I was a little bummed out from the weekend, as I lost only 1 pound due to all the eating my mother forced on me and the supper at the school. Had I known she would watch my eating on Sunday, I would have eaten less, but this morning, I managed to evade her, and I gave my lunch to Olivia.
Complete fasting until supper, and I was hoping to drop at Olivia's or Marge's to make it a complete fast day.
But first, I had to tackle the day in school.
I had math, science, and then social studies that Monday morning.
The first two went well, but then it was geography quiz time!
We had recently played our first round, but it was then a slow process. First, Mrs. Sanchez had to re-explain the rules. Second, it took time to get into a groove. Finally, she had to finish giving some lessons about cities, so only a portion of the class was devoted to it.
This time, we had the whole time with only a few seconds of rule repetition.
We once again asked questions in order of team number, so we went first.
Mrs. Sanchez had a grid setup showing which team asked which team because we would only ask each other team once.
I wasn't feeling that well, but Lyndon was, so he asked the questions today.
We had time to ask 5 questions, only 2 of which were answered, but we successfully answered our 4 questions and got 3 bonus points for unanswered questions. That's 17 more points, solidifying our lead.
What the whole class realized quickly is that we asked compound questions, making it harder to answer while remaining legal.
For example, "Which city on the east coast, smaller than New York, has more population than the 5 least populated cities in the Midwest?" or something like that. Mrs. Sanchez loved those types of questions, but most students couldn't find those answers fast enough. We could.
Why? Because we expected those types of questions. When they came up, we could reply for a bonus point, but most weren't prepared.
We had fun. I managed to answer two of those bonus points. Not bad for a girl with a headache!
I was hoping it was finally my menarche, but I didn't have any cramps yet.
At the lunch break, however, I was given my recital costume, and boy, was it amazing!
It was indeed a dull, boring gray with diagonal white stripes. The effect was clear; it was futuristic. And what helped was that the white stripes were irregular. On my arms, for example, they were thin and in groups of 3 bars with spacing before the next group of three.
"Wow, this is outstanding."
"I tried to break the pattern, you know?" She says.
"Let me try it," I say.
We are on the stage, so I go backstage and just undress completely to put it on. It fits perfectly!
I look at myself and even take a picture of me.
It's not sexy, but it's not unsexy. I don't know how to describe it. Perhaps form-fitting without being sexualizing? It made me attractive, but not in an adult way. It's like she managed to strike the perfect balance.
I joined her, and she just said. "Wow, Julie. It fits even better than I thought. I guess you really are losing your extra weight."
"I am. And it looks better than I thought. And fits perfectly."
"Of course, I saw you as Gabriella, and I have a good eye. Ok, let's practice, and I want you to add more flourish to your moves."
"I don't know; isn't it perfect already?"
"Oh, Julie, nothing is ever perfect, and I decided to focus on your routine at the cost of the other students. I wanted to make the point that a new dancer can still excel under my training. We can't just settle into ordinary; it needs to be extraordinary."
I look at her.
"Why are you not helping your other students more?"
"They have been dancing for years, and I mostly see them after school. You take very little time to eat, and some of them take forever. As you know, I don't eat lunch, so with them, I just sit there, in my leotard, waiting for their stomachs to be full and their mouths to stop gossiping. You are above all of that, Julie. It's why I see you as my star. And unlike them, you have experience in shortage but enthusiasm in excess."
Is she serious? I know it's not a good day for me. Maybe because I ate too much yesterday, but I feel like this is too much pressure on me. But I can't tell her that. I know she will get mad; she did raise her tone a few times in the past, and my headache won't let me go.
"Oh, I get it. Ok, let's add more flourish," I say, faking a smile. Happy that my social studies class is behind me.
As it turns out, flourishes are not easy.
How can I explain this.
A dancer is doing a move, with music, that is usually from a large catalog of moves.
Like she explained, it's like making words from letters and sentences from words.
I do a step, I pivot, I slide, I step, and I pivot. That's a word. I chain them to accompany a verse; that's a sentence. If I do three pivots, they are all the same. It's like using the letter R three times in a sentence.
But the flourish? That's like making fancy letters that are different from one another.
It might be to pull my head to the left in defiance during a slide to the right. Or to pump my fist after clearing a box.
What troubles me is that I managed to use her word analogy to learn patterns. This is why I managed to learn my routine quickly. I know common sequences of moves I can picture in my mind, and I just chain them.
But the flourishes? They are almost random. They make no rhyme or reason.
I try to tell her, but I am drowned in her creativity enough that I learn to just keep quiet and do my best.
And my best isn't quite enough, but it's not that bad. I manage to get a few into my muscle memory, and for the rest, we have 3 more lunch breaks (since Friday is the general repetition).
I wouldn't say that Mrs. Sanchez was happy with my progress, but she wasn't angry. Let's say hopeful.
I did promise I would practice at home, but I wasn't sure I actually would.
My afternoon, however, was torn. I really wanted to see both Marge and Olivia, and the reason I decided to go see Olivia was threefold.
One, she worked on Tuesday this week, so it was today or in 2 days that I could see her. Second, she actually knew Lyndon, and Marge had already heard part of it.
But the final one was more self-centered. I had managed to avoid breakfast and lunch. If I went to Marge, since Ellie and Mom speak all the time, I couldn't fake eating there. I really felt like I needed a full day of fasting; I wasn't feeling well at all after eating too much over the weekend.
As it turned out, Olivia also wanted to talk to me, so it fit well.
On the bus, as is often the case, we barely talked.
Olivia is a rather private person in public, and I respect that.
At home, I heard her news. Her parents had unofficially separated over the weekend.
"I am so sorry to hear that. How are you feeling?"
"Devastated. My father moved out over the weekend, and I have no idea what's going to happen."
"Do you miss him?"
"No, it's not that I miss my father. He is barely there, but how will my mother keep on paying for the house?"
"I think he will need to pay some alimony, and shouldn't she worry about that?" I tell her.
"Yeah, she should. But they are both so neglectful. And even if it pays enough for us to live, then how will he live? Both my parents are poor, Julie. Sure, he drinks a lot of his pay, but not all of it. The reality is that they barely have enough for this house, and apart, I don't know how it will work."
"I feel for you. It's tough. I would let you move in with us, but I know from sheltering Edith already that you would need your own bedroom, and, well, we don't have another one."
She put her hand on my shoulder. "I already know you have a good heart, Julie. I mostly need a friend to talk to."
"Let's hope that things work out with your parents. If not, I can refer you to Edith's social worker. She works for CPS."
"Good to know. Hopefully, I am just scared, and everything will be alright," she says.
"I get that. I guess I won't tell you what I wanted to tell you."
"About your date with Lyndon?"
"Yeah," I say.
"I figured you would call me over the weekend; when I didn't get a call and you said nothing today, I figured it went badly, but then again, you barely spoke to him in class."
"No, I had a headache today. We have another date next weekend."
"So it did go well?" She says, all weird. I know that I am sending mixed signals.
"It's complicated. I am not done with puberty, so I don't, like, desire him yet. I want to. He is a good potential boyfriend, but shouldn't I feel it in here, not in here," I say, pointing to my heart first and then to my head.
"Oh, I get that. I wouldn't want to be in your place. I fully remember when I was confused about what I wanted, and I don't want to go there again."
"But with the girl you like, it's complicated?"
"Well yeah, you are lucky."
"Why?"
"90 to 95% of guys are straight, but for me, only 5% to 10% of girls are gay. I don't have a lot of choice, but my heart doesn't know that."
"Wow, I never thought of that. Must be tough," I say.
"It can be. But enough about me, how was the date? What did you do?" She said, with very little enthusiasm, but I could understand. Her parents are getting separated.
"He proposed a movie, but there was none interesting in the movie theater."
"For real?"
"Yeah. Well, no, there were a few cool ones, but all were rated R."
"I can't wait to be able to just have a date at an R-rated movie. I don't mean a sexy one, but like, a good horror flick," she says.
"No way, I love horror movies! Maybe we can double date eventually," I tell her.
"Oh, I would love that," she says, a little awkward too, but that too, I could get. She can't imagine herself in the near future, let alone in a little over 3 years.
"They have a home movie theater above the garage."
"Of course they do. It's a ridiculous house."
"It is! And yet, I could see, like, broken stuff in the room that they didn't care about."
She laughed. "Your house is perfect. So it's poor people like us and rich people like them who don't care."
"I guess so," I said.
"So, how did it go? What did you watch?"
"We watched The Princess Bride, which I loved. I think it went well. He eventually put his arm around my shoulder."
"He did? Wow. Classic move. Did you like it?"
"I don't know. I think I am not booted up enough to like it, you know?"
"Right. Delayed puberty."
"Exactly. He wanted to kiss me at the end, and I told him no. That I wasn't ready yet. I had explained to him the truth about me."
"And he accepted it?"
"Surprisingly well."
"Well, good, I might not have to kick his ass," says Olivia.
"Olivia. He is stronger than both of us."
"I'll have Edith hold him while you and I kick his ass," she says.
I laugh. I imagine the scene. The worst is, if I asked Edith, she would do it.
It's Olivia who brings the conversation back on track.
"I am proud that you held your ground," she says.
"Me too. I did give him a quick kiss on the lips, but, like, we didn't make out or anything. Just a fraction of a second."
Olivia looked at me but then smiled. "Oh, right. I see what you mean. And you have another date next weekend?"
"I wanted to take it slow, and I had a family event Saturday and dance practice Sunday."
"With Mrs. Sanchez?" Says Olivia, puzzled.
"Yeah. It was cool. We had a few hours, and I made a ton of progress. She made me this wonderful costume. I have it; I could show you."
But she stops me. "I'll be there Friday; keep it a surprise."
"Good idea!" I said.
Olivia told me a little about her first date with her first girlfriend. It was awkward; neither of them knew what to do or who should take the lead, and they ended up not sure what to do.
Fine, I had more details, but it's none of your concern.
Soon enough my dad picked me up. It made me happy because he asked me fewer questions about what I ate. I told him about the separation, and he was sad to hear about it. "She seems like a good kid."
"Yeah, she is."
He sighs. "If only I could save every good kid in town."
"You already have two teenage daughters."
"I feel so lucky," he said.
"Didn't you want a boy? You almost had one."
He thinks as we pull up to our house.
"Yeah, but I don't miss it. Plus, I am bonding with Charlie."
"You know that if they break up, you'll lose him, right?"
"Can I give you a secret?" He says as we leave the car.
"Sure."
"I am friendly enough with the new Richard that I might just stay in touch with Charlie if they were to break up."
"Dad?"
"Yes Sugar?"
"Haven't you considered that Edith might see that as a huge betrayal?"
"Oh, no, I didn't. Shoot."
I laughed, he did, we got inside, and Mom didn't even ask about food. I was safe!
I had done my homework with Olivia before Dad came to pick me up, so I undressed and practiced my dance routine, and then I soaked in the bathtub.
One of the best things about being in a naturist family is that Edith could come sit on the toilet, nude, and talk to me while I was taking my bath.
We didn't have much to talk about; it was just idle talk, but I liked it.
I got my story, and I went to sleep, happy not to have eaten anything since I woke up. Maybe tomorrow, I won't have a headache.