DAY
3
This night’s dreams were filled with dread and horrors that I had endured in the past, without uttering a word to anyone. Mims visited me several times as the night wore on, first in the kitchen, where he used to sit with me while he waited for my brother to get home. He’d watch me with those piercing eyes, narrowing — never giving a clue to what he was thinking about, just staring relentlessly. Then he followed me through my dreams to school, where he stood behind bushes, trees and around corners just watching, never stopping. And finally, when I couldn’t hide from him at school, he followed me home, where he cornered me in the storage closet. How I wanted to scream, to shout out, but I couldn’t. Mims had his hand too tightly over my mouth, and what good would it have done? There was no one else home to save me, there never was…
I woke tangled in the bed sheets from thrashing about all night. Toby sat atop my desk. One leg dangled off, and the other was perched so his knee came up to his chest. His elbow was on his knee, and his face rested in his hand. He was wide-eyed and seemed to be watching me closely.
“What time is it?” I asked, turning to see my clock radio, but it was facing away from my bed.
“Six,” Toby answered, not removing his hand. It concealed his whole right cheek, and as I looked closer, there seemed to be a light grey outline under his hand.
“Something wrong?” I felt like I was missing something important.
“You punched me last night.” He said with a hint of shock.
“I did not!” I retorted indignantly. I would never do such a thing!
“You did, in your sleep,” he argued but kept his face hidden.
“Oh?” I sat up.
“And,” Toby lowered his hand to reveal a dark bruise that covered much of his whole cheek, “well, you were able to hit me.”
I was aghast; I didn’t know what to say. I felt guilty and ashamed, and I wished more than ever that I could get away from him. How was I going to look at him ever again without feeling horrible for what I had done? Toby moaned and looked away as if to punctuate my sentiments.
“I was sleeping, quite nicely,” he started to explain, touching his jaw tenderly from time to time. “I think I was dreaming about me, my life, but it’s nothing I could remember now, even though I’m trying. Anyway, suddenly I feel this whump, and I mean it was like someone had hit me with a brick. You know, you got a lot of strength behind your punch.” He flashed me a smile. “So I get up, and you’re just going at it, punching and kicking. I moved away before you could clip me again.” He rubbed his jaw again. “I tried to wake you, but that just got you more upset.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, lowering my eyes. I’d never punched anyone before in my life!
“No worries, the pain makes me feel real.” I snuck a glance to see that he was smiling when he said this. “Besides, no one will see it and bruises go away with time.”
“I guess they do,” I said. I didn’t want to face him, or the day that lay ahead of me. Dread made my heart feel heavy.
“Well this kind of bruise goes away.” He hopped down from my desk and held out a hand to help me out of bed. I accepted it wearily. “Oh, I took the liberty of picking you out some nice clothes for today,” he said once I was standing. “I put them on your chair.”
I looked over at them. It was my tightest pair of jeans; the ones that made me feel like I couldn’t hide in, as well as a shirt with a plunging collar that had a fanned waistline. I didn’t want to even try it on. I knew I’d feel too exposed in them.
“Give it a shot, and if it doesn’t look good, I’ll tell you.” He continued to hold my hand. “I just think that if you were to wear more stylish clothing, you might get a different response from your peers. You do have some positive features. It would help if you showed them off a little.”
“I don’t want to,” I said, pulling my hand from his. I looked at the pile of clothes in disgust. “I don’t think dressing like the girls in my class will make me any better off.”
“These are not to make you look like the girls in your class.” Toby seemed offended. “I wouldn’t want you to try and show off like them, I just want you to look like a girl.”
“I am a girl.” I didn’t need to expose my breasts for people to know I was one! “I have all the right parts, and I don’t need to show them off to look like I am one.” I heard my voice getting louder and worried that I might wake my family, so I tried to speak more quietly.
“You don’t look like a girl when you wear baggy sweatpants and oversized sweaters. You look like a very chunky boy!”
I couldn’t believe he said that! I was hurt and offended. “Turn! I’m changing,” I spat. He obliged. And instead of putting on the outfit that he had picked, I deliberately got back into the clothes I’d worn the previous day. When I let him turn back, he was obviously disappointed, but didn’t say a word.
Upstairs, I started to clean up the mess from my brother’s party, and Toby asked, “Why do you clean up when it isn’t even your mess?” I had a bucket, and I was collecting bottles and broken glass in it.
“Because if I don’t, then no one will,” I answered bitterly, hating my life. There was a soft tinkling sound as I threw another piece into the pail.
“But that’s not your problem,” Toby said, standing right where I was trying to clean. I stopped and looked up at him. “Stop,” he said. “Just have breakfast, and let’s walk to school.”
I couldn’t understand myself, but I listened to him. I had always wanted to do that, but I knew there would be consequences. I ate only one bowl of cereal before I packed my bag and headed out the front door to school. I thought of how Toby couldn’t eat, him being… A ghost? Well, him being not alive at the least. “Do you miss food?” I asked.
“What a weird question,” he said, looking over at me. “But come to think of it, not really.”
“I would, I think.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because it’s so good, I mean c’mon, doughnuts! And ice cream, and gummy bears and soda pops. They are about the best tasting things in the world, not to mention fudge and cola, and best of all, licorice. No. Popcorn. I could eat popcorn for breakfast, lunch and dinner!”
“But nothing you just mentioned is actually food,” he said.
He was right, and I knew it. “Well what about spaghetti? Or burritos? I’m not talking the kind you get at 7-11. My father once took us out for a real Mexican meal, and it was so great. He used to take us out once a month.” I paused. “Have you ever had sushi? It’s the best…” I trailed off, because that was the last place he had taken the family to eat out. Since he left, Mom, Jake and I hadn’t ever gone out for dinner again. I missed those meals with everyone together, and thinking about it made my thoughts dark and cold.
“Okay, I see your point.” Toby’s soft voice broke into my misery. “I don’t need food, so I hadn’t really thought of it.”
“It doesn’t matter.” My heart ached and I wanted to get away. “You probably can’t remember eating, so what would you miss about it?” I asked, quickening my pace.
“Actually, I remember pizza.” I stopped and turned. He went three steps, then slowed down and looked back at me. “Coming?”
“Pizza?” I quizzed as I came alongside of him again.
“Ya, yesterday morning, when you were eating that leftover slice.” He scratched the back of his neck, ruffling the hairs around his hand. “There used to be this really great pizza place near my school, and I would go there…with friends…ya, and they served one of the best deep dish pizzas you could ever imagine.”
“Do you remember your friends? Do you remember where you went to school?”
“Nope, just the pizza. It was really good.”
“Better than your friends!” I knew I liked food better than friends, mainly because I didn’t have friends. “And if it was that good, don’t you miss it?”
“I think I had good friends, but I still can’t remember them. And no, really, I enjoyed the pizza, but I don’t miss it. I can enjoy the memory of something and not miss now what I had then.”
We neared the schoolyard. My two most dreaded places at school were the front steps, where all the “cool” kids hung out and smoked, and the girls’ washroom. Both were “high attack” areas, and both had too many past incidents attached to them already. As we walked up the steps that day, and of course I say we, but no one there saw anyone other than me, I endured the same ridicule I’d heard for over two years, only now someone noticed that I was dressed in the same outfit as the day before. I think it was Effie. She didn’t smoke because she had asthma, but that didn’t stop her from being considered cool and able to hang out there with the rest of the “cool-junkies.”
“Look, Mariah hasn’t changed! She really is an elephant. Elephants don’t change their skin, and neither does Mariah.” This comment incited peals of laughter that followed me into the school.
As we got in, and the door swung shut behind me, Toby said softly in my ear, “You may be the one being called an elephant, but her saying it is like the pot calling the kettle black.” I gave a sad smile and headed toward my locker. All I could wonder was whether it would have been better to wear what Toby had picked out, or would it have been worse?
It didn’t take long before Toby was talking in my ear again. We passed a group of boys. They were the “techies,” or “nerds,” as everyone called them. To be honest, a few of them were not bad-looking. I mean some had zits and a few were too skinny, and one was too tall, but as outcast as they were, I still fell far below them in the social pecking order. So they too took their shots at me. “Godzilla approaches,” was uttered a couple of times. I guess they hadn’t heard “elephant” yet.
But as I thought that thought, Toby leaned in—I couldn’t figure out why he was being so quiet about it. No one else could hear him—and he said, “The tall one likes you.” This caught me so off-guard that I quickly glanced back at him. The tall boy was just as quick to look down the hall in the opposite direction. “I know you think this means he doesn’t, but trust me, he was all eyes for you before you looked back. Maybe next time, don’t be so obvious about checking, okay?”
I gave an almost unnoticeable nod as we stopped beside my locker. Then I grabbed my book and we made it to homeroom well before the first bell. Being my routine whenever I was early, I picked out a romance novel from my bag and started to read. I was the only person in the class for over five minutes, and then Elijah came in. He too was sort of an outcast, but still not as low on the pole as I stood. However, he was far enough down that he had never picked on me, at least not that I knew of.
It was less than a minute after he’d taken his seat that Toby was whispering in my ear again. “He really likes you.” This time I took a moment, then snuck a glance over my book. I caught Elijah looking at me, but he quickly looked down at his desk. My heart skipped a beat. He was cute in a boyish way, with brown curls that fell like springs over his face and dark blue eyes. He was only an inch or so taller than me. I’d tower over him if I ever wore heels or platforms. He had high cheekbones and deep red lips, not a freckle on his face, but one beauty spot halfway along his right jaw.
I had to stop studying him, for I felt the colour rising in my face, but I positioned myself so I could watch him out of the corner of my eye and still look like I was reading. Sure enough, Elijah looked up from his notes three more times to stare at me for a moment or two. It made my breath catch. Why?
I wasn’t sure if I was altogether comfortable with this. I suddenly thought of my hair, the black mess of tangles that cascaded down my head no matter how hard I tried, and never looked right to me. And my washed-out face. I really should start wearing some make-up, I thought. Then I desperately wished I’d worn the clothes Toby had wanted me to. Why had I been so stubborn?
As if reading my thoughts, Toby said, “Don’t worry about it, you already ‘wow’ him.”
Carefully, I took the paper with yesterday’s note on it out of my desk, my fingers fumbling, and wrote, “What do you mean by ‘wow’ him?” Toby read it, and then I folded it up and placed it in my book.
“He likes you. That’s clear, otherwise he wouldn’t be looking at you. But he likes you for more than looks, although he notices them too.” Toby looked long and hard at Elijah, like he was trying to read something from far way, then he continued. “He likes you because once or twice, when you were feeling brave, you made him laugh.”
He really liked me? I blushed and hoped that Elijah wasn’t watching at that moment. I took the paper out and wrote in my smallest writing, “How do you know this, and are you sure it’s true?” Once Toby had read it, I hid the paper in my book again.
“I’m not sure, but I sort of get these flashes of memories, I think, just specific moments and sometimes a feeling. They are his, because it only happens when I concentrate on a specific person, and I’ve been kind of focusing on him for a while.”
I took out the paper again and wrote smaller than I had before. “What sort of things did I do that made him laugh?” And as an afterthought, “Do you see or get those feelings from me too?” I wanted to ask him so much more, but the bell rang, and I got nervous having the paper out. I didn’t even wait to see if Toby had read it all before I hid it back in my book and shoved it in my bag.
Toby waited for everyone to settle and all the teacher’s announcements to be done, and then after she had dismissed us for our first period, he answered. “Were you ever in drama with him?” I gave a curt nod; I was one of the last ones to leave the class, so no one was behind me to see it. “Well, he really enjoyed a short monologue you did. And also there was a time when you had to be his partner for an improv. He found you fun to work with.” We continued to walk down the hall, up a flight of stairs and over to my science classroom. “You didn’t take drama this year,” Toby said. “Why not?”
I turned to glare at him as I took my seat. I was not about to be baited into answering. I had taken drama my first year, because I had transferred halfway through the semester, and it was one of the few electives still open, and I had enjoyed it, so I had taken it again. However, at the end of the second year, I embarrassed myself so much in the class doing a skit that I vowed never to take it again. Now, in grade ten, I had opted for industrial shop and home economics. I sucked at shop and regretted ever choosing it, but it was too late now to do anything about it.
Toby pointed out three more boys that found me interesting during science, but not with quite as much detail. Two he flat out said were only in it for the looks. What looks? He said he just wanted to prove his point that I was not as ugly as I perceived myself. Even though he had said this morning that no one could tell I was a girl!
I started to feel self-conscious and really began to wish he’d stop, as with each mounting “looker,” I was finding it harder and harder to concentrate. Finally I became so distracted that I spilled the chemical mixture down my sweater, and the teacher had to send me to the washroom to get cleaned up. She was furious. My lab partner made a snide comment that was too low for the teacher to hear—“Clumsy elephant.” I left feeling disgraced and wondered if those three boys were watching me leave. How did they feel about me now? Not so hot, I figured…
In the washroom, I sat in the stall. Toby was thankfully able to stand just outside, and I tried to calm my frayed feelings.
“Just take the sweater off,” he said, tapping on the door. “The shirt you’re wearing under it is very nice.” I didn’t want to listen to him, and I wasn’t about to take his advice while I was feeling so upset. His voice whispered right in my ear, and I knew he had closed his eyes. “What is it really that has gotten you so upset?”
“You can open your eyes. I’m fully dressed,” I said, not feeling comfortable with him so close again. He did and moved to stand against the inside of the stall door. We were still really close, but at least he wasn’t able to touch me.
“You’re making me feel all self-conscious with your reports about who is looking at me!” I said, quite a bit louder than I had intended. I guess all this holding my tongue had built up.
“Why?” he asked, looking innocent. His chocolate eyes danced.
“Because they are looking at me!” I said, exasperated. Why would they want to look at me?
“But they were looking at you before I said anything. I’m not making them look, I’m just pointing it out.” Toby smiled.
I couldn’t argue with that. “Ya, well!” was all I managed to say, and then I had to collect my thoughts. I pinched the bridge of my nose, something I’d seen one of my favourite actors do in a movie when she got upset. “I was blissfully unaware before, and now you have me doubting everything about myself.” I crossed my arms.
“Does it upset you that I told you? Or are you more upset that they’re looking?”
I wasn’t sure which it was… After I thought about it, I knew it was the latter. How could they find me attractive? I was ugly! They had no right to steal peeks! But I couldn’t be mad at Toby for their looking.
“Can I say something?” he asked tentatively. “I noticed these same boys looking at you yesterday, and I’m sure that it wasn’t the first time. I just thought it would be good for you to know that you’re being admired, even from afar. I mean, you are so down on yourself about your looks that I thought it would help for you to see yourself through someone else’s eyes.”
“But you’re not giving a full spectrum. You only tell me when I’m admired, what about those that detest me?” The ones that recognized my true hideousness and thought I could be in a carnival where people pay to see the world’s most ugly human!
“You’d be surprised—there aren’t as many as you seem to think there are.”
I breathed out a “humph” of disbelief. “You must not be paying close attention to everyone then!” I crossed my arms tighter.
“No, I’ve been watching everyone,” he assured me. “I can even see the truth behind Effie and her lackeys. They don’t despise you. In fact, as I explained yesterday, they’re scared of you.” He nodded, still smiling.
Now I knew he was wrong! “What?”
“It’s true. Most kids don’t even pay attention to you, and those that do are either trying to prove their status or are truly fearful of your potential. You have a lot to give, especially when you were in drama. You have so much more skill than Effie and any one of the kids that hang with her. You are also a better student in typing, and you have a wonderful smile. I’ve only seen it once, but it is killer. That is why they try to cut you down, they want to keep you down before you get a chance to get up!”
“And you know all this because you know it?” I scoffed. Being dead must have addled his brain!
“I know this because I see it in all the kids. When I pick them out of the crowd, I can sense it. But I also get the feeling that it was a part of my former life.”
“You remember your life now?”
“Not yet, but what I told you feels familiar in some way, so I can only figure that it was a part of my life.”
“Do you think you were scoffed at like me? Or perhaps someplace in the middle, not popular, but not the bottom of the barrel. Just low enough that you felt like an outcast too?” I found the idea of his life fascinating and a nice distraction from my own.
“I don’t know. That doesn’t matter right now. My life is over. Yours, on the other hand, is happening as we speak.”
I didn’t like how quickly we had gotten back to the subject of me again, but I knew the bell for class change was about to sound, and I had to gather myself together and get on with it. As I stood, I pulled off my sweater. The shirt clung a little at my bumpy waist, but it had a moderate neckline that revealed my chest. Toby smiled at this, like it was an improvement, but he kept his thoughts to himself. I stepped from the stall and went to wash my face in the sink. When I was finished, I tried to straighten my frizzled hair without luck, and headed for the door.
“You are going to have to face Effie now,” Toby said as I reached for the handle. Within a moment, it was lurched out of my hand and opened up onto not just Effie, but also two of her friends. I gulped. I usually avoided the washrooms for this very reason.
For a moment Effie and I just stood looking at each other. She seemed slightly taken aback, then found her lost voice. “Godzilla,” she said like it was a proper greeting, and for the first time it didn’t seem as hurtful, or to inflict the kind of fear that usually shook me to my very core. I nodded then stepped past her and her friends into the hall that was filling with students off to their next classes.
Toby returned to my side a moment later. “You didn’t get to hear what she and her friends said as you left, did you?”
I put my head down as I walked up the hall to the stairway
“You missed something great.” Toby seemed excited, but he didn’t say anything else.
I wanted to ask what, but I was still fearful of sounding like a raving lunatic, so I kept my mouth shut and went to my locker. I deposited my sweater; it was ruined, unless I could wash the chemical mess out. I was disheartened. That sweater was like my security blanket, and I was afraid to let it go, but I did. I grabbed my books for the next two classes, and Toby followed me there without uttering another word. It wasn’t until I was in the lunch line-up that he found his voice again.
Our school cafeteria was located on the ground floor of the second building. It had one main entrance and five exits. Upon walking in, you had to pass the refreshments display, then the payment counter. You weren’t allowed to leave through the entrance unless the bell sounding the end of lunch had rung. From the payment counter, the room opened to the size of three classrooms filled with picnic tables that could comfortably fit four students on either side. Some tables were pushed together so larger groups of friends could visit. Two of the walls had no windows or doors and were painted an awful green colour. The other two walls had windows that let in loads of natural light. Out of one group of windows, you could see the outdoors eating areas.
“In math you had three admirers,” Toby announced as I was picking up my tray. “I decided not to tell you while we were in class, because you said that it distracted you, and I respect that. I’m not going to point out any more to you, but I wanted to let you know that they’re everywhere. In fact, you had the most admirers in wood shop. Five guys; one was particularly into looking at you, but that could have something to do with losing that parachute of a sweater, so I guess I’ve proved my point now, and we don’t need to argue about it any more.” He wore a huge goofy grin, as if to say, “I win.”
I shrugged as I took my favourite seat at a table in the far corner. I was beside a window that faced the track. I was usually never bugged there, so I could sit on my own. That was unless it was Thursday, and Ms. Telz was on duty. She never kept a good eye on what the kids were up to, so the bullies could really make someone like me miserable. I tried to avoid the cafeteria on those days.
I sat with one side to the wall, the other facing the rest of the room; this way I could watch the door, but I had my back to the window. I liked it when the sun was shining, because I would feel warmed, but it was a disadvantage, because sometimes the kids outside would try and scare me by banging something against the outside wall, if the teacher was far enough away not to notice. Yet all in all, this was the safest spot for me in the whole room.
Elijah and his group of friends sat three tables away. They were often referred to as “artsy-fartsy’s,” and sometimes the first part was left off their name to be a greater insult. Toby sat on the table with his back to me, facing the whole lunchroom. He seemed distracted by something. I figured he was just sneaking glances at the other kids’ thoughts and memories, or picking out how many were admiring me, but no one I could see was looking my way, not even Elijah.
When I was done with my food, I pushed my tray off to the side and took my novel out of my bag, but I had no intention of reading. I slipped out our communication paper from the back of the book and started to write. “What did I miss with Effie and her friends?” Toby didn’t seem to notice me. I sat up and looked right at him for what seemed like forever, but he didn’t even acknowledge me. I carefully shifted over with my elbow to bump him. A shock shot up my back with the contact. Toby jumped from my touch and turned to face me.
I was really concerned now, knowing many people were secretively watching me, so I didn’t want to make any sudden move that could be taken the wrong way. Toby turned but missed the note I had slid just slightly in his direction, so I rolled my eyes, then looked down at the table, tapping my pencil.
“Oh!” he exclaimed. He bent forward and read while I tried to look as if I might be working on some homework, something I often did. He straightened with a grin playing on his lips. “Got you curious, did I?”
I felt like I was a mouse, and he was the cat who had cornered me; or was I the cat and he a bear? Curiosity kills the cat after all. It wasn’t a nice feeling either way. I took a deep breath and wrote “yes”. I wanted to add “What did you think?” and a whole host of other things, but more than that I wanted him to get on with what I had missed.
Toby seemed to get the picture. “Well, Effie said to her friends, ‘I guess I can’t call her elephant any more.’ And one of her friends, the other overweight one, said more under her breath, ‘Ya, and probably not even Godzilla either.’ But Effie didn’t catch that. No matter what, you threw all three of them off, even her thin friend. She bit her tongue when she saw you.”
“Why would she do that?” I questioned.
“Do I have to spell it out for you again?” he asked, sounding more than a bit disappointed.
“I really need to hear it again, because it would make me feel a lot better. You know how much Effie’s hurt me, don’t you?” I slid the note back and waited.
Toby sighed. “She’s only hurt you as much as you let her,” he said. Then he leaned back on his elbow and scanned the cafeteria. “They’re mean to you because they’re trying to make you feel bad so that you won’t amount to anything.” He breathed deep and turned to face me. “But you’re the only person that can prove them wrong, by not letting them get to you and by being all you can be.”
Tears welled up in my eyes. Not caring how I would look to others, I hid my face in my arms on the table and shook as I tried to regain control of my emotions. Did he understand how hard it was to not let them get to me? I was only one girl, with no one, not one person telling me anything nice about myself!
I heard the pain in his voice as he put his hand on my back and said, “Mariah, I’m sorry.” He left his hand there, and it warmed me more than the sun shining through the window ever had. I stayed like that until the bell sounded, signaling the end of lunchtime.
Toby didn’t touch me again, but he stayed glued to my side through PE, then during English he knelt by my desk and watched as I completed my assignment. “You have nice printing,” he commented. Like that was worth anything. Or, “You are very creative in your writing.” I did enjoy writing. I didn’t acknowledge him, more for fear of being noticed than anything else, but he didn’t seem to mind, and he kept making kind observations. “You got that right, no one else in this room did.” I had to smile just a bit at that.
English was one of my favourite classes. Mrs. Lavender was always nice to me, and she didn’t even dock marks if I misspelled a word. She had a strict “the content is more important” policy. It gained me great status in her class, but I had even learned to shy away from that, for when I seemed to succeed in an area, those around me would become even more intent on trying to take it away. This got me thinking about what Toby was trying to tell me, and as it resonated through me it started to feel more and more like truth.
When school was over, I decided to walk home. With my books put away in my locker and my ruined sweater in my hand, I headed out the front door, down the steps and past all the “in crowd” kids that had started to congregate there. I didn’t try and dart past them as I usually did, but I took my time—not too much though, and I looked straight ahead instead of keeping my eyes on the ground. Well, I didn’t have my head so high that I would be mistaken as pompous, and I did glance at the ground as I passed someone, but only because I didn’t want to be tripped, a mean trick that they would play on any unsuspecting soul.
Once we were on a side street and I was sure we were alone, I started up a conversation. “I think I will wear the clothes you picked for me tomorrow,” I said. My chest swelled with a feeling of confidence for the first time that I could remember.
“They’ll look very nice on you, I’m sure,” he said, and even though he seemed distracted I didn’t care; I had to keep talking.
“But they won’t show off too much?” I asked, feeling slightly less self-confident.
“No, they’re still respectable.” His eyes were filled with pain. It frightened me, but I didn’t know why.
“Good.” I breathed a sigh of relief. I didn’t want to compete for attention, and I especially didn’t want to look like some of the girls who show off everything. Those were the girls that I was sure were also letting the boys touch them everywhere, and I was a strict “hands off” girl, because I’d watched enough shows to see that doing that for attention didn’t get you anything in the end. But more so, the thought of being touched in that way just made me ill.
“Why don’t you have more nice clothes?” Toby asked. We were walking down a quiet street, with just a faint scent of late blossoms in the air. It was still nicely warm out; we’d had a very mild fall so far.
“I don’t know,” I answered. “Perhaps because I wouldn’t wear them? I really feel safe in my sweat pants and loose tops, but my mom buys my clothes, so I don’t get to choose much.”
“Why does she buy your clothes?” He shook his head in disbelief.
“I’ve never thought about that before…she just always has, and I never asked if I could. When I was littler, we used to go together, but now she’s just too busy to take me, so she gets me what I need if I put it on the list.” That’s just how it had been since my father left.
“How does she know your size? Or what you like to wear?” Toby seemed more concerned than I thought he should, which made me think it over myself.
“I’m not sure…Well, I sorta know. When I grow out of a shoe size, I’ll just say ‘sneakers’ and put the next size up for her to get. Once that didn’t work, so I went to the store and sized my foot, then I was able to tell her precisely 8½. For my clothes, I usually give her the size of my jogging pants. You can’t go really wrong with an elastic waist. And for my tops, I always tell her two sizes bigger than I need. Sometimes she picks out things with the sizes I’ve given her, but that’s rare. Actually, that’s how I got those jeans. There was this one time when she was trying to encourage me to lose some weight, and she bought me everything one size smaller than I asked for, but I refused to wear any of those clothes, so she never tried that again.”
“You really should go shopping and try on some of the clothes. I think you’d be able to find nicer things that you might like better.”
“I don’t know,” I said again, feeling tired and wondering why it really mattered. It was only clothes.
“You are how old?” he asked.
“Just turned fifteen,” I answered.
“Don’t you think you should decide what you wear at your age, not your mother?” He sounded appalled.
“But she’s got all the money.” I was once told to be happy for whatever she decided to give me, and I remembered it well.
“That shouldn’t matter. You could go out and get a job if you needed money of your own. Don’t you want to be independent?”
I stopped and thought about what he was saying, and it all made sense. Why hadn’t I ever put this together? I was fifteen, not a child any more! Even though she hadn’t celebrated my birthday for the last six years, that didn’t mean I hadn’t grown.
Toby didn’t notice that I’d stopped walking, so he made a sort of comical jolt as he reached seven feet away. He slowly retraced his steps until he was standing right in front of me. “What?”
I held up a finger to indicate that I was thinking. What I was really doing was scrutinizing my life. Why had I been so blind to my fate? I wasn’t going to be stuck in that house with my overly busy, self-indulged mother forever, nor with my violent, verbally abusive brother. Why hadn’t I been able to see that before? A distant light appeared, like I was on a train in a tunnel, and finally I could see the end, though it was still far away. Regardless, it now was in sight. I felt foolish for thinking life was so hopeless only two days prior. Was it just two days ago? Life had seemed so dark then, and now, in comparison, it felt bright and alive, with a flame—albeit a small one—of hope.
“You really don’t even know yourself,” he said. He looked at me with his dark, piercing eyes; Toby, in his tight black shirt, his loose pants and those threadbare white socks.
“Know what?” I said, shaken back to that moment.
“You don’t know who you are, what you like, all your skills, anything that is good about you.”
“You don’t know anything about your own life!” I retorted.
“Yeah? But I’m not the one who’s supposed to be living here!” he said, but he faltered. He ran his hand through his hair and licked his lips. “Mariah, you have so many skills, so many talents. I could see them the moment we met, but now I understand that anything outside of pain and misery are foreign to you.”
He made my life sound so tragic, something they’d put on a daytime drama. I wanted to argue, so I said, “It’s not all that bad.”
“Really?” he challenged. “Give me three things that you can see are good in you or your life.” He held three fingers up.
“There are some really good shows on TV,” I said quickly, “and I know you don’t miss the food, but it’s really quite delicious!” I struggled for a moment, and then added, “And I’ve got some great books to read.”
Toby shook his head. I was feeling feeble about my answers too, but if I dwelled on anything else, it just felt like I was falling down a cliff with razor-edge rocks that I’d scrape against, cutting me to shreds until my insides were out, and there would be nothing left of me.
“I understand now,” he said softly, but it didn’t feel like he was saying it to me. It was more like he was saying it to the air around us.
I hated the way he was looking at me; pity showed all too clearly on his face, but his eyes mirrored the deep well of sorrow that I could feel in my heart. “It’s not that bad,” I said, trying to ease his look.
This only made him look sad and more hurt. “No,” he finally said. “It’s worse. But I can help you, like I said. I know now that this is why I am here.”
I wanted to get mad at him again. It infuriated me that he thought he could help, but an even more powerful emotion welled up from a deep hidden spot within: I felt like I was nine again, and I stood facing my father for the last time, his bags in his hand, and I wanted to cry out to him “don’t go” and run to him and hug him so tight and never let him go. Now I stood facing Toby, and I wanted to do the same to him. I could feel my eyes pleading with him, “Be right.”
Toby closed his eyes against my stare, which made him disappear, only to re-appear within an inch of my face. I was so glad to see him that I reached out and embraced him, and though he seemed taken off-guard by my sudden action, the rigidity quickly melted away, and he wrapped his arms around me in response. I don’t know how long we stood there. I wonder what it would have looked like had anyone come walking past, but I felt safe, and mercifully I was spared any intrusion on this tender moment. Eventually the feeling passed, and more importantly the need for it did as well.
I let go of him, my ghost friend who felt more real to me than anything in my life at that moment. He seemed to not want to let go, but he did. As we continued home I felt a refreshing of my resolve, like that hug had breathed life into me, and now I was more than an empty shell walking around just filling in time on this wretched earth. I called my mom’s work and demanded to talk to her at once. I was her daughter. I deserved at least a few minutes of her time!
She sounded panicked when she came on the phone. “Mariah? What is it, are you all right?”
Slightly taken back by her response, I hesitated. Toby put his hand on mine, and that gave me courage to go on. “Yes, something is very wrong,” I answered.
I heard the panic rise in my mother’s voice, “What is it? Is it Jake? Does he need help?”
“No, it’s me, I need something,” I said, losing steam as she uttered each new word of worry and fear.
“What’s wrong?” And now I heard the tone of frustration creeping back into her voice. She was returning to the typical tone of overwhelmed exasperation that she reserved just for me.
I faltered again, and Toby swept my free hand up into his. “Don’t let her scare you into silence; you’ve been quiet too long! Say something; she needs to know how you feel.”
Tears threatened to fall; I could feel them forming a bubble in my throat, trying to stop any words from spilling forth. I wouldn’t cry; I just wouldn’t let myself!
“Is anything wrong, or are you just wasting my time?” she said, not restraining the contempt in her voice. Then I forgot everything I wanted to tell her. All I could see was that I’d now used up two minutes of her important time, and I knew her time was much more important to her than I was. “I’m going to hang up if you don’t say something right now, and we’ll have to talk when I get home.”
I was shaking so much that the phone didn’t rest on my ear any more. “Mariah,” Toby said, waving a hand in front of my face so I’d look at him, “Tell her you are tired of being quiet.”
“I’m…t-tired of, of b-being q-q-quiet,” I said as I tried to keep my composure. I could feel my eyes sting and my vision blur.
“What are you talking about?” my mom asked, her voice hard and threatening.
“Tell her ‘you didn’t want to make her life hard, because you understood how tough things were.’” Toby continued to feed me words. I repeated what he said, only this time it was just a bit easier to say it, not as much stuttering and stammering.
“Mariah, can’t this wait until I get home?”
“No!” I demanded. “You won’t listen!” I felt nervous for talking to my mother this way, but I kept going. “You are always too busy with Jake or your work or other things.”
“Yes,” she snapped, “I am busy, you know I work hard so we won’t go hungry, and your brother keeps getting himself into trouble, so I’ve got to take care of his mess.” If I made her too angry, she could take away so much from me. I lost my nerve.
“Yes, but…” I started to stammer again. Now I was losing confidence.
“Tell her you sometimes need help dealing with your stuff too,” Toby prompted.
“Mom,” was all I could manage to say. But she held on, silently waiting on the other end of the phone. “I need you too,” I finally said, feeling so vulnerable.
“Well, I’m busy now, so you will have to wait until I get back home.” Her snappy business tone had returned, and before I could say anything else, she said, “Now, goodbye.”
I dropped the cordless phone and fled to the safety of my room and the comfort of my bed sheets. I buried my head in my pillow, feeling scared and frustrated. Why had I even tried? Tears stung at the corner of my eyes, yet I didn’t cry. I never did. Toby just sat as the hours went by, holding my feet tightly on his lap.
It was almost eight thirty when I heard my mom get home. I quickly got up and barred my door. She came storming down the stairs, and when the chair worked to stop her from getting in, she pounded on my door. “Mariah!” she shouted, “Talk to me, tell me what’s going on!” she screamed at the top of her lungs.
“We’re done talking!” I screamed back, feeling so angry that I could melt the door right off its hinges if I wanted to. I stood in the middle of my floor with my arms crossed in front of me. But truth be told, I was terrified.
Toby came to stand in front of me, his eyes narrowed. I gave him a “What?” kind of look.
“Come on. Really?” he said, shaking his head. “You wanted her to talk to you. To listen. Well you’ve got her full attention, use it.”
“I want to have money to go shopping for my own clothes!” I said, slowly going over to my closed door. There was no way I’d open it. I was too scared of what she would do if she could reach out and grab me. I knelt on the chair and stayed there.
“Really?” she replied through the door. “Is that what this is all about?”
“Ya,” I said shakily. I avoided looking over at Toby to see what he thought about this. I knew, and he knew, that this wasn’t the real problem; my real problem, being so lonely, was too hard to talk about, because I just couldn’t take it if I told her the truth and she rejected me again.
“How come you didn’t just say that on the phone?” The anger in her voice was subsiding, but I still didn’t feel safe opening my door. “Why couldn’t you wait until I got home?”
“I was afraid I’d forget,” I said, which was only partly true. The real truth was that I knew I’d lose the nerve to tell her everything, as I had. Things like: “Why didn’t she miss dad like I did?” or “How come she put up with my brother?” yet, “I wasn’t allowed to even get C’s, let alone drop out of school.” Now was my chance, and I stood biting my lip when I should have been telling her how I truly felt.
But the relief in her voice was enough to buy my silence for a little while longer. “Okay, I’ll get you some money tomorrow on my way home from work, how does that sound?” I didn’t have a response. “Say about $150, sound like enough to get what you want?” How was I supposed to know? I hadn’t ever shopped for clothes, but I agreed. “And I’ll just give you that much each month, alright, unless you find you need more.” This last statement made me feel somewhat happy inside, so I wholeheartedly agreed and even said, “I love you, Mom,” through the door.
I returned to bed feeling relieved. Toby looked a little green, but he came to sit next to me. “How do you feel?” he asked as he took my hand again.
“Tired,” I said, then I pulled my hand away and lay down on the bed. In my dreams, I replayed the whole day in my head over and over again: the look on Effie’s face when I was coming out of the bathroom; Elijah sneaking glances at me over his book; my mom giving me money every month to go shopping for my own clothes. These were all good things, and every time I went through them, I felt a bit stronger, a bit freer, a bit lighter, and a bit happier about myself, until I woke the next morning ready to face a new day.