The Cruel Halls

"Is it true that you don't like guys?"

I turned around slowly to see the dowdy-faced girl sitting behind me in third period.

"What?" I asked. My face was twisted with inquiry and annoyance. Meadow was her name, and for some reason, my science teacher had placed her nearest me because she would not stop talking in class. Her tactic was unsuccessful.

"Julie, turn around please," Mrs. Benson said gently.

I spun around, hoping that my pony-tail would whip Meadow across her scabby, pasty face.

"I heard a group of eighth graders talking about it when you passed in the hall," she continued in a highly audible whisper. "They said that you�you know�like girls."

I could not help but turn again and look her in the eyes. Was she lying? Was she kidding with me? Was she trying to be funny?

Meadow stared back at me, honestly anticipating an answer to her questions.

I felt my forehead wrinkle as my eyebrows drew together. "No, I do not."

"Do not make me ask you again, Julie," Benson said, less gently this time.

I met Benson's glance and lifted my hands in a pleading shrug. I tried telepathy, Mrs. Benson, she is the one talking, but it didn't work. When she turned to continue her lecture, Meadow was at it again.

"Well, you really should talk to Katie Koenicki about it 'cuz she's the one who was telling everyone in the hall about it. She said she heard you had never had a boyfriend, and that you didn't want one anyway�."

My concentration stopped at hearing that name: Katie Koenicki. Easily one of the most intimidating figures at Moore Junior High School, Katie was the envy of the popular girls and the desire of the hormonal boys. She was the pinnacle of junior high fashion, dawning name brands like Esprit, Guess, Cavaricci and Swatch. Katie was one of those early bloomers who looked eighteen even though she was only fourteen. While tall for her age, she looked even taller because her hair was sculpted to radiate five inches above her forehead in all directions. Ordinarily, the fact that Katie Koenicki knew I was alive would have been flattering. Up to this point, I had been trailing in the teenaged popularity race. To be mentioned in the popular circles of the older students would have been a blessing. Not today.

I left third period and headed to the cafeteria where I saw Missy. Her eyes met mine, and she waved me over with a spastic, urgent motion. I sat down beside her at the table.

"Did you hear what people are saying about you?"

*

The next several weeks were nothing short of hell. As I crept through the halls, every eye was on me, like a high profile murder suspect wading through the crowds of angry protestors and press to get into the courthouse. I was overcome by the peers of my peers and the jeering questions: "So what is it like to kiss a girl?" I no longer gave my sarcastic "No!" I had stopped responding altogether; I was defeated.

My only haven was the classroom. There I could smother myself in my schoolwork; I could concentrate on the lecture instead of the icy hallways and lunchroom. I could linger in the classroom, asking the teacher questions I knew the answers to, until the very last minute�after the crowds began to clear the halls, before I would be late. There were times after class when a teacher might ask, "Can I help you?" Awkward pauses, they seemed moments long, filled my head with pleading possibilities. People are spreading rumors about me. I don't know what to do or say. Could you help me come up with things to say?

What came out instead was, "I was wondering if you could go over number twelve with me real quickly."

Friends had run from me like a building set to flames. I couldn't blame them. Still sometimes, as I walked home alone, I wished that I could change my name, that I could change schools. I wondered if I could throw myself into the world of teenaged dating, find any boy who was willing and show them all that they were wrong.

*

For the first time in weeks, Missy waved me over in the lunchroom. I waded through the other students as though walking in slow motion through a beehive.

"Did you hear that in one day, Angie Mitchell was expelled for bringing drugs to school; Brendan Murphy and Lars Fuentes got into a fight. But here's the big one: Nancy Miller. She's pregnant. People say she had an abortion."

I ate quickly, happy to finally have a table to sit at, and left the lunchroom. That afternoon, I noticed that, strangely, people in the halls were engaged in quiet, intense conversation, and no one glared at me while they whispered sharp words.

The days that followed were the same; I had been released from the petri dish beneath the social microscope, and I was thankful for that. Still one afternoon, as I left the classroom early to run to the restroom, I saw a haunting image: another girl, examining the halls from a classroom doorway-like a child before crossing the street. Seeing that the halls were clear, she stepped from the door, lowered her head and hurried to the next room.

Nancy Miller and I never met, but we had more in common than any friend I ever had.