I've got a problem. I'm in love. Okay, maybe I'm only fourteen, but I've liked girls before and I swear it was never like this.
It started in Ms. Barnes's class. We were doing this history project. Our group had chosen to depict the persecution of the California Mission Indians in papier-mâché. Ms. Barnes was circulating to see how we were doing. When she came to our table, she kind of reached behind me and put her hand flat against my back. It was just one of those how-are-things-going-over-here things, but all of a sudden, I had the feeling I was going to hurl.
My stomach flipped over and I felt my face turning red. I got all worried that I had B.O. It was love. It had to be. Otherwise, why would I be so worried about how I smelled? It was because she was so close to me … and her perfume. It was soft and inviting, like the smell of Play-Doh right after you open the can. It was what's the word intoxicating.
I can't even believe I'm saying that.
A second after she put her hand on my back, someone on the other side of the room started screwing around. She spoke sternly to him, but she still had her hand on me, like she forgot about it, and I could still smell her perfume. Without knowing it, I turned my head in the same direction that she was looking. I couldn't tell you who she was talking to, or what she was saying, because all I could think about was the touch of her hand on my back, the smell of that perfume, and the sensation of her body so close to mine.
Is this sick? This sounds sick, doesn't it? I'm sick.
But then, suddenly, she turned her head back toward me. She did it so fast that I didn't have time to look away. My face was right there. When she swung her head around, her hair swept across my cheek, and for a moment we were face-to-face. Like, kissing distance. I lost all track of where I was, and who I was. For a flash of a second, I actually thought we were about to kiss. I kind of pressed my lips together and pushed them out, the way people do when it's about to happen.
I AM SO STUPID!!
If that wasn't embarrassing enough, at the same time I lifted my hand up behind her back, the way really smooth movie guys do. And my hand accidentally brushed right across her butt. GAH!
I didn't mean to. But it happened and I'll never forget it. When I touched her like that, it made her jump. Plus, I was blinking like crazy from getting poked in the eye by her hair. I was puckered up, blinking like a maniac, and my hand touched my teacher's butt. Very smooth.
She was cool about it, but I wanted to disappear.
Is this love? Is this what happens? Because if it is, then it's way worse than the stuff they teach us in Sex Ed. Pregnancy and STD's are one thing, but this feeling this feeling will ruin your life. This feeling will kill you.
Maybe I should stop here ’cause it just gets worse.
I wish I could describe her. The picture in our yearbook just makes her look like a teacher, and the one I took with my camera gives her gigantic nostrils. At first I would look at her and not go nuts, but the more I saw her, the more I didn't want to take my eyes off her. I don't know what it is. She has this sexy nose (which is why my picture is not fair to her). It kind of curls up at the end and, on top of that, she has an overbite. I don't mean literally on top. Her nose is actually above her mouth, where it's supposed to be. But the two together are just too beautiful. It makes me happy to look at her face.
Sometimes, depending on what she wears, I can see the freckles on her shoulders and just below her neck. Maybe it doesn't sound like much, but between the time I came into class on that first day and now, those were the things that just made me crazy. Crazy.
I started spying on her.
You see what I'm saying? Crazy.
At first, it was just hiding behind a tree to watch her walk to her car after school. But it got worse.
On the Monday morning of the holiday weekend (we got the day off from school), I went to the mall and she was there. I spotted her off in the distance. I don't know why, but I started following her around, staying far enough back that she wouldn't see me. When she went into a store, I would stand outside, behind one of those booths that sell hats or cell phones. I'd watch through the front windows, pretending we were a couple and she was out shopping for me and we'd meet later for drinks and shrimp cocktails….
After a while, she went into one of the big department stores and I followed. She went up the escalator to where the dressy clothes are. I watched her glide up away from me.
When I got upstairs, she was going through the racks of dresses and holding some up to herself. That drove me crazy. I hid behind a rack of sparkly dresses, pretending that I was a rich older guy. I would surprise her by secretly buying one for her. When she took it up to the counter, the clerk would say, “It's yours. A handsome gentleman purchased this for you.” And then she would look over and see me and we would both be in love.
I watched Ms. Barnes come out three times from the dressing room to see herself in three different dresses. She looked great in all of them. In the mirror, she twisted around to see how they fit. She smoothed the dresses down and posed and turned so that the skirts kind of floated out. It was the best day off from school I'd ever had.
I was there for a while, just standing around, hiding behind stuff, trying to act casual. Naturally, the security guard stared at me, all suspicious. Can you blame him? I got the idea to show him that I was not a creep or a shoplifter, so when Ms. Barnes headed back to the dressing room for the fourth or fifth time, I grabbed something off a rack as if I were there to shop. It's easy to look back now and say, “That was stupid,” but at the time, it seemed like the smart thing to do.
I took the first expensive thing I saw a suit with narrow blue-and-white stripes. It was a coat and pants plus a vest. (They call it thumb-sucker or seersucker which is appropriate because it truly sucks.)
I hurried over to where the dressing rooms were a long hallway with doors on both sides. The girl there said, “How many items?” all bored and stuck-up, before unlocking one of the doors. And then it hit me. What if she's on the other side of the wall changing?
It was like when my friends Zack and Mike C. pushed me into the women's bathroom during a school basketball game and held the door shut. It was scary but kind of not. Part of me wanted to get out right away, but this other part felt goofy excited about being there.
So, there I was and the doors of the dressing rooms didn't go all the way down to the floor. To stick with the plan, I decided to try on the suit. I should have looked at what I was grabbing I have a thirty-inch waist and these pants were about a size 58, like clown pants. I had to hold them up with both hands so they wouldn't fall down. I was nearly laughing out loud at myself, when all of a sudden, I heard one of the other doors open.
I scrunched down to look under the door and I knew those legs were hers. She has really great calves and ankles.
See? There I go again. Calves and ankles! I'M LOSING IT!
She wasn't changing next to me after all. She must have been in the dressing room directly across the hall because I could see the hems of some of the dresses she'd tried on hanging below the door.
I opened my door a little so I could peek out and watch her walk away. She was wearing a dress with really thin straps and hardly any back. She looked so amazing.
I couldn't stop watching her. Everything about her was just so … sigh-ful. It was a complete Zen moment of inner peace.
And then my stupid cell phone went off, blasting loudly. I spun around and yanked my (real) pants from where I dropped them on the floor you know, to get my phone. But when I whipped them up, my cell phone flew off its clip and right out under my door. Crap!
I ducked down just in time to see it skip off the carpet and bounce into the dressing room across the way Ms. Barnes's dressing room.
What was I supposed to do? Leave it there?
I had to get it and I had to move fast. So, I opened the door, made sure the coast was clear, and stepped across the hallway. The idea was to open the door real quick, scoop up the phone, and get out of there. I'd made up my mind to end this here and now. And I would have. But the door to her dressing room was locked. I'd have to crawl under.
Still holding up my clown pants, I leaned over to see where exactly the phone was. I couldn't quite reach it. I lay down flat on my stomach and planned to crawl partway in, grab the phone, and get back into my own dressing room, where I would change my clothes and my misguided ways once and for all.
But halfway under Ms. Barnes's door, I heard another door open somewhere behind. My other half was sprawled across the hallway. If I went backwards, I'd get caught for sure. I did the only thing I could, and edged all the way into Ms. Barnes's dressing room.
My heart was pounding. I knew I shouldn't be in there, but I couldn't get myself to leave. It was like being on a giant roller coaster and seeing the bolts coming off the track. I was scared to death, but wanted to see if I could make it to the end of the ride before the whole thing came crashing down. I remembered to pick up my cell phone, but then I just stopped for a second to look at her things.
I realized, with a chill, that this wasn't her clothing.
There were some of the same colors, but it wasn't what she'd been trying on and it wasn't what she'd worn in. It was all bigger. A lot bigger.
I was confused. Honest to God, the only reason I reached down to pick up one of the lacy things was to try and piece together what was happening. Like picking up one piece of a puzzle to figure out how it fits into the whole picture.
I don't think this bit of lace was anything you would wear on the outside. I was staring at it when there was a click in the lock and the dressing-room door swung open.
It wasn't Ms. Barnes. It was the woman who actually belonged to this stuff, with the dressing-room attendant right next to her. At first, they were both as stunned as I was. But after a second, the girl gave me a look like, ooh, you're disgusting, and the woman began screaming.
Maybe I panicked. I lifted up my arms to tell her to stop, to say, “It's okay. It's okay.” But when I lifted my hands up, my pants fell to the floor.
Her scream got louder. What was I supposed to do? I ran. Or, at least, I tried. I couldn't really get by her because she was big and she was right there in the doorway. The only way to get out was to squeeze past her, but the second I touched her, she screamed louder!
“GET YOUR HANDS OFF ME! GET YOUR HANDS OFF ME!”
“I DON'T HAVE MY HANDS ON YOU!” I was trying to use my hands to pull up my pants.
I pushed as hard as I could to get by her, which made me pop out of that dressing room like somebody squeezed a pimple. I stumbled across the hallway and slammed into the door of my dressing room which was now locked, with my wallet and school I.D. inside. The woman was still howling, but somehow, over all of this, I heard my name being called.
“Billy?”
Oh, God. Ms. Barnes.
I was standing there in my underwear, with those stupid pants around my ankles and that woman shrieking at me. Before I could try to explain (as if I could have explained), the security guard came up behind her. So, I bolted!
Considering that I was trying to keep the pants up, I did a pretty good spin move to get past the security guard. But when I ran into the mall, the device that was locked onto the pants set off the security alarm.
So … now I am a shoplifter, a peeping Tom, a cross-dresser, and something the therapist I have to see twice a week calls a very disturbed young man.
This is what I get for falling in love.
We get warned about everything strangers, drugs, alcohol. We get buckled into car seats; we can't go outdoors without wearing a helmet; and not one ray of sun has ever managed to penetrate the coating of sunscreen that gets lathered on every inch of my exposed skin. Can someone give us a hand with love?
It was my first love. And I was no more prepared for it than one of the mice they have in pet stores. You know, they're kept in those little cages. They get free food and water. They stay all nice and cozy. And then, one day, some kid comes along, buys one, and takes it home to feed to his snake.
That's all I'm saying.