I’m shaking my head no, but she just keeps talking.
“But really, I’ll own you, and Michael is dead to you. You will drop him, with no explanations, nothing. He’ll have to sit there trying to figure it out until he gives up and hates you all over again.”
I’ll tell him.
I’ll get out of this storage room and I’ll tell him.
Anna studies me. It must be all over my face, because she says, “If I think you’ve tipped him off, I’ll plaster his journal all over school and take it to Holt. If you refuse to drop him, I’ll do the same.”
My heart stills. Expulsion. Those pages all over school. His grief. His secrets. His ruin. I can’t let that happen.
“That means whatever happens to Michael is your fault,” Anna says, reading my mind. “And even if he does find out the truth, do you think he’d forgive you for putting him through this bullshit? He’s already forgiven you for a lot. It wasn’t easy for him to be with you, you know. He put that in his journal, too.”
“He did?” I whisper.
Anna closes her eyes briefly, basking in this moment. This is Anna at her finest. This is the Anna everyone is afraid of. The Anna I’m afraid of.
She opens her eyes. “Didn’t you read the entry I taped to the door?”
I clench my hands into fists. “I hate you so much.”
“You did it to yourself.” She nudges me out of the way to get to the door and hesitates. “He’s really sweet, though, isn’t he? Anyway, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I dig into my pocket for the entry she was talking out. I unfold it and read it.
And then I start to cry.
Weird month. The kind of emotional evolution she’d be proud of.
It’s hard, but—I like her. I think it’s going to be good.
The bell rings. I leave the storage room and keep walking until I’m pushing my way through the front doors. I can’t risk Michael seeing me like this, because he’ll ask and I’ll be weak and I’ll tell him, and then Anna will find out and ruin him again, and I can’t do that to him, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t. I hit the parking lot, gasping, aching. Stupid, ugly tears, all over my face.
I almost had them.
I’ve never felt a more painful miss in my life.
I go home.
Anna calls nine hours later.
“Skirt and cardigans tomorrow,” she says. “Thought you’d want to know.”
Skirts and cardigans .
My throat is all closed up. I try to swallow down my morning coffee and I try to take an antacid but I can’t do either, and my parents are just sitting there, and I can’t stand it, and I don’t know what to do with myself, so I head for school.
My outfit feels stiff and gross, and I can’t stop picturing his face when he sees me in it—a fashion clone. The school parking lot is completely empty. I position myself in front of the doors and wait, the familiarity of it suffocating me, until I find myself inside, in the washroom, hunched over a toilet, dry heaving.
Because there’s nothing in my stomach to puke up.
I lean against the door and press a shaking hand against my mouth. I could cry, but I’m afraid if I start, I won’t stop. I shove an antacid in my mouth and chew it and then try to get it down with a little spit. I can’t do this.
I can’t do this.
Those four words over and over again in my head while time creeps by and the school fills. School noises leech in through the walls, and it eats me up. I take a deep breath and fumble with the door, but I can’t open it.
The bell rings. I miss my grand entrance.
I stay in the stall.
I’m going to stay in this stall. I wedge myself against the door, close my eyes, and I stay still until I’m uncomfortable, and even then I don’t move.
If I’m not moving, nothing bad is happening.
Every so often people come in, and then the bell rings again and there’s that surge before the next period. I listen to girls talk at the sinks, over stalls, and they peter out, and it’s quiet again. It stays quiet for a long time, until the door opens and I hear footsteps cut across the room. A stall door is pushed open and then another and another, until it’s the one next to mine, and then it’s mine. But I’ve locked it and it doesn’t give.
“Get out.” It’s Marta. “Now.”
“No,” I say.
“Okay, let’s end this now.” Kara. “Anna keeps those pages really close, Regina.”
I open the door. Marta and Kara exchange a glance and a smile. I catch sight of my reflection in the mirror. My skin looks waxy, pale.
“Lunch in five,” Kara says.
I push past them and head straight for the sink. I run the tap hot and then cold. “Great,” I say.
“I want you to walk behind me,” Kara says. “From this point on. Just walk behind me, and don’t talk to me unless I address you first.” Marta laughs. “Kara!”
“You heard Anna,” Kara says. “We own her. Hurry the fuck up, Regina. We’ve waited long enough.”
I grip the edges of the sink. “Give me a second.”
” Now .”
I run the water as hard as it will go.
“…Let her have her second,” Kara finally mutters. They leave me at the sink. My second turns into a minute, and then another. The door opens again. Anna.
“You’ve had your second,” she spits. I turn off the tap and we leave the washroom. Jeanette’s there with the others. As the five of us make our way down the hall together, Anna leans over. “I’m so glad you chickened out this morning, Regina. A lunchtime entrance will be better. Everyone will see it.”
It isn’t until we’re at the door to the cafeteria that I begin to register the people around us. They’re whispering and pointing, and then I remember our outfits, totally completing this nightmare. I glance at the other girls and it’s skirts and cardigans all the way down. I roll my shoulders and try to get the dirty feeling off me, but I can’t.
I take a deep breath and enter the cafeteria with them.
It’s not like everyone notices at once. There’s no awed hush as we make our way to the center table. The room is buzzing the way it usually is, until the realization Regina Afton is back in hits the left side, and there’s a subtle shift, the frequency changes, and makes its way back across the cafeteria. I feel lightheaded, and my neck is so tense when I turn my head to look at the Garbage Table, I’m afraid it’ll snap.
Michael’s oblivious. It hasn’t reached him yet. I’m comforted by this, like it buys me time–for what, I don’t know—
But then he looks up.
His eyes travel over Anna and Kara, and when they get to me, there’s this flicker, something torn between recognition— I know that girl —and total incomprehension: What is she doing over there? Anna jostles me over to the center table, but I can’t look away from him, until his mouth drops open and then I have to.
Josh, Henry, and Bruce are already at the table, dutifully waiting for us girls. It’s so horribly familiar, I wander to the seat next to Josh, where I used to sit, before Anna pulls me back.
“Best friends should sit together,” she says.
She takes my old seat and settles in next to Josh. His lunch tray is fixed up for two. He slides her half over and gives her a kiss on the cheek. Anna points to the seat between her and Bruce, and I sit down. Being this close to Bruce is disgusting and recalls the smell of the supply closet, which sends my gut into a somersault routine. I try to ignore it and take a slow look around the table. Josh’s expression is unreadable, or he just doesn’t care. Marta is picking at her fingernails, waiting for a cue from a higher-up. Jeanette is giving the straw in her juice box head, hoping Henry will notice. He does. Kara’s oddly somber. I thought she’d enjoy this more. A lot more.
Anna unwraps a granola bar and looks at me. “Aren’t you eating?”
“No.”
“Eat.”
“Anna, if you make me eat, I will puke all over you.”
“Then at least smile. Let everyone know how happy you are to be here.”
I force a smile at her and the right side of my mouth starts twitch- ‘ ing. I feel Michael’s eyes on me now the most. I really, really don’t want to see his face.
“Well.” Bruce leans back. “If you’re not eating, Regina, I need a drink. I’m sure Kara and Marta could use one, too. Why don’t you run up there and get us some Coke?”
“That’d be nice,” Marta says. “On Regina.”
“I don’t have my wallet.”
Bruce digs into his pocket and tosses a bill at me. “Get it, girl.” I stare at the money.
“Go,” Anna says. “And don’t forget to smile.”
I grab the bill, push my chair out, and stand. I make the biggest, most painful close-mouthed smile I can muster, and then I’m in a long lineup. Smiling.
“What are you doing?”
My heart goes into overdrive. Michael. Right next to me in this line. I keep my eyes on the menu tacked to the wall, still smiling. I can’t look at him or I’ll give it away. If I give it away, he is fucked. So the only thing I can think to do is pretend that he’s not here. I stare straight ahead.
“It’s a joke, right?” The line moves up. “Regina.”
“We had a good talk yesterday,” I say. The line moves up again. I want it to go faster. I can feel the center table. All their eyes on me. “We’re friends again.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“She finally believed me about Donnie,” I say distractedly. The line moves up again, and I rub the back of my neck. I blink once, twice, three times. Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry. “So it’s okay.”
“I don’t believe you,” he repeats. “Not after yesterday.” I reach the cash register and ask for three Cokes. He keeps talking. “Why are you doing this? You’re wearing the same outfits—”
