monday morning I took up arms against a sea of troubles. I marched into the school office, asked to see the nurse, and learned we only have one on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
“What if someone gets sick on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday?”
The secretary looked at me without humor. “Then you get to go home.”
“I’m just learning this now? All those civics classes I suffered through, for nothing.”
She sighed. “What do you want, Maggie? You know we’re super busy before school.”
I chewed my lip, deciding how to proceed. “What if I’m worried about the health of a student? Who would I talk to?”
The secretary tilted her ash-blond head. I could see her flick through the mental card catalog of possibilities—drugs, pregnancy, depression. “You could talk to one of the assistant principals.”
“Is Mrs. Cardenas available?”
“No. Just Mr. Halloran. Would you like me to see if he has time to see you?” Her drolly bland expression said she knew the answer to that question.
“Uh, maybe later. First I have to make an appointment for that root canal I’ve been putting off.”
“Right. See you, Maggie.”
“See you, Ms. Jones.”
I grumped out of the office, irritated to be sidelined so quickly. Bad enough I had to rescue Jessica Prime at all. I wanted to get it over with.
“Maggie!” Brian found me in the busy courtyard, a smile on his handsome face. He made a token effort to sober up. “I heard you and your friend had a fight at Cadillac Grill. I’m sorry.”
“No, you’re not.”
“If he’s just your friend, then I am. If he’s more than that, maybe not.” He flashed an unrepentant grin and I had to give him points for honesty. He handed me a ticket. “That will get you into the game this afternoon. When it’s over, I thought we could get something to eat.”
I had a lot to do that afternoon. Besides homework, newspaper, and yearbook, there was saving the world as well. Where was I going to fit in a date?
But none of these excuses actually made it to my lips and Brian took my silence as assent. He dashed off before I could tell him to be extra careful.
I turned to go to my own class, but stopped when I saw Jessica Prime staring at me from near the picnic tables. There was malice in her eyes, but that didn’t shock me. It was the sunken hollows in her cheeks and the collarbones jutting out like knives. She looked like a walking toothpick with a pair of grapes stuck on the front. Her fake boobs were the only things with any life. The rest of her was deflated down to the bones.
How had this happened so quickly? Was the change so fast, or was I looking with new eyes? Either way, it was clear I wasn’t going to be able to wait for the nurse to return tomorrow. I had to take action immediately.
I arrived in the locker room early, which should have given Coach Milner’s marathon-conditioned heart an attack. She glanced up from her desk as I tapped on her office door. “Got a minute, Coach?”
“Certainly, Quinn. Have a seat. If you’re worried about your grade for the swimming portion of the six weeks—”
She broke off with a raised eyebrow as I closed the door and sat down purposefully. “It’s not my grade. Though I will point out that lots of people have phobias about the water. But this is about Jessica Prime—I mean, Prentice.”
“Prentice? What about her?”
“Last Friday, when I went back to get my goggles, I heard her throwing up. In secret.”
The coach’s eyes narrowed. “You shouldn’t jump to conclusions, Quinn. Maybe lunch wasn’t agreeing with her.”
“I don’t think any food is agreeing with her.”
“Look, Quinn. Not everyone with a trim figure is anorexic or bulimic. As a cheerleader, Prentice must be rigid about diet and exercise. You shouldn’t let jealousy color your perceptions.”
I sat back in the molded plastic chair. “Jealousy?”
“Yes. You struggle in every physical activity, when you bother to try at all. For your height, you could stand to lose at least five pounds. I’ve been teaching P.E. for a long time, and I can tell you, a healthy body comes with hard work.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t think that includes sticking a finger down my throat.” Furious, I surged to my feet. “I thought you’d be an advocate for a healthy person, not just a thin body. My five extra pounds means an extra book read, or another banana split I shared with my dad. I’m happy like I am, and I am certainly not jealous of Jessica Cheers-for-Brains Prentice.”
“That’s detention, Quinn.” Milner’s face went red beneath her sun-bronzed tan. She shoved a D Hall slip at me. “Take it and go.”
“Fine.” I grabbed the pass from her. “But open your eyes and take a look at her today, not how you remember her looking last week. Just help her. Please.”
I stormed out, leaving the door open behind me. I ran into a crowd of girls in various stages of dress, their changing interrupted as they gathered to stare in confusion at Jessica Prentice. It was impossible to call her “Prime” while she gazed at herself in the mirror and wept in unfeigned anguish.
“How did this happen?” she wailed, unable to tear her eyes from her reflection. “I haven’t eaten anything. I’ve exercised two, three hours every day.”
I could sense the funeral pyre stench at the back of my throat. I was attuned to the smell by this time; it seemed faint. Days old.
Thespica stood to one side of the mirror, her face twisted with anxiety. “You don’t look fat, Jessica.” She wrung her fingers into a fearful knot. “Maybe, if you’re worried, you should see a doctor.”
The crowd parted for Coach Milner. If the scene weren’t so pathetic, I would have relished her shocked expression.
“What’s going on, Prentice?” Milner asked when she had recovered herself. She pitched her tone somewhere near its usual go-get-’em bluster.
“Look at me, Coach.” Jessica could not tear her gaze from the mirror. “I’m so … fat.”
“You’re not fat, Prentice.” She moved slowly, reaching to take the girl’s arm. “You’re going to be fine. Why don’t we go in my office and talk?”
“No!” She pulled away. “I know you think I must be eating like a pig, but I’m not. I’m not eating at all.” Tears slipped down her gaunt cheeks.
“I know you’re not. Let’s just go in my office.…”
Milner turned her gently away from her reflection. Jessica saw me, and started to shriek. That was always such a pleasure.
“It’s her, isn’t it? Did she tell you I’m crazy? She hates me, you know.”
“Let’s leave Quinn out of this.”
“She’s just jealous!” The girl began to sob. “Or she was. Now look at me! I’m disgusting.”
I looked. Not at her, but in the mirror. When Jessica opened her eyes and gazed at her image, I saw her toothpick-and-grape figure burble and warp. In its place was a girl I had never seen before. It wasn’t merely that she was fat. She was certainly overweight—rolls of flesh strained against her too-small clothes—but a wardrobe change would do wonders.
No, this girl in the mirror, wearing Jessica Prime’s clothes, her hair, her boobs, was ugly. She had piggish eyes and a bulbous nose and as I watched, her face erupted in a minefield of gaping black pores and pus-filled pimples.
Jessica screamed. The sound echoed off the metal lockers and the tile floors. Some of the girls put their hands over their ears. Some were too appalled to move. They couldn’t see what Jessica saw in her reflection. To their eyes, her perfection was marred only by her emaciation and slipping sanity.
She reached her hands to her face and began to claw at it, to tear the skin. I jumped forward to stop her, dizzy from the dual vision of the girl, nearly perfect and utterly grotesque. As she raked her nails over her cheeks, in the mirror the pimples popped and ran, and I gagged on the putrid smell. It was as if, in the vision-Jessica, all the rot inside her oozed out of her face.
I squeezed my eyes shut and dragged her hands down as Coach Milner came to help. Jessica fought us like a wild thing, flailing and kicking, shrieking at the top of her lungs. Milner got her in a restraining hold, wrapping whipcord arms around her from behind, and gently but inexorably lowering the struggling girl to the floor.
“Call nine-one-one,” she said as Jessica went limp. In her weakened state, she was no match for the coach. She subsided, sobbing, a wretched heap of sticks on the cold tile floor.