You have never once considered responding to his pleas. The few people you have ever told have said, Don’t. Don’t you dare. Forget you ever saw that. It is satisfying to delete his words, to watch them disappear, but here’s the thing: you can’t forget you ever saw that.
Now, though, you are the saddest you have ever been in your life. Your father is dead. Your mother is off the wagon again. You can’t finish anything. Just last week, your childhood house burned down with everything in it. You wonder when the world will stop hurting you.
You respond.
Chad is my boyfriend, Beth tells you on the phone. I didn’t want to tell you, because I didn’t want your hopes and dreams to be, like, totally crushed. I liked that you liked that he liked you, she says. It was cute.
But Chad is my secret boyfriend, and it’s serious, she says. Maybe even love, she says.
She says, You need to move on.
Clarissa can’t believe it. You’re sitting in the school locker room, straddling a bench, snapping Bubblicious gum. Yesterday, you decided to dye your hair back to black, your natural color. You want to look sad all the time, and you think this will help. Your ears are stained gray from the dripping chemicals.
That bitch! says Clarissa. Who does she think she is? She’s probably making it up because she’s crazy jealous of you.
You both allow the lie to sit between you, to swell there.
But Chad doesn’t stop messaging. In fact, he messages you more. He is sorry, just so sorry, that he never told you about Beth. He didn’t want to break up your best friendship.
Do u have a private line? he asks you. 2 talk like adults?
If I get off AOL I can free up the line, yah, you say.
It’s the first time you’ve ever heard his voice. At school, he has only ever looked at you—through the classroom windows, from inside his car, across a swarm of students moving through the bells. He has never once even waved. His voice on the phone does not match what you’d imagined. It’s high-pitched, ragged as puberty. His laugh sounds like Pee-wee Herman crying, you later tell Clarissa.
Are you in bed? asks Chad. I wanna talk you to sleep like I’m tucking you in.
Chad wants to know what you’re wearing under the covers, if you know what sex is, if you’ve ever given a blow job, and if so, to whom.
Aren’t these questions you should be asking your GIRLFRIEND, you say.
What I have with Beth doesn’t change the way I feel about you, says Chad.
I can’t even talk to her anymore, you say. It’s too painful for me.
I have another friend who thinks you’re cute. We both beat off to you, he says. Maybe if you like him we could go on double dates. The four of us could always be together in secret. That way I can still be close to you, because I think I might love you, he says.
I love you, too, you say. You like the gravity of that word. You feel sure inside of it.
Instead of calling Beth every night, you start calling Chad. Beth thinks she’s too good for you and Clarissa. She’s becoming a real snob, a bitch, you tell yourself.
That friend I told you about, says Chad. I really think you would like him. I’ll be so jealous but I really hope you can go out, so I can be around you in real life without getting in trouble.
I don’t even know who he is! you say. He could be a creep!
He’s my best friend, Cherry Top.
I’m not even a Cherry Top anymore, thanks for NOTICING.
Talk to him … for me.
It doesn’t take long for Gil to message you. Gil is another senior, and he seems nice enough, but maybe a little boring. You have similar interests. He sends you song lyrics from emo bands: Your taste still lingers on my lips like I just placed them upon yours and I starve, I starve for you!, and you tell him about your obsession with Chris Carrabba of Dashboard Confessional—He just gets me!—how you recently had him autograph your Charlie Brown T-shirt at a concert while your mom waited in the car.
Do you ever feel SO alone? asks Gil.
All the time, you say. I want to kill myself almost every day. My mom is SO embarrassing and my dad’s been drunk my whole life and I have NOBODY who gets what it’s like.
That was before me lol.
Gil is a good listener. Sensitive, sweet. You think he might be a long-term friend or maybe husband material one day. You plan to meet him the next day between C and D periods, just a wave in the hall, so you can find out who he is. You don’t look him up in the yearbook because the suspense gets your blood pumping.
The next day, you wear your mom’s bra under your school uniform. You stuff it with cloudy silicone pads shaped like chicken cutlets. You and Clarissa bought a whole pack at the mall last month, felt each other’s double push-up bra padding as if you were lovers, Oh yeah, baby, that feels soooo good. The cutlets feel most like the real thing.
After C period, you stand by the door of your history class. Middle and high schoolers rush by, Eat shit, Queera. Go kill yourself already. You respond by holding up your pentacle necklace; you’ve recently promised that you are casting hair-loss spells.
You look for somebody cute, somebody you must have missed all this time. And then somebody approaches you and says, Hey, I’m Gil, and everything inside your body crumples. This man looks old old, like, thirty. He’s over six feet tall and wears a ponytail—tinted, square, transition glasses, purpled by the sun. He breathes through his mouth, and it hangs open, underbitten, the smell of clogged dishwater. Most striking are his teeth, narrow and long as piano keys, the gumline black.
He leans in to hug you and you scrunch your face into a walnut—disgusting.
You ignore all messages from Gil after that.
Chad looks older now in his online picture. His face is bloated, hairy. The whites of his eyes have gone red. The picture is one he took of himself on a phone in a splattered bathroom mirror.
You respond to his message.
You say, Why do you want my forgiveness?
I dunno, I guess I just feel bad, he says. About the way things happened.
Why? you say again.
I didn’t know if I should act on the feels of love for you, he says, and I chose wrong. Anyway, I can’t believe you would still be that mad about it now, after all this time. Beth didn’t care.
He’s lonely, you think. Or maybe desperate. He only wants a way back in. You’ve heard rumors about his life after high school. Everyone has.
I was twelve, you say. Those things don’t go away.
In my defense, he says, I thought you were thirteen.
Let’s put all this bullshit behind us, Chad says in an instant message. It’s a Friday night, and you’re alone, as usual. Clarissa is always babysitting. You refuse to speak to Beth, even though she tries.
I feel bad we’ve never actually hung out. Not very nice of me, says Chad. Why don’t we go 2 the mall this wknd? Buy sum presents?
Just us? you ask. Really 4 real?
Just us, he says.
Why don’t u pick me up tom morn round 10?
U shitting me? he says. Not lookin 2 get arrested. Get dropped off @ the mall. Noon.
You call Clarissa. You will NEVER guess what I’m doing tomorrow. Clarissa screams. You both scream. You father opens your door again. When did it become always scream, scream, scream? he says. You shuffle through your drawers, try to find the perfect outfit. Your school uniform consists of sweater vests, long khaki skirts, starched collars that cut. This is your chance, you think, to look like a sultry island princess, to embrace where you came from, to show off the exotic woman you could one day be.