stares at Ted as he walks away and whispers, “Ted is such a list fucker! I mean, could he be any more transparent?”
Margo watches Matthew reach for the Ping-Pong paddles, which are kept on top of the soda machine. The two of them have never been single at the same time before. She tended to date older guys, guys who could get her friends beer and who had cars. Matthew dated younger girls, the sweet girls who did well at school and were friendly to everyone. Girls from his church. Margo didn’t go to church.
“Anyway … as I was saying, the only one I feel bad for is Jennifer.” Dana spins in her seat and scans the tables behind her. “Look at her. Even the chorus girls have abandoned her.”
Though she doesn’t want to, Margo looks. Jennifer is across the room, sitting at a table full of other kids, but she isn’t with anyone.
“Do you buy her whole happiness act?” Dana asks.
“No way.” Rachel bites into a fry. “It has to be a cover. I mean, four years of being the ugliest in your class? How do you not kill yourself?”
“I give her credit. If I were Jennifer, there’s no way I could walk into school like she did and hold my head high,” Dana says. And then she whispers, “Remember at the junior picnic, when someone whipped that hot dog at Jennifer’s head? And Jennifer was laughing, like it was funny? Ted never copped to it, but I know he did it. I saw him. A-hole.”
Rachel shakes her head in disgust. “She probably deals with that kind of crap every day.”
The girls watch Jennifer pick at her sandwich. Two younger boys, obviously freshmen, pass behind her as they carry their trays to the wash line. As they do, they point Jennifer out to friends across the cafeteria and make gagging faces. Jennifer is oblivious to it.
Rachel throws down her fry. “That’s it. I’m going to ask Jennifer if she wants to sit with us today.”
Margo reaches out to stop Rachel from getting up. “Come on. No.”
Rachel stares down the two freshmen boys as they walk back to their table. “I don’t like those little turds thinking they can make fun of Jennifer because she’s on the list. Don’t they have any respect for the fact that she’s a senior? If she’s with us, they wouldn’t dare say anything.”
Margo sighs. “No one cares about hanging out with us that much.” But she knows that isn’t true. Especially when it comes to Jennifer.
“Huh. Easy for the prettiest senior girl to say.”
“Shut up, Rachel. You’ve been on the list, too. Both of you. It’s not a big deal.”
Dana cocks her head. “Yeah, but you’re the one who’ll get to be homecoming queen.”
“That’s not a guarantee,” Margo says, even though it basically is. “And anyway, I don’t care about being homecoming queen.” Sure, it will be nice. But if Margo hadn’t made the list this morning, if it had been Rachel or Dana instead, she’d have been fine with it.
Rachel pats Margo on the back. “Inviting Jennifer to hang out for half a lunch period isn’t going to kill you.”
Margo pretends to concentrate on picking the lettuce out from her chicken wrap. It doesn’t surprise her how quickly the legs of Jennifer’s chair squeak against the floor.
“Hey, Jennifer,” Dana says, sliding over so Jennifer can sit.
“Hi,” Jennifer says. “I like your shirt, Dana. It’s so cute.”
Dana grins down at her front. “Oh, thanks.”
It’s quiet for a second. Margo glances over and sees Jennifer staring at her. “Hi, Margo,” Jennifer says, all bright and cheerful. “Congratulations on … you know.”
“Thanks.”
Rachel drums her nails against the table. “So, Jennifer. We wanted to tell you that we’re sorry that you’re on the list again this year.”
Jennifer shakes her head, like it’s nothing. “Honestly, I’m used to it by now.”
“Yeah, but you shouldn’t have to get used to something like that,” Dana says, pursing her lips. “Whoever made the list this year is a total sadist.”
Margo thinks back to when senior year had just started. Dana got assigned a seat behind Jennifer in French II, and she complained every day for a week about the fat rolls on the back of Jennifer’s neck. Whenever Jennifer looked down at her textbook, the folds of skin would smooth out, and when she’d look up, they’d squeeze together, like a disgusting human accordion.
It annoys her how easily Dana can forget the past.
But it also makes Margo jealous. Because she can’t.
At three o’clock, Danielle shuffles from her last class of the day to her locker. She collects her textbooks and her swim bag as slowly as possible, in no rush to get where she needs to be. Well, that’s not true. Danielle should be at swim practice with Hope. But she’d been instructed not to go to the pool.
Everyone in English had looked up when Principal Colby knocked on the door. Danielle’s teacher welcomed her. Principal Colby didn’t say anything to him, she just looked around the room. When her eyes landed on Danielle, she walked over and said simply, “I’ll see you later.” This left the bulk of the explaining to the note card she placed on Danielle’s desk.
TO THE GIRLS ON THE LIST:
PLEASE REPORT TO MY OFFICE IMMEDIATELY AFTER SCHOOL.
THIS IS A MANDATORY MEETING.
PRINCIPAL COLBY
Danielle bit the end of her pencil. What could Principal Colby want with all the girls on the list? Were they in trouble? Had Principal Colby figured out who had written it?
Though her questions baited juicy answers, Danielle hardly cared to know them. Instead, she became aware of the boy sitting to her left, craning his neck as he tried to read the note. She quickly slid the card into her book and succumbed to humiliation for the second time that day.
Her cheeks are still hot from it.
Just then, Sarah Singer, the ugliest junior, passes by. Principal Colby is right behind Sarah, her hand pressing into Sarah’s back, forcing her forward. Sarah’s steps are comically laborious — flat-footed trudges, punctuated by tortured sighs, the toes of her sneakers dragging across the linoleum floor.
Danielle had heard about this girl and the word she’d scrawled on her forehead, but this is the first time she sees it for herself. Part of her is impressed by Sarah’s toughness — a different Game Face than the one she’d worn today, when she pretended there was no list, that she hadn’t been on it. But the rest of her is humiliated knowing she is the same as Sarah. That all of Mount Washington will look at her and see the same word, whether or not it’s written on Danielle’s face.
