A Step Toward Falling (3 page)

Nothing else made sense. The last time I saw her, she was playing Little Red Riding Hood.

Then I realized the boy was Mitchell Breski, someone who'd been arrested once at our school and taken away in a police car. We never knew for what, but there were plenty of rumors, mostly about drugs. Knowing that much made the whole scene more frightening and, somehow, less comprehensible.
Wait,
I kept thinking.
Wait a minute.

I should have screamed that, I know now.

I should have screamed
anything
to make it clear this didn't seem right. I
knew
Belinda, but my brain couldn't process what it was seeing: her pressed against the fence like that, powerless behind him. They couldn't have been a couple, couldn't have even been friends. I should have said her name. I should have called out, “Belinda, is that you?” even if I hadn't said hello to her once in the last three years. I didn't do that, though. I was struck mute in that instant and I remember very little after that. I know that at some point, a football player ran out from the locker room, which must have jolted me momentarily out of my panic. Maybe I thought,
It's okay to leave because he's here now and will take care of this.
I honestly don't remember.

I know I staggered out from under the bleachers to a roar of noise and light from the crowd. I know I found a teacher, Mrs. Avery, wearing a scarf and pompom earrings, screaming “DEFENSE!” between cupped hands, and I touched her elbow. “There's something happening under the bleachers!” I said. The roar behind us got bigger.

“WHAT?” she yelled.

“There's something happening. To a girl. Under the bleachers.” My heartbeat was louder than my voice at that point.

All at once, everyone in the stands was up on their feet screaming. Later I learned, we'd made an interception and carried the ball for a forty-five-yard run. We'd taken a losing game and turned it around. Everyone was ecstatic—screaming and hugging and pounding their feet.

Then I saw the football player from under the bleachers jog onto the field and felt a great flood of relief.
He took care of it,
I thought.
He stopped whatever was about to happen
.

I sat for a few minutes so my heart could slow down. When it did, I walked back to the far end of the bleachers where I'd just come from and saw the flashing lights of a police car pulsing red in the parking lot near the snack stand. I was surprised at first and then relieved by what it meant:
Yes, the football player called the police
.

I didn't sleep much that night, which meant my nerves were raw when I read the newspaper the next morning and saw a small article on the fourth page under the headline
INCIDENT BRINGS POLICE TO HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL GAME
. Neither student was named, nor were many details given, but seeing the headline made me break down on the spot and confess to my parents what had happened. “I saw this. I walked in on it and—I don't know what happened—I froze. I didn't do anything.”

My parents were quick to reassure me. “You were frightened for your safety, sweetheart. You were following
your instincts. No one can blame you for that.”

“Yes, they can,” I told my mother. The more I thought about it, the worse my actions seemed. “I didn't help her. I ran away and let the other guy take care of it. It was terrible.”

My mother tried to argue with me, but what could she say? I
hadn't
done anything. Finally she squeezed my hand and said, “Well, thank heavens that other boy was there. It sounds like the girl is going to be fine and it's time for everyone to put this behind us. It's
okay
, Em. Next time will be different.”

It was impossible to know if Belinda
was
okay. I didn't see her in school, but then our paths hardly ever crossed, so maybe that didn't mean much. That whole week afterward, I looked for her at school, wandering past the Life Skills classroom where I assumed she spent most of her day. I never saw her, but I saw some of her classmates, joking around with one another, wearing aprons one morning. When one of them looked up and saw me, I asked, “Is Belinda here?”

“No,” he said. “We haven't seen Beminda in a while.”

What else could I do to find out if she was okay? Instead of going to lunch that day, I stood outside the athletic office and studied the roster of football players. I wanted to figure out which player had saved her. I hadn't seen his face but I remembered his number, which meant it was Lucas Kessler, who I'd never had a class with and didn't know except for his size. I remembered someone once saying he wore size sixteen shoes that he had to special order because no
one mass-produced shoes like that.

It wasn't until the end of that day, when a summons to the guidance counselor told me I would no longer wrestle with my guilt in private but would have to discuss it—extensively, with various authorities, as it turned out—that I also learned this: I wasn't alone. Lucas hadn't done anything either.

It took another week to get the whole story, but when I finally did, I could hardly believe it. It turned out Belinda had saved herself.

P
RIDE AND
P
REJUDICE
HAS
many parts that I love. My favorites aren't the same as Nan's favorites and sometimes she talks right straight through my favorite parts even though I'm careful and never do that to her. It especially bothers me when she makes me answer her questions because I don't want Mr. Firth to look out from the TV and see me not paying attention to his show.

Nan says he can't see me and I shouldn't be ridiculous, he doesn't even know who I am. Mom says you never know, he might have read one of the letters I've written to him. The first time I wrote him a letter, he sent me a typed note thanking me for my letter and saying if I want an autographed picture I should write him back and enclose a self-addressed stamped envelope.

I wanted to do that, but then I worried that if I got an autographed picture I might have a hard time thinking about anything else. I know I would stare at it all the
time and worry about something happening to it. I'm not sure I could fall asleep in the same room with an autographed picture of Mr. Firth, but if I had one, I couldn't imagine sleeping in a
different
room. I'd want to frame it of course and Mom would probably say frames are too much money, just use a sheet of plastic, which would upset me. Nan would probably buy me a frame but not a very nice one. She'd get one from CVS where she goes once a week to get her prescriptions filled. It would have plastic instead of glass and price stickers on it and it would make me sad to put Mr. Firth in something like that. Then Nan would say she lives on Social Security and what do I expect?

I decided it was better not to get any picture at all than to get something so special that it would only create problems, so I never sent him a self-addressed stamped envelope but I have kept writing him letters, usually about once a month.

I've told him about my family situation and a little about my health. He's one of the few people who know that as a baby I had three operations on my heart. I don't talk about that with other people because I don't like to think about being in hospitals. After a year of writing to him, though, it was something I thought he should know about me.

I've also told him a few hard stories about my life. I always get the feeling he isn't bothered by hearing them. I told him the terrible things that happened on the school bus when I first started riding it in seventh grade. How people pretended to be my friend so they could take my
milk money and food from my lunch. That went on for a long time before I could figure out how to stop it.

I couldn't tell anyone at school because the kids on the bus would say, “Don't tell anyone, okay?” Then I thought of something smart. They hadn't told me not to
write
anyone. I have always been a very good typist even though I have problems with my eyes and reading is hard for me. When I was in elementary school, I did a program called
Type to Learn
every day. My fingers memorized where the letters were and now if I have to, I can type with my eyes closed. Usually I don't do this, though. I keep my eyes open and put the font on very big so I can see if I've made any mistakes, which happens a lot. Still, I like keyboard practice and sometimes it's my reward at school for getting the rest of my work done. The computer knows when I start and stop. Afterward, it can tell me how fast I've typed a paragraph and how many mistakes I've made. Then once, right in the middle of my timed test, I thought: “My fingers can type what my mouth isn't allowed to say.”

So they did. They typed:
Boys are stealing my lunch and my money every day on the bus.
For that timed test, I had 321 mistakes which made the teacher wonder what happened and read what I had typed. I was surprised. She understood right away what my fingers were saying. She hugged me and said she'd get to the bottom of this, which she did.

Later, she told me I could either ride a special van for other kids with disabilities or have my own reserved seat on the regular bus behind the driver with a monitor who would sometimes ride with me. I had never ridden on the
special needs van because Nan says I'm not disabled like those kids are. I'm just a little disabled. I'm slow at learning things like math which I can't do at all. I tried to learn addition and subtraction for a long time until I got to tenth grade and the teachers finally said, “That's enough. Let's quit trying to learn addition and subtraction.” Instead I worked on life skills math like telling time and counting money which is also hard for me. Even though Nan doesn't like the van with all the disabled kids, she wanted me to ride it so I could be safe, but Mom said leaving the bus forever would be like letting mean boys win. So I kept riding the regular bus, in my new seat. I wrote Mr. Firth about all of this because I was proud of myself. And the next time I watched
Pride and Prejudice
, he looked at me in a new way. As if he was a little bit sad but also proud of me.

I haven't written him yet about what happened to me at the football game because I don't want to worry him. I also don't know what I would say. Even if I went back to school where the only computers I can use are, I don't think my fingers would know what to type.

Recently I'm starting to think Mr. Firth is looking at me different again. Like he's wondering why I'm spending so much time watching him and not going to school. Like maybe he already knows the real reason even though I haven't written a letter and told him.

Today I look down and realize that even though I'm watching
Pride and Prejudice
, I'm wearing a T-shirt and pajama bottoms. Also, my hair isn't brushed.

I don't know why I haven't realized this before.

I'm so embarrassed, I turn off the TV and start to cry. Nan rushes in and says, “Belinda! What is it? You've scared me to death!”

I can't tell her why I'm crying. That I can't keep watching
Pride and Prejudice
in my pajamas because I'm scared Mr. Firth will look out and see me and I don't want him to be disappointed.

Nan helps me sit down and brings me water. I don't remember how long it's been since I've gone to school. I don't remember if I've gotten dressed at all but I don't think I have. Which means it's been a few weeks at least that Mr. Firth has seen me watching him in my pajamas. My heart keeps beating fast but finally, after a long time, I calm down enough to speak. “I have to get dressed,” I say.

The next day I do.

My clothes are loose and my hair is longer than the last time I looked in a mirror. I'm so surprised at this I almost don't recognize myself. I look in the mirror and talk to see if my lips move. They do. It
is
me. “Hello,” I say to the mirror. “My name is Belinda.”

Seeing myself talk makes me cry again. I don't know if I'll ever look like the old me. I wish we had more pictures of the old me so I could remember what I used to look like but Mom doesn't have a camera and Nan says cameras have gotten too complicated for her. We have my school pictures framed along the wall but they don't look like the real me. In most of those, my smile is nervous, which means I don't remember what the real old me looked like. Maybe
when Mr. Firth squinted from the TV, he wasn't worried, he just didn't recognize me.

Because my old clothes don't fit, I wear Nan's clothes around the house. Nan mostly wears dresses with matching belts and skirts with white shirts that button up. “In my day,” she always says, “ladies never wore pants except to work in the garden.” Usually this makes Mom stick her finger down her throat and lie down on the sofa. Wearing dresses makes me feel different, but not bad. I like the flowered prints and the little matching belts. One morning I try wearing nylons and orthopedic shoes like Nan, too, but those don't feel right. I like wearing the dresses, though. They make me feel like someone in an old-fashioned story. Not
Pride and Prejudice
but something else. A story I haven't seen yet.

Sometimes I'll wear one of Nan's dresses and imagine people calling my name again. I picture boys saying, “Belinda! Hello! Look at you in that dress!”

It makes me feel hopeful and then I remember about not leaving the house and not going back to school ever again. I don't know when I'll see people who might say hello or comment on my clothes.

Even though I'm getting dressed now, nothing changes much except I let myself watch
Pride and Prejudice
again.

It's hard to be sure, but I think Mr. Firth notices my dress. He squints in the middle of one of his lines and then he stops speaking. It makes me smile. I almost stand up to show him the whole dress, but he has to get on with the story and I don't want to waste time either.

The first time Nan walks in the room and sees
Pride and Prejudice
back on, she says, “Oh good,” then turns around and walks back out. She's happy because it means she doesn't have to worry about me all day if I'm busy with this.

I
N MY FIRST MEETING
with the guidance counselor, Ms. Sadiq, I told her that I didn't remember everything that happened at the game, but I did remember trying to tell Mrs. Avery. Apparently Mrs. Avery remembered this, but also remembers me walking away without repeating what I told her. “So why didn't you do
more
?”
Ms. Sadiq asked. “There were three police officers at the game. Why didn't you tell one of them?”

“I only saw them later,” I stammered. “I knew someone must have called them to help Belinda.”

“That was how long afterward, though?” She eyed me suspiciously. “Fifteen minutes? Twenty?” I knew what she wasn't saying:
A lot can happen in fifteen minutes
.

I had no answer. I told her my heart had started to race so hard I couldn't breathe for a while. I told her I felt like I was choking and then I lost all track of time.

She looked down at her paper, where she had notes written and a timeline of the events. “You sat there that
whole time
, having a hard time breathing?”

“That's right,” I whispered. I couldn't look at her. How
could I explain that I thought if I held still, if I closed my eyes and held my breath, maybe I could erase what I'd just seen? Or make it something else: A game they were playing. Or maybe a joke. Maybe there was some way to explain that what I saw wasn't what it looked like.

Then I remembered Lucas. “I saw the other guy run onto the field. I knew he saw them, too, and I assumed that he had helped her.”

She closed her eyes and shook her head. “He didn't, though. You know that, right? He didn't do anything either.”

That was when I understood why her tone was so unrelenting. Belinda had been left entirely alone. She'd had to save herself by screaming loud enough to alert a custodian working near the snack stand. He came running; he called the police.

Ms. Sadiq continued: “What we're trying to determine here is how culpable you two are for what happened to Belinda. If you witness an assault, it's your responsibility to
tell someone.
We need to make that message clear to you and the rest of the student body.”

She hardly needed to tell me this. Every year, Youth Action Coalition, the group I cofounded with Richard, sponsors an anti-violence ribbon campaign where we set up a table at lunch and hand out white ribbons to everyone who signs the pledge:
I promise to never commit an act of violence against another living being and I promise to report any acts of violence I witness to an appropriate authority.
Though Richard developed the campaign and wrote the pledge, I
do most of the legwork for that one. In my drawer at home, I have three white ribbons for every year I've signed the pledge. It made me sick to think about it.

“I understand,” I told her.

In the week before our meeting with the disciplinary committee, Lucas and I didn't speak at all. I wasn't sure what he would say in his own defense, but I could have guessed: hundreds of people had come to watch a team he was part of. If I missed the second half kickoff, no one would notice; if he missed it, they would. I held a soda; he held a starting position on the defensive line.

The morning of our meeting, I walked into the waiting room outside the principal's office and Lucas was already there. I was with my parents, dressed in an outfit that felt ridiculous: a fair-isle sweater and wool skirt. Both items belonged to my mother. We'd had a fight that morning because I came downstairs wearing a black denim skirt and a long-sleeve T-shirt. “Absolutely not,” my mother had said. Sitting alone beside a potted plant, Lucas looked as if he'd given no thought to his clothes, which made me angry at my mother all over again.

“Why does it matter if I
look
innocent?” I'd screamed at her. “I'm
not
innocent. And they shouldn't base their decision on what I'm wearing today!”

This whole business had been especially hard on my parents, who felt bad about Belinda and also worried for my future. A few nights before the meeting, my mother came into my room and told me I should show the committee how sorry I was, but also tell them I was afraid for my safety. I didn't disagree with what she was saying, but I disagreed
with the idea of walking into the meeting armed with an overly defensive list of excuses. What I did was inexcusable. I could have screamed NO! I could have rushed out to the crowd fifty feet away and yelled at the top of my lungs about what was happening. If I'd done any of those things, I would have changed the story. Belinda would still have been attacked, but instead of learning the brutal truth about violent people, she also would have learned that there are people in the world who will
help
her.

As my parents got more anxious, I grew more dubious about mounting any defense. My father was afraid I might get suspended the same year I was sending off college applications.