The Geography of Girlhood Read online

  and her too-short skirt and her foster parents yelling at

  her from the house. My mother was a person who

  always wanted to leave wherever she was.

  She told me once that her first kiss was with a traveling

  salesman. She told me once that she left home at

  sixteen. She told me once that I was just like her.

  The Valley

  After the first semester of tenth grade

  is over, I ride my bicycle

  into Anderson Valley.

  I’ve never been down here before

  and there’s something faraway about it,

  the way it’s overgrown with cows and plum trees

  and the distant cat calls of dogs and birds.

  I guess the thing I never imagined about high school

  is how suddenly there would be a whole landscape

  of boys

  and it’s not like I get to take my pick or anything,

  but I can be in love with whomever I want,

  I could love someone who’s two years older

  or six inches taller,

  I could love someone who hunts

  or someone who fishes,

  or someone who doesn’t believe in either.

  The rain is starting now and

  I pedal further into the valley,

  no idea where I’m going

  except knowing that when I get there

  I’m going to realize

  just how lost I really am.

  Motorbike

  I pedal home, following the smell of motorbike.

  Bobby just bought one, so my sister

  has spent the week with her arms

  wrapped around his waist

  racing through alleys and other parts unknown.

  My sister is sparkly with friends and people that

  love her,

  my sister is a walking tiara.

  She is everyone’s prize

  but the only thing she seems to want

  is the smell of gasoline in her hair

  and the taste of something

  that doesn’t taste like anything else

  on her lips.

  Report Cards

  After a dinner of succotash stew

  my stepmother does dishes

  and my father looks at our report cards.

  He tells Tara just because she’s in love

  it doesn’t mean now she can flunk all her classes.

  He tells me that just because I get A’s in English

  it doesn’t mean I can get C’s in every other subject.

  He tells my stepbrother Good job

  because he gets straight A’s in everything.

  That’s probably because he has no life,

  my sister says and I laugh.

  Our stepmother gives us one of her vegan glares

  because her son is the model of perfection

  and we are just the messes

  she’s being forced to clean up.

  On Fire

  I think the only reason Denise started smoking is

  because she likes to see things burn. I’m starting to

  think she likes lit matches more than being my friend.

  I guess it makes sense; she’s always lived her life like it’s

  going up in flames any second. One day, she’s going to

  start a fire and she’s not going to be able to stop it.

  One day she’s going to start a fire and I won’t have the

  water to put it out.

  History Class

  As for my other (so-called) friends,

  Elaine and Skyler walked into history class today

  with Charlotte Ames and some other girls

  and they were all waving their pom-poms around

  and squealing about the game tomorrow

  and I wanted to throw up on their shoes

  until Mr. Stearns said,

  For those of us who aren’t sports fans,

  can you keep it to yourselves?

  I loved him for that.

  And have you ever noticed what

  nice hands he has?

  The Bus

  Charlotte Ames rides my bus

  and she’s the kind of girl who’s born happy.

  She is sunny and bright and pure,

  she doesn’t have crazy thoughts

  passed down to her by a mother

  who left town before she knew how to count.

  Her parents are PTA All The Way.

  When it comes to crazy,

  I am definitely a “have”

  and she is a “have-not.”

  Except this morning, Charlotte Ames

  gets on the bus and she can’t stop crying

  and she tries to hide it

  but it’s like a thunderstorm is raging

  inside her pep squad uniform.

  She sits down next to me and

  I pretend not to notice the typhoon of her sadness

  is gaining speed and velocity.

  Soon, cars and homes will be in danger.

  Soon, there will be mandatory evacuations.

  I know nothing about Charlotte Ames

  But I know what it means to be that sad

  and how sometimes sadness is the loneliest kind

  of bad weather,

  it’s more like lightning than rain

  because it only strikes a person who least suspects it.

  But I don’t say this to Charlotte Ames.

  Instead I just hand her the napkin from my bag lunch

  and she mops her face and

  we ride the bus together to school

  without speaking, the two of us floating down a river

  whose banks have long since flooded.

  The Big Game

  Tonight is the night

  of the big game

  and it’s so dumb

  people call it that

  because it seems like

  it’s the same size

  as any other old game.

  Quarterback

  I do not want to love you

  because that’s everyone else’s job.

  It’s the job of Elaine and Dawn,

  of Skyler and Maggie and Charlotte,

  girls I’ve grown up with,

  girls who line the field at night

  to watch you sprint and score,

  your face a never-ending flush of tiny victories.

  I do not want to love you

  because I fall to ruin watching you

  run and sprint and lob things

  into the air so high

  they might never come down.

  I do not want to think about you

  walking towards me or

  taking me to places I have never been.

  I do not want to think about you

  at night, when no one is thinking of me.

  I do not want to love you,

  so I am giving you to the other girls;

  they can have you and the sun that smiles down on you,

  they can have you and the sky that opens up for you,

  they can have you

  and they can keep you.

  Geometry

  In that “I hate my life” voice of hers,

  Mrs. Shields is going on and on

  about polygons and parallel lines

  when somebody pokes me on the back.

  It’s Jenny Arnold, passing me a note.

  I open it, thinking it might be from Denise

  but I don’t get many notes from Denise

  because she barely comes to school anymore.

  Instead it’s in Jenny’s famous handwriting:

  Where’d you get those shoes?

  They’re vintage, I write back,

  which is sort of true

  because technically they are secondhand,

  having been stolen from my sister’s closet

  just this morning.

  Jenny writes back, Cool


  which is practically like getting a note from God

  telling you you’re getting into heaven.

  If that weren’t enough, she writes back:

  What kind of music do you like?

  The usual stuff, I write and she writes back,

  Then obviously you need my help.

  She gives me a grin

  and suddenly, I love quadrilaterals

  and supplementary angles

  and I love geometry

  because Jenny Arnold

  just became my friend.

  Soundtrack for Smart-Asses: A Mix CD by Jenny Arnold

  Rebel Girl—Bikini Kill

  Violet—Hole

  Fuck and Run—Liz Phair

  I Know I Know I Know—Tegan and Sara

  Portions for Foxes—Rilo Kiley

  This Isn’t It—Lemona

  Oh!—The Breeders

  One More Hour—Sleater Kinney

  Y Control—Yeah Yeah Yeahs

  Dress—PJ Harvey

  Dirty Knives—The Bangs

  Gigantic—Pixies

  The Difference Between Love and Hell—Sahara Hotnights

  Yes She Is My Skinhead Girl—Unrest

  Bull in the Heather—Sonic Youth

  Summer Babe—Pavement

  I Am a Scientist—Guided By Voices

  The Falls—French Kicks

  The Tide That Never Came Back—The Veils

  Maybe Not—Cat Power

  Spaz

  My stepbrother comes into my room

  reeking of spaghetti and video games.

  What are you listening to? he asks.

  A mix CD. I shrug.

  Who’s on it?

  You wouldn’t know the bands, I say.

  And he says, Maybe I should make a mix CD for

  Beth Sczepanick.

  I ask him who Beth Sczepanick is

  and he says, all blushing and dorky, She’s this girl.

  Then he blurts, She’s really good at ice-skating!

  I stare at him.

  Are you in love?

  Instead of answering,

  he runs out of the room,

  tripping over a pair of shoes

  and then spastically falling down in the hallway

  which is further proof that he just might be

  the most ridiculous person

  I have ever met.

  For the Ice-Skater He Loves

  You’re the girl my stepbrother’s in love with

  and he’s just the twelve-year-old kid

  of a lady my dad married last year.

  It’s not like I care about him,

  in fact, he drives me crazy

  with his stories about you,

  the figure skater who’s skated

  a perfect flower on the rink of his heart.

  He won’t shut up about your double axels

  and your triple-toe loops

  and how once you smiled at him in the hall.

  Personally, I suspect you’ve never even noticed him

  and why should you?

  He’s not much to look at

  but he’s got shiny hair and

  sometimes he smells like cinnamon

  and yesterday, he went to the mall

  and bought me a pair of really ugly earrings

  that are kind of cute.

  Which is why I’m telling you now

  that if you hurt him, or carve a figure eight

  into one of his soft spots,

  I will fill your locker with hate notes,

  I’ll carve bitch into the side of your sled.

  I’m not above snagging your tutu

  and tampering with your blades,

  breaking bones or poisoning your cocoa,

  because this good boy with a broken heart

  is like you without ice to skate on.

  These sound like pale threats, but trust me,

  if you hurt this dumb-ass kid

  I never thought I’d know,

  your life will be spent

  in the hot nub of a sunny day,

  waiting at the edge of a lake

  that just won’t freeze over.

  The Last Day of Tenth Grade

  It’s the last day of tenth grade

  and all I have to show for it

  are a bunch of B plusses

  a very strange stepbrother

  a very vegan stepmother

  one ex-friend that’s ditched me

  to become a cheerleader

  another friend who’s going as crazy as her father is

  a sister who hates me

  a never-ending crush on her boyfriend—

  but the weirdest part

  is that I am leaving tenth grade

  being friends with the girl

  who was the whole reason

  I didn’t want to show up in the first place.

  If anyone tells you that life is predictable,

  DO NOT BELIEVE THEM.

  4

  Bodies of water

  Permission

  I’ve never asked my father to stay out late before.

  Because of this, he interrogates me for an hour like

  I’m one of the guys who work for him at the mill.

  Where are you going and When will you be back and

  Are you sure you’ll be back and it goes on and on, until

  finally my stepmother says, Gerald, it’s fine. It’s summer

  vacation. Let her go. Then she smiles at me and it

  makes her look kind of pretty and for the first time,

  I can sort of see why my father fell in love with her.

  At the Drive-In

  We leave twenty bucks in an envelope

  and get our bottle of whatever

  from a tire in Mike Neeson’s front yard

  because he is legal

  and we are not.

  We go to the drive-in to drink it

  and it tastes terrible but Jenny says that’s not the point,

  it’s about the way it makes you feel.

  I feel dizzy and dangerous

  and temptation sits like a pat of yeast

  on my tongue, rising and rising

  and sour.

  It’s dusk when the movie starts

  to filter through the trees

  and Jenny says, Come on,

  lets go downtown,

  and she starts the car and we drive away

  heading for trouble

  like we’re heroines in the making

  like we’re starlets getting lit into being

  by the curving screen.

  The Hilltop

  Jenny sneaks into the Hilltop

  and smuggles me out a beer

  before going back in.

  A drunk guy’s outside

  telling a really loud story about

  a fight he got into last week

  with his neighbor

  and then I turn around

  and there’s Mr. Stearns,

  my history teacher.

  He laughs and says, I’m not going to ask

  what you’re doing here, Penny.

  and I say, Then I guess I’ll have to ask you

  what you’re doing here

  and he kind of laughs

  and that’s how it started.

  Learning History

  I want to know what it’s like

  to fall against you in the heat,

  you, my own history teacher,

  my own Battle of Gettysburg,

  my thirteen colonies.

  You have hiked from here to Idaho and back,

  always loving the wrong woman,

  the compass biting your palm,

  your sex swaying like a bean stalk.

  It’s as though you’ll always

  be a teenager, a scalding runt,

  self-centered, effusive, your

  crooked teeth like Letters of Congress,

  like crates of tea in the Boston Habor.

  To
night, as we stand outside the Hilltop Tavern,

  my B’s and B plusses glittering behind us

  and Jenny yelling Come on! from the car,

  I want to know what its like.

  With this liquor quick around my hips,

  state capitols slurring my speech,

  I want to see whole declarations of independence

  float from between your lips,

  and I want to believe

  they are meant just for me.

  Anything

  Were you flirting with Mr. Stearns?!

  Jenny yells when I get in the car

  and we laugh and laugh and

  all I know is

  at this moment I feel like

  I can do anything I want

  and be anyone I want

  and go anywhere on the globe

  and still call it home.

  Party at Rick Stangle’s

  By the time we get to Rick Stangle’s

  famous Start of Summer party

  it’s almost eleven.

  After everything that’s happened tonight

  I’ve almost forgotten

  this is the first actual “party”

  I’ve ever been to.

  But when I get there I realize

  that parties are basically just

  School With Booze.

  All the same people are here

  wearing all the same clothes

  talking about all the same things,

  except they are having fun

  and people who would never normally

  converse with each other

  are drunk enough to actually do it

  and there’s something

  sort of sweet about it

  even though from what I can tell,

  it does seem to involve

  a lot of vomiting.

  Moonlight

  I walk out into the moonlight

  and there in Rick Stangle’s backyard

  are my sister and Bobby

  and I stop and stare

  because when it comes to them,

  I can never stop looking.

  Watching them is like a disease

  I can’t be cured of.

  Tonight, though, instead of pulling Bobby

  into her arms like she always does

  my sister shoves him away

  as if something has unhinged in her.

  Then Jeff Eckman, who has slept with everything

  that moves

  calls over, Come here, Tara, and