The room quiets down and we all turn to face Kiera. When she has our attention, she leans into the microphone.
“Uh, first of all…,” she starts, taking a more than dramatic pause, “Moxie girls fight back!” To my delight and surprise, the girls around me cheer and scream and a few hold up their red Solo cups. Kiera keeps going. “This is a kick-ass lady event, and we’ve raised a ton of money for the girls’ soccer team, enough that we can buy uniforms from this century, I think. So thanks for coming. That’s it. Turn up the music.”
Everyone cheers again, and soon we’re dancing, our bodies moving, one big mass of girls having fun. As I watch Lucy spin and knock her dark curls around, and as I listen to Claudia laugh and sing along (badly), it occurs to me that this is what it means to be a feminist. Not a humanist or an equalist or whatever. But a feminist. It’s not a bad word. After today it might be my favorite word. Because really all it is is girls supporting each other and wanting to be treated like human beings in a world that’s always finding ways to tell them they’re not.
After another hour or so, it’s starting to grow dark outside, and Kiera makes another announcement into the microphone that they have to lock up the hall. Girls boo until Kiera promises to organize another Moxie meet up later, which gains more cheers. She reminds girls to walk home if they’ve had too much “grown-up lemonade” and to walk in groups.
“I’m okay to drive,” says Sara. “I didn’t drink.”
Kaitlyn and Meg go with her, but Claudia and I agree to walk home with Lucy, who doesn’t live too far from the hall and who walked to get here.
“Maybe we should try to help clean up a little bit first?” Claudia asks, pointing at Kiera and Amaya and a few other girls folding up card tables and dumping cups into big black trash bags.
“Yeah, that would be nice,” Lucy agrees. As she and Claudia busy themselves, I offer to lug some of the garbage bags to the Dumpster.
When I push the back door open, the hot, sticky night air surrounds me like a too-tight hug. There’s a scraping sound as I shove the door open over the gravel parking lot.
“Oh, hey,” a female voice calls out from nearby. I look up and blink my eyes, trying to adjust to the darkness, and spot Marisela and Jane pulling apart from what I can only guess was something more than just a friendly hug. Jane tugs down her T-shirt. Marisela coughs. I’ve stumbled onto a secret, and if it weren’t so dark, Marisela and Jane would be able to see just how much I’m blushing.
“I was just trying to throw these out,” I say, pointing weakly at the bags by my feet. “I’m sorry I interrupted y’all.” I hope my voice reads it’s cool. There are two boys who are out at East Rockport, both of them seniors and both of them involved in the theater department. They hang out together and even though I don’t think they’re together together, everyone assumes they are, and they’re the regular butt of stupid jokes and promises that they’ll be prayed for. I can only imagine that they each have a calendar counting down the days before they can leave this place.
But I don’t know of a single girl who’s come out in all my time at East Rockport High. I mean, there have been rumors, obviously. But that’s all they’ve been. Rumors.
“You won’t tell anyone, right?” Marisela says, leaving the thing I’m not supposed to tell unspoken but obvious. I shake my head no and say, for emphasis, “I won’t tell anyone. I promise.” And I know that I won’t. Not even Lucy or Claudia. Because in a town like East Rockport, what Marisela and Jane have going on is the sort of thing you can’t risk too many people knowing about.
“Thanks,” says Jane. She crosses her arms in front of her, avoids eye contact, and my heart cracks a little for her, and for Marisela, too.
“Here, let me help you,” says Marisela, and she grabs one of the garbage bags, and we haul them into the big blue Dumpster behind the hall.
“Okay,” I say. “Well, I’m heading back in.”
“’Kay,” says Marisela. Then, after a beat, she says, “Tonight was fun. I think this is the best night I’ve had in maybe my entire life.” Her voice is soft and slow, like she’s had her fair share of lemonade. When Marisela says this, Jane looks right at her and smiles so big you can see her gums.
“It was a pretty cool night,” I say, grinning back.
By the time Claudia and I walk Lucy home, we are yawning and dragging our feet on the sidewalk. It feels later than it is.
“You can spend the night if you want, or I can drive you home,” Lucy offers. “I only had one cup of that lemonade, and that was hours ago.” We take Lucy up on her offer of a lift since our parents are waiting up, and we don’t have any of the stuff we need for a sleepover. I text my mom that I’m on my way. By the time Lucy drops me off, Claudia is half-asleep in the backseat.
“’Night, Claud,” I murmur over my shoulder.
“Hmmph.”
“I’m so glad Kiera put that together,” Lucy says. “If it wouldn’t scare your mom and your grandparents, I’d honk my horn out of happiness.”
I reach over and honk Lucy’s car horn twice—toot toot.
“What the hell?” says Claudia, sitting up suddenly, blinking and rubbing her eyes. Lucy laughs, and I do, too.
“Moxie!” I yell, getting out of the car.
“Moxie!” Lucy yells back. She toots the horn one more time before pulling out of the driveway.
My mom greets me at the front door.
“Viv, what’s going on? Are you okay?”
I smile at her and pull her in for a sweaty hug. “Sorry, we were just being stupid.”
“You stink!”
“Thanks a lot,” I say, opening the refrigerator to hunt down something cold to drink. I pour myself some orange juice.
“So how was it?” she asks. I’d told my mom I was going to a girls-only fund-raiser for the soccer team, but I’d been vague on the details.
“Mom, it was so fun,” I tell her, “but I’m so tired.” I want to get to bed while my memories of the night are still fresh so I can fall asleep replaying them in my head.
“Did a lot of girls show up?” my mom asks, leaning against the kitchen counter, watching as I down the entire glass of juice in a few gulps. I hadn’t realized how hot and thirsty I was.
“Yeah,” I say, setting the glass in the sink. “Lots.”
“That’s great,” my mom answers. “I love that the girls wanted to do that. Who organized it, exactly?”
My head is starting to ache a little bit. Maybe from the lemonade. I rub my temples and close my eyes.
“It was just the girls on the soccer team and some other girls,” I say, edging my way down the hall.
“I ran into Claudia’s mom, and she said it was some group called Moxie? She saw Claudia’s flyer for it?”