be hemorrhaging?”

Dikker’s jaw dropped, and then he said, “She didn’t tell you? But you two are like glue.”

“No,” I said, swallowing hard. “She hasn’t told me, whatever it is.”

“She dumped me,” Dikker said flatly. “Last Saturday night. I haven’t talked to her since.”

Stunned, I stood staring at him while he stared back at me. “Oh,” I said finally, then got myself into gear, signed out his book and handed it over.

“Did she...happen to say why?” I asked cautiously.

“Not really,” said Dikker, taking the book. “Just that she wanted to think about things for a while. I dunno, stuff like that.” He looked around helplessly. “What’s there to think about all of a sudden? We went out for a year and a half without thinking. In that whole time I didn’t cheat on her, I swear I never cheated on her once. So why would she be gung-ho for me one day and suddenly break up with me the next?”

Again we stood staring at each other, except this time my eyes kept flicking to the display case behind him.

“I don’t know,” I said finally. “Like I said, Joc hasn’t talked to me about it.”

“Weird,” said Dikker. He sighed heavily, then gave me a lopsided grin. “‘The frailty of women,’” he quoted emphatically.

“Yeah right,” I said. “Joc is hardly Ophelia. No way would
you catch her drowning herself over some turd who treated her the way Hamlet treated Ophelia.”

For a moment Dikker just stood there blinking at me. “Okay,” he said, “but it’s still a great line. And here’s another one.”

Staggering backward with one hand pressed to his heart, he said, “‘What should fellows as I do crawling between earth and heaven?’”

Hamlet
seemed to be perking him up quite rapidly. With a half-grin, I said, “Watch out for broken glass, I guess.”

Slowly Dikker lowered his hand, his playfulness vanishing. “I really would’ve thought she’d’ve told you,” he said. “She was always closer to you than me. It bugged me, that thing between you two, as if the rest of the world was just...well, extra.”

His eyes held my face for a moment, as if trying to read something in it, and then he turned and walked out of the library. Watching him go, I almost called after him, but then I thought,
What could I tell him? I’m the last person who would know what Joc is thinking.

At that moment the door to Ms. Fowler’s office opened, and the tutoring club came pouring out. On their heels, Ms. Fowler walked up to the check-out desk and said, “Thank you so much, Dylan. You’re one of my most reliable volunteers. I don’t suppose...”

Hesitantly she glanced at the display case. “Well,” she added wistfully, “you haven’t been struck with a genius idea for next month’s display, have you?”

“Uh
no
,” I said, aiming for a tone between definite and polite. Another display was absolutely the last thing I needed right now. Glancing at the infamous construction-paper silhouettes, I studied them for about the zillionth time, and that was when it hit me. The three titles Ms. Fowler had put in the girl’s groin—
To Kill A Mockingbird
,
Stranger In A Strange Land
and
The Farthest Shore
—she’d chosen them for a reason. They were a kind of code, clues that said something about
her
.

I wanted to ask her then, oh how I wanted to ask her straight out. Instead, I went at it deviously.

“Ms. Fowler,” I asked. “Are you married?”

“No,” she said, giving me a startled glance. “No, I never have been.”

“Do you have kids?” I asked.

A brief sadness passed through her face, and she shook her head. “No,” she said quietly. “I don’t.”

“Are you happy?” I asked, watching her carefully.

“Happy?” she repeated, as if astounded. “I don’t know about
happy
.” Eyes narrowed, she stared off across the library. “I don’t know if I would say life is about being happy, Dylan,” she said finally. “But I’m alive, and aware, and learning. And yes, every now and then I am actually happy.”

For a moment we just looked at each other, a kind of unspoken meaning there in the air between us. Then Ms. Fowler gave a small shrug and said, “It’s the seventeenth of October, and I’m going to have to put up a new display soon. Put on your thinking cap and see if you can come up with another brilliant idea, why don’t you?”

“Maybe,” I said cautiously. “I’ll think about it.”

And we left it at that.

Chapter Twenty-one

When I got to English after lunch, I put on my best terminally bored expression, dropped into my seat and tried to glance casually at Joc. But instead of glancing back, she continued to sit, eyes closed, and leaned against the wall with an equally terminally bored expression on her face.
I am stuck here in neutral for the rest of my life
—the thought was written all over her. And my having just walked into the room obviously hadn’t changed that for her. Last Thursday afternoon was beginning to look more and more like something that belonged in a parallel universe.

Holding up my copy of
1984,
I said, “You’ve read half of this already? What’s happened to your love life?”

Joc’s terminally bored expression didn’t waver. Looking me dead in the eye, she said, “I get Dikker to read it to me. Then I can pay attention.”

“Oh,” I said weakly, my eyes flicking away. Then, of course, I got hit with another neurotic power blush.

Blushing!
I thought furiously.
Why the hell am
I
blushing?
I’m
not the one lying here
.

Grimly I forced my gaze back to Joc’s to find her still watching me, her eyes tired and dull-looking, but with something
glimmering in behind the dullness. I had to hand it to her—of the two of us, she was the much better faker.

“You mean he’s not quoting
Hamlet
at you anymore?” I asked, watching for a change in her expression, a brief flicker in her gaze, but she just shrugged.

“I wanted to tell you,” she said coolly. “I’ve decided to start walking to school in the morning. I’m getting fat and I need the exercise.”

Panic hit me full force. “What d’you mean?” I asked, my voice going up into a squeak. “The last thing you are is fat. I wish I was as thi—”

“Dikker said I was,” Joc said flatly, cutting me off. Again, her gaze didn’t waver, but mine did. I mean, in all the years that I’d known Joc, I’d never figured she would flat out lie to me. And I had the feeling she knew that I knew she was lying. So how come
I
was the one who felt guilty about it?

“Okay,” I said helplessly. And then, because there didn’t seem to be anything else to say, I turned around in my desk and sat facing the front of the room. The clock over the door stood at two minutes to one, and all across the classroom kids were yakking, getting in that last bit of gossip before the bell went. Even Mr. Cronk was talking to a couple of front-row keeners at his desk. Usually Joc and I were the last ones to break off conversation when the bell rang, in fact it was probably more realistic to say that we never actually broke off talking, just took a few breathers here and there. But today, as the last minute ran down on the clock, we sat side by side, deadly quiet. Never before had I realized how lonely air could feel.