Millie

Seventeen

A bowl of mixed balled melon with a side of cottage cheese (my mom’s extremely sad idea of dessert), a homemade apple-cider-vinegar facemask I found online, my fluffy notebook of achy feelings, and my completely unwritten essay for my summer program application. I am the picture of Friday-night excitement.

Callie called in sick to work today, so I was left to close the gym up by myself. I guess it’s not that big of a deal. I could do that job in my sleep, but I know she wasn’t sick unless you can get physically ill from your own self-induced drama.

I feel judge-y. I’m trying so hard not to be judge-y. But what kind of person trashes someone else’s cell phone and causes a huge scene in the middle of school? I wasn’t there to witness it, but Amanda was, and she gave me every gory detail. Breaking up with someone is bad enough . . . I imagine, at least. Seeing as I’ve never had a boyfriend outside of the few random summer flings at Daisy Ranch. (Translation: two awkward summers of hand-holding with Scotty Pifflin and then James Ganns the following summer and one half kiss when Greg Kassab missed my lips in the dark and instead got the corner of my mouth.) But why would you want to make it worse with a public breakup? Why would you want to draw more attention to yourself?

But maybe girls like Callie don’t think about the expense of drawing more attention to themselves. It’s something I consider every day. It’s like a cost benefit analysis. Is this floral tunic too loud? Is me being happy wearing it worth the attention it will cost me? Is my backpack covered in patches and stitching just one more thing for people to make fun of? How much do I have to love it for that to be worth it?

I can feel my facemask hardening, letting me know it’s time to rinse. After a quick trip to the bathroom, I return to my computer, where my blank document awaits me. The essay is due in a matter of weeks and I’m not the type who can just wing it the night before and I still have to figure out my audition tape. I have my suit and my script mostly written, but I still need a cameraman, and the only person I know who’s familiar with AV equipment is Malik.

I scroll through my video library and land on Legally Blonde, starring Reese Witherspoon. A good rom-com for background noise is just as good as any playlist if you ask me, and Legally Blonde feels especially relevant.

I push the laptop back and reach for a fresh sheet of paper and my freshly sharpened GIRL BOSS pencil.

My mom stopped using her camcorder to record my childhood memories when I was ten years old and already shopping in the women’s plus-size section of Russle’s. I was the kind of fat that video couldn’t hide. Pictures were still safe, though. My mom was a master of all the various flattering angles.

I stare down at the words. They’re going to see my audition tape. It’s not like they won’t know that I’m fat. But do I have to talk about it, too? I shrug. It’s just a rough draft, right?

I’m still fat. That hasn’t changed. What’s different now is that I’m ready to be on camera—unflattering angles and all. I’ve spent years dreaming of following in the footsteps of women like Barbara Walters, Lisa Ling, Diane Sawyer, Christiane Amanpour, and even my own local anchor, Samantha Wetherby. I think so many of us waste too much time dreaming of the things we believe we can’t have. But I’m done dreaming. I’m ready to make my dreams my reality.

The messenger on my computer pings. I drop my pencil and push my papers aside as I pull my laptop closer.

Malik.P99: that group project in psych was the worst

I sit there for a moment, my fingers hovering above the keyboard. Why is it that he can talk to me so freely when we’re both hiding behind a screen? How is that fair? Especially after everything I said last week. I know Amanda had told him I had my wisdom teeth taken out and that I was under the influence of painkillers, but still I haven’t made any effort to take it back.

I know that logically he’s probably just shy and everyone thinks I should put myself out there. But I’m having a really hard time thinking about things logically right now. Maybe it’s that dumb comment that Callie made in front of Mitch earlier in the week. I should have just shaken it off, but I couldn’t. It stuck with me.

So now with my cursor blinking in the compose message box, part of me can’t help but wonder if the real problem is me. My head pieces it all together so easily. He went to the Sadie Hawkins dance with me out of pity, and now he’s reminded of it every time we see each other in class. Or maybe he really does like me. It could be that what he tells me from behind the screen is the real deal, but he’s just too embarrassed to act on any of it in real life.

I know thinking like that isn’t gonna get me anywhere. And it’s the exact reason why I’m not going to fat camp and obsessing over diets with my mom anymore, but all those horrible thoughts still exist. I’m just trying to figure out how to live in spite of them.

Despite all my doubts, I choose to believe I’m the girl who can tell a boy that her feelings are way more swirling-heart emoji than they are handshake emoji. Also, Elle Woods resolving to go to Harvard in the background doesn’t hurt. I take a deep breath and begin to type.

aMillienBucks: I feel like you’re two different people. There’s the Malik I see during school Monday through Friday and the Malik who talks to me at night through a screen. I can’t do it anymore. Either you talk to me in person the way you talk to me through this screen or you don’t talk to me at all.

I hit send before I can even check for spelling errors, which is huge, because I believe in accurate spelling just about as much as I believe in the Oxford comma and the truth that Andie and Duckie should have ended up together in Pretty in Pink.

It’s a few excruciating minutes before he responds, and I feel like I’m about to break out into hives.

Malik.P99: Can I come see you?

My heart skips like one of Willowdean’s old Dolly Parton records.

aMillienBucks: Right now?

Malik.P99: I know it’s late.

I check the clock in the corner of my screen. It is super late. If my mom caught me with a boy this late at night, she would shriek until she turned into a pile of ashes before my very eyes.

aMillienBucks: be outside my house in an hour.

Malik.P99: Ok

I have never snuck out, but it’s time I start doing things I’ve never done before. And if Malik is going to go out on a limb, I’m willing to meet him.

I’m too nervous to duck out the front door, so I make plans to climb out my window. Thank goodness we live in a one-story.

I do a quick once-over in the mirror and cover up any major blemishes with concealer before adding my favorite tinted ChapStick. Once my parents are in their room and the hallway light is turned off, I brush my teeth, not bothering to keep quiet. It’s part of my nighttime routine, after all.

I sit in front of my alarm clock, which looks like an old telephone with a spin dial, a gift from my mom on my eleventh birthday. I’m always surprised by how good I am at sneaking around. It still shocks even me that I managed to keep the pageant a secret from my mom all the way up until the week before. But actually sneaking out? This is a whole new level of deception for me. I try to feel guilty, but I don’t. Not even a little bit.

The clock strikes midnight, and I drop my phone into my purse. After opening my bedroom window, I carefully lift the screen.

I will be totally honest and say that fitting through a tiny bedroom window was not in the Fat Girl Manual. But as the cross-stitch hanging above the scale in my mother’s bathroom reads, WHERE THERE’S A WILL, THERE’S A WAY.

Our back fence is notoriously creaky, so I’m extra careful when I open it just enough for me to squeeze past.

And there’s Malik, waiting for me under the streetlight across from my house. He leans up against a dark green Toyota RAV4, which is technically his sister’s, but he’s been allowed to use it since she left it here when she went to college in Boston.

I can say, without an ounce of embarrassment, that I have dreamed of this exact moment. Malik waiting for me across the street from my house beneath the flickering light of a streetlamp, with his fists balled up in his pockets and his penny-loafer-clad feet crossed at the ankles.

If this were one of my movies, I’d cross the street to him and we’d kiss and that would be the end. We’d live so happily ever after that the credits would roll and you wouldn’t even need to have any more details, because the rest of our lives would be wonderful, boring bliss.