The Inside of Out (31 page)

“You need to tell her that.”

She turned to look at me.

“Tell her that. Exactly that. And while you're at it, tell her what happened to you as a kid. What your parents did. I'm guessing she doesn't know?”

“Nope,” she muttered, staring at her lap.

“So tell her. You can be full of shit out there in the world all you want—but not with her. Not with your best friend. Tell her the truth and I promise you, she'll understand. She'll cut you a break.” I attempted a smile. “She's good at that.”

“Maybe,” she said, glancing up. “Thanks for—”

“I take it back,” I blurted, my courage flaring. “Don't be full of shit. Don't let her cut you any more breaks. My dare stands. And come to homecoming! There will be so many people there who understand. You need to get out of this house and face up to the fact that you're not the special little snowflake you think you are.”

She laughed—loud, unrestrained. It was Lida's laugh, all grown up. Fireworks went off in my chest at the sound of it.

“
Okay
. Jesus,” she said. “I'll think about it.”

Before she led me out the front door, Natalie grabbed my wrist.

“Listen, Daisy? Chris is a really solid guy. Be good to him, okay?”

I had to blink, breathe, reboot before I could answer. Out of everybody in the school, I'd have thought Natalie would have been the very last to believe that rumor. But apparently QB's plan was more effective than I'd given it credit for.

“He
is
a solid guy, isn't he?” I leaned against the doorframe. “It's bizarre. We're not dating, though. I'm sort of his free,
unlicensed therapist . . . slash surrogate sister. Although that may be one-sided.”

Natalie raised her eyebrows. “Sounds complicated.”

I smiled. “I'm getting used to complicated.”

When my feet hit the sidewalk, I heard her call after me.

“I'm still mad at you, by the way.”

I spun around. “Same here.”

She nodded. “See you at school tomorrow?”

There was an “I dare you” glint in her eyes, her hands clenching and unclenching at her sides. Apparently it was her turn now.

“See you at school,” I said.

Speaking of dares,
I thought, walking home.
Okay. Yeah. Here goes.

I called Hannah. Got voicemail. Launched right in.

“You were right about what happened when you came out. I got fixated on the difference between us. Which I guess makes me the same as all the people I've been fighting. So I wanted to say that I'm sorry. And that you're
boring
and
ordinary
and I love you. And I hope you're doing okay.”

She didn't call me right back, but that was fine. I'd said what I needed to say.

When I got back to my room, an incongruous sight awaited me—a purring ball of gray fur happily ensconced at the foot of my bed. This was the third time this week. As I peered down at Zelda, she stirred and blinked up at me.

Could this be happening? Could I have conquered all of my enemies in one fell swoop?

With a shaking hand, I reached down to pet her. Before I got within two inches, Zelda bristled like a Halloween decoration, attacked my bedpost, and bolted, her tiny paws tearing a thunderous path down the stairs.

But staring down at the dent she'd left in my comforter, I smiled. I knew progress when I saw it.

It happened.

There I was, outside school, staring at the smeared brass handle, steeling myself to reenter the fray, when the door eased open under my fingertips—and everything changed.

The transformation was subtler than I'd imagined but undeniable. The students I passed in the lobby caught my eye. Some of them smiled.

“Hey, Daisy,” chirped Jenna, a senior I knew from Parapsychology. “You're back!”

“I
am
back,” I answered brilliantly as three freshmen from French class waved and Darius Williams fist-bumped me on his way to homeroom.

I'd known these people for years. Passed them in the hallway, worked with them on school projects. But we'd never been on the hey level. The
fist-bump level
. Had we?

In the crowded intersection of the English and language hallways, I spotted a pristinely gathered red ponytail swinging its way through the crush of students.

“Morning, Daisy!” Natalie called out. “Lunch today?”

Everyone in the hallway started walking in slow motion.
This was unprecedented. Not just between me and Natalie. Between Natalie and anyone.

Her expression didn't waver.

“Sure,” I said, pulling myself taller to match her false confidence. Then an idea bloomed. “Meet you on the stoop?”

I had to fight to keep from skipping as I turned the corner. It was like I'd woken up and stumbled into a parallel universe. I liked this one so much better. Had it been here all along, waiting for me to discover it?

But my step unstrutted when I reached French and found Raina waiting outside the door. I drew a breath and tried my best to fake nonchalance, raising my hand for a casual greeting. But before I could blurt it, she said, “Got a second?”

“Um, yeah.” I shook my head, confused. “I mean, I have to get to class—”

“We're cool,” she said, nodding into the room at my teacher, who smiled and waved me on.

I slid the door shut and turned to Raina, but she was staring into the distance at a group of black students clustered around their lockers, laughing at a joke one of them had made.

“When I moved here, I tried to make friends with those kids.” Raina's voice was low, distracted. I didn't dare interrupt. “I just went up and introduced myself. You know, ‘Hey, I'm Raina, I'm from Winston-Salem, I'm black, you're black, let's hang out.'”

Raina's face had relaxed with the memory. She looked younger, somehow. More like the actual teenager she was.

“I got stonewalled. They wanted nothing to do with me.”
She leaned against the wall. “It was so easy for me to make friends back home. But
they
looked at me and saw northern, not Gullah, not us. Maybe they could tell I was queer, who knows. But I think the biggest thing they saw was privilege.”

I stepped back, confused. Her eyes darted to mine and sharpened.

“I don't exactly qualify for scholarships myself,” she admitted. “My dad's an attorney and my mom's got family money. She ‘paints.'” She made air quotes, rolling her eyes. Then she sighed. “Listen, that's not what I came here to talk about. When you were out this week, people were talking about you.”

I shrugged, not surprised.

“I didn't like what I heard,” she said, crossing her arms. “In fact, it really pissed me off. And it made me realize that there is, in fact, some overlap in our Venn diagrams.”

“You're saying we're alike.” I pressed my lips together, ironing down my smile.

“In some ways.” She sniffed. “You're you, no matter what people say, and yeah—I can respect that. Even when it becomes a major pain in my ass.”

“About that,” I cut in. “I'm sorry for jeopardizing everything. You were right, I was careless with something that didn't belong to me and—”

“Stop.” She leaned against the lockers, her eyes boring into mine. “What happened at the rally is
not
just on you. The whole point of being an Alliance is that we become an ‘us.' The kind of ‘us' that stands up for ‘us' when we . . . say . . . throw hot soup on some douchebag's crotch.”

“Vivid example.”

“I cut you out so I could scapegoat you. I shouldn't have. It was
facile
.” Her brow contorted at the word, like it was the ultimate insult. “Any mistakes we made—asking you to lie being the big one—they're on
us
. All of us. Okay?”

“Okay,” I said. “Thank you.” My head swam as she stepped away. “That was some intense bonding right there.”

A grin flitted across her face as her posture returned to all-business mode.

“We're meeting after school. Same room, A2. If you're not too busy.”

She smirked over her shoulder as she walked away, leaving that carrot dangling for me to chase.

Hannah was already on the stoop when I walked out, a steaming Cluck-Cluck bag on the cement beside her. I hesitated a split-second in the doorway, wondering what her reaction would be, but she rose before I could come up with a good opening line.

“You're back,” she said. “At school.”

I motioned to myself. “Voilà.”

“Can we talk?”

“Of course.”

“I mean, like,
have a talk
. Not, like, chitchat talk. Fair warning.”

I walked closer. “I got that. And yes.”

“Although hopefully we can chitchat
after
. I mean, I have nothing against . . .” She itched her chin, trying hard to smile. “Okay. Sorry. Starting over.”

I could see now that she'd carefully left enough room on
the stoop for me—and that the bag of food was way too full to just be for her. Her Moleskine was dangling open in her hand. On top of one page, I could make out the words:

“
To say to Daisy
:”

“First of all, you were right—I haven't been myself lately, and I'm really sorry,” she started reciting. “You're not the only one who's been self-centered.”

Even in her written draft, she was calling me self-centered. For some reason, I found this so funny I had to bite my knuckles to keep from giggling as she went on.

“. . . I've been so focused on what's been going on with me that I forgot how to be a good friend to you.”

“That is so not true!” I covered my mouth. “Sorry. Ignore me, go on.”

“It
is
true.” Her brow furrowed, the notebook flapping. “I feel like, the last few months, I've been watching myself from a distance, with absolutely no idea what I'm going to do next. I
hate
it.”

That sounded like me all the time.

She sat on the top step, tossing the notebook aside. “I've always seen myself as so rational and together and above it all. But lately I'm just one contradiction after another. I have no idea what I want from one moment to the next. I'm happy and then I'm, like, devastated. I'm . . .” I sat next to her. She mussed her hair. “A mess.”

She'd stopped talking, so I offered, “Do you think this is because you came out?”

She tucked her legs up and hugged them. “Probably.”

“Or do you think maybe you're just . . .” I thought of Sean
and Diego and loaded sighs and best friends and tapping pens and steering wheels and glasses. “In love.”

It looked like it hurt her to breathe.

“Probably that too,” she whispered. Her hand crept over to the Cluck-Cluck bag, picking at the edge of the paper. Then she crumpled it shut. “Listen, I miss you. Lots and lots. And I want to do whatever—”

Behind me, the door squeaked open.

“Hey Han?” I got up. “We'll pick this up later, I promise. But there's someone else who wants to talk to you just as much as I do, and if I don't give her a turn, she might burn my house down.”

Natalie's fingers were pressed under her chin as if in prayer. Hannah's face had shifted from open to lockdown. After what felt like an epoch, she stuck her notebook in her backpack and scooted over—making room.

Natalie's eyes darted to mine. I motioned for her to take my place.

“See you guys later,” I said, but they were already talking, quietly, carefully. I watched them from the doorway, then went to find my own lunch table.

Nobody bothered me while I ate. And nobody gawked out the windows at my friends. They were too busy staring out the giant glass walls on the other side of the room— at the massive party being erected in a once-vacant field across the street.

After lunch, we were excused from class to attend a homecoming rally in the gym. The cheerleaders cheered. The
football team pounded the air. The homecoming court marched out wearing their silly crowns. I'd called it—Madison was queen. She didn't seem that happy about it. Darius was king. QB was doing his best to look excited to be in the court again this year. And everybody in the stands clapped and cheered, but mostly muttered, distracted, as if this were a dress rehearsal for homecoming, not the real thing.

The real thing was across the street.

The school's excitement only seemed to grow once the assembly was over.

“Are you gonna go?” a freshman boy asked the girl who was walking out with him. I knew in my bones he wasn't talking about Dana Costas's birthday party.

“I'm not sure my parents will let me,” she whispered back.

“Don't tell them!” he said, and I very nearly hugged him.

But that was the dilemma, wasn't it? All these kids who wanted to participate—who sensed that this was important, a key moment, an exciting one, or just a good party—but didn't feel safe enough to be a part of it. That's why we were doing this. To change that.

In some small way, we already had.

Seventh period. Club period.
Technically they can't stop me
period.

I turned the doorknob to the administration's conference room, my heart racing with apprehension and hope.

My eyes were glued to the carpet as I walked in, so it took me a second to realize that something was different today. Talk about an alternate universe.

The room was packed. People were sitting on the windowsills, cross-legged on the floor, in extra chairs that they'd pulled from other offices. I recognized some of Sophie's friends, a bevy of drama girls, Dan Sawtuck and Mara Thomas
not
making out, three kids from my homeroom, a dozen other vaguely familiar faces. Unless the past week had seen a huge uptick in Palmetto students coming out of the closet, the Alliance had enacted some policy changes.

“Hey Daisy.” Kyle swiveled a chair in my direction. “We saved you a seat.”

A couple of guys in lacrosse hoodies scooted to make room.

Raina turned to the group with a tremulous smile—more nervous than I'd ever seen her. “Hi everybody, and welcome to our first meeting.”

“
First
meeting?” I whispered.

“You've all known us as the school's LGBTQ Alliance for the past few years. But now that we're part of the Gay Straight Alliance Network, we're looking at today's meeting as a fresh start.”