Revenge of a Not-So-Pretty Girl (5 page)

“All is forgivable if he or
she
who commits that action is repentant. But if a sin is also a crime, part of that repenting
involves informing the proper authority, at which point the healing can begin.”

“Authority?” I echo.

I no longer feel fever-hot. I now feel as if I’ve been set on fire.

“It’s all good,” I say quickly. And I force a ridiculous laugh. “I was just testing you. Trying to figure out what would be the worst sin to commit. It’s all good.”

And I just about tear the curtain down as I beat it out of that confessional.

*  *  *

It’s raining really hard when I start back home with Mama, and I realize I left my flimsy umbrella back in the church. I try not to walk too close to the curb to avoid the rainwater splashing up as cars whiz by. Mama’s moving even faster now, and I’ve dropped to twenty paces behind her. But she never slows down to check on me or offer me any shelter, which is just fine with me. I’d feel weird and claustrophobic having to be all bunched up close to her as we walk the whole way back to our apartment in silence. Besides, she’s probably looking for the rain to finish cleansing me of whatever confession did not. But I can’t really worry about her. I have my own horrible trials and tribulations to deal with.

KARMA
.

Written in big twelve-inch-high white letters on the blackboard. That’s the first thing I see when I walk into my religious studies class. The word
karma
, double underlined. And just as frightening is what—or who—I spy to the left of that word: Sister Margaret Theresa Patricia Bernadette. She takes her usual place in front of the class, waiting for everyone to be seated and settled. Her head is held really high, like she’s one of those meerkats. You know, like there’s a stick poking up out of her back, holding it up. Her hands are clasped in front of her, and her beady little rat eyes dart from left to right, right to left. She doesn’t wear a nun’s habit. None of the nuns at Bishop Marshall do. Instead, she has on the same long gray skirt, maroon blouse, and gray angora sweater she wears every day. The first button on her shirt is open, and a gold cross with a crucified Jesus hangs just below her neck. I swear, if I see one more crucified Jesus … I don’t understand why people wear them. It’s
just so depressing and all. I wouldn’t wear any dead person hanging from my neck, no matter how many miracles he might have performed.

I take my loose-leaf binder out and ease my knapsack under my desk. I didn’t sleep a wink last night, but I don’t feel tired. Just the opposite. It’s as if I’ve eaten two pounds of sugar. I’m filled with all this anxiety, and it’s taking everything within me to not start shaking uncontrollably. I take a deep breath, and as I exhale, I notice Keisha mouthing the word “Karma” and “Ooh,” and miming a horror-movie scream. For the first time in the past fifteen hours, I can feel a smile working its way onto my face. But just as quickly, my face muscles tighten and I begin to feel the anxiety again.

I’d have to consider Keisha my very best friend, and even though we don’t sit together—on account of the Sister seating everyone alphabetically—she’s the only thing that makes religion class and Sister Margaret Theresa Patricia Bernadette bearable. She’s the only thing that made starting a new high school in the middle of freshman year bearable.

Keisha and I kind of have a bit of history, since we went to junior high together. And even though we weren’t great friends there, we were friendly. But then her stepdad bought a brownstone and moved the family to Fort Greene, and she started at Bishop Marshall right off. Mama and I moved too, but just deeper into Flatbush. By the time I got to Bishop Marshall, everyone was already part of one clique or another, and most didn’t want to let in a new kid. But not Keisha.

I know best friends are supposed to tell each other
everything, and I wish I could explain to her all the angst I feel inside, but I can’t. She could never understand what it’s like being me. After all, she has a mom who’s interested in every little thing that goes on in her day. She has a mom who hugs her and tells her how much she cares. And though her dad died in a car accident when she was two, she has a stepdad who comes home every night and treats her and her brother, Kevin, like they’re his own.

I keep looking as Keisha continues clowning, but I suppose me not laughing causes her to become serious. The next thing I notice is that she’s mouthing, “Are you okay?”

I shake my head and force a smile before turning away and looking down at my desk. That’s how Keisha is all the time: sensitive and caring and ready to help out. She’s always taking in stray animals with broken limbs and making sure everyone is okay. On Saturdays, she even volunteers at this nursing home in Williamsburg with her cousin, so just imagine me telling her I think I might have killed an old woman I was in the process of robbing. She’s so sweet and good that sometimes it makes me feel like even more of a bad seed. And I feel like I’m one of those wounded animals she’s always trying to rescue. I guess that’s mainly why I keep hanging out with Gillian and Caroline. With them, I can be as rotten as I want, and I don’t have to feel guilty about it. I don’t have to make any apologies.

As Keisha continues to clown around, I try to forget everything that happened in that old lady’s Parkside Avenue apartment. I even chuckle a little. But the nun must have some weird laser lock on me, because with all the
whispering and fidgeting going on, I’m the one her death stare focuses on.

“Ms. Andrews, may I inquire as to what you find so comedic?” she asks.

Oh, I have a million good ones I could come out with, but I just sigh and mumble, “Nothing, Sister.” Then I wait for her to call on us to read our homework. The assignment was about the principle of reincarnation and whether it is represented in Christianity. I’m just hoping she doesn’t go alphabetically, because I’ll be called first, and honestly, I never got past writing my name and date on that piece of notebook paper last night. That’s the problem with having Andrews as a last name—you’re always the first one up in front of the firing squad. But maybe she’ll do her picking in reverse alphabetical order. That way, Kiara Harding will go before me. And since she always has those A-plus book reports, I’ll be able to jot down some good ideas from her. Of course, I’ll have to change it around a little so it doesn’t sound completely like I’m cheating, though I see nothing wrong with taking advantage of such a situation, if it’s done in a creative way.

Everyone finally settles into their seats, and the murmuring dies down. That’s when Sister Margaret Theresa Patricia Bernadette walks around to the front of her desk and clears her throat.

“Today, I would like to jump right into the Hindu philosophy of karma. Who has an understanding of what that is?”

Charlene Simpson, an average-looking girl’s worst nightmare, is one of the first to raise her hand. What’s new? And Sister just beams at her.

“Basically, it’s the principle that whatever you put out will come back to you. So, if you do good, good comes to you. If you do bad, bad comes to you.”

“As usual, Charlene, you’ve hit the proverbial nail on its head.”

And teacher’s pet flashes her hundred-watt, spent-two-thousand-dollars-on-braces-to-get-the-chompers-perfectly-straight smile, then flings her thick, shiny black hair this way and that.

“Yes, this philosophy asserts that for everything you do, there is a direct, balanced consequence that will take place sometime in your life. Does anyone have an example of a karmic experience?”

Sylvester Young shifts his bulk uncomfortably in his too-tiny chair, then raises his hand.

But another kid yells out, “Sylvester ate a tubload of fried chicken. Two hours later, he threw it all up. Now, that’s karma.”

“Class!” the nun says sternly before the laughter can expand any further.

“No,” Sylvester says. “I was gonna say, I helped this little old man who had fallen on a patch of ice a few months ago, and later he gave me a twenty-dollar bill.”

“That’s one way of looking at it,” the Sister says. “Anyone else?”

And it goes around and about like this with everyone highlighting a good deed that was in some way rewarded. It comes back around to Charlene again, who mentions something about rescuing a cat from a tree or stopping a
speeding bullet from hitting a baby carriage or preventing the atom bomb from going off, or something as ridiculous as that. Whatever. And the Sister oohs and aahs and drools and slobbers.

“But karma can also be bad,” the Sister continues once she’s able to tear herself away from Charlene’s “awesomeness.” “I’m sure some of you have dealt with experiences that led to rude awakenings somewhere down the line.”

Okay, I’m really starting to feel queasy. If there is such a thing as karma, the worst consequence must be given for killing someone. I mean, even with the Ten Commandments, isn’t “Thou shalt not kill” the mother of them all?

“Okay, bad karma, bad karma. Whom shall I call on … Let’s see … Who would have some experience with bad karma? Faye Andrews!”

If there is a God in heaven, please strike me down. Now! Is “old-person tormenter and potential killer” stamped on my forehead for all to see?

“Why’d you call on me?” I ask. “I wasn’t even raising my hand.”

“No, but you were looking a bit shifty.”

“I don’t know what that means,” I say. “I was probably looking the way I always look.”

“Exactly,” the nun says. “Anyway, an example of bad karma. Go.”

“I don’t have one,” I say between clenched teeth.

“Oh, I’m quite sure you have a few.”

The thing is, having the mom I do, I have a lot of experience with people saying not-so-nice things to me, either
blatantly or in a backhanded way. But I still manage to give them the benefit of the doubt. So I take a few seconds to process the nun’s words. Who knows, maybe she didn’t mean them the way they came out. But then I look around the class and see some kids giggling, and I see Keisha’s “Oh no she didn’t” expression, and I know what I heard is actually what that nun said.

Now, I’ve always been a little suspicious of Sister Margaret Theresa Patricia Bernadette, and it’s not just because she has four first names and she makes us call her by all of them. Not just Sister Margaret. Not Sister Margaret Theresa. Not Sister Mags Terry Pat. It has to be Sister
Margaret Theresa Patricia Bernadette
. And even though servants of the Lord are supposed to be caring and compassionate and nonjudgmental, this woman’s just plain mean and petty. Case in point: the bizarre beauty contest she had all us girls take part in a few weeks back—which of course Charlene won even though it wasn’t supposed to be a test of outward beauty. Something about examining the virtues of prudence, justice, restraint, courage, faith, hope, and charity. Still, Sister was judge and jury, and somehow all the pretty girls ended up on top while the girls like me ended up down at the bottom. I mean, what the hell does beauty have to do with religion class, anyway? I’m completely convinced Sister is Satan’s kin.

“An example of bad karma,” I say. “Okay. Well, I did cut Mass one time and used my offering money for soda and chips. And now I’ve been put in a horrible religion class with a crazy, frustrated, mean old nun.”

I see Keisha quickly look away. There is mostly silence. But then someone in the back of the class laughs. Satan’s daughter does not. Her face just becomes rock hard. She stares at me awhile, like she’s trying to figure out whether she should turn me into a pillar of salt like Lot’s wife and risk blowing her demonic cover. But instead, she walks back over to the blackboard and stands next to the word
karma
again.

“Let’s talk about karma as it relates to Christianity,” she says. “Proverbs eleven eighteen. ‘The wicked man earns deceptive wages.…’ ” She fixes her eyes on me as she says this, then turns to Charlene as she adds, “ ‘But he who sows righteousness reaps a sure reward.’ ”

The minute school
is over, I’m flying through the hallways like a bat out of hell. I hardly even shoot a second glance at Anthony “Curvy” Miller—my future husband in the event that Michael Jackson is unavailable. I dash through the doors and run out into the streets of Crown Heights, trying to make it to the bus stop, almost taking out a Hasidic boy who’s not watching where he’s going.