*
Hair does not burn well either. It melts and sizzles and smells. It burns a little easier when you cut it off, but it’s not nearly as satisfying. The strands of hair are nothing but lifeless extensions of me.
*
When I come downstairs with my hair cut ragged, Dad is already on his way to work. Adam grins broadly, Mom sighs her displeasure, and Grandpa smiles. I try to shift away from it and focus on Adam’s happiness instead.
He gives me a double thumbs-up. “Wicked, sis.”
I reach up and run my hand across my scalp. It feels different, though I’m not sure if “wicked” is the word I’d go for. It’s prickly. Lighter.
I glance at my reflection in the window. Green. Mine.
“You look like a troll. A really cool one,” Adam continues gleefully. “Doesn’t she, Grandpa?”
“She looks like a creature of legend, that’s for sure.” Grandpa thumps Adam’s shoulder. They’re good friends, the two of them, and I have no idea how that ever happened. “But I wouldn’t go for troll. Wood nymph, perhaps. Or a mermaid.”
“A nymph? An Ent, maybe.”
“Oh no, she’s far more elegant than—”
I don’t want him to think me elegant.
They continue to talk about me, as if I’m not there, until Mom snaps, “Would you be quiet, the two of you?”
I pour myself a mug of coffee and sit down at the kitchen table, as far away from Grandpa as I possibly can, and brace myself for Mom’s reaction. She continues making breakfast, punctuated by long-suffering sighs, but once we all have bacon and toast, she rounds on me.
“I know you’re going through a . . . phase”—she spits out the word as if it tastes disgusting—“and we’ve made allowances for your anger and for your stories. But the school has informed me your grades are falling. And this is simply unacceptable. Whatever will Reverend Winters say?”
Perhaps he’ll notice me, I want to tell her. Instead, I stuff a strip of bacon into my mouth and chew with abandon.
Adam snickers. Grandpa raises his mug in salute.
“Between this and your grades, it seems your dad and I will have to have a conversation when he’s home,” Mom says.
“Sure.” I shrug, but it only seems to infuriate her more.
*
I successfully avoid Zoe for almost two weeks, with only the most perfunctory of greetings when our paths cross in class, but I can’t avoid her forever. And right on cue, as if my green hair’s a beacon, when I walk to my locker, she comes bounding down the hallway. She screeches to a stop when she sees me, her sneakers skidding on the linoleum.
“Jenna Georg Cantor. You dyed your hair green.”
I hesitate. “Way to state the obvious, Z.”
“It’s different.” She walks around me, observing me, and even though I know it’s Z., my skin crawls. “It’s different, but it suits you. Did your mom go through the roof when she saw it?”
“Pretty much,” I say. I can’t smile yet. I keep my voice level. But I hope this means she’s forgiven me.
Her hand sneaks into mine, and she pulls me to a quiet corner. “Are you okay? Like, really okay?”
“No.” I flinch. I wish I could take it back the moment I say it. “I don’t think so, but I’m trying to be.”
Z. doesn’t look convinced. She always has such an easy smile. She isn’t pretty by traditional standards—her light brown hair is always tousled, her nose is crooked from that time she broke it during volleyball, and she’s broad and muscular. But when she smiles she is radiant, and I miss that smile.
“I’m sorry?” I try.
“Don’t be silly.” She wraps me in a one-armed hug. It’s slightly awkward, but it also feels a little safe. She squeezes. “We all have our ugly moments. We all have our secrets.”
I draw in a breath and wait for her to say more, wait for her to tell me she knows my secret. Her words sound like the perfect lead-up, and outside of my own family, Zoe is the one who knows me best. She must have noticed something.
But she hasn’t. No one has. She doesn’t say anything more than “Don’t you dare disappear on me like that again.”
And I want to be relieved. I am relieved. But somewhere, deep down, I would much rather she guessed it. I’d rather she knows and breaks the dam that keeps my words inside, barred by a hundred throwaway comments.
*
If hope is the thing with feathers, as Mrs. Lee taught us, then secrets are things with talons. They’re light at first, almost unnoticeable. They’re comfortable and easy to hold. But over time they grow heavier and develop sharp edges. Words become harder to share, and secrets cling to you and claw at you until they’ve dug themselves so deep, you’d have to tear yourself apart to get rid of them.
Until you do they’ll strike out at everyone who gets too close.
*
I spend the whole school day with Zoe, and it feels like old times except when it doesn’t. She makes jokes about things that happened in the days before, and I don’t have a reference for them. She comments on hanging out with Kamal who, it turns out, is a theater kid. She shows me the flyer for a musical the theater club is putting on at the end of the year—The Addams Family—and notes for the role she wants to learn to be a part of it.
“I didn’t know you were into theater,” I say.
She slowly eats the whipped cream off her mocha, savoring each bite. “I didn’t know either, but it sounds fun.”
“I’m sure both your coaches will be thrilled by another curriculum.” As always, Zoe’s schedule exhausts me just thinking about it.
“Spoilsport.” She rolls her eyes. “Volleyball season will end soon, and so will our swim meets. The rest of the year will just be swim club and endless free time. I can fit it in.”
She hums and then sings, “Let your darkest secrets give you away.”
I take a bite from my brownie. It tastes bland, though I’m quite sure that’s me and not the Coffee House. Our entire class comes here, frequently, because the coffee is good and the sweets are better. And Zoe . . . Zoe would be a regular if she didn’t schedule her days to the fullest. “You’re impossible.”
She spoons up some whipped cream and unceremoniously presses the spoon against my nose. I bat at her, and she laughs without abandon. I love her and I hate her at the same time.
When we’ve reached the bottom of our mugs and have scraped up all our crumbs, Zoe leaves me for a bit to go to the bathroom. I try to gather all her scattered belongings to put them back into her backpack.
I fold the flyer carefully, and then I stare at the papers for Zoe’s new theater project. They’re three notebook pages filled with finely scribbled notes and comments, in Zoe’s hand and another. Kamal’s, maybe? Zoe wants to play Alice, but beyond the name, I can’t find much about the character. The Addams Family, on the other hand, are outlined in quite some detail. Kamal calls them “objectively dysfunctional but supportive and macabrely happy.”
My fingers curl into a fist, crunching the paper. I breathe hard.
I should fold the notes and put them with the flyer.