Stereotype (7 page)

I run into Graham’s mother while I’m walking down to Sarah’s. Mrs – sorry, “Anna, call me Anna” – O’Brien. Considering there’s all of ten metres between my house and Sarah’s, it’s surprising I see her at all.

I happen to like Anna, despite the intensely obnoxious nature of her son. She, after all, has no idea what an asshole she’s raised, and I think she always secretly hoped that I’d become Graham’s girlfriend and eventually wife and mother of her grandchildren, and so on.

We do the hi-how-are-you exchange, followed by a don’t-you-look-lovely-where-are-you-off-to on her part, followed by an explanation from me, followed by an oh-enjoy-yourself.

She says goodbye and walks off, weighed down with green bags from Superquinn. I think about her going home and telling Graham that she was talking to me.

I imagine Graham filling her up with lies about what a horrible person I am. Funny that I care more about what his mom thinks of me than what he does. Then again, I have a tendency to seek approval from authority figures and/or role models. It’s part of my insecurity complex.

I try to present myself as a quiet-but-polite girl to adults, an intelligent and reasonable teenager. This obviously excludes my parents and anyone who actually knows me well, because fooling them would be impossible. Not that my parents know me that well, but still.

I wonder what Anna would think of me if she saw the scars on my arm. Recent, still red, still painful. Considering it makes me feel uneasy. I don’t want anyone to find out what a mess I am, I realise slowly in something akin to an epiphany.

Obviously I am nowhere near as messed up as the kids who have
real
problems. You know what? I hate that term. “Real” problems. Who defines what’s real and what’s not? It’s a real problem if it involves death, abuse or illness, but not real if it involves anything else? Real if you’ve got a prescription for Prozac, not real if you just don’t want to go out to a party? You’re only allowed complain if you have a real problem, but if it’s just melodramatic teen angst, forget about it. It’s not important. You are irrelevant.

I am irrelevant and I hate it. Surprise, surprise.

I find myself thinking of that debate in Irish during the party. The one about the uniforms. One advantage that we never mentioned was their ability to hide just how skinny some people are so that the not-so-skinny people can feel a little better.

I’m also reminded of why I hate colour days. Well, in a way I love getting to wear my own clothes into school, but in another way I hate the fact that all the thin people wear clothes to emphasise that and I’m left feeling rather elephant-like.

And it’s ridiculous because on a good day I know that I’ve got a relatively good figure. Maybe not wonderful, but it’s not that bad.

I just hate the way that everyone else seems to be prettier, thinner, better than me. I don’t want to compete with anyone. It’s pointless.

Everyone else has make-up plastered on, too. Well, the girls do. The guys – for the most part – don’t. I’m wearing a little eye shadow and tinted lip-balm. I feel severely inferior.

I think most of the girls here are from school, although I’m not sure. I don’t know that many of the Fifth Years. It’s not like Sarah has parties regularly. Or ever. Not like this. Not with the loud music and people spilling out into the back garden. Sarah’s sister is upstairs, locked away in her room. Their parents are away for the weekend and she’s supposed to be in charge and not let any wild parties be thrown. Because she’s the desperately “good” type – sort of like Rebecca The Annoying Optimist – they know they can trust her to keep things under control.

Which is why she’s made Sarah promise to clean up thoroughly tomorrow morning. Fiona and I are staying over to help, on the condition that anyone throwing up is
her
responsibility.

Fiona, I notice, is doing a wonderful job of mingling. I am the wallflower, watching – and utterly bored. I don’t know most of these people. I hate parties. Why am I here?

I could just hide out in Sarah’s room until everyone leaves. Read a book, watch TV, escape from
this.

I hate drunk people. I think I inherited this from my non-alcohol-drinking parents, who are always the designated drivers at an event, the sober people who end up taking care of the ones who can barely walk. Now I know how they feel, surrounded by incoherent idiots.

The party has barely begun, so not everyone has reached that stage just yet, but a lot of people were drinking before they arrived. That annoys me too. I mean, what’s the point? (Oh, God, I’m turning into my parents. Help!)

I go into the kitchen to get another glass of water, debating whether or not to follow the “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em” rule and go for a Smirnoff Ice instead.

Sarah is sitting on the table with someone who I presume to be Shane. He looks vaguely familiar, and I can remember watching
American Pie
with him and Sarah at her house.

“Abi! Having fun?” she asks.

I shrug. “Yeah, I suppose so.”

“Hey, Abi,” Shane says.

“Hi,” I smile. Behold, ladies and gentlemen, my amazing conversational skills!

Awkward silence. To have something to do, I get my drink. (I choose to “join ’em” and take a bottle of Smirnoff Ice. Total rebel, that’s me.)

“So, this is awkward,” grins Sarah.

Shane and I laugh. Then silence again.

“That was meant to break the ice,” Sarah says pointedly.

“Oh! Have you guys come up with a name for the band yet?” I ask.

“Still throwing around ideas,” says Shane.

“No,
you’re
throwing around big words,” Sarah tells him.

He shrugs, grinning.

I look at him. He’s not in typical rocker attire. Just jeans, and a semi-loose but not excessively baggy plain black t-shirt. I’m somewhat impressed by the non-statement he’s making.

He also happens to be quite attractive, if you were wondering.

Chapter Thirty-Two

Shane, Sarah and I do the small-talk thing for a couple of minutes; then he leaves to go talk to his friends.

She watches him, fondly, as he walks away. “He’s great, isn’t he?”

“Yeah.” He’s got a fantastic smile, anyway. How much can you tell about a person from the minimal amount of interaction we’ve had? I know that he’s into music, and I know that he laughed at
American Pie
. In other words, nothing that distinguishes him from everyone else of his age and gender.

I wonder what he’d think if he saw my scars, and whether he’s the sheltered “why would you do that?” type or the hardened “yeah, so what?” type.

And it doesn’t matter, anyway, because that’s not me. That’s not who I am. I’m never going to do it ever again, because I don’t
want
to be the poor-little-attention-seeking girl. People like that sicken me. I hate them.

I am just going to be normal. Well, not
normal
normal. I mean, my motto is the title of that Avril Lavigne song, ‘Anything But Ordinary’. I don’t want to be normal, but a touch of normality couldn’t hurt. I could live with being creative and wacky. I would
love
to be thought of as creative and wacky.

Instead of, you know, weird, freaky and definitely abnormal. Not to mention ugly. Looks compensate for so much in this world. Take Ciara in my class. She’s quiet and mousy and has been getting up to all kinds of crazy things this year, like doing her homework and handing in projects on time. But she’s pretty and skinny and looks
right
, so she fits in with Hannah and Leanne and Tina and everyone.

I
ache
to be thought of as pretty. It’s blatantly unfair that people like Tina get to be attractive and slim when they do nothing but complain about how hideous they are and spend half their lives in the gym trying to perfect their figure.

And yeah, I know what you’re thinking. “But Abi, maybe it’s just that
everyone
hates the way they look, and I’m sure
they
think that
you’re
pretty.”

The world would be a wonderful place if it actually worked that way, but it doesn’t. Welcome to reality. Some people are attractive. Some are not. I fall into the second category.

I do, however, know when to use
you’re
and
your
in essays, something which a significant percentage of my class still haven’t mastered.

(Sorry. Feeling inferior makes me bitchy.)

Sarah, still perched on the table, looks depressingly great. She’s gone for a semi-gothic look tonight, in black and red velvet and lace. She has the
perfect
figure. You know the way that if you look hard enough at someone, you can find some flaw? Or maybe not even a flaw to you, but something that you know
they
hate. Like Fiona thinks that her thighs are too big. (They’re not.) Sarah is perfectly proportioned, with curves in all the right places. Fiona and I told her that once.

“But what’s the point of having a good figure when you have a face like
this?”
she moaned. You’d swear she was the Bride of Frankenstein or something. In fairness, though, she never complains that much about how she looks. None of us do. It should be one of those things that doesn’t matter between friends.
Should
be.

I am still sipping at my Smirnoff Ice, perhaps in the hope that if I drink enough of it, I’ll be able to look in the mirror and think I look attractive.

“You want me to introduce to you to people?” Sarah asks.

I think about it. “No.”

She laughs. “Not in the party mood?”

“Not really.”

“Oh, well. Stay in here for a while and talk to me.”

“You should be out there mingling. You’re the hostess,” I smile.

She rolls her eyes. “They’re getting along fine without me. There’s music, there’s drink, that’s all they need.”

Our lives are veering dangerously close towards the land of teenage normality. I wonder if she realises this, and has opted to stay on the path anyway.

We end up being social and friendly after all. Shane drags us out of the kitchen and in to talk to some of his friends. The conversation turns to football, and I watch, mildly amused, as the guys, and a couple of avid female fans, get all worked up about it. Caroline and I exchange we-could-be-here-for-a-while looks.

It’s not as bad as I thought it would be. For the most part, the guys are moderately intelligent, and some are even speaking in whole sentences as opposed to grunts at regular intervals. I’m impressed.

I find myself discussing all things musical with Hugh, one of the band members. He’s a U2 fanatic, so we debate which of their albums is the best, the three main contenders being
The Joshua Tree
,
Achtung Baby
and
All That You Can’t Leave Behind
.

Hugh, being a drummer, is talking about Larry Mullen when Shane joins in. “Yeah, but come
on
now, they’d be nothing without Bono.”

Hugh seems to have heard this before, many times. “Shane wants to
be
Bono,” he tells me conspiratorially.

I grin. “How sweet,” I tell Shane. “We all need a hero.”

“So who’s yours?” he asks, deflecting the attention from his own hero-worship.

I shrug. I really have no idea. I mean, I love Sylvia Plath and all that, but I certainly have no intention of dying at thirty.

“Lisa Simpson,” I finally say, half-joking.

He grins. “Not Homer?”

“I’m not the Homer type.”

“No, I suppose you’re not.”

What’s that supposed to mean? I want to ask, but don’t.

The first thing Sarah asks me, once everyone’s gone, is what I thought of Shane.

“He’s nice!” I say for what feels like the millionth time.

“
Nice?
That could be anyone.”

It’s almost two in the morning. My vocabulary isn’t the best at this time of the day. “He’s interesting,” I add. And yeah, I suppose I’m telling the truth. But he’s a tad on the intimidating side and he can make me feel uncomfortable and I’m not exactly sure what I think of him, or what he thinks of me.

“What did
you
think?” she asks Fiona.

“The same,” Fiona yawns. “Look, Sarah, would you just
admit
that you fancy him and stop interrogating us!”

“I don’t,” she protests.

“Sure, sure,” Fiona and I say.

“Besides –” she begins, and we all know that whenever anyone starts talking like that, it clearly means that they’re interested in someone, but are trying desperately to prove otherwise. “
Besides
, even if I
did
, he’s not interested in me.”

“How do you know?” Fiona demands. “Have you asked him?”

“I just
know,”
Sarah insists. “I think he likes Abi.”

“What?”
I splutter. She’s clearly delusional.

“Well, he was talking to you all night,” she says.

“Yeah, me
and
Hugh
and
Caroline and anyone else that wanted to join in. You’re reading too much into this,” I tell her. “Besides, Caroline thinks he likes you.”

“Well, he doesn’t,” she says firmly.

Fiona is watching us with amusement. “Are you two going to fight over him?”

“Don’t be stupid,” I say.

“I don’t even like him,” Sarah says, but the lack of conviction in her voice is obvious.

“Sarah, he likes you,” I tell her.

“No, he doesn’t,” she says. Yes, it’s true, denial isn’t just a river in Egypt. I know
exactly
why she’s doing this. If he doesn’t like her, then she can convince herself that there’s no point in flirting with him or asking him out, because it’s pointless. It lets her off the hook. I do it all the time.

Besides, there’s no way he likes me. I mean, normal, nice, sane guys never like me. Generally even the crazy ones avoid me. But it’s OK, because I don’t like him either.