This is not a personal s.., p.23
This Is Not a Personal Statement, page 23
Brand returns with two sticky red cups. “I’m not a great bartender, but hopefully all this ice will melt and disguise the disgustingness.”
I take a sip and whatever cheap drugstore rum he used slams onto my tongue.
“It’s fine!” I shout despite the fact that I’m sure the scrunch of my face gives me away.
I sip again, and the rum burns my mouth, then my throat, then my core. It spreads warmth into my limbs, loosening my muscles, making them more susceptible to this music’s heavy beat. My parents would be livid. Perlie, at a party, drinking alcohol, with a boy? But they’re half a state away, and I have never been so thankful for it.
I shake off the earlier failed “Hi, I’m Perlas.” I am determined to have fun tonight. All the heartache of years spent squeezing into the unyielding mold of Perfect Perlie, of breaking off parts of myself so I’d fit—it falls away. I don’t know who I am yet, but tonight, with the music and energy crackling in my blood, feels as good as time as any to find out.
After this Super Smash Bros. match ends, Claire plants the controller in my hand. “Here. Show these boys what’s what,” she says before snatching the drink out of my hand. “Don’t drink this sludge. I’ll get you something better.”
As she flits to the kitchen, Brand pats me on the shoulder. “You’ve got this, Perla.”
And just like that, I feel welcomed, at home. I’ve got a game controller, a seat in front of the screen, and people cheering me on. I choose a character—Samus, of course—and wait for the other players to settle on theirs. Claire returns with a cocktail, one with fruit juice and vodka, and it’s a thousand times better than Brand’s. When I tell him so, he gives me a mock-hurt look, and Claire shuts him up by making him one too.
The match begins, and I finish my sugary drink faster than I’d intended to. In between lives—I can’t believe I got cornered and knocked out by a hammer—I toss the empty cup into the trash can a few feet away. I’m immensely proud it goes in, rather than bouncing against the rim and falling out. Perlie would have missed. Perla’s a great shot. And of course I win the match.
I hand the controller to Brand next and settle in my spot on the couch arm, alternating between watching the TV and the crowd. I’m at a party, and I’m enjoying myself. I don’t remember the last time this happened. Maybe Chuck E. Cheese when I was eight?
I hear an electronica version of a song I like, and even to my surprise, I rise from the couch arm and start dancing. Me, the girl who managed to skip homecoming, prom, and any other school-sanctioned occasion involving music and socializing. Me, who sits at the edge of family weddings, watching everyone else get “a little bit louder now” on the dance floor to “Shout.”
But I remind myself that that person, the bookworm built on grades and prestige and some false sense of pride, is gone. Strip away the pressure of perfect academic marks and those people I endlessly stress about making happy, and this is me, this is who I can be. Night-embracing, music-swaying, free. Maybe this was the sign that I was looking for: that I have the capacity to be happy just because, that it’s enough that I’m proud of myself for making it so far. Claire joins me mid-song, and we laugh and dance together as if we’ve been doing this for years.
Thirty-Four
I don’t know how long I’m at the party when the lights start to swirl together. The music, once rhythmic and immersive, begins to feel off-key. It throws me around, the beats hitting all wrong, the notes discordant. My stomach, though full of things sweet and bubbly, feels sour and stone-heavy.
After I lose a match, I practically shove the controller at Claire, then scan the apartment for the bathroom and stumble toward it.
Claire grabs my elbow before I get too far. “You all right? You look—”
“Fine. Bathroom.” Full sentences aren’t a possibility right now.
Someone nearby tells a joke about some sociology professor, and everyone but me laughs. I feel too off to pretend I understand the punch line.
I stagger out of Claire’s grip. The lights above the mirror shine too bright on me and all the grossness that is a guys’ bathroom.
I plant my hands on the cold granite counter and drag in stuffy air scented of stale beer and hypermasculine body wash. My vision refuses to cooperate. My eyes drift from spot to spot, focusing on nothing. Sweat beads on my forehead and temples. I drag my clammy fingers through my hair. I close my eyes, ignoring the swirl of my surroundings, and concentrate on getting enough air.
My first time drinking and I’ve overdone it.
I feel sick.
I want to go home.
And this Delmont place that I thought was home? This doesn’t feel like it anymore. The brief joy earlier wasn’t a sign: it was a mirage. And here I am, blinking, dehydrated and alone in the desert.
A fist bangs on the other side of the door. “Hurry up in there.”
I become acutely aware of how far I am from my actual home right now, from my comfy pink bed and the familiar fuzzy faces of Bip and Bop. I’m six hours away, alone in the dingy bathroom of an older student from a school I don’t go to.
The sudden shame over submitting my spring semester application hits me like a tidal wave. What do I think I’m doing here? One stolen semester, one carefully crafted personal statement, one loud party won’t make me a Delmont student. As of this second, I’m not sure I ever can be.
I run my hands through the icy water of the faucet and dry them on the already-damp brown hand towels hanging from a ring next to the sink. I steel myself for the onslaught on my senses and pull open the door.
The beat of the music sings a hard “go, go, go.”
So I stumble and elbow my way through the throng of laughing strangers toward the exit. The fresh night air outside beckons me, promises me salvation. The world tells me I can’t stay in this muck of an apartment for another second.
“Perla? You leaving?”
Except I came here with Brand.
I angle my head over my shoulder but keep moving toward the door. “Yeah, don’t feel well. Heading back.”
He lowers his controller, and his eyebrows furrow. I brace to argue with a “You want me to walk you home?” But when he opens his mouth, he says, “You’re good, right? I’m going to stay. They’re loading up the alien game, and I’ve got next.”
The disappointment adds another thick, suffocating layer to the atmosphere. Be cool, I tell myself. You feel and probably look awful, and you don’t want him to see you at your worst, in the bright lights of the residence hall you don’t live in. “Sure. That’s fine.”
“Text me to let me know you got back safe, okay?”
I manage a smile, then plow my way to the door. I just need to get to Camilla’s room. I can smooth over this quick, awkward exit in the morning, when my stomach isn’t trying to destroy me.
I barrel down the stairs, missing the second step from the bottom of the flight. I land with a twist of my ankle that sends a bolt of pain through my leg. My jaw clenches as I try to forge ahead.
Weak streetlight bathes a bench on the main road. A car zooms by, pumping the same music I heard at Jimmy’s. The desire to sit overwhelms me. I can rest for a few minutes, then head back to Godwin.
The second I sit, that plan melts away. A warm wind wraps around me, and I breathe in deep for what seems like the first time in hours. My eyelids lower, and I soak in the feeling.
New plan: close my eyes, let these swirling colors die away, get up energized in a few minutes, then make it back to Godwin.
A car door slams nearby, and my survival instincts force my eyelids open. A familiar silhouette casts shadows in the streetlight.
“Perla?”
A familiar voice too. Even the gait of the approaching steps is familiar. I squint into the darkness, struggling to keep my eyes open and focused.
Someone crouches in front of me, his hands planted on his thighs. Jackson.
“Hey, are you okay?”
My lips feel heavy, messy. “I need to go home.”
He frowns as I speak, but I’m too tired to enunciate or explain further.
“Come on. I’ll give you a ride.”
He springs back up and opens the car door.
I shake my head, and it sends the world in a spin. “No, I can walk.”
Jackson glances behind him at the cars whirring by on the main street. “I don’t think it’s a good idea. Crosswalk’s kind of hard to see down there. I can drop you off in front of your building. I won’t even take it out of your paycheck or tell my dad.”
A giggle bubbles up out of me. I will all of my energy into my legs and hoist myself up.
“Were you at the party?” I ask. “I didn’t see you.”
He shakes his head. “Closed up at the Bubble and Bean for the night.”
Of course a high schooler like him wouldn’t have been invited. I’m apparently also too exhausted to be embarrassed about my nonsensical question.
The sheer thought of a bed propels me into the car, and my fingers feel thick and clumsy as I try to buckle my seat belt.
“Here, I got it.” Jackson brushes my hands away, and a second later, the seat belt clicks together.
“Which building?” he asks, starting the car.
“Godwin. East.”
I don’t know if he says anything else. I fall asleep, comfortable in this worn front seat, air streaming in from the sliver of the open window.
Thirty-Five
Someone bangs on the door, and for a second, I think I’ve dreamed everything up. But another two bangs has me peeling my sweat-beaded face off Camilla’s pillowcase. She’s going to be furious I used her bed.
The makeup I’d carefully applied earlier tonight smears against the blue cotton. All the lights are on, and I’m cradling a half-empty bottle of water I don’t remember buying.
It must’ve been Jackson.
Somewhere from behind the blossoming headache comes the memory of him opening my car door for me in the driveway outside Camilla’s building. I’d argued with him about walking me to my room. I at least had the wherewithal to know that he’d think something was off if I’d taped open the lock of my own dorm room.
Three more too-loud knocks.
“Hold on, I’m coming,” I call toward the door. Could Jackson have followed me? If so, he’d better have brought something to settle the acid in my stomach. Only then could I hope for enough brainpower to talk my way out of this.
I take a sip of water to swish around in my dry, sour mouth and pause a second at the edge of the bed to let the hurricane in my head calm.
What time is it?
I glance around for my phone, but it’s not on Camilla’s bed or plugged into the charging cord. I can’t have been asleep that long though. That low-grade rum still runs like poison in my veins.
I wobble toward the door.
“Jackson, I don’t need you to take care . . .”
The words die on my lips.
Brand’s forearm is perched on the doorframe, his free hand dangling a cell phone. My cell phone.
“Looking for this?”
In my rush to leave, I must have left everything behind. I grab my cell phone back and mumble a thanks, fully aware of my rat nest of hair and the raccoon smudges of my eyeliner and mascara.
“I was waiting for your text. When I didn’t see it, I found your purse on the coffee table.” He pulls Camilla’s gray clutch out of his back pocket. “I was going to keep it, but it didn’t match my outfit.” Judging by the sleepy eyes and thick words, he must have come straight from the party.
I offer up my gratitude to the universe for the fact that I am back in a dorm room and not hanging out on that bench. He would have walked right past me and banged on Camilla’s unlocked door until it gave way and swung open.
Brand lolls his head to the side. “Sorry, I had to open it up to make sure it was yours. How’d you get into your room without your room key?” He waves Samantha Simon’s old room key—the one I purposely fumble with as I walk through the lobby or wait in the elevator—in front of me like a piece of candy.
The alarm bells instantly cut through the fog in my head. “I . . . front desk. Temporary key.”
He accepts this lie like every other one I’ve slung at him. “I’m starving. Jimmy’s pizza was cardboard. You wanna go grab something to eat? I know a 24/7 diner down in the village.”
The thought of the fifteen-minute hike into town renews the fizzing of my stomach acid. “No, I should really be getting to . . .”
Voices drift around the corner. To my horror, they do not sound like the cheery type of voices of partiers stumbling home after a late night. They reek of authority. The static of a walkie-talkie drains every bit of blood from my face. Whoever’s coming will round the corner in a matter of seconds, and they stand between this room and the main entrance to the building.
I could shut the door, but Brand’s still outside.
“Get in here,” I whisper to him, not bothering to hide the urgency in my voice.
His eyes fog over with confusion. “But the diner . . .”
“Not now!” I grab his shirt and try to drag him in, but he’s heavier than I’d imagined and those rum drinks slow his movements.
“Excuse me, young man. Young man!” a voice bellows down the hall.
Panic bolts through me. “Hurry!”
But Brand wrenches out of my grasp and peeks back outside, a damn grin on his beautiful face. This boy must have never gotten in trouble in his life. “Yes, Officer?”
Boots thunder toward the room, and suddenly I’m penned in by Brand and two campus safety officers. Not sworn-in police officers but still not the kind of people I want asking me questions in the middle of the night. Shining brass badges sit above one pocket of their blue button-down shirts, black plastic name tags above the other. Officer Walton and Officer Khan.
“We’ve gotten a noise complaint,” Officer Khan, her piercing green eyes the same shade as her geometric-patterned hijab. “Someone banging on a door or walls.”
The mustached Officer Walton eyes us both, and I get the feeling that my lies will bounce off of both of them. I summon the most forlorn, apologetic look I can manage.
I don’t even get a chance to speak because perfect Brand straightens and says, “Yes, sir. That was me. I’m just returning my friend’s purse. It took me a while to wake her up.”
Officer Khan peers at the clutch under my arm and frowns. “We still have to write this up. I’ll need your student IDs.”
Brand goes to fish his out, and my fingers drift to my clutch as I scramble for an excuse. I paint on my best feigned surprise. All that guilt over lying to my friends and family doesn’t even make an appearance. I’m purely in survival mode now. “Oh no, my ID’s not in here. It must have fallen out. Brand, did you see it in here earlier?”
Brand casts me a dejected look. “Sorry, Perla, I don’t think so. But wouldn’t you have used it to get a new room key? They might have it at the front desk, right?”
I cast him as strong of a “shut up” look as I can manage, but the message doesn’t seem to reach him.
Officer Walton takes Brand’s ID and scribbles his name down on a form on his clipboard. He glances at me. “And he said your name is Perla?”
I nod. I can’t even pretend I’m Camilla now.
“And your last name?” Officer Khan asks, a hint of impatience in her voice.
It’s been years since someone I’m not related to used that “you’re in trouble, missy” tone with me. I already feel my throat tightening. The slightest rise of volume in someone’s voice immediately sends me back to elementary school, getting scolded by the teacher for spilling water on a keyboard in the computer lab. But what I could get scolded for here is much, much worse.
My “Perez. Perla Perez” comes out as a whisper.
“Louder, please.”
I repeat it, hating the waver in my voice, and Officer Walton scrawls it down too.
I want to throw up.
“Birthday?”
I tell him and realize, belatedly, I’d given them my real birthday, not the one I’d written out in my detailed seven-part plan backstory tab, the one that would make me a legal adult.
Calculation flashes in Officer Khan’s eyes. “You’re only sixteen?”
No one accidentally misstates the year of their own birthday.
“I turn seventeen soon,” I correct her, ignoring the deepening of the officers’ grimaces and the drop of Brand’s jaw.
Officer Khan glances at my room number and reminds Officer Walton to add it to the form.
I shove down the terror at what this means for Camilla, who saved me from creeping and sleeping around the library stacks, and the dread at the fact that I’m back where I started, having to find yet another place to stay.
The rest of Officer Walton’s questions center around Brand, like what time he arrived, whether he lives on campus. Officer Khan occasionally glances at me, as if assessing my responses to Brand’s answers. Her gaze is unnerving, but there’s nowhere I can hide from them. I just want them gone as soon as possible.
Officer Walton tucks his pen into his shirt pocket. “Someone will follow up with you in the morning about the complaint. You keep it down now, got it?”
We nod and “Yes, Officer” dutifully. Once they disappear around the corner, Brand turns to me, his brown eyes devoid of the warmth they’d glowed with a mere ten minutes ago. “Sorry for getting you in trouble with all that noise. I’m going to go.”
My throat tightens again. Not that I’d wanted to drag myself out to that 24/7 diner, but it’s clear that the invitation from him for any kind of get-together is closed, nailed shut, and buried underground. “Yeah, of course. I’ll see you in class?”
