Sebastian chuckles. Zach starts barking and lunges tongue-first for her ear. She screams and throws herself back against the lockers.
“Cut it out, dude.” Sebastian kicks his friend hard in the shin.
“Aah!” Zach reaches to his leg, a lick of slobber now coating his chin. “Asshole.”
“I’ll see you at the bus,” she is calling, and the hallway opens up, vaulting into the gymnasium. A short set of stairs, a familiar rhythm. After school, this is where she comes to leave herself behind. In the last year, she has begun to run harder and faster, to approach her body like a hard, perfectible thing.
But not now, not in gym class. Now is only a sham of an hour. In the changing room, the other girls are already in various states of undress, tying up oversized shirts with hair elastics to grant a peek of their belly buttons, rolling up their Soffe shorts one, two, three times. Viola understands they are playing a game: to be noticed and worthy and attractive without ever standing out. It is a herd game, the game of prey. She could have tried harder, earlier, to blend in. But she has never quite been sure how.
As she steps out of her flats, Lisa DePaulo turns. “You’re smuggling peas,” she says, under the pretense of kind advice.
A hush befalls the tittering gaggle. Viola looks down at herself, the assertive nipples of her otherwise flat chest puffing through the delicate fabric of her dress. She doesn’t own a bra.
Her neck grows hot, she runs to the toilet stall. Her eyes are stinging, and when she can hear the girls evacuating, she allows herself a single, stupid sob.
Why did no one tell her it was time to buy a bra?
She sits on the lid of the toilet, indulgently imagining her death:spontaneous combustion in a bathroom cubicle.First Cello in the Youth Symphony Orchestra, her obituary would read.First place in the under-fourteen’s cross-country regionals. Honor roll. Beloved sister. Never left America. Never fell in love.
And then she pulls herself together. For the final hour of eighth grade, she tosses half-hearted dodgeballs and checks the minute hand of the clock every thirty seconds until Finally! The blessed bell. The flood of sneakers, squeaking, backpacks swinging over shoulders, papers shoveled into the recycling bin. Goodbye Lisa DePaulo! Goodbye gym class! Backpack covering her chest, Viola makes her way to the bus, still wearing her gym clothes.
In the parking lot, slouching sweetly, is her brother.
“Screw it,” she says, breathless. “Let’s go to the movies.”
He pumps his fist in the air, wiggles a little dance. “What about Grandma?” he asks.
Together, they imagine her asleep in front of the French Open. They imagine her forgetting them entirely.
“She’s getting old.” Viola sighs.
“She’s always been old,” Sebastian says.
In her mind’s eye is her father, his concerns and mislaid expectations. She does not want to betray his trust. But life is calling.
1986
In the Logan Airport departures terminal two days after their wedding, Susan touches Al’s face and says confidently: “We can do this.”
“You’ll be careful,” he says.
“I’ll be careful.”
“You’ll look both ways when you cross the street.”
“I won’t cross any streets.”
“You won’t get abducted.”
“I’ll do my best.”
The ceremony was a small, rushed affair at the registry office, which disappointed both of their mothers but made Al and Susan giddy.People are going to think you’ve gotten into trouble, Al, his mother said, and they both laughed about it afterward. Screw her. Let them think that! He booked a too-big hotel room, a white duvet smattered with rose petals. And as he helped her out of her dress, pressing his lips to her temple, his able hands easing the spinal buttons out of their loops, she was filled with the knowledge of herself as an unbearably selfish person.
“And if anyone…” he starts now. “If you’re not comfortable with anything, you can always just say no.”
“I know,” she says, smiling bravely.It’s daytime, Mark Flowers explained,so everything will be tasteful. But she’s no fool. If you don’t say yes in this business, there are a hundred other girls who will.
“And call me.”
