Keep Holding On (17 page)

“Did you know that Roy G. Biv was an actual dude?” Ms. Scofield inquires.

“I don’t think that’s right,” Jolene says. Her hair is so shiny I need sunglasses.

“An actual dude,” Ms. Scofield insists, “who had a cat.”

“What was the cat’s name?” Warner asks.

“CAT.”

“He named his cat Cat?”

“Of course.” Ms. Scofield writes CAT on the board. “Colors All There. Get it?”

We stare.

“Because Roy G. Biv represents all colors of the visible light spectrum.”

We groan.

“Not your best effort, miss,” Jolene remarks snottily.

“Oh, am I extra corny today? My bad. It must be all the excitement of Fun Fizzycks Friday.”

Warner snorts.

“Moving on!” Ms. Scofield says, unfazed. “What color is Ali’s shirt?”

We all look at Ali. Ali turns red.

Darby says “pink” at the same time Simon says “magenta.”

“I’d say it’s magenta, too,” Ms. Scofield agrees. “But the wild
thing is? None of us is seeing the exact shade of color as everyone else. We’re all seeing that shade of magenta a little bit differently. Depending on where you’re sitting and the way light is reflecting off Ali’s shirt, every other color in the visible spectrum is being absorbed except for that one particular wavelength of light that is magenta. It’s just that we’re all perceiving magenta differently.”

That’s so weird. I always thought everyone was seeing the same colors. I mean, sometimes I think about how I’m seeing things differently from everyone else because I’m the only one looking at everything from my eyes. Every other person in this room is seeing a different configuration of the room. They’re seeing me in a way I can’t. The more you think about perception like that, the weirder it gets. But I was hoping we could all count on colors to be the same.

“Which means!” Ms. Scofield tings Lloyd. “That no two people can see the world in the same way. No matter what you’re looking at, no one is seeing it the same way you are. Fascinating!”

So it’s not just about differences in personality and character and beliefs. We all see the world differently on a physical level. Is it such a stretch to conclude that everyone will always have differences and, therefore, we’ll never all agree on any one thing?

We have to do an activity in pairs. Ali and I scootch our desks together.

“Aren’t you happy you wore that shirt today?” I ask her.

“Extremely. I probably turned as magenta as my shirt.”

“No, you didn’t,” I say. Even though she kind of did.

I go over to the materials bench to get what we need. The activity is on reflection and refraction. I fill a clear carrying container with lenses, prisms, blocks, diffraction gratings, and some of those sample color strips from the paint store. Then I take everything back to Ali.

Working with her shouldn’t feel awkward. We’re a pair in here by choice and we’ve done stuff outside of school before. But as she reads the procedure out loud and I set up the materials, I feel guilty. Ali has asked me over a few times this year. But I always tell her I can’t. Ali gets bullied way worse than I do. Carly and Warner and those guys would make my life even more of a living nightmare if Ali and I became better friends.

We’re finishing the activity when Ms. Scofield yells over everyone that we have five minutes left. As I put our materials back in the container, I’m hoping Ali won’t ask me to come over.

“Do you want to do something after school?” she asks.

“I can’t. I have plans with Sherae.”

“She’s awesome. It would be fun to hang out with her sometime.”

I know how desperate Ali is for a friend. I know how much it would mean to her. And still I can’t go down that road to even more torture.

I really, really hate myself sometimes.

I get nervous when Sherae comes over. I’m always worried that she’ll see something I don’t want her to. But this is an emergency.

Hector went up to Sherae again after school. She still wouldn’t talk to him. He was like, “You can talk to me here or you can talk to me at your house, because that’s where I’m going to wait for you.” So I said she could come over and hide out for as long as she wanted. We have at least two hours before mother gets home. Even if Sherae is still here by then, it should be okay. Mother usually puts on her Normal Mom Act in front of other people.

My room is Humiliation Central compared to Sherae’s. But it’s not like we can hang out anywhere else. The living room is grungy and there’s a stack of overdue notices from bill collectors on the table. Sherae never cares about my dingy room, though. She gets on my bed and props my pillows up against the wall. I’m relieved that I saved my old floor pillow from when I was little so I have somewhere to sit.

“Why does he keep bothering me?” Sherae says. “Why can’t he just leave me alone?”

“Maybe he’s afraid you’re going to report him.”

“According to him, there’s nothing to report. He doesn’t even know why I’m mad.”

“Why don’t you tell him?”

“Seriously? He should
know
.” Sherae picks up our latest cootie catcher from my night table. She pulls it open to see if I finished it.

“I hate that you have to go through this,” I tell her.

“I hate it more.” Sherae starts to say something else, but suddenly she’s crying. The crying quickly gets worse. I run to the bathroom to see if mother got more tissues. Of course she didn’t. But there’s a box in her room. I grab it.

I sit on my bed next to Sherae while she cries. I wish I knew how to comfort her. Should I be saying things like, “It will be okay” in a soft voice, like they do in movies? Should I be rubbing her back or something? I never know what to do.

I just sit with her, holding the tissue box.

Sherae needs to know she’s not alone. Everything I rehearse saying to her in my head sounds lacking. But there is one thing I could do. I could try to make her feel better about her life by opening up about mine. Maybe if she heard all the things I’ve been so ashamed to admit, she’d feel less alone. And the truth is, the pressure of hiding everything from my best friend is crushing me. I want to tell her everything. I
need
to tell her everything.

“This might make you feel better,” I begin.

When mother comes home, she doesn’t even bother putting on her Normal Mom Act. It’s like she somehow knows I’ve just spent the last hour telling Sherae every nasty thing about her.

“Are those my tissues?” mother accuses.

“We needed them,” I retaliate. It’s so stupid that I even have to explain about a box of tissues. Shouldn’t they be
our
tissues? How messed up is it that the woman hoards basic household supplies?

They say that parents should be role models. That you should look up to them and follow their example of who to be.

I use mother as an example of who
not
to be.

Sherae stopped crying a long time ago. She’s looking at mother flatly.

“I’m not cooking,” mother broadcasts like this is an unprecedented
event. “You girls can make yourselves something if you want.”

I love the “if you want” part. Like, you know, just in case you might want dinner tonight. You can make something. In our kitchen that has no food.

“Actually?” Sherae says. “We were just leaving. Come on, Noelle.”

This is news to me.

Sherae drives us to our favorite diner. I love it here. The old-school neon signs for the Carnegie Deli and Hostess CupCakes and The Donut Pub. The constant flux of strangers who never judge us. Even the floor tiles are cool. Maybe if every night were Fun Diner Night the whole school thing would be remotely tolerable.

Right after we score our usual window booth, I notice the old lady who’s always here, eating her cantaloupe. She’s always at a two-seater booth. She’s always alone. And she always gets half a cantaloupe. I’ve heard her ordering it before. She’s very particular. Her cantaloupe must meet certain color and firmness criteria. She always looks relieved when the cantaloupe arrives. As if maybe the waitress is going to come back and report that a random hooligan just snatched the last one.

Is that what life comes down to after all your friends have died and your kids are far away living their own lives? Sitting all alone in a diner, eating cantaloupe?

I am so, so thankful that I have Sherae.

We decide that we’re starving and must get vast quantities of food. We order club sandwiches with about ten million sides.
Sherae insists she’s treating. I’ll totally surprise her next time by being the one to treat.

“I’m glad you told me about your mom and everything,” she says.

“I should have told you a long time ago. It’s just … so humiliating.”

The waitress puts our drinks in front of us. I say thank you.

“Were you surprised?” I ask Sherae.

“By what you told me?”

I nod, sipping my cherry soda.

“Mostly, yeah. But I already knew some of it.”

“Like what?”

“Well … I didn’t know your mom was insane about laundry, but I knew you ran out of socks a lot.”

“Is that why you put those rainbow stripy socks in my gift bag for my birthday?” A bus boy (actually a middle-aged dude) passes by with a pile of plates. He drops a fork. I pick it up for him.

“It just seemed like you needed more socks. Now I know why.”

Before I can ask what else she knew, I stop myself. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is that Sherae knew more than I thought. Now I realize that she’s been doing little things all along to help me without being obvious about it. When I thought she was giving me her old laptop and printer because she got new ones for Christmas, she was actually trying to help me. I guess there are some things you just can’t cover up. No matter how hard you try.

Our plates and baskets of food arrive. We forget to talk for a minute. Emotional exhaustion always makes us hungry.

“I can’t believe the way your mom treats you,” Sherae says. “I’m so sorry she’s like that. If my mom treated me that way, I’d hate her.”

It’s such a relief that Sherae understands. Everyone says how it’s impossible to hate your mother. They’re all,
But she’s your mother.
Like that’s supposed to mean something. And maybe it should. But when a parent isn’t taking care of you, I think you get to choose what your relationship will become. You can choose to be suffocated. Or you can find a way to keep breathing.

It’s cake time. Sherae and I always get cake and coffee for dessert at the diner. But they’re out of the cake we like. We consider pie instead.

The waitress shakes her head at this. She leans in conspiratorially.

“Get the coffee cake,” she advises. “It’s fresh.”

“Sold,” Sherae says.

“Hey,” I go. “We’re not just having coffee and cake. We’re having coffee cake!”

This cracks us up for no reason. We have successfully transitioned the Worst Day Ever into Fun Diner Night. We rule.

Banner in main
hallway, metallic red with blue lettering:

WE ARE WHAT WE THINK.—
BUDDHA

Why does gym always have to come along and ruin everything?

My day was actually looking up. Simon brought his usual packed lunch tray to lit mag for everyone, but we were the only ones there. I didn’t have to share the mac and cheese or anything else. I even forgot about my hair for five minutes.