The List (18 page)

anielle is about to jump into the pool with the other freshman swimmers when Coach Tracy beckons her over to her office.

“Do you have regular workout clothes with you today?”

“Yes.”

Coach Tracy grabs some papers off her desk and says, “Go change out of your suit and head to the weight room.”

“Okay,” Danielle says, curious. “Sure.”

The Mount Washington High weight room is directly across from the gym. At one time it had been two classrooms, but the adjoining wall had been torn down, the blackboards replaced with mirrors, and the room filled with free weights, benches, exercise bikes, and treadmills. An old radio stayed tuned to the classic rock station and provided a sound track of Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, and Steve Miller Band.

Danielle walks into the room in sweats, a plain white tank, and her favorite red sports bra. She is definitely nervous, in part because she’s never done any weight training before, but more because most of the varsity swim team is already there, girls and boys, hanging around and talking with each other. There aren’t many chances for the team to mingle this way, as everything in the sport is segregated by sex. But there’s a clear unity to the swimmers. Everyone seems close. Like friends.

Danielle knows who some of them are, and a couple of people give her a little head nod, as if they know who she is, too.
The looks are different from the ones Danielle has been getting in the hallway since the list came out. These come with smiles. With recognition that she is a good swimmer.

“Alright,” Coach Tracy says when she walks through the door with a stack of papers. “Today we’re going to be concentrating on arms with the girls and legs with the boys. Break off into pairs and complete this weight circuit twice. And for those of you who don’t already know, this is
Danielle
.” Coach Tracy grins at Danielle, a nod to their private joke. “She’ll be joining our four hundred freestyle relay team for Saturday’s meet.”

A rush of energy shoots through Danielle. She is officially a varsity swimmer! It is the first good thing that has happened to her this week, and she relishes it.

She thinks about asking to go to the bathroom. Not to pee, but so she can find Andrew to tell him the news. But before she can, she’s paired up with a senior girl named Jane. Their first exercise is a bench press.

“Do you want to go first?” Jane asks her.

“No. I’ve … actually never done this before. So I think you’d better start.”

Jane loads up the bar with two round weights, ten pounds on each side. Then she lies down on the bench. “Okay, Danielle. Stand behind me and keep your fingertips lightly under the bar. I don’t want this thing falling and crushing me.”

“Got it.”

Jane lowers the bar until it is almost sitting on her chest, and then raises and lowers it eight times. As she works her way through the set, her limbs shake and her cheeks turn red. On
Jane’s last rep, Danielle has to help lift the bar. Not much, but a little.

Jane sits up, a little winded. “Okay. Your turn.”

Danielle lies down on the bench and takes a deep breath as she readies herself to lift the weight. Her heart is already pumping fast, mostly out of nerves. She pushes up and lifts the bar from the cradle. It is lighter than she expects. And, to her surprise, she pumps it up and down eight times without much trouble.

“Wait up!” Jane says, looking down at her in surprise. “That was way too easy for you.” She slides another set of weights on the ends. “Now go.”

Danielle does. It is slightly harder than the first time, but still totally doable.

“Coach Tracy!” Jane cries. “Come here a second. Danielle is rocking this bench!”

Coach Tracy approaches, and so do a few other girls on the team. Jane loads more weight on the bar. Danielle does eight more reps, and the girls whoop and holler.

When Danielle looks around, she sees that a couple of the boys have come over to watch, too. They peer down at her wearing looks of begrudging respect, like the boys had at Clover Lake.

More weight is added, and Danielle has to really work to lift the bar for the final set. Coach Tracy has taken over Jane’s spotting duty, and the rest of the team gathers around the bench to cheer her on through the reps. When she lowers the bar and readies for the last press, Danielle’s arms feel like overstretched rubber bands. But with her new teammates rooting
for her, she finds some energy deep down and roars as she pushes with all her might to raise the bar back up. Her arms shake, and she drops the bar into the cradle with a huge crash. Everyone screams.

Danielle sits up, a little dizzy. Drops of sweat drip down the sides of her face. And as the crowd parts, she sees a couple of the football boys hanging around near the weight-room door.

One of them is Andrew.

Chuck laughs hysterically. “Dude. Does Dan the Man do that to you?” When Andrew doesn’t say anything, Chuck turns to the rest of the guys and chides, “I bet that’s their foreplay. She lifts Andrew up and benches him a few times.”

Andrew stands terribly still, his forehead wrinkled and pinched. He looks pissed. But she can’t tell whether he’s upset at Chuck for saying those jerky things or at her for provoking them.

Chuck punches Andrew’s arm. “Hey! Good thing Dan’s not trying out for football. You’d be back down on JV. She’d definitely beat you out for tight end.”

Danielle wants to stand up, to walk away from the door, but she can’t move. She can’t even wipe the drops of sweat rolling down the sides of her face, curling under her chin.

“Shut up,” Andrew says. But his voice is drowned out by his friends’ teasing.

“Move along, gentlemen,” Coach Tracy says. “Stop distracting my swimmers.” She closes the weight-room door on them.

Danielle, her chest still heaving, her muscles so sore, watches Andrew turn and leave.

should have gotten a salad,” Lisa says, frowning down at her plate.

Bridget is sitting across from her sister at the pizza shop in the mall. She picked the table near the window, even though it was dirty and she had to clear someone else’s plates away, so she could distract herself from the food by watching the shoppers avoid the man at the kiosk flying his rubber-band airplanes.

“Don’t be stupid, Lisa. You love the pizza here. So … eat it and then let’s go.” Bridget stabs at a piece of wilted lettuce in the side salad she felt compelled to order so as not to be suspicious. As hungry as she is right now, it is wholly unappetizing.

Wasn’t that the point?
Really, she is angry for quitting the cleanse. If she hadn’t quit the cleanse, she wouldn’t have been starving, and if she hadn’t been starving, she wouldn’t have screwed up so badly today.

Lisa shakes her head. “I shouldn’t eat like this. Especially because I’m not playing sports. I’m going to blow up.”

Bridget sets down her plastic fork and eyes Lisa suspiciously. “Where’s all this coming from?” She wonders if maybe Abby mentioned seeing her in the bathroom. She hadn’t been able to throw up, though she’d wanted to. What luck, to have been caught in her weakest moment. Having dragged herself to the vending machines for some pretzels. Pretzels, for heaven’s sake. Not nuts, not a pack of Life Savers.

Lisa shrugs. “I don’t know. I’m not upset or anything that
Abby got prettiest. She totally deserves it. But it would be nice if maybe next year, I could get it.”

“God, is that what you’re worried about?” Bridget says. “You’ve got Dad’s genes. He can’t gain weight. I’m the one who has to worry, with Mom’s side of the family. And anyway, one piece of pizza isn’t going to make a difference.”

“You never eat pizza anymore,” Lisa accuses.

Bridget stabs her fork into the Styrofoam bowl. She doesn’t even want to be in this pizza shop. But Lisa had insisted. And now she’s going to complain?

“Here,” Bridget snaps, and grabs Lisa’s plate.

Take a bite.

Take a big bite.

That’ll shut her up.

Instead, she reaches for napkins from the dispenser. “If you’re that concerned about it, do this.” Bridget lays a few napkins on the cheese, and taps them gently with her fingertips. They bloom bright orange. “This saves you, like, a hundred calories. I mean, you could peel the cheese off and just eat the bread.” Bridget does exactly that, lifting the cheese off in one layer and dropping it on the side of the plate in a heap.

“But the cheese is the best part!” Lisa whines.

Bridget ignores her. She grabs another napkin and wipes off the sauce. “This is so bad for you, by the way. Full of sugar.” Finally, Bridget tears off the crust. “And skip the crust. It’ll just sit in your gut.”

Lisa takes back her dissected slice — a pale piece of soggy bread — and frowns. “Gee, thanks.”

Bridget can feel the oil on her fingertips. She wants to lick them, lick them clean. Instead, she takes another napkin and
wipes them so vigorously, the paper tears. She feels guilty for bringing her sister into her shit, and for ruining a perfectly good piece of pizza. She can’t wait until this stupid dance is over, until she can go back to being a normal person again. “I’ll buy you another slice, okay? I just wanted to show you how stupid you’re being.”

“It’s fine,” Lisa says quietly. “I know you’re only trying to help me.” She eats the heap of cheese on the side of the plate and then says, “We can go now.”

Bridget takes a deep breath, and then rustles her hand through Lisa’s hair as they stand up. She would explain herself, but she just wants to get out of the pizza parlor.

Half an hour later, they are in the department store. Bridget sees the homecoming dress she wants right away. A little red strapless one. It’s so pretty and feminine. As she circles the mannequin, she notices that the dress is folded and pinned in the back to make it even tighter. She starts thinking of those pretzels, imagines those pins popping out, ripping the fabric to make room for her.

“That is going to look SO good on you,” Lisa says, and hugs her from behind.

“I don’t know.”

Lisa bounces off to another rack. “Try it on!”

Bridget pushes dresses along the rack. She picks her size, the same size as the summer bikini, and holds it up. It looks like so much fabric, so wide. A red circus tent. And she probably won’t even fit into it.

In the dressing room, she frowns at the mirror. She is able to get the dress on and zipped up. She should be happy. She’s lost
the weight she’d put back on since leaving the beach. Plus, the red looks nice with her dark hair. But her hips jut out and ruin the silhouette. Her tummy, too. A little pouch in the very front of her, like a kangaroo. Even her knees are fat.

“I feel so bad for Abby,” Lisa is saying from the next dressing room. “I mean, she’s probably not going to be able to go to the dance now. All because of Fern.”

“That sucks,” Bridget says after a few seconds. She wants to cry, looking at herself in the dress.

If only you were a size smaller.

Bridget thinks about the bikini. How it was a goal. Because she’d bought it, she’d had to achieve it.

With two days to go until the dance, if she bought another size down, could she do it?

“Can I see?” Lisa asks.

“I’m already dressed. Just meet me at the register.”

As Lisa gets her clothes back on, Bridget runs out to the floor and grabs the red dress in a smaller size. She’ll test herself one more time.