The Brittanys Read online

  I remove the plastic, and we can see the piercing’s a little off-center, but you can’t really tell unless you’re up close, so I’ll just have to show people from far away. It’s going to take time to heal anyway, but it’s fun to show people right when you first get it. Jensen begins working on her third hole while I go grab ice from downstairs. I make sure to cover my ear with my hair so my mom won’t see it if she’s in the kitchen. She’s not, so I grab a paper towel and wrap it around a few ice cubes and run back upstairs. Jensen’s already done and admiring her new piercing.

  “It was so easy!” She beams. “I squeezed it just to line up the earring and it went right in.”

  We’re both happy and in a little bit of pain. We watch a movie and take a nap, careful to sleep on the opposite sides of where we just pierced so nothing catches and tears.

  Jensen leaves later that afternoon, because I have to go to some party for my brother. He’ll be off to college next year, and a family that lives in Margate is having an open house for the University of Miami. Brad’s already pretty sure he wants to go there, but my mom wants him to meet some other kids who might end up attending, too. He’s applied for a bunch of scholarships, and my parents are convinced he’ll get funding because of his good grades—he’s got a 5.6 GPA, which isn’t even possible, but he got an award for it. They have all the faith in the world in him when it comes to his schoolwork and his genius.

  It’s Sunday, and I don’t have anything better to do, so I don’t object to coming along. I like being driven around by my parents anyway. In two years I’ll get my license and be free to do whatever I want, but there’s something nice about listening to my iPod in the car and staring out the window, watching the Florida scenery drift by. Jensen and I already have plans for the day she gets her license, which is about a month before I’ll get mine. She’s going to pick me up and take me to the mall, and we’re going to listen to *NSYNC on the way. We made the plans back in fourth grade, when *NSYNC was really popular, but we want to stick to it, because it’s what our nine-year-old hearts wanted. It’s our dream to go to the mall and find a parking spot and go inside all by ourselves, without one of our parents waiting at the entrance of Bloomingdale’s, without walking around the mall in fear or embarrassment that we might run into them.

  I get overdressed for some reason. I feel like looking nice, even though it’s not my event. There’ll be older boys there, juniors and seniors, maybe even some college freshmen, so I wear a navy-blue dress from Abercrombie & Fitch and straighten my hair as best I can. I wear small wedge heels that aren’t too bad to walk in, but the lady who owns the house insists on no shoes inside, so they come off anyway. My mom drags my brother around to talk to other parents and kids of those parents who are going to the University of Miami. My dad finds a seat on the couch and talks to another father about something I have no interest in. I try to find a phone to call Jensen, but the only one I see is in the kitchen, and it’s too out in the open, even if I stretch the cord. Any others must be upstairs, which is off-limits. There’s a big sign tacked to the wall telling people not to go up, which makes me want to, badly. Instead, I go to the bathroom and examine my ear. It’s not doing so well. When I pierced my second holes, the area was itchy, which meant it was healing. But this time it’s pulsating red and hot. I think it might be infected. I decide to take it out, and luckily the hole doesn’t bleed. I wrap up the earring in tissues and toss it into the trash can next to the toilet. I take a hand towel and wet it with cold water. My tragus is on fire. I feel stupid for trying to pierce that part of my ear, something that probably needs to be done professionally. I also feel stupid because now Jensen will be the only one with a new piercing tomorrow at school.

  I wet my ear and there’s a little relief. It needs time to heal. Back in the living room, I beg my dad to let me use his cell phone, and he agrees. I go out back, to the pool, where some older kids dressed in shirts and ties are eating chips. I feel cool with my dad’s cell phone. I dial Jensen, and she knows my dad’s number when it comes up on her phone, so she answers.

  “I had to take out the earring,” I say. “So don’t tell anyone we both have piercings tomorrow. Or before tomorrow, if you talk to anyone before then.”

  “I took mine out, too!”

  “Why?”

  “I think those kits are defective. Mine was hurting so bad.”

  “Was it hot?”

  “On fire. That means it’s infected, right?”

  “I think so.”

  “I showed my brother, and he said you’re supposed to leave it in if it’s infected, but I already took it out. It feels better already.”

  “Mine too. I didn’t tell my brother, though. He’d probably tell on me.” I look around the party for a minute. In a few years, this will be me and Jensen in someone’s backyard, getting ready to venture off to another place, somewhere bigger and better than Boca.

  “How much candy do you have left?” I ask.

  “Too much.”

  • FIVE •

  Our school is supposed to be beautiful, with its big lake and many breezeways, statues of eagles perched at various elevations, all the buildings painted canary yellow. There are neatly trimmed hedges lining the pathways to air-conditioned classrooms, palm trees that wrap around the perimeter of the campus, a stable full of horses for the equestrian team nestled behind the senior-class parking lot. There’s a whole room with semicircular stadium seating dedicated to the student government’s meetings, called Town Hall. We have everything we don’t need, and we hate telling outsiders that we go to a prep school. I often walk in on girls doing lines in the bathroom or upperclassmen receiving blow jobs in the stairwell of the building where I have history. Everyone smokes weed in the parking lot. Everyone buys and sells pills there, too. Plus our lockers are a rusted red color and clash badly with the navy-blue tiled floor. All our classrooms have popcorn ceilings, just like every other place in Florida.

  I’m in all honors classes. I was proud to see the big capitalized H next to each course when they mailed us our schedules at the beginning of the year. I love English, and history is okay, but I’ve always struggled in math. In pre-algebra, I sit behind Eddie Bernstein, who smells like chocolate and knows all the answers all the time. I never understand the material, so he lets me copy his homework. Kenzie isn’t in my class, but sometimes she tutors me during free period and I pay her back by checking her English homework for her. I have a hard time listening to Kenzie, though, because we sit at the new café they just put in by the lake, which sells cookies and Rice Krispies squares. It’s hard to focus with all those snacks. I’m always so hungry. I eat a ton, but I don’t gain any weight. Jensen’s grandparents, Yiayia Thea and Pappou Christos, tell me I need to eat more or they’ll give me the pantófla—some Greek joke about a slipper.

  But since the tutoring didn’t help, the first week of November I’m told I’m getting switched out of honors pre-algebra and into regular. The dean says they want to see if I fare better in a “slower-paced environment.” My mom is concerned about how it’ll look on my transcript, and I know she secretly wishes I could be in all high-level classes, like Brad. Last year, my mom even had him try to tutor me, but he got so frustrated with my not understanding that we had to stop. So, even though I know it will ruin my GPA, I can’t help but feel a little relieved—maybe this way I’ll actually be able to understand the math and not have to feel so behind, like everyone else gets it except for me.

  After my demotion, Jensen and I go to her grandparents’ house for the weekend, like we do sometimes. Pappou Christos picks us up from volleyball practice and brings us cheese pies, phyllo with cheese and butter. We always want to stop at 7-Eleven, even though we’ve already had a snack, and he takes us. We get Coke-flavored slushies and play floppy doll in the car, which until recently I thought was called “floppy dog.” It’s when we let our bodies change with the movement of the c
ar, our positions often resembling those of a rag doll. This is fun until we spill our slushies. We don’t have the heart to tell her grandpa, so we leave the slush pile in the back seat. I wonder if he’ll ever notice.

  At Jensen’s grandparents’ house, I take in the oddly comforting sight of the big pile of shoes by the front door, the rugs on top of the carpet all over the house, the bowls of dried chickpeas and yellow raisins out on the kitchen counter. We go from room to room and admire the antiques and family heirlooms. Jensen claims certain pieces for herself to inherit before her brother can, and she tells me they always argue over the black-and-gold vase in the icon corner. I remember when Jensen told me about the corner in their house that was meant for prayer, how her yiayia Thea kept an oil lamp burning at all times. I’m always jealous that our house doesn’t have anything like that, a special sacred area where we can go and talk to our ancestors. Our menorahs and candles sit in the closet, gathering dust.

  “It’s yours,” Yiayia Thea promises Jensen, then says, “Let me fix you a snack,” even though we’ve had so many already. Warm pita, more phyllo and cheese, lamb and potatoes and orzo, baklava with raisins and nuts, and butter cookies with ice cream. The cookies look like little braided challahs. Jensen gets mad when I don’t finish all my dessert.

  “It’s, like, rude to refuse food from an elderly Greek woman,” she says.

  “I can’t eat that much. I’m going to die,” I say. My stomach has expanded over my shorts, and I feel sick. I guess Yiayia Thea finally found my limit.

  “You’re literally breaking her heart.”

  We go to bed full, and I want to do my homework for math, but Jensen promises it’s an easy class. She’s in regulars, too, and already failed her first two tests.

  Jensen’s different at her grandparents’ house. First of all, it feels like we’re in another world, all the way out in Boynton Beach, in a retirement community where some people can still take care of themselves, like Jensen’s grandparents, and other people have live-in assistance. There’s a clubhouse in the middle of the development that has a pool and an air hockey table and has sweet tea and lemonade out for grabs at all times of the day. Jensen always pockets a few sugar cubes and sucks on them at random throughout the rest of the weekend. But mostly it’s that Jensen was raised by her yiayia Thea and pappou Christos because her mom and dad worked so much. These are like her real parents; she doesn’t ever want to do anything to upset or offend them, whereas with her actual parents she’s a total brat. I’m not close with my grandparents at all. I only have one grandparent from each side of the family still alive, but one of them remarried and lives in a retirement community in Deerfield Beach, and the other is still in New York, and I haven’t seen her since we moved to Florida. I don’t understand how someone could be so close to a grandparent, but Jensen’s are funny and quick-witted. Her grandma can even do the splits.

  It’s hard for me to fall asleep when we stay there, though, and I always regret agreeing to spend the night. That night, I get up and go to the bathroom. There’s a night-light that glows aquamarine and the toilet seat has a pink plush cover and a matching pink rug. When I come out, I see her grandparents sitting on the couch in the living room, watching TV. It’s well past midnight, and they are watching QVC. I try to stay quiet, but Yiayia Thea hears me.

  “Are you hungry?” she asks.

  “No, I just had to use the bathroom,” I say.

  “There’s more lamb if you change your mind. I can heat it up for you!”

  “Leave her alone!” Christos shouts.

  “Fýge apó edó!”

  They start whisper-yelling at each other in Greek, and I creep back to bed. I can still see a hint of the blue night-light shining into the room. It doesn’t seem to bother Jensen, though. She’s fast asleep, and I stare into the darkness. I always worry about something bad happening in the middle of the night, or even that I won’t ever be able to fall asleep. I do end up sleeping, though, just like I always do, and I wake up when it’s morning, still not having done any homework.

  * * *

  —

  The regular class is much slower than the honors. They haven’t even gotten to finding slope yet. They’re still on defining x and y as variables. The teacher, Mrs. Alonzo, gives out Airheads candy for no good reason and keeps stepping outside to make calls to her husband from the hallway.

  Ben Weiner has the desk behind me and says, “Welcome to the jungle,” when I sit down on my first day. He has a pointy nose and bright blue eyes and really gelled hair. He’s chewing on a blue-raspberry Airhead and his tongue is dark. “Want the red one?” He gestures it toward me, and I accept, but I’ll end up giving the candy to Jensen at PE, our only class period together this year.

  “All right, everyone,” Ben announces to the class when Mrs. Alonzo is once again out of the room. “At exactly ten thirty, we will all drop our pencils directly in front of our desks. Got it?”

  No one responds. We continue our horizontal drawings of x-axes and vertical y ones. I let Ben borrow a piece of graphing paper from my binder even though it is a class requirement to have your own supplies, so I worry he will need one every day for the rest of the year. His excitement builds every minute the clock nears the specified time. Mrs. Alonzo returns, in her long denim skirt, big lavender sweater, and white sneakers, and coughs up a ball of phlegm when she sits down at her desk. At 10:28 a.m. we all look at one another and telepathically decide that Ben’s plan will work, whatever that means. We will appease him because Airheads aren’t enough and we want to learn something, or maybe it’s because we want to rebel, or maybe it’s just because we can so we will and it will be a story to tell the other kids. The honors kids appreciate the antics of us regulars. We may not be wise, but we sure are funny. We create chaos where we lack genius. Our older brothers and sisters set such high standards, big shoes to fill, and we just can’t live up to them.

  10:29 a.m. We pick up our pencils.

  10:30 a.m. Drop.

  “Ben Weiner. Conditional!” Mrs. Alonzo yells, and Ben stands up, gives a peace sign to the class, and leaves the room. His parents will have to sign a conditional form, a green piece of paper saying that Ben did something stupid, and the next day he will be back in his seat, behind me, telling us to inch our desks forward every minute on the minute for the entirety of our class. I would never learn algebra correctly, but at the end of the month we had a placement test that I passed with flying colors. I got back into honors pre-algebra, where I would stay this time, because I knew I could do better.

  Ben Weiner was still nice to us, though. He was one of those kids who always gave Jensen and me hugs in the hallway. He was one of those people who understood the suffering of life, how hard things are, and to deal with it he simply made fun of it. I saw pictures of him online years later. He’d joined the Peace Corps and was smiling in a distant land. He looked happy. He looked like he’d ended up where he was supposed to.

  * * *

  —

  The seasons don’t change in Florida. When November hits, the skies don’t grow gray or cold. People can still go to the beach on the weekends or days off, or when they just plain feel like skipping.

  In the “winter months,” the student government stands outside the 300 Building and serves hot chocolate for free. It’s not that great, but it feels nice to walk around holding something, a sort of conversation piece that makes young adults feel older. Around this time, we take our PSATs. Standardized testing leaves us with a lot of half days, days off, early dismissals. There’s only one way to get off campus.

  You have to get a parent to sign a letter that you must hand in at the beginning of the day. Then the office calls your parent to confirm, and you’re free to go when their car shows up. If you drive, same process, but you get a yellow pass you show the guard at the gate. Sometimes, if you really want to leave bad, you can type up your own note,
print it in a classroom, forge the signature, call your mom from the bathroom, and tell her you feel sick, sad, depressed, overwhelmed, want to spend time with her, and plead to have her confirm the note, go to the office, tell them you forgot to hand the note in before first period, then look down at their desk, not up at them, just down at the eagle-shaped paperweight. Then the office assistant will ask how your family is doing as she dials your mom’s number, even though you don’t know her that well and your mom definitely doesn’t know her that well. So you sit in a blue chair next to the desk and wait to be okayed and confirmed, and then you go back to class and wait to get called to the office, where your mom is poised to take your backpack off your shoulders, but you insist on holding on to it because it’s yours. These few minutes between the office and the car are some of the only moments when you truly appreciate your mother. She’s been cleaning all day, paying bills, thinking about you, and now here she is to save the day. She is so warm and beautiful in jeans and a T-shirt and Asics sneakers. Her purse, filled with more paperwork and a book to read in case she had to wait for you, sags at her shoulder. She asks where you want to go, and you always say the mall. She asks if you’re hungry, and you say yes, very.

  I get Chinese food from the food court, usually sesame chicken with fried rice, and a Coke. My mom grabs a handful of fortune cookies, which I open and read and throw away unless she wants them. “These would be great with some vanilla ice cream,” she always says. We walk around the mall for a while, and I ask to go into Bloomingdale’s, try on a pair of Hard Tail pants, show my mom how good they look until she buys them for me. She asks if I need anything new, and I say I don’t know, but then we end up in Abercrombie & Fitch and I get some new stuff: a few tank tops and denim shorts, something floral, lacy, girly, a color and not black or gray. My mom says that she likes these clothes better than the overpriced Hard Tail pants. We stop at the candy store and fill up a plastic bag with Swedish Fish and dark-chocolate-covered almonds and a few malted-milk balls for Mom.