Suicide Notes from Beautiful Girls. Lynn Weingarten
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at dinner. Ryan takes the onions off my plate and gives me the guacamole off his. I eat one bite. When the three of them are done eating, Ryan takes our dishes to the kitchen to load the dishwasher, and Marissa goes upstairs to her room. Then it’s just me and Mac. He comes over to the couch where I sit and leans in, voice low. “They’re having something for her tonight,” he says. “Her friends from Bryson, I mean.”
I stare at Mac. I wonder if he is purposely not saying this in front of Ryan. I wonder, maybe, if somehow Ryan told him what happened all that time ago.
“Where?” I ask.
Mac shakes his head. “Sorry, I wish I could tell you. I only heard that they were meeting at her favorite place. And I don’t know what that is.”
But I just nod and almost smile, because the thing is, I do.
2 YEARS, 5 MONTHS, 24 DAYS EARLIER
By the time Delia and June got to the reservoir, the boys were already there.
Delia linked her arm through June’s. “Don’t be nervous,” she whispered. “It’s not too late to change your mind.” She was using this gentle, sweet tone she only ever used with June and her cat.
But June shook her head. “I want to get this over with.” It was the summer after eighth grade, and June had decided it was time.
Delia snorted a laugh. “Well, that’s one way to think about it.”
They kept walking down toward the water, and June could hear the others now – laughter, the clink of bottles, and music coming out of someone’s phone. According to Delia, they were out there almost every night during the summer. They all went to Bryson, which was the school Delia would have gone to if she hadn’t convinced her mother to tell the school district that they still lived in their old house even after they’d moved in with Delia’s stepfather.
“Guys at Bryson are generally hotter,” Delia had told her once. “More skateboardery than soccer player, which is why it’s better not to go to school with them. Then you don’t have to see them in the morning and look at the oozy zits they popped when they got out of the shower, or smell their coffee farts, and have no choice but to find them disgusting forever.”
And so when June mentioned not wanting to start high school still not having kissed anyone, Delia made a joke about kissing her, then laughed and said, “Well, you’ll just make out with one of the Bryson boys, then.” Like it was no big deal and already settled. Delia, of course, had kissed lots of people. Eleven, according to her list.
They made their way toward the tiny flickering campfire and stopped. Delia reached over one of the guys’ shoulders and snatched the bottle of beer from his hand. Then she backed up and sat on a rock. Delia stayed far from the fire. She always did. Fire was the only thing on earth she was scared of.
“Hey, D,” the guy said without turning. He had longish floppy hair and a black-and-white striped T-shirt.
“Hello, boys,” Delia said. “This is June.” She turned to June and handed her the beer. “June, I can’t remember any of their names. It doesn’t really matter, though.” Delia grinned at June. She was doing her Delia Thing, which guys always seemed to love. June held the beer tightly to keep her hands from shaking. She pretended to take a sip and looked at them more closely.
There were four: one shirtless with wiry muscles, two in black T-shirts who looked tough and cool, and the one whose beer she had. She watched as he raked his hair away from his face. He had a tattoo on the back of his wrist where a watch would be, a figure eight maybe, but she couldn’t say for sure. He caught her staring at him, and by the light of the fire she thought she could see the tiniest hint of a smile.
“Tell us honestly, June,” Shirtless said. “Is Delia paying you to hang out with her?”
“No,” June said. “I’m her imaginary friend.”
June hadn’t known what she was going to say until the words popped right out. When she was around Delia, she was a better, more clever version of herself. Like she really was someone Delia had made up.
All the boys laughed. And for a second June felt bad; maybe it wasn’t nice of her to join in with the boys’ teasing. But Delia laughed too, and slung her arm over June’s shoulder, proud.
“Then how come we can see you?” said Shirtless.
“She must have a very powerful imagination,” Striped Shirt said. “A dirty one.” He was staring directly at June then. She felt herself blush, and she was glad it was dark. She liked the way his voice sounded, sexy but playful, like he was saying that but also making a joke about someone who would say that, all at the same time.
June glanced at Delia, who was looking back and forth between them. Delia gave June a tiny nod. Him. A minute later when the boys asked them to sit down, Delia arranged it so that June and Striped Shirt were sitting next to each other. And then a minute after that Delia walked toward the water. “Hey,” she shouted. “Come with me if you’re not a pussy.” They all watched as she stripped down to her bra and underwear, climbed up to the top of the tall rocks, and threw herself off into the reservoir.
“We better go down there and see if she died,” Shirtless said. Even though they could already hear her splashing and whooping below. Shirtless and the two in black stood up.
“Next time you take a drink from your sink,” Shirtless said, “remember: My balls have been in your water.” He leaped off the edge, and the others followed.
And then it was June and Striped Shirt all alone, just the way Delia had planned it. He leaned over, put his elbows on his knees. She could see the tattoo on his wrist again. It was covered in plastic wrap. He reached out to rub it, like he wanted her to notice.
“I only got it a few days ago,” he said. “So it itches.”
“Does it mean something?”
“Yes,” he said. And she couldn’t tell if she was supposed to ask more questions or not. So she picked up a skinny stick and poked the end of it into the flame.
She wished very much that Delia were still there next to her instead of far away in the water. June’s heart was pounding. She felt small and scared. She closed her eyes, pictured Delia nodding. Him.
June took a deep breath, then turned toward Striped Shirt. In one swift motion she grabbed the neck of his shirt and pulled him in toward her until their lips were touching.
For one horrifying second he just sat there, lips slack. His mouth was cold and tasted like beer, and she thought about the fish at the bottom of the reservoir that sometimes nibbled at their toes when they went swimming, and how this was what kissing one of them might feel like. But a half second later he started kissing her back, and a second after that he pushed his tongue against her lips. She opened her mouth and let it in.
This is my first kiss, she thought. I am having my very first kiss now.
But it didn’t feel sophisticated or cool or even good. It was odd and a little gross, really. And suddenly, June was struck with something: For the rest of her life, no matter how many kisses she had, no matter who those kisses were with or what they meant, this was the one that came before all of them, out in the dark with a guy whose name she didn’t even know. He would always be her first.
Striped Shirt reached up and put his hand on her boob. His hand felt small, in a creepy way, kind of like a child’s. She thought maybe she wanted him to stop, wanted to undo this. But she wasn’t sure how.
A moment later Delia and the boys were back, climbing up the rocks, dripping and shivering. June and Striped Shirt pulled apart.
Shirtless said, “Whoa, hey now,” and started backing away when he saw them.
But Delia just stood there, wringing out