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Okay. I’m back. We left off weeks ago, the end of October, and now it’s almost Thanksgiving. First quarter is over. I got an A in physiology, PE, peer communications and Bs in the rest. Miss Banks gave me an A for originality of thought on my Color Purple paper, but only a C on organization—“RAMBLING AND DISJOINTED,” she’d scrawled across the top in her bright green, fine-tipped marker. So, there went my A in English.
When I reread the paper, I could see what Banks meant, though. I don’t care. I’m glad I followed my “originality of thought” ideas, rather than choosing an easier theme.
I could easily have written about racism, or sexism. But I decided to write about how when love followed the rules of the day, with men being dictators in marriages and families, everything turned sour. But when it went beyond the rules, like with Celie and Shug, and others, love blossomed. Okay, so I’m still rambling. But I’ve been wondering lately about all the rules that are attached to love—wondering if we need them. Anyway, I still have a chance for an A in English on my semester grade. We’ll see.
I’m kind of sorry to be finished with The Color Purple. Those two characters, Celie and Shug, made a big impression on me. I’ll miss them.
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I’ve added a medical careers course to my schedule. It meets on Saturdays, which isn’t all that great, but if I do well in it, along with physiology, I’m almost certain of getting into the RN program at the HHCC.
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Things with Conan? Cool! I can’t believe how I jumped to the conclusion that he wanted to break up with me. That’s so not Conan.
Speaking of Conan, though, we’ve won our last two football games against teams that decimated us last year. Everyone says Conan and Brian make the team. The Hamilton Heights Daily News is playing up the barbarian thing—THE BUCK STOPS AT THE BARBARIAN! BARBARIAN BATTERS BRUINS! Conan claims he hates that stuff, that it’s a team thing and no one person is any good without the others. I think he likes the attention, though. And his dad is all happy because it looks as if Conan will be getting at least three or four offers for football scholarships.
Anyway, Conan’s a hero. Everyone at the whole school knows him. Of course, he’s hard to miss because he is literally the biggest man on campus. As much of a hero as he is at school, he’s the biggest hero of all to Sabina. Finally, after lots of visits to our house, and frisbee throws with Wilma, she tolerates seeing me kiss her brother. She and I have become great friends, but she’d still prefer to be the only love in Conan’s life.
At school, some of Conan’s fame slops over to me. The “in” kids go out of their way to say hello to me now. I was invisible to them before Conan. Not that I cared. That group always seemed kind of phony to me. The first time I heard Tammy Spears, the Barbie-style cheerleader that half the guys on this campus are ga-ga over, yell “Hi, Lynn,” in her sweet, chipper voice, I looked all around to see where the other Lynn was. I’m used to it now, though. I smile and wave and say hi back, knowing I would become invisible again if Conan and I were no longer a couple. Never happen.
What else is new? Remember how I thought Eric must have had a big change over the summer? I was right. He had some kind of religious experience. We don’t talk much anymore, but one day he asked me if I knew Christ.
“I know of him,” I’d said.
“But does he live in your heart?”
“Not that I know of,” I told him.
He launched into a mini-sermon about finding the way, and being saved, and I don’t know what else. He’s president of the Christ First club now. Tiffany’s in it, too. They wear necklaces with little gold crosses. Everyone in Christ First wears them.
Enough about that. Where was I? Oh, yeah—our winning football team. That’s not Hamilton High’s only winning team. Our volleyball team’s won every league game so far. Even so, the Daily News doesn’t bother to report girls’ volleyball events. The Hamilton High Times does, but that’s because Nicole’s the editor. I don’t care. I’m in it for the game, not the glory. Good thing!
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Kit seems pretty happy. We’ve been through some changes these past months, but we’re both pretty happy. Kit spends a lot of time with Star, and I spend a lot of time with Conan. Our Friday nights aren’t the same. I go to the football games, so I can cheer wildly for Conan. Then there’s always a party somewhere, after a game.
Kit and Star go to a gay coffee bar in Pasadena. It’s become kind of a Friday night thing for them, and also for others in the GSA group.
At first I didn’t like Star. But I’m over that now. She includes me in her “stupid jokes” weekly e-mail messages, like “What did the fish say when it swam into the wall? Dam!” And “What do
you get from a pampered cow? Spoiled milk.”
Besides the laughs, I respect how Star hasn’t let life get her down. When her mother found out Star was a ten percenter, she threw all of Star’s clothes out on the front lawn. Star was only fifteen, but her mother told her to think of herself as an orphan from that time forward. Guy Reyes helped her find a place to stay at a church sponsored shelter. Then a PFLAG woman took her in. Star works full-time at an electronics store, installing car stereos. She’s nineteen and she’s just this June going to graduate, but she’s done it all on her own.
Star told me about the PFLAG woman—her adopted mother, is how she refers to her. The rest I learned from Kit. We still usually sit out under her tree when we get home from school. And we still call each other at the same time. And I still go to GSA meetings with Kit, because we’re spirit sisters. For life.
Last Saturday night Kit stayed over at my house, like old times. We ate pizza and watched “My Life as a Dog.” It was one of those movies we’d never have rented, except it had “dog” in the title. It turned out to be a perfect choice—really funny and really sad in the way good movies can be. It also had some “gender identity” stuff in it. (See how I can throw that term around now?)
One of the main characters was a girl who pretended to be a boy. She was a real roughneck on the soccer field, and at boxing—probably Dawn was like that when she was younger. Anyway, get this, when the girl in the movie started getting boobs, she bound her chest with tight ace bandages so no one would know, and she kept playing soccer on the boys’ team.
It seems like everywhere I look now, movies, TV, life, I see examples of people who are not exactly of the straight and narrow 100 percent heterosexual persuasion. I wonder why I never noticed before?
After the movie we crawled into bed, each on our own side, with plenty of space between us. We turned off the lights. It’s easier to talk in the dark.
Kit told me what a hard time her mom is having with her “new look.” Kit hasn’t even used the “L” word with her mom. Neither of her parents know about Star.
“It’s strange,” Kit said. “Star’s one of the best things that’s ever happened to me. Sometimes, it’s like I’m exploding with happiness. The sad thing is, I can’t begin to share that with my parents.”
“Not even your dad?”
“My dad accepts the idea of me being a lesbian, but I think it’d send him over the edge if he thought I was acting like a lesbian.”
The conversation drifted to S-E-X.
“I can’t explain how I feel with Conan. I don’t even know the words . . .”
Psychologist Kit went to work.
“Try excite,” Kit said.
“Ummm. Yeah.”
“Try arouse.”
“Ummm.”
“Try you love your hands and your mouth all over him. Try you love his hands and his mouth all over you.”
“KIT!”
“Try, WATCH OUT, THERE’S A FIRE DOWN BELOW!” “STOP!” I said, laughing.
“BLAST OFF!”
“STOP NOW!” I begged, laughing even harder, Kit joining in.
We caught our breath.
“You better be using protection.”
“We’re not doing it the make babies way,” I told her.
“Oh, so you’re doing it our way?” she asked.
“What do you mean?” I said, not sure I wanted my sex life with Conan to be compared to lesbian sex. Whatever that is.
“Star and I aren’t doing it the make babies way, either.”
“Well, duh!”
“No. Think about it. Excite. Arouse. Hands. Mouth. Fire
down below . . . What’re you doing that we’re not?”
“Nothing, I guess, when you put it that way. Except one of us has really different equipment.”
That got us laughing again.
Then Kit said, “You’re missing a lot, being with a guy.”
“What do you mean? I think you’re the one who’s missing something.”
“No, look. It’s natural for women to know what women want, what feels good. Men only know what they want. I bet Conan doesn’t make you feel as good as Star makes me feel.”
“And I bet the opposite, but I’m not going to try to prove it.”
It was another one of those crazy conversations that only spirit sisters can have.
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Here’s how I look at things now. Kit and I are both crazy in love. We’re happy. That’s what matters. It’s what I hoped for, for our senior year. I just didn’t expect Kit’s love to be a girl. I’m pretty used to that idea now, though.
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While we’re caught up on things, I should tell you about GSA. One day when I was studying in the library, waiting for Conan to be finished with football practice, Emmy came and sat beside me and took a poster out of a tube.
“Frankie designed this,” she said, laying the poster out flat.
“Wow! Beautiful!”
It looked professional, with bright rainbow colors, and purple block print—like a movie poster you might see on the wall at Blockbusters.
“He did it on his computer—some graphics program he has,” she said.
Besides the color, the art-deco design, the poster announced that the Gay Straight Alliance Club was now meeting at Hamilton High, and it gave information about meetings.
“We’ll put it in the glass case in the main building. More people will see it there than if we post it in the library. What do you think?”
“Sure,” I said, not caring much one way or the other.
It was nearly closing time in the library and hardly anyone else was there. Rosie came out of Emmy’s office and sidled up to me, hiding something behind her back.
“Finished with your homework?” Emmy asked.
Rosie nodded, still with her hands behind her back, her eyes sparkling.
“I think she wants to show you something,” Emmy said. Then, to Rosie, “Go ahead. Sweetie. Don’t be shy with your old friend Lynn.”
Grinning, she brought her right hand around, waving a sheet of paper in front of me.
“What?” I said, making a grab for it.
She jerked it out of my hand, giggling.
“What? What?? Please? Pretty please?”
She handed her report card to me and watched as I read it.
“Hey! Outstanding in math facts!”
I give her a high five. The rest of the report card was also good, except for an S (satisfactory) minus in art.
“I don’t like the smell of the paints,” she explained, as she walked over to the drinking fountain.
I stacked my books and put them into my backpack.
“Conan’s probably finished by now,” I said.
“Yeah, it’s quitting time for me, too,” Emmy said, carefully rolling the poster and putting it back in the tube. “I’ll see you Thursday.”
I zipped my backpack.
“You are coming to the meeting, aren’t you?”
“I’m not sure yet,” I confessed.
She gave me one of those looks like I sometimes get from my mom. Like she was looking into my head, and not sure she liked what she saw.
“Lynn . . . we need you.”
“Why?”
“Don’t you see, the better the mix of gay/straight students, the more credibility our group has? If you and Conan come to meetings . . . you both have a lot of respect here, and that lends respect to GSA.”
“I don’t know . . .”
“We need support. Your presence will make things easier from the very start.”
Easier for who, I wonder. Not for me.
“Think about it. Okay?”
“Okay,” I said, but not very enthusiastically.
When I talked to Conan, I told him I’d go to the meeting if he would.
“You know, I’m all for tolerance. And I think it’s a good idea to have the club meet on this campus.”
“But?”
“But I’ve been taught to lay low, except in athletics. That whole thing about my grampa teaching me to stay alive ..”
“But this isn’t like dealing with cops.”
“No, but it opens things up for ridicule, which makes me mad, and then one thing leads to another.”
“I’m not going either, then,” I told him.
But the next day, out of the blue, Frankie told me how much he appreciated my support.
“It’s hard, you know, feeling like a freak, and like no one in the world will ever like you.”
He looked as if he might cry. He walked away before I could say anything. I watched him move his swishy little butt down the hall, students moving away from him, no one speaking, the only recognition a few rude comments. For a moment I forgot my own trivial hang-ups, and my heart hurt for Frankie.
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On the day of the first meeting, Kit brought a pastrami sandwich for us to share so we wouldn’t miss out on lunch. Between Kit and Frankie, I had to go.
Now our lunch table has become an extension of GSA, which is cool with me, except some people can be such jerks. They walk past us and make stupid remarks, stuff about faggots and dykes. Frankie Fudge-packer, some guy said yesterday, and poked Frankie on the shoulder. Not hard. Just the insult, and the poke. We pretend not to notice. It’s so juvenile—it doesn’t deserve a response.
Besides Frankie’s poster in the glass display case, we post notices on a few classroom doors, and on the doors to the library. Last week some of our posters were torn down. Jocks, probably. Emmy says not to jump to conclusions, or to stereotype jocks. She reminds me that Conan’s a jock, but he’s not a jerk. Which is true.
Just yesterday, Conan told me he talked with Brian and Justin and some of the others at football practice—suggested it made the team look bad to have players being rude, like they were at lunch-time. All that did was cause Conan to get hit doubly hard at practice. Conan thinks Brian’s got a grudge against Kit because he couldn’t even make it to first base with her. That’s probably all Brian thinks about with girls—base hits and home runs, if you know what I mean.