I didn’t have to go on the Internet and look it up to know that a family wasn’t just something that brought you comfort and security. It provided some warmth in an otherwise cold and often harsh and cruel world. It gave you hope, especially when events or actions of others weighed you down with depression and defeat. All the rainbows in our lives originated with something from our families.
In fact, all I was thinking about this morning was my mother, the softness in her face, the love in her eyes, and the gentleness in her touch whenever she had wanted to soothe me, comfort me, or encourage me, and how my father glowed whenever we were with him. How I longed for that warmth to be in my life again. Yes, family mattered.
True friends mattered, too, even though I had few, if any, up to now. Just because I was good at making it seem as if I was indifferent and uncaring about relationships didn’t mean I actually was. Students in the schools I had attended thought I was weird because of what I could do and what I had done, most of it so far above and beyond them that they didn’t even want to think about it. I didn’t need to give them any more reasons to avoid me, especially adding something like being a social misfit, which in the minds of most teenagers was akin to having a fatal infectious disease.
I knew most avoided me because they believed I was too arrogant to care about anyone else but myself. I mean, who could warm up to someone who seemed to need no one else? From what they saw, I didn’t even require teachers when it came to learning and passing exams. I was a phenomenon, an educational force unto myself.
Maybe I didn’t need a doctor or a dentist or a parent, either. I already knew as much as, if
not more than, all of them put together. It wasn’t much of a leap to think I didn’t need friends. I’m sure most wondered what they could possibly offer someone like me anyway. Besides, being around me surely made them feel somewhat inferior. They were afraid they would say something incorrect, and who likes to worry about that, especially when you’re with friends? I would have to confess that I didn’t do all that much to get them to think or feel otherwise. Perhaps it really was arrogance, or maybe I simply didn’t know how to do it. I didn’t know how to smile and be warm just for the sake of a friendship. One thing I couldn’t get myself to do was be a phony. I was too bogged down in truth and reality.
Julie moved farther into my room, inching forward carefully, poised to retreat instantly, like someone approaching a wild animal, even though the wild animal was in a cage. Thinking that was where I was made sense. If anyone should feel trapped and in a cage right now, it was I.
In fact, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that wasn’t much of an exaggeration. That was what I felt I was, and not just because of what I had done and what was happening today. I’d always felt this way. Deep down inside, despite my superior intellect, I sensed that people, especially educators and parents of other students, believed I was like some new kind of beast that needed to be kept apart from the rest of humanity, a mistake in evolution or the final result of it, and because of that, I was chained to something I’d rather not be, especially at this moment: myself.
As she drew closer, the sunshine streaming through my bedroom windows highlighted every feature of her face. I wished it hadn’t. I was sorry I had opened the fuchsia curtains, but I had needed to bring some light in to wash away the shadows gripping my heart. I had no desire to look into Julie’s hateful, jealous dull hazel eyes. Sometimes they followed me into dreams, those envious, vicious orbs floating on a black cloud, invading my sleep like two big insects that had found an opening in my ordinarily well-locked and guarded brain.
I lifted my shoulders and stiffened my neck as if in anticipation of being struck. My abrupt action stopped her, and she retreated a few steps. She fumbled with her cowardice. She never, ever wanted to look as if she didn’t have the upper hand in this house, especially when it came to confronting me. However, she never seemed to get the satisfaction she sought—at least, not until now, when I was most vulnerable, practically defenseless, but with no one to blame for that but myself.
“I don’t care how smart people say you are. You never fooled me with your complicated excuses and fabrications concerning things you have done and said. Right from the beginning, I could see right through you as if you were made of clear glass,” she said, more like bragging, to give the impression that she had some special insight that neither my teachers and counselors nor even my father had. She was always trying to get my father to believe that, to believe he couldn’t be as objective about me as she could and thus was blind to my serious faults.
To emphasize the point, she narrowed her eyes to make herself look more intelligent, inquisitive, and perceptive. I nearly laughed at her effort, because she was so obvious whenever she did that and whenever she spoke with a little nasality and used multisyllabic words like “fabrication” instead of “lie.” She was the queen of euphemisms anyway, always trying to impress my father with what a lady she was, never without a perfumed handkerchief, the scent of her cologne whirling about her, her head held high and her posture regal. She loved giving off that aristocratic air, practically tiptoeing over the floors and carpets as if she floated on a private cloud.
I think Julie had long ago convinced herself that somewhere in her background and lineage there really was royal blood. She believed she was born with class and had inherited elegance and stature. Heaven forbid she heard any profanity out of my mouth or her daughter’s. Didn’t we know it was unladylike, made us look cheap and unsophisticated? She would go into hyperventilation and have to sit quickly, especially if it happened in front of my father, who would rush to her side to apologize for me, because he knew I wouldn’t. He couldn’t see that small smile of satisfaction sitting on her lips, but I could.
Why were men so easy to fool or so willing to tolerate phoniness just to sail on smooth water? What wouldn’t they compromise to keep the pathways to their beds unobstructed? Were women really the superior sex? Was sex, in fact, a big disadvantage for men? Ironically, I had been thinking about writing a paper on that topic. Women seemed more able to avoid sex, hold off longer than men, and certainly use it as a weapon when necessary or a device to get what they wanted. I had read a theory that developed the idea that women craved sex with nearly the same intensity as men only when they were ovulating, while men craved it continually.
“I always knew you were very capable of being mean, evil, and selfish,” she ranted. “Your intelligence doesn’t make you any sort of angel. In fact, in your case especially, it’s just the opposite. You’re sly and conniving. We already know how effective you are at manipulating people, especially someone younger than you. You’re just better at these evil ways than most people.”
She waited for my reaction, but I just continued to stare at her as if she was some sort of curious form of life. It was getting to her, despite her claims of invulnerability.
“You don’t intimidate me with that ‘I’m better than you’ look. It hasn’t happened to you yet, in my opinion, despite what others might think, but someday you’ll get your just desserts,” she concluded.
I finally had something to say. “I can tell from the way you’re saying that expression that you are spelling it wrong in your mind,” I said.
“What? What the hell are you talking about now? What expression?”
“ ‘Just deserts.’ Desert in the sense you mean is actually spelled with one s, not two. You’re using that expression to mean I’ll get my proper punishment.”
She continued to glare at me but now with her mouth fallen slightly open, her salmon-pink tongue looking like a dead fish.
I straightened up, and I’m sure it looked to her as if I was in front of a classroom, my classroom. I was a good inch and a half taller than she was, a little broader in the shoulders but with just as small a waist, long legs, and just as ample and firm a bosom. Despite the fact that we had no facial resemblances or similar hair color, I was always afraid that someone who didn’t know us might make the wrong conclusion that we were actually related.
“Dessert with two s’s is most always that course in the meal that gets people excited and happy. And getting what you deserve might also mean you’re finally receiving the accolades and rewards you’ve earned. That’s certainly nothing to fear. But the expression does come from a book called Warning Faire Women. The exact quote in question is ‘Upon a pillory—that the world may see, a just desert for such impiety.’ It’s spelled with one s, coming from deserts in the sense of things deserved. Understand?”
“Understand? That’s how you treat what I say even after all you’ve done? Do you think I’m one of your dumb high school classmates? Why, you pedantic little bitch,” she said, spitting the words out through clenched teeth. “I bet you think you’re so superior to the rest of us because of that computer you have for a brain and those bureaucratic school administrators who fawn over you as if you were the next Albert Einstein. They’re just as much a cause of all this as you are, by encouraging you to think of yourself as . . . as someone who doesn’t need to go to the bathroom or something.”
I didn’t change expression, even though I was laughing at her on the inside. My father wasn’t home. He had an errand to do before we left, so he didn’t hear her say all this, not that I thought he would have done much to reprimand her for saying any of it anyway at this point. I recalled the expression on his face yesterday when he didn’t think I saw him looking at me. It was soaked in disappointment. Vividly recalling that look, I thought he might even agree with her now, every nasty and mean word. I imagined him nodding and putting h
is hand on her shoulder, not mine, to bring her comfort and whisper something to make her feel better and show her how concerned he was for her welfare. “Don’t get yourself too upset,” he might tell her. “It doesn’t do anyone any good for you to get sick, especially now, in the middle of all this.”
“I don’t mean to be condescending,” I said, with just the quiet, matter-of-fact tone that irritated her. “You use the expression so often, Julie, that I thought you might want to know about it. I know how important it is for you not to look like a fool in front of your friends. Not that any of your so-called friends would know the difference anyway. If you surround yourself with mediocrity, you become mediocre,” I added. “You probably think you stand out, but believe me, they pull you down, not that you had all that far to fall.”
Her eyes widened, and her face reddened, with cheeks that looked like fully matured red apples. She balled her fists and readied her vocal cords for screaming. I loved the way I was getting inside her and tying her already twisted little heart into tighter knots. For me, it was sweet revenge, and for the moment, that took my mind off the pool of trouble in which I was swimming, maybe drowning.
“It’s not unlike another favorite expression of yours,” I continued. I felt as if I were on a roll, like a contestant on Jeopardy! “ ‘The icing on the cake.’ I notice you’re always using it for negative remarks like ‘His wife’s suing him for divorce is the icing on the cake.’ It really is used more for positive comments. Think about it. Who doesn’t like licking the icing on a cake?”
She continued to glare at me, as if hoping her fiery eyes would make me explode and drop into a pool of dust at her feet. She could do that so easily to her daughter.