Bright Purple: Color Me Confused with Bonus Content (6 page)

“You guys didn’t get into a fight, did you?” says BJ in a slightly accusing tone.

“Huh?” I try out my innocent routine as I struggle to tear open a packet of dressing and then slowly squeeze it onto my chef’s salad.

“Remember?” she persists. “I asked on Saturday night if you guys were having a fight, and you said no.”

“We’re
not
having a fight.”

“Then why is Jess acting so weird?” asks Amy Temple. Amy, like Jess, is really into softball. They play both spring and summer leagues. And usually Amy and Jess get along great, although I’m not sure what Amy will think when she finds out about this. Amy already has a tough time with the women’s softball coach, since she’s pretty sure that Coach Reeves is gay, although no one knows this for sure. Still, we all agree that the woman is pretty butch both in appearance and behavior, and we all try to keep a safe distance from her. At least I thought we did. Now I’m not so sure about Jess.

“Yeah, Ramie,” says BJ. “Why is she acting so weird?”

“Don’t ask me,” I say as I stab my fork into a piece of hardboiled egg.

“Well, you can’t ask Jess,” says Amy. “She’s not talking to anybody.”

I peer at Amy. “Really? She’s not talking to you either?”

“She’s not talking to
anyone,
” says BJ.

I glance over at Lauren, another sports friend. “How about you?”

“Nope.”

“What do you mean exactly?” I question them. “Are you saying that you can say something to Jess and that she completely ignores you?”

“Not exactly,” admits Amy. “It’s more like she just blows you off.”

“Yeah, she just gives a snippy answer, then looks away like she’s too busy, like she doesn’t have time for you.”

“Like she hates us all.”

“Did we do something to offend her?” asks Lauren.

I roll my eyes and let out a big sigh.

“You do know something, don’t you, Ramie?” Amy points her unopened straw at me.

“She does,” confirms BJ. “She admitted as much to me on Saturday night. But you also said that Jess would tell me herself, Ramie. But she hasn’t. So what’s up with that?”

“Yeah, Ramie, spill the beans,” says Lauren.

“Come on,” urges Amy. “If Jess is having some kind of problem, you should tell us. We’re her friends. Maybe we can help her.”

Now I’m not sure what to do. I remember what Mom told me, how Jess really needs her friends right now. And it does occur to me that telling these guys could take some of the pressure off me. Kind of like they’d suddenly be involved in this sticky dilemma too. On the other hand, it might really hurt Jess if I let this out. And, as mad
as I am at her, I guess I’m starting to feel a tiny bit sorry for her too. I mean, how can she be so set on ruining her life? Who does that?

“It’s complicated,” I tell my friends. “And I really think you should hear it from her. Okay?”

Lauren’s eyes light up now. “I know!” She says, pointing her spoon into the air. “I know what it is!” Then she gets this slightly appalled look on her face and sets her spoon back into her bowl of half-eaten chili with a dull clunk.

“What?” demands BJ. “What is it, Lauren?”

“Nothing.” Lauren doesn’t look up. And I think maybe she really does know. But how? How could she have figured this out? Or is it possible that she’s involved too? The mere idea of this is so disturbing that I want to shove it away from me. How messed up would it be if Jess wasn’t the only one? I study Lauren for a moment and realize that she does have kind of a strong masculine side. Not that it means she’s gay. But I suppose it means she
could
be.

“Come on,” Amy pleads with her. “You gotta tell us now, Lauren. you can’t say you know and then keep it to yourself. Out with it!”

Lauren just slowly shakes her head. She keeps staring down at her soup, looking like she really is about to be sick.

“Lauren,” I say to her in an urgent tone, and she looks up at me with worried eyes. “Do you
really
know?”

“Not really.”

“Come here.” I stand and pull on her arm. “Come tell me what you think without anyone else listening.”

“Oh, man,” says BJ. “Talk about middle school.”

“Yeah,” chimes in Amy, “like a déjà vu all over again.”

But I ignore them as I practically drag Lauren off to a quiet corner of the cafeteria. “Tell me what it is that you think you know, Lauren,” I command her.

I can see her swallow hard, and I know she doesn’t want to say the words out loud. Who does?

“Come on, Lauren. I’ll tell you whether or not you’re right, okay? Because I do know what’s up with Jess.”

“Okay.” She looks to her left and to her right and then over her shoulder before she asks in a quiet voice, “Is Jess gay?”

I blink, then nod. “But how did you know?” Of course what I really want to ask her is,
Are you gay too
? Because that might explain her suspicion about Jess and why she knows. Still, I know that would be pretty intrusive, not to mention stupid. And I suspect that I’ve already pushed her too hard, because she actually seems even more upset now that I’ve confirmed this is true. Seriously, I don’t want the poor girl falling apart on me right here in the cafeteria. Still, I’m curious. “Really, Lauren, how did you find out about Jess?”

“Last week,” she begins in a hushed tone. “I can’t remember what day it was, but early in the week . . . it was after school and I was on my way to practice when I saw Jess going into the counseling center. She didn’t see me, so I started to yell at her, but before I did, she ducked into the conference room in there.”

“So?”

“Well, remember those colorful posters that were plastered all over the school, the ones about the gay alliance and their sexual-orientation meeting? There’d even been an announcement about it during—”

“That’s right! That meeting was supposed to be on
Tuesday in the conference room in the counseling center
, and I remember some of us were making fun of it during English when the announcement came on. I actually teased Joey Pinckney. I told him he should go to the meeting and see if he could find himself a boyfriend.” Suddenly I feel really bad for teasing him like that. I remember the look on
his face and how quiet he got. But I was just kidding. Everyone acts like that sometimes. It’s just the way high school kids are. People really shouldn’t get offended so easily. Still, maybe I should apologize. Both to him and Jess.

“That’s weird.” Lauren gets this funny look on her face.

“What?”

“I saw Joey that day too. I mean I can’t say for sure that I saw him go into that room, but now that you mention it, I do remember seeing him hanging out in the counseling center. I thought it was kinda strange, but then Joey is kinda strange.”

“Do you think he’s gay too?”

She shrugs. “Guess it’s not really our business. Besides, it’s Jess who concerns me right now.”

“Well, you’re probably right about her going to that meeting. She’d told me earlier that day that she was going to miss practice because she had to do a chemistry lab, which I remember thinking was odd since I hadn’t had any extra assignments in my chem class. But I’m sure that was just her cover-up so she could attend that meeting.”

“I didn’t really know what to think,” admits Lauren, “but I decided not to mention it to anyone. Even when Jess missed practice, I sort of just told myself not to start imagining things.”

“So now you know you weren’t.”

“Just because she went to that meeting . . .” Lauren looks uncertain. “I mean it doesn’t prove anything. Going to a meeting doesn’t make you a homosexual.”

I kind of shrug, wishing we’d never had this conversation.

“But you said she was,” Lauren persists.

“No, you
guessed
that she was.”

Now Lauren looks at me with what seems a pretty suspicious
expression. I can almost tell that she’s trying to put two and two together, and I know I need to stop her before she adds it up to equal
gay.

“If it makes you feel any better, I was totally shocked by the news too,” I say quickly. “Actually, Jess outted herself to me on Saturday. We were at the Greenville Mall when she told me. I swear I almost had a nervous breakdown.”

“Seriously?” Lauren looks properly stunned now. “She told you that while you were at the mall? How does someone do that anyway? Were you guys like shoe shopping in Nordie’s and she just turns to you and announces, ‘I’m gay and what do ya think of these new Nikes?’”

“Not exactly,” I admit. “I guess she did try to break it to me gently.” I kind of laugh now. “Not that there’s a way to break something like that gently.” Then I go on to tell Lauren about how my lip actually went numb and how I had a meltdown in the restroom. “It was pretty weird.”

“Wow.”

“I just didn’t think I should tell anyone,” I continue. “I mean it’s Jess’s business. If she really wants to come out of the closet, well, don’t you think it’s up to her to let her friends know?”

“I guess.”

“So, maybe we should just keep it to ourselves.”

Lauren is looking over my shoulder now, back over to where we abandoned our lunches and our friends. “You really think they won’t figure this out, Ramie?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, I’ll do my best to keep my mouth shut. But this is going to be tough to hide. I mean Amy’s already pretty homophobic anyway. you know how she runs whenever Coach Reeves gets too close.”

“Don’t we all.”

“Apparently not
all
of us, Ramie.”

“Yeah, whatever. Just the same, I really think we have to keep a lid on this, Lauren.” I’m tempted to tell her about how I’ve been praying about this, how I’ve been hoping that God will get a hold of this thing and that he’ll convict Jess of her sin before it’s too late and everyone finds out. Still, I know that Lauren’s not a Christian. And I doubt that she’ll really get me. Instead I say something that sounds uncomfortably like my mom.

“You know, Jess is really going to need her friends’ support on this. Some people will probably ostracize her. It shouldn’t be us, Lauren. The kindest thing we can do is to wait for Jess to out herself. Don’t you think?” Okay, I know I sound totally hypocritical—at least to myself—and the truth is, I want this whole thing to just go away. I’d like to lock Jess permanently in the closet.

She nods. “Yeah. You’re right. you really are a good friend to her, Ramie. I’m not sure that I’d be so cool if Amy suddenly announced something like this. I mean people might assume that just because we’re best friends, I’m gay too.”

Of course, I will never admit to Lauren that I was actually questioning her sexual orientation only minutes ago. Although I’m pretty much convinced by her reaction that she is not, and has no interest in becoming, a lesbian. That is a huge relief. It would be really disturbing if more girls involved in team sports started popping out of the closet. I’m sure everyone would just naturally start to think that if you’re a girl and if you’re into athletics . . . well, I just don’t want to go there.

I
T WASN
’
T EASY TO IGNORE
BJ
AND
A
MY AS THEY PESTERED
L
AUREN AND ME
with questions about Jess. But it did help that I was no longer alone in this thing. And for some reason it’s consoling that Lauren seems almost as upset about it as I am.

“This thing with Jess is really going to make the rest of us look bad,” she says quietly to me after we leave the cafeteria. She sadly shakes her head. “I totally hate being called a ‘girl jock,’ Ramie. It just gets to me. And now Jess goes and does this.”

I don’t answer her. But I do understand.

“Hey, Ramie,” calls a guy. I turn to see Mitch coming from behind us. I’m so happy to see him and so glad that he’s the one approaching me. But I manage to keep my cool. I give Lauren a glance and she just nods with wide-eyed approval. Kinda like
go girl
. So I do.

“How’s it going?” I ask him. I’d been watching for him all morning and during lunch but never saw him.

“Okay. But now I’m starving.”

“You missed lunch?”

“Yeah. I went to that military recruiting meeting at the counseling center.”

“Really? Are you interested in the military?”

“Maybe. I mean it probably sounds kinda lame, but I’ve always dreamed of going to the Air Force Academy.”

“Isn’t it hard to get in?”

He nods and holds up some papers and pamphlets. “But according to the recruiter, I might have a chance.”

“Good for you. But too bad you missed lunch.”

He grins. “Not really. My day’s over now anyway.”

I make a face at him. “Oh, that’s right. Mr. Lucky Senior. you’re only going half days.”

“But that might change,” he points out. “If I want to get into the academy, I’ll have to beef up my schedule after Christmas.”

“Are you thinking about it?”

“Yeah. But it also means I’ll have to give up my job.”

“Where do you work?” I ask as we pause near the front entrance.

He makes a funny face. “Well, if I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

I laugh. “So you’re with the FBI?”

“Something like that.”