Trying

“Do you think there’s something wrong with me?”

“Why?” Geena asked, sliding her sunglasses down her nose to look at me.

“Everyone leaves me,” I sighed, leaning back on my sister’s pink towel.

“What are you talking about?” my friend muttered, fiddling with a strap on her bikini.

“Fiona,” I said, “and now Kate too.”

“Hmm,” Geena mused, scrunching up her tanned features, “Well, they’re losers. Their loss, right?”

“I guess so,” I murmured, unconvinced.

“Anyway,” Geena said, grinning, “they’re not here. So lets get you out of that oversized T-shirt and into that water, alright?”

“Ehh,” I said, pulling self-consciously at the old shirt I’d borrowed from my mom’s latest boyfriend, “no thanks.”

“Come on, Jess,” Geena pouted, getting up from her chair, “you know you want to!”

“No, really,” I insisted, clutching the pink towel, “You go ahead.”

“Fine,” she said, flouncing away from me through the sand, “See ya.”

Geena didn’t notice when I sneaked away, pink towel in tow.

It was still early in the afternoon as I began walking home in the oversized flip-flops I’d inherited from my mother. Once I got home, I knew I’d be met by Frank who, since he’d moved in with us, had wanted to prove to my mom that he could be a good dad. Even with his expensive gifts, he just couldn’t match the standard I set for all my mom’s boyfriends: my dad. On second thought, I decided, I wouldn’t go home. Frank was nice and all, but all his efforts to replace my father irritated me. So, instead, I headed over to Geena’s house, but not to see Geena who I was sure was still at the beach, showing off her new bikini.

“Coming!” Mrs. Rosenburg called as I rung the doorbell for the second time.

“Oh, Jessie,” she gushed as she opened the door, “Come on in.”

“Hi,” I said, smiling for the first time that day, “Is Connor home?”

Rolling her eyes, the stout woman sighed, “He’s always home. He really needs to get out more. Meet new people, you know?”

Nodding, I asked, “Upstairs?”

“As usual.”

“Thanks Martha,” I called back as I climbed the stairs up to Connor’s room.

Passing Geena’s DO NOT ENTER sign on her door she’d painted bright pink, I wondered with some guilt if she’d noticed that I’d abandoned her yet.

“Hey, Jess,” Geena’s brother greeted me as I walked into his room.

“Hi,” I answered, plopping down onto his beanbag chair.

“Weren’t you and Geena supposed to be at the beach today?”

“Yeah,” I said, “but I’m not really the greatest swimmer.”

“You didn’t want to take off that T-shirt, did you?”

“Yes,” I admitted, blushing, “So what are you doing today?”

“Comics,” Connor said, grinning as he held up FoxTrot proudly.

“Cool,” I said, taking a comic from his shelf, “Mind if I read this?”

“Sure,” he said, brushing back his blonde curls, “go ahead.”

“Connor,” I asked a few minutes later, “How did your parents react when you told them you were gay?”

“They freaked out at first,” he sighed, putting down his comic, “but now I think they’ve decided that it’s just a phase. They keep on saying I’ll get over it.”

“Will you?”

“No,” he murmured, looking straight at me, “I don’t think so.”

“Is that why Ty and Sam don’t come by anymore? Because they found out?”

“I told them.”

“Oh,” I said, nodding, “sorry. I guess they weren’t good friends.”

“I guess not,” Connor agreed.

After sixth grade, school had gotten tough. It wasn’t the work, it was the kids. Popularity became the most important thing. Everyone revered people like Sofia Davidson and looked down upon people like Lucas Thomson who was suddenly labeled a ‘nerd’. I was somewhere in-between. Not popular but not a loser, neither skinny nor fat, ugly nor pretty. Fiona was the new girl in school when Kate, Geena, and I took her in to our little group. She was smart but she made herself stupid, she was thin but she made herself skinnier. She spent her time shopping for expensive clothes she didn’t like with money she didn’t have. All that for popularity. And Fiona did become popular. It wasn’t a great loss. She’d only been my friend for a couple months, but I did feel somewhat used and betrayed. For a while, she called and emailed me, insisting that we were still “best friends”. But we weren’t and we both knew it. Eventually, she stopped calling.

Recently, Kate who, at first, had been angry with Fiona, suddenly became her biggest fan. She followed her around and started wearing all the same clothes as her. I even caught her repeating things Fiona would say. Kate, the girl I’d known since third grade was slowly morphing into something I didn’t recognize.

“Hey, buddy,” Geena greeted me, smiling mischievously, “Guess what?”

“What?” I asked, stuffing my algebra notebook in my locker.

“Come on,” she pouted, “guess!”

“Ok,” I muttered, rummaging around for my biology notebook, “Is it a guy?”

“How’d you guess?” Geena squealed, clapping her manicured hands.

“So, who is it?” I asked because I knew it was the question she wanted.

“Harry!”

I raised my eyebrows in mock surprise, “Really?”

“Yeah, we’re going to that new horror movie!”

“Oh,” I said, slightly put out, “I thought we were going to see that together.”

“You don’t mind, do you?”

“No, it’s fine,” I lied, “have fun.”

“You’re the best!” she called as she rushed away from me to her next class.

When I don’t know what to do, I either talk to Connor, attempt to speak to Geena, or paint. Since Connor was working on his History essay and Geena was busy with her new boyfriend, I pulled out the watercolors my art teacher had given me as an award for her most artistic student the year before, and began to paint. I paint on instinct. I don’t think or worry. I just sweep my brush around in an attempt to transfer my emotions to the paper. My art teacher said that I have a passion for art. It’s like I have to draw, need to paint what I cannot say.

“Honey,” my mom called, interrupting me in the middle of a picture of Geena, “Come down for dinner!”

“Coming, Mom!” I grumbled, reluctantly putting down my paints.

“This is delicious!” Frank praised my mom, stuffing the stuffed shells she’d made into his oversized mouth.

“Thank you,” my mom giggled, flattered, then frowned, realizing that I hadn’t said anything, “How was your day, honey?”

“Fine,” I muttered to appease her, “same as always.”

“How’s that lovely girl?” she asked, cutting her food up into neat little pieces, “What’s her name? Fiona?”

“Fiona’s fine,” I sighed, realizing not for the first time how little my mother knew about my life.

“Good,” she smiled, content that there was nothing to worry about.

“Hello?” I asked, picking up my phone on the third ring.

“Hi.”

“Hey Geena,” I greeted her, “how was your date?”

“Um,” the person on the other line murmured awkwardly, “It’s Kate.”

“Oh,” I said, surprised, “Hi.”

“Well,” she started, “I was just wondering…”

When had talking to Kate become so awkward?

“MmmHmm?”

“Are we still friends because it doesn’t really seem like it,” she rushed as if she couldn’t get the words out fast enough.

“Yeah,” I said automatically, not sure if I was lying or not.

“Ok,” she sighed in relief, “good.”

“I’ve still got to finish that Biology project,” I said, “See you tomorrow?”

“Yeah, ok,” she agreed, sounding considerably less guilty, “See you.”

Hanging up, I went back to painting. I’d finished the biology project the week before.

Turning off my blaring alarm, I hoisted myself out of bed and over to my closet. Pulling out a dark blue T-shirt, jeans, and my favorite scruffy sweatshirt, I smiled slightly, reminding myself that in a few days it would be the weekend. In a few days I could do whatever I wanted, but what did I want? Frowning, I realized I wasn’t sure. Did I want to hang out with Geena? Did I want to stay friends with Kate?

“Connor!” I greeted my friend excitedly, catching up to him in the hallway.

“Hey, Jess,” he replied, smiling as he noticed me.

“History’s next,” I reminded him.

“How could I forget?” he grinned as we linked arms and began on our journey down the hallway.

What I’d always liked about Connor was that he didn’t seem to care what others thought of him. When I was with him, it was like some of his confidence flowed to me. His unfailing optimism could brighten anyone’s day. And he didn’t even know it.

“Psst!”

Without glancing up, I took the paper Connor passed me and unfolded it.

Hey, what’s up?

Taking a moment to get my thoughts together, I chewed at the back of my pen.

Katie called. She asked if we were still friends and I told her we were.

Reading this, my friend raised his eyebrows in surprise. I’d told him all about Kate, Fiona, and all the rest of this seemingly pointless drama.

Is that true?

I don’t know, I wrote. It was true too. I had no idea what Kate and I were. Not enemies but not quite friends either. Not anymore.

Hopefully she’ll come to her senses. But if she realized what an ass she’s been, would you really want to be her friend again?

Maybe, I wrote after a moment, I’m not sure.

How about you and Geena?

What about us?

Are you still friends?

I guess, I wrote, marveling at Connor’s ability to read my mind, What’s your opinion on the Kate situation?

Not even pausing to think, Connor wrote, You’re too good for her. She’s not a good friend if she’ll leave you for something as superficial as popularity.

I nodded, not agreeing but not disagreeing either. So since Ty and Sam left you for something as superficial as you being gay, they’re bad friends?

Pausing, he frowned, not eager to contradict himself. That’s not the same thing.

Since I didn’t know too much about Connor and his ex-best friends, I didn’t pursue the matter, choosing instead to go back to listening to the History teacher, scribbling notes into a notebook I’d used the year before for math.

After having bade Connor goodbye, I headed over to Biology, the one class I shared with Kate. At the beginning of the year, when Geena, Fiona, Kate, and I had all been somewhat friendly, we all tried to make sure that we had as many classes together as possible. I regretted that now, though, at the time, it didn’t seem like a bad idea. I saw it as a way to stay close to the only people who seemed to care for me.

“Today,” Ms. Flinden announced, “we’ll be revising something you should have all done last year, in eighth grade,” she paused for dramatic effect, “the bones of the human body!”

“I thought you would particularly like this exercise,” Ms. Flinden chuckled, grinning down at me as I accepted the paper she offered.

With a groan, I realized that this was another quiz to ‘refresh our memory’, as my Biology teacher liked to say. On the paper she’d given me, was a drawing of a human skeleton with a line next to each bone (or group of bones) she wanted us to label. As Ms. Flinden very well knew, I was terrible at tests. Especially when I hadn’t gotten the chance to study. Tests were too important. If I continued failing these quizzes, I might not pass Biology though my homework was usually very good to perfect. On my report card, Ms. Flinden almost always wrote: Jessica needs to learn better studying habits. Her test score average is 68% and her homework average is 97%. Some trimesters, when I’d really try hard, my test score would be raised to a 70% or, at most, an 80%. Geena, on the other hand, barely tried at all and had a test score average of 90%. After a while, I stopped trying in Biology. It was too hard to keep up, so I got left behind.

“And… times up!” Ms. Flinden called to the class, “Pass in your papers!”

As I handed in my test, she took one look at it and sighed, “You can’t hand that in.”

“Why?”

“Because,” my teacher explained patiently, “it’s the third test you’ve handed in blank.”

Suddenly feeling uncomfortable, I nodded, inching towards the door.

“Wouldn’t you rather get a D than an F?”

I thought about that for a moment. Why didn’t I just try? Because trying was hard and didn’t usually bring good results. Wasn’t it better to do nothing at all than try and get it wrong?

“He’s amazing!” Geena gushed.

“Great,” I muttered as my friend described for the millionth time how adorable her boyfriend looked with his new haircut.

“And the way he says my name,” she sighed wistfully, “like he cares about me more than anyone else. Like I’m the most important person in the world to him.”

I had to admit that I was a bit jealous of Geena’s relationship with Harry. I doubted that anyone cared for me nearly as much as Harry seemed to care for Geena. And, though my friendship with Geena hadn’t ever been very strong, I’d always felt good knowing that there was someone there for me, someone who cared at least a little. Now, the only person Geena seemed to care about was Harry. One good thing about Geena and Harry was that I could spend more time with Connor, the only person who I knew I could really trust, the one person I could really call a friend. Lately, Connor had been telling me that I should do something about Fiona, Kate, and Geena.

“You need to tell them how you’re feeling right now,” he’d reasoned, “Then, you can sort out all your problems together.”

“But what if that doesn’t work?” I’d muttered, “What if—”

“Well, you’ll have to talk to them to find out, won’t you?”

Though I thought that not saying anything to the three girls would be better than risking ruining what was left of our friendship, I decided to take Connor’s advice and talk to them. I started with calling Fiona.

“Hey, it’s Jess.”

“Jess?” Fiona repeated incredulously.

Biting my lip nervously, I realized how long it had been since my last real conversation with Fiona. Would this be even more awkward than talking to Kate?

“Um,” she muttered after a moment, “hey. What’s up?”

“I…” I started, unsure of what I wanted to say, “I…”

I was beginning to regret having called at all. What was I supposed to say?

“I just wanted to know if you knew what the French homework was?”

“One sec,” she said, “Lemme go check.”

“Kay, thanks,” I sighed, relieved, though, I knew the French homework.

“Here’s Kate. You can talk to her while I go look.”

Suddenly in a panic, I clutched the phone so tightly my knuckles turned white. This was my chance. I could straighten everything out with one conversation. Or I could fail and ruin everything.

“Hey, Jess,” Kate greeted me.

I hung up.

“Hey! Jess! Wait up!”

Turning carefully so as not to drop any of my textbooks, I saw Kate, running over to me.

“Hey,” she panted as she reached my side.

“Hi,” I murmured, shocked that was even speaking to me.

“What happened last night?”

When I looked blank, she added, “On the phone?”

“Oh, yeah,” I muttered, “sorry about that. My phone’s not working too well right now.”

“So,” she said, following me down the hallway, “did you get the French homework?”

“Yeah,” I mumbled, sure that this wouldn’t last. Kate would leave me any second now and things would go back to the way they were. So, before she could leave me, I left her.

“I’ve got to get to Social Studies…”

“Ok,” she said, sounding somewhere between relieved and disappointed, “see you later?”

Without answering her, I shuffled down the hall.

“So, did you talk to her?” Connor asked as I slid into the seat opposite him, contemplating the mac-and cheese that had been heaped onto my plate by one of the forever annoyed-looking lunch ladies. Their noses were always wrinkled in disgust at the smell of the food they were serving.

“Um…sort of,” I muttered, poking at the yellow lumps I was expected to eat.

“Sort of?” my friend asked, exasperated, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

With a sigh of resignation, I explained what had happened.

“Do you want me to talk to her?” Connor questioned.

“No, no,” I rushed, “I will.”

“When?” he grumbled, clearly fed up.

When I didn’t answer, he said more gently, “You can’t avoid this forever, Jess.”

I was tempted to do just that: avoid everything. But I knew that Connor was right. Eventually, something had to be done.

I hadn’t talked to Geena much at all since she’d started dating Harry so I was surprised to see her waiting for me by my locker on a Friday afternoon she’d ordinarily be spending with her boyfriend. As I got closer, I noticed her unusually puffy eyes. Her mascara was in streaks around her eyes.

“Hey,” I greeted her, “where’s Harry?”

Without warning, she burst into tears. “He…” she blubbered, “he…”

“He…what?” I asked, trying to contain the triumphant grin playing at my lips.

“He broke up with me!” she sobbed, leaning heavily on my shoulder.

“It’s ok,” I consoled her, patting her on the back, “he was a loser.”

“No!” Geena cried, “He was perfect!”

Perfect? Harry? I had to stop myself from laughing.

“C’mon,” I urged, supporting her by the shoulders, “Lets go get some ice cream.”

Once we’d sat down at a booth with our soft serves and extra large diet cokes, Geena appeared to be feeling much better.

“I’ve missed you, you know,” she mumbled in between spoonfuls of ice cream, “I really have.”

“I’ve missed you too,” I admitted with a hesitant smile.

“So, what’d you do while I was with Harry?”

“I mostly hung out with Connor,” I explained, sipping my coke.

Rolling her eyes as I knew she would, Geena sighed, “You spend way too much time with my brother. What do you guys talk about?”

“Stuff,” I muttered vaguely, stuffing too much ice cream into my mouth.

“…Like?”

I’d hoped she’d drop the subject but of course she hadn’t. I had two choices: tell a lie or the truth. I could have lied easily. After all, Connor and I had plenty in common: a love of video games, both die hard Red Sox fans… So I wouldn’t really even have been lying if I’d told her Connor and I discussed Xbox and David Ortiz. But that wouldn’t have been the whole truth, the real truth.

“We usually talk about…Kate and Fiona.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, your brother thinks I should talk to them,” I continued, aware that I had Geena’s full attention now, “What do you think?”

“What is there to talk about?” she asked blankly, as if she was unaware that Kate and Fiona were no longer our friends.

“Kate’s been my friend forever,” I tried to explain, “and now she’s leaving me for popularity.”

I’d never said these words to anyone other than Connor. They left an unpleasant dry taste on my tongue as I awaited my friend’s reaction.

“Are you planning to stop her?” Geena asked after a pause.

Before I could answer, she added, “Because you can’t. You’ve got to let her go.”

“Wha…What?”

“Kate’s got to figure it all out for herself before you can help her. Let her make her own mistakes.”

I was completely shocked. I’d never known that Geena even had an opinion on the subject because I’d never asked her. I’d started to many times but had never really followed through. Staring over at the girl opposite me, I realized that I’d misjudged her. I’d thought I knew her. But there are two sides to everything. Things are never as they seem.

“So,” Geena chirped, applying her new lip-gloss with the help of her compact mirror, “wanna go to the mall?”

“Sure,” I murmured, my lips curving up in a barely visible smile, “lets go.”

So maybe Geena was right. Maybe all Kate needed was the chance to make her own mistakes so she could learn from them. Maybe, I thought to myself, I should let myself make mistakes once in a while. Maybe I should try.