want to be with you , I whisper, willing my plea to reach all the wayacross town. Stay with me. Stay…stay home…
But he doesn’t. He leaves the very next day and I cry in my room, for five hours, like a heartsick little schoolgirl. Now I’m glad I didn’t mention the kiss to Stacy. For him to just leave, just like that, after everything that happened, after we talked for hours, after he touched me the wayhe did, after we kissed…
He didn’t even say goodbye .
He’s been playing with mymind.
It meant nothing to him.
I’m too vulnerable for games. He’s disarmed me, and I’m more in love than I ever thought possible…madly, deeply, terribly
in love.Yvette put him up to these pranks. She’s the biggest bitch in
town. and I’m the pawn in a heartless scheme. No doubt, from day one Lard-Ash has probably known that I’m completely in love with Tammy. She’s probably seen the want in my eyes every time I’ve looked his way, clear back to when he was going out with her. That’s whyshe came to me, trying to see if I’d go out with her, and when I rejected her, she began calling me a faggot.
They’ve probably been in cahoots for the past nine months, since that historic day in church. They’ve been planning and preparing the for theft of my heart, guffawing together as they surveymyunrelieved hunger, mystupefaction, mydejection, as he yo-yos between being genial and spiteful.
It’s all been a prank. Like everyone I’m stupid enough to love, Tammyhas onlybeen out to amuse himself, to toywith me, before leaving town and recommencing his important life.
And yet, can I hate him? Can I regret experiencing my very first kisses with him? No.
No matter how cruel he is, I’ll always love him.
It’s all I can do not to splatter tears and snot all over the clean white pages of my yearbook as I weep over pictures of him, the impeccable senior portrait of him, unsmiling and dangerously beautiful, in a black jacket and shirt unbuttoned to reveal the dark hairs on his chest, the glorious action shots of him playing football, soccer and baseball, a group photo of him and his jocks hamming it up. As I thumb through my autograph pages, I come across something that seizes mybreath in mythroat:
Don’t change. There’s only one Jamie in this world. Your friend, Tam Mattheis
I’m inconsolable.
Stacytries to help, pointing out boys for me to crush on. Boys. Ray, who doesn’t seem to know I’ve been pining after his
best friend for the past year, keeps suggesting “shorties” who would love me.
I hope they’ll get a life and leave me alone so I can punish myself in peace.
If he cares about me, why did he go?!
I return to Miss Halliday, and she renews my Zoloft, gently scolding me that I should never stop taking something without checking in with her first.
I begin smoking more heavily, bumming more and more cigarettes off of Stacy and Patti, and putting each one out on the big scar on myleft ankle.
chapter nine: tammy (graduation night/college)
After graduation, we all go to Ray’s and swim and sign yearbooks. I wait for Jamie to turn awayfrom his and grab it.
I want him to sign mine too, but I don’t know how to ask. In his, I take everything inside of me and compress it into a couple of simple sentences, erasing at least five times before I think I’ve got it right.
I spend the entire evening with him. We talk more than we ever have. Stacycranks the radio and everyone argues about what music we’ll listen to. Ray and Benny want AC/DC, Ozzy, Metallica, etc. Queen Bitch wants the “soft rock” station. Stacyfinds a classic rock station playing Heart, The Pretenders, The Police. Yvette sulks as the rest of us nod in consensus.
This unexpectedly charmed night with the elfin boy I secretly ache for starts when Rayand Bennytoss Jamie into the pool.After I ream their asses about grabbing him by his bad arm, I teach Jamie to swim. When I first take him under with me, he resists, kicking back up to the surface and
But he doesn’t. He leaves the very next day and I cry in my room, for five hours, like a heartsick little schoolgirl. Now I’m glad I didn’t mention the kiss to Stacy. For him to just leave, just like that, after everything that happened, after we talked for hours, after he touched me the wayhe did, after we kissed…
He didn’t even say goodbye .
He’s been playing with mymind.
It meant nothing to him.
I’m too vulnerable for games. He’s disarmed me, and I’m more in love than I ever thought possible…madly, deeply, terribly
in love.Yvette put him up to these pranks. She’s the biggest bitch in
town. and I’m the pawn in a heartless scheme. No doubt, from day one Lard-Ash has probably known that I’m completely in love with Tammy. She’s probably seen the want in my eyes every time I’ve looked his way, clear back to when he was going out with her. That’s whyshe came to me, trying to see if I’d go out with her, and when I rejected her, she began calling me a faggot.
They’ve probably been in cahoots for the past nine months, since that historic day in church. They’ve been planning and preparing the for theft of my heart, guffawing together as they surveymyunrelieved hunger, mystupefaction, mydejection, as he yo-yos between being genial and spiteful.
It’s all been a prank. Like everyone I’m stupid enough to love, Tammyhas onlybeen out to amuse himself, to toywith me, before leaving town and recommencing his important life.
And yet, can I hate him? Can I regret experiencing my very first kisses with him? No.
No matter how cruel he is, I’ll always love him.
It’s all I can do not to splatter tears and snot all over the clean white pages of my yearbook as I weep over pictures of him, the impeccable senior portrait of him, unsmiling and dangerously beautiful, in a black jacket and shirt unbuttoned to reveal the dark hairs on his chest, the glorious action shots of him playing football, soccer and baseball, a group photo of him and his jocks hamming it up. As I thumb through my autograph pages, I come across something that seizes mybreath in mythroat:
Don’t change. There’s only one Jamie in this world. Your friend, Tam Mattheis
I’m inconsolable.
Stacytries to help, pointing out boys for me to crush on. Boys. Ray, who doesn’t seem to know I’ve been pining after his
best friend for the past year, keeps suggesting “shorties” who would love me.
I hope they’ll get a life and leave me alone so I can punish myself in peace.
If he cares about me, why did he go?!
I return to Miss Halliday, and she renews my Zoloft, gently scolding me that I should never stop taking something without checking in with her first.
I begin smoking more heavily, bumming more and more cigarettes off of Stacy and Patti, and putting each one out on the big scar on myleft ankle.
chapter nine: tammy (graduation night/college)
After graduation, we all go to Ray’s and swim and sign yearbooks. I wait for Jamie to turn awayfrom his and grab it.
I want him to sign mine too, but I don’t know how to ask. In his, I take everything inside of me and compress it into a couple of simple sentences, erasing at least five times before I think I’ve got it right.
I spend the entire evening with him. We talk more than we ever have. Stacycranks the radio and everyone argues about what music we’ll listen to. Ray and Benny want AC/DC, Ozzy, Metallica, etc. Queen Bitch wants the “soft rock” station. Stacyfinds a classic rock station playing Heart, The Pretenders, The Police. Yvette sulks as the rest of us nod in consensus.
This unexpectedly charmed night with the elfin boy I secretly ache for starts when Rayand Bennytoss Jamie into the pool.After I ream their asses about grabbing him by his bad arm, I teach Jamie to swim. When I first take him under with me, he resists, kicking back up to the surface and
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