I was wasting my life sitting there. Finally, I stopped on 61. I watched a bunch of girls wearing cheerleading uniforms and shiny, wholesome smiles, standing at their lockers, talking about the big game. “Omigosh, you guys! Isn’t high school the best?!”
What a crock, I thought as I started to cry. I pictured my face on one of their bodies. Not that I ever wanted to be a cheerleader; that was my mother’s dream, not mine. I just wanted to see what I’d look like—the butt-faced girl, standing at her locker, trying to act normal.
It was a vision too pitiful for words.
Day two … Day five … Day seven … Day ten.
In all my years as a student, from nursery school to elementary school to junior high, I had never missed so many days in a row. Not for sickness. Certainly not for playing hooky. And now here I was, two weeks into my high school career, already a delinquent. And bored out of my mind.
In my former life, if I ever got bored, I would call Taylor. My best friend, the boredom buster. Needless to say, I wasn’t doing that now. Which left me with three options: daytime TV, food, and feeling sorry for myself.
Lying on the couch, all I could think about was the fact that I was stuck at home like some kind of leper, while Taylor and Ryan were living it up on the sports fields. I knew from Kendall and Rae, who’d texted me from the gym as soon as the team rosters were posted, that Ryan made varsity football, and Taylor made varsity field hockey.
Well, I thought bitterly. At least Mr. Dano will be happy. Ryan’s dad used to play Division 1 football for Notre Dame, and whenever I was over at the Danos’, that’s all Mr. Dano could talk about. Football, football, football. He cared about football, it seemed, more than he cared about finding a job. No way would he have been satisfied if Ryan only made JV.
Taylor making varsity wasn’t a shock, either. She and I were the best players on our ninth-grade team. Up until the accident, the two of us had practiced every day of the summer—running drills, even timing each other in the two-mile, to ensure we were in the best shape possible for tryouts.
Tryouts that I missed.
A team that, even if the coach took pity on me and let me try out late, I would never play for. Because the mere thought of running down the hockey field—my hair in a ponytail, my face bare to the world—filled me with dread.
The longer I thought about it, the worse I felt. Why should Taylor get to play when I couldn’t? Why was I the one to end up looking like this when she deserved the punishment? And why, for God’s sake, did I defend her to my mother?
This tsunami of self-pity swept me off the couch and down the hall to the bathroom, where I stood in front of the mirror for a long time, squeezing my eyes shut.
Finally, I opened them.
Even though the stitches had dissolved since the last time I’d looked, and the bruises had faded from a deep purple to a sick, yellowish green—even though the entire right side of my face was no longer swollen up like a puffer fish—I still looked horrible. Worse than horrible. Hideous . All you could see when you looked at me was the graft. It drew your eyes in like a target. A two-by-two-inch target of angry, red butt-skin with a crispy maroon border, about two millimeters higher than the rest of my face. It was the ugliest, most wretched thing you have ever seen in your life.
“I hate you,” I said to my reflection. “I hate you so much.”
The girl in the mirror glared at me. I took a few steps back, trying to see the big picture. I was still wearing pajamas, but since my mother forced me into the shower last night, my hair was finally clean. Clean and thick and shiny as ever, the color of corn silk, down to my shoulder blades. “Barbie hair,” Taylor used to call it. “Rapunzel hair.”
All I could think now was how incongruous it was. How could someone so ugly have such beautiful hair? It made no sense. It was absurd.
The girl in
What a crock, I thought as I started to cry. I pictured my face on one of their bodies. Not that I ever wanted to be a cheerleader; that was my mother’s dream, not mine. I just wanted to see what I’d look like—the butt-faced girl, standing at her locker, trying to act normal.
It was a vision too pitiful for words.
Day two … Day five … Day seven … Day ten.
In all my years as a student, from nursery school to elementary school to junior high, I had never missed so many days in a row. Not for sickness. Certainly not for playing hooky. And now here I was, two weeks into my high school career, already a delinquent. And bored out of my mind.
In my former life, if I ever got bored, I would call Taylor. My best friend, the boredom buster. Needless to say, I wasn’t doing that now. Which left me with three options: daytime TV, food, and feeling sorry for myself.
Lying on the couch, all I could think about was the fact that I was stuck at home like some kind of leper, while Taylor and Ryan were living it up on the sports fields. I knew from Kendall and Rae, who’d texted me from the gym as soon as the team rosters were posted, that Ryan made varsity football, and Taylor made varsity field hockey.
Well, I thought bitterly. At least Mr. Dano will be happy. Ryan’s dad used to play Division 1 football for Notre Dame, and whenever I was over at the Danos’, that’s all Mr. Dano could talk about. Football, football, football. He cared about football, it seemed, more than he cared about finding a job. No way would he have been satisfied if Ryan only made JV.
Taylor making varsity wasn’t a shock, either. She and I were the best players on our ninth-grade team. Up until the accident, the two of us had practiced every day of the summer—running drills, even timing each other in the two-mile, to ensure we were in the best shape possible for tryouts.
Tryouts that I missed.
A team that, even if the coach took pity on me and let me try out late, I would never play for. Because the mere thought of running down the hockey field—my hair in a ponytail, my face bare to the world—filled me with dread.
The longer I thought about it, the worse I felt. Why should Taylor get to play when I couldn’t? Why was I the one to end up looking like this when she deserved the punishment? And why, for God’s sake, did I defend her to my mother?
This tsunami of self-pity swept me off the couch and down the hall to the bathroom, where I stood in front of the mirror for a long time, squeezing my eyes shut.
Finally, I opened them.
Even though the stitches had dissolved since the last time I’d looked, and the bruises had faded from a deep purple to a sick, yellowish green—even though the entire right side of my face was no longer swollen up like a puffer fish—I still looked horrible. Worse than horrible. Hideous . All you could see when you looked at me was the graft. It drew your eyes in like a target. A two-by-two-inch target of angry, red butt-skin with a crispy maroon border, about two millimeters higher than the rest of my face. It was the ugliest, most wretched thing you have ever seen in your life.
“I hate you,” I said to my reflection. “I hate you so much.”
The girl in the mirror glared at me. I took a few steps back, trying to see the big picture. I was still wearing pajamas, but since my mother forced me into the shower last night, my hair was finally clean. Clean and thick and shiny as ever, the color of corn silk, down to my shoulder blades. “Barbie hair,” Taylor used to call it. “Rapunzel hair.”
All I could think now was how incongruous it was. How could someone so ugly have such beautiful hair? It made no sense. It was absurd.
The girl in
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