Here Lies Bridget

Once he’d left, I went back to reading the magazine I’d stashed in my Prada bag.

Finally I heard my name called in the secretary’s nasally voice, and I headed toward the headmaster’s office. I noticed that Brett, who was exiting, avoided eye contact with me.

Drama queen.

By the time I reached the door of the office, I had plastered a wide smile across my face, all thoughts of Brett out the window. I shut the door behind me.

“Good morning, Headmaster.” I acted like we were old friends meeting for lunch.

“You’re pretty busy for so early in the morning.” I pointed a polished finger toward the now-empty waiting area.

“Yes, well, I’ve only got these seven and a half hours to fit in all the angst of private high school. So what is it you’re here for, Miss Duke?”

I let my smile fade and traded it for a much more serious expression, as I prepared to get out of trouble. My charm was a useful tool in these situations.

“Well—” I began, and the phone on his desk rang. He excused himself and answered it. I studied him as he listened to the person on the other line.

Headmaster Ransic was probably in his late forties and had obviously been attractive in his younger years. His hair was a little thin and graying at the temples, and there were faint lines in his face when he spoke or smiled, but he had blue eyes in a shade that looked hot on younger guys. There was something about him that made it seem strange that he worked at a school.

Perhaps it was his unkempt way of dressing and doing (or not doing) his hair. He seemed perfectly competent, but the fact that he wasn’t a carbon copy of some musty old politician seemed to turn off most of the parents at the school.

His desk, too, was different than the usual kind. It had none of those silly metal toys or anything. He had a frame that pictured him and a pretty woman who, judging by his naked ring finger, was his girlfriend. He had a couple of things that I supposed could only be called artifacts: one rock with two faces carved into it, a bowl that looked handmade and ancient and a few wooden sculptures. The only thing on the desk that looked at all academic or work-related was the yellow legal pad that lay in front of him.

I was just tilting my head to see what was written on the pad when he said, “All right then, I’ll talk to you later, John,” and hung up. I jerked guiltily back into a normal non-nosy position.

“All right, surprise me.” He leaned back in his chair.

From his knowing tone, I could tell that the jig was up. I was going to have to come up with a plan to get out of trouble. One that could explain my constant lateness and perhaps score me the chance to continue with my habit of sleeping in a bit.

“Well … it’s kind of hard to talk about.”

Probably because I didn’t know what I was going to say.

“It’s an easy question. Why is it that you can’t make it to class on time, like every other student?”

I took a deep breath.

“It’s my parents. Well, it’s my stepmother. I’ve hardly been able to get any sleep at home lately, so getting up so early has been a …” I searched for the right word “.challenge.”

“And why is that?”

Because I was watching reality TV late into the night and ignoring the texts of needy girls asking me to come hang out and guys asking Hey, what are you up to tonight?

“Well …” I tried to come up with something so personal that he wouldn’t dare pursue the subject. Maybe refer me to the guidance office, so I could get the hell out of here.

“Yes …?”

“Well, when my dad’s there, there’s a lot of yelling.” At the Redskins, the Orioles and every other sports team he followed like a maniac. I contemplated my next implication.

“And when he’s not, there are other noises.”

“Other noises? “

I bit my lip and looked down for a moment before meeting his eyes and delivering what I hoped would be The Silencer.

“My stepmother has … guests. Well, one guy in particular. It’s … uncomfortable to be around at those times especially, but—” I shrugged “—you know.”

My implication hung in the air for a moment, before he finally had the decency to look embarrassed and avert his eyes.

The truth was, the only objectionable sounds I’d ever heard coming from my stepmother’s room when my father was away were strains of Rod Stewart albums and, on one memorable occasion, the Partridge Family. And, more embarrassingly, her thin voice singing along.

But the headmaster didn’t know that.

The closest thing Meredith had to a male guest was Todd, the flaming interior decorator she’d employed for years who kept trying to leave chintz throw pillows on my bed. Apparently the mess in my room was “insulting” to him.

But the headmaster didn’t know that either.

“Really.” He didn’t say it like he wanted an answer. So I kept talking.

“Um, yeah. I mean I have to see him like five days a week, you know? That’s what makes it even worse.” I tried to look tortured for a moment. It was true; Todd was there all the time. Since Meredith didn’t have a job, she had nothing better to do than to redecorate every room in my house from bottom to top, baseboard to crown molding. I also suspected Todd might be one of her best friends.

I wasn’t sure if that was sad or not.

“That must be difficult,” he agreed, looking hesitant.

I nodded. Now it was time to get back on track.

“Listen, I’m not really comfortable talking about this,” I said, and it was true.

“The point is that I think it’s been hard at home, and it’s been hard in class.”

He paused.

“I certainly am sorry to hear about your trouble at home, but I still don’t see what one has to do with the other.”

Why wasn’t he letting this go?

I floundered, trying to wrap it up in a way that made sense.

“Well, how would you like to have the two people who hate you most plotting together about your future for their own convenience?” I was embarrassed at how clear the hurt was in my voice.

But Mr. Ransic had already lost patience.

“Miss Duke, I still don’t see what you’re talking about, and the point—”

“What I’m talking about is my stepmother and Mr. Ezhno’s little private …'rendezvous.'” I was raising my voice a little bit more, not having realized how mad I was about this until now. All the parent-teacher conferences that Meredith left saying what a “nice man” Mr. Ezhno was, and how “we both” just want the best for me, and that this kind of behavior wouldn’t “cut it in college.”

“I mean, why should I have to suffer because my teacher is, like, in love with my stepmom and he’s trying to impress her or whatever by scheming with her?”

I was practically panting.

“Are you saying—”

“I’m saying it’s personal,” I spat.

“Not professional. Not academic. Per-son-al.”

Mr. Ransic finally looked like he didn’t know what to say. Thank God. It was about time he pulled his nose out of my business. Whether it was imaginary business or not.

At last, looking as if he had a speculative grasp on the situation and the fact that Mr. Ezhno and Meredith had something personal against me and that I needed help, not punishment, he said something about his busy day and stood up to open the door for me. I walked out, finally free from being judged.

Two HOURS LATER, I WAS in the locker room with Michelle, one of my best friends. Our gym lockers were next to one another, which was convenient for my venting.

“I was seriously only thirty seconds late. And it wasn’t even my fault! It was his beloved Meredith’s fault.”

“Yeah, that sucks.” Michelle pulled on her shorts. She’d had them since freshman year, and they didn’t really fit her anymore.

“You know, you should really buy new shorts this year. Those are getting a little tight on your hips. I think they’ll order some for you if they don’t have your size.”

I pulled on mine, which I’d been forced to buy two sizes too big because I got stuck with one of the last pairs before I knew they could just order them, and my father had told me to deal with them (his go-to response whenever I complained—it really sucks that he’s not a pushover). Meredith had said, in that irritatingly sweet way of hers, that maybe I’d grow into them. Yeah, right, like I’d ever let myself go up two sizes.

They were constantly slipping down, putting me an inch away from embarrassment every time.

“Mine, on the other hand, are huge.” I pulled on the waistband, and looked down at my sneakers through the pant legs.

“Okay, so what happened when you came in late?” Michelle asked sharply.

“Basically, he sent me to the office with this totally stupid note talking about how I’m some kind of menace. Ugh, and he said something about me distracting other students who were trying to pay attention.”

I watched Michelle for an aghast reaction, and was disappointed to see her fiddling with the cord on her shorts.

I kept talking.

“It was so stupid. So then I had to wait for like, ever, with three of Winchester Prep’s Least Wanted.” I looked expectantly at Michelle again.

She was tugging violently on her waistband now.

“Are you even listening, Michelle? Or are you just going to rip your pants trying to make them fit?”

She looked up, like she’d forgotten I was there.

“Oh, sorry, go on, I was listening.”

I sighed.

“So, finally I go in, right, and then I’m about to be super-nice and just say something about how I promised not to be late anymore, and how homework’s been hard lately, possibly start crying, and then …” I paused for emphasis “… Mr. Ezhno actually called the office to tell him that not only was I late but that I was disruptive or whatever.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. So then I knew I was going to have to think fast, and really all I wanted to do was to get out of there, right? So I start talking about how Meredith’s always got this ‘male guest’ over.”

Michelle didn’t see my finger quotes, or my self-impressed smile, because she was back to messing with her shorts.

My smile faded and I decided to finish my story, because obviously she was incapable of paying attention.

“I just complained about how she and Mr. Ezhno were always meeting and stuff, and how he was like in love with her, and how everything he does is because of that.” I looked at her. Was nothing I said going to get her attention? “And how they’re totally doing it,” I added, just to get a reaction.

“Wait, what?” She looked up.

I glared at her, and a whistle blew to indicate the beginning of gym. Oblivious to the ball I’d just set rolling, I flounced off to class.

CHAPTER TWO

The next day, I showed up to Mr. Ezhno’s class on time. Frankly, it wasn’t in reaction to his threat of suspension, but more just needing to escape my house and Meredith’s sobbing. If I didn’t hate her so much, I might have asked her what was wrong. I couldn’t stand it when other people cried around me. I always felt guilty, even when I hadn’t done anything wrong.

But seriously, who wakes up at seven o’clock in the morning to cry?

As soon as I sat down, Jillian, my other, more gossip-appreciating best friend, passed me a neatly folded note (she’d been the first one in fourth grade to be able to make origami and paper footballs).

I looked up at her.

“You can’t just say it? We have to pass notes?”

It sounded kind of mean, but come on, everyone was talking and class hadn’t even started yet.

Jillian made a face and mouthed, “Just read it.”

I opened the note and started to read the rounded, funky handwriting I’d never been able to copy. Instead, I had total boy handwriting.

Michelle told me about everything that you told her about Mr. Ezhno. Is it true?

I nodded and made a gagging face. Her eyes widened, along with her mouth. Finally someone appreciated how irritating the situation was. I felt a wave of fondness for Jillian, as I saw how commiserative she was.

As class started, I wrote back, asking her what else had been going on in school. She had some decent gossip, as usual. It was really the main reason I kept her around. Jillian had an amazing ability to remember just about everything. She didn’t use her memory to score high on tests and do well in Spanish class—obviously, if she was talking to me all through class, she couldn’t hear that information to memorize it. She used her memory exclusively to collect and archive everything about everyone we went to school with.

Jillian was going on about the colleges everyone was interested in applying to, and the boy who’d just gotten kicked off the soccer team for having a 1.9 GPA. I had just been about to say something about “getting to the good stuff” when she mentioned that there was a new girl.

“… 1.9 GPA, which is so sad, because it’s only like point-one away from being acceptable. Oh! And that new girl is in my gym class, speaking of soccer. She was actually really good.”

I thought of Liam and the girl I hadn’t recognized the day before.

“So, wait, did you talk to her?”

“Oh, yeah, she’s so nice. Her name is Anna Judge, and she moved here from Maine. It’s actually kind of funny, I kept running into her and Liam yesterday. Seriously, like, all day.”

My opportunity.

“Liam?”

I spoke too quickly. Super casual. But thankfully, Jillian never noticed that kind of thing and simply answered my question.

“Oh, right, he was showing her around yesterday. You know how the office, like, assigns you a buddy or whatever on your first day when you’re new?”

“Yeah, go on.”

SPIT. IT. OUT.

“Well, Liam was her buddy. I mean, he was assigned to do it, but I heard he volunteered. He was apparently in the office picking up some form for football when she came in. He dropped her off at each class, picked her up, ate lunch with her, all that normal stuff that the buddy guides do—”

Or all that stuff that he used to do with me every single day.

“—except he drove her home, too, which they don’t always do.”

No, they didn’t.

They never did that.

I spent the rest of the period prodding her for information about Liam and Anna. She spoke delicately, in accordance to my sensitivity on the subject of him. My best friends knew it was a hot button for me. But once she told me she didn’t know anything else, I knew she was telling the truth. Jillian was honest, always. Which was the reason she was the wrong person to tell a secret to, but an excellent person to leak them from.

She did keep talking about how super-nice Anna had been.

Not so delicate.

When the bell finally rang, I was more than ready to leave. I was the first one out the door, tossing an “Oh, bye!” back to Jillian. I had thought that getting out of the classroom and away from Jillian would be enough to relieve me of having to think about the new girl and her friendship (or whatever it might become) with Liam. But as I walked down the hallway, it seemed like her name was on everyone’s lips. Maybe it was all in my head, but even if it was, it was pissing me off.

I ducked into the bathroom, hoping to renew my self-confidence with the reapplication of lipgloss. And there she was.

Miss Anna Judge, the Super-Nice, Surprisingly-Good-Soccer-Player from Maine. Washing what looked like ink from her fingers.

What could be more awkward for me than to stand elbow to elbow with the girl who I had only seen from a hundred yards away but had already devoted so much thought to? Not awkward for her, of course; she didn’t even know who I was.

Oh, my God, she didn’t even know who I was.

I felt the petty, obsessive, desperate-to-be-liked feeling that had been living in my stomach since I was in elementary school. That was always ready to jump out and whine, But what about me? Whenever I felt it, I’d usually try to say or do something to draw the attention to myself.

And keep it there.

I walked to the other sink, next to her, and started to dig through my bag for my NARS lipgloss.

There was no one at the school who didn’t know who I was. I’d worked hard to make it that way. At this point, half the guys were trying to get with me, and half the girls were jealous of that fact or trying just as hard to be part of my inner circle.

I had parties all the time, and everyone knew I only invited the people I wanted to. It didn’t hurt that I had the best pool in Potomac Falls.

Though my dad and Meredith were strictly against alcohol at the parties, we usually managed to spike the punch. Then we’d just claim it was a slumber party, and that’s why no one drove home ‘til morning. Meredith would spend days planning the decorations, themed music, (temporarily) virgin drinks and anything else she or I could think of. It was pretty cool of her—not that I could ever get over my issues with her enough to tell her so.

It was even cooler that she would then spend the whole time in her room or out with my father, out of our way.

I redirected my thoughts back to figuring why Anna simply must know whom she was standing next to. Surely she’d heard someone talk about me, or something. Maybe someone had pointed me out to her while I was too busy to notice. I pulled out the lipgloss and started applying it, still considering other probable reasons why she simply must know who I was. She was just pretending not to.

I risked a glance at her reflection.

She had short, silvery-blond hair, which seemed to me like an obvious effort to look spunky and fun. She had long eyelashes, and the smooth skin I had always assured myself was just airbrushing in magazines and pictures of celebrities. Her arms were thin, just like the rest of her. She was wearing a dress that was bound to be “in” soon. She was still scrubbing her hands.

Then she spoke, taking me off guard. It was like I’d forgotten she could see me, too.

“Pen exploded. I didn’t kill a squid or anything.” She smiled, exposing straight, white teeth.

“I’m Anna, by the way.”

I nodded curtly and smiled back.

“Hi, Anna.”

I didn’t tell her who I was. I had to see if she already knew. Had to.

“And you are … Bridget Duke?”

My mind eased. What had I been worried about?

“Yes, I am.” I waited a moment before deciding that, yes, I needed validation.

“How did you know that?”

“Oh, sorry, that must seem creepy. I saw the name on the corner of the paper sticking out of your bag. I’m new here.”

I paused as the disappointment set in.

“Okay, then.” I turned back to my mirror and started fussing over my eye makeup.

I tried desperately to think of something cool to say while she nonchalantly applied ChapStick to her lips (which didn’t seem to need it).

“Actually,” Anna started, still not looking at me, “I think Liam mentioned your name. Do you know Liam?”

I mused over the simplicity of the question, and the understatement that would be my answer.

“Yes, I know him.”

“Hmm. He told me to look out for you.” She glanced at me, smiled again and waved goodbye.

My face was frozen in shock as I stared at the doorway until she was gone and her footsteps faded. It felt like she’d just pulled the pin out of a grenade, and I had no idea how to stop it from exploding.

I LEFT THE BATHROOM—the scene of the crime—in a daze.

I was analyzing, picking at and utterly disassembling what Anna had told me Liam had said. I’d done this many times with things he’d said to me, each time shredding his words so thoroughly that I worked myself into a fit. Sure, this was she-said he-said, but it didn’t matter. Liam said a lot of cryptic things, seemingly not on purpose.

I’d particularly agonized over what he’d said when he broke up with me. He’d said that of course it wasn’t what he wanted, and that maybe sometime in the future.

Oh, he’d given me plenty to mull over that night.

So, there I was, putting on the familiar thinking cap specifically designed for figuring out what the hell Liam meant by what he said.

He told me to look out for you.

Because she should get to know me, or because I am someone to avoid?

I decided I would definitely have to use one of my other favorite techniques: bringing Liam up into every single conversation and asking what everyone else thought he might have meant.

I had just decided to go to the nurse’s office because of imaginary cramps and say that I was really not able to stay the rest of the day when Brett popped up out of nowhere.

“Hey, Bridget—ready for this test in NSL?” I always hated small talk about classes, particularly National, State and Local Government. Blech.

“Ugh, Brett, what are you—” Wait.

“What test?”

“What test?” He repeated my words with an entirely different inflection, one that implied that I was very, very stupid.

“The midterm, Bridget. You studied for it, right?”

“No? When is it?”

“Today, in like—” he looked at his watch—which, incidentally, looked like it was taken from the personal wardrobe of Inspector Gadget “—forty-six minutes.”

He was still looking horrified at my unpreparedness.

“How much is it worth?” I asked, feeling a little breathless. Today sucks, I thought.

“Thirty percent, just like the final, and then the other forty percent is homework and the other quizzes and stuff.”

Oh, no. I had gotten a D on the last quiz and forgotten about three homework assignments. On last week’s progress report I’d had a seventy-two percent in the class. I had to pass.

“Brett, there’s no way I can study enough during this lunch period. You have to help me.” I said this last part like it was obvious.

“I can’t help you study, Bridget, I have no time—” “No, not study, Brett, you have to help me during the test.”

Technically, I was asking for a favor and, really, one shouldn’t treat the person she wants a favor from like he’s stupid. But Brett didn’t seem to notice. His expression just turned from worry for me to worry for himself.

He understood exactly what I was saying.

“I can’t, Bridget. If we got caught, I’d fail this test, then my grade would drop down to a sixty-six percent. I have to work really hard to keep my grades high enough to get into college.” He shook his head.

“There’s no way.”

“Oh, my God, we’re not going to get caught.” I had no idea if we’d get caught, but I tried to sound confident.

“This’ll be so simple, she’ll never notice. Okay, are you right-handed?”

“Yes?”

“Okay, then you sit to my left, and I’ll sit behind Walco, he’s huge, Mrs. Remeley won’t be able to see me look at your paper. All you have to do is write really clearly and keep your paper diagonal toward me. It’ll be no problem, it’s how most people write, anyway.”

He looked firm on his refusal. And then the obvious struck me.

“Michelle. I’ll trade you Michelle!” I said it like I’d figured out the Da Vinci Code or something.

Brett had had a totally annoying crush on Michelle since, like, first grade. She and I hadn’t really been friends yet at that age, but my mom knew her mom, so we played with each other. She used to get secret-admirer cards and letters. A fact I teased her about because I was positively green with envy, and resentful that no one sent any to me. Except for that one I’d written to myself once, and claimed it was from resident cutie J.R.

We didn’t know for sure who was writing them to her until one day in fifth grade, when I caught Brett in the cubby room writing one while everyone else was playing Heads Up Seven Up. I’d been cold and going to get my jacket when I found him.