Bad Hair Bad
Short Story, Fiction, started original version years ago...this is the revised version. Enjoy.
by: C.A. MacConnell
Let me tell you a secret. I am bad. They call me Shelly Hopscotch because I’m the fastest at the game. We’re junior high, so we’re way too old for it, but we play anyway. It’s either that or tether-ball, and there’s always a line there, so we get bored and hopscotch it is. I can stretch my legs, throw the perfect stones, and make it to ten before the other girls even make it to the playground. So I always stand there and laugh, watching how their ponytails chase after them like all those red-faced, horny boys. If it rains in the valley, I'm the first one to swallow drops. If the sun pokes up over the mountain and beats down, I'm the first one to take off my mud boots and dance. The other kids watch me tie someone’s shoelaces together, and they follow, one by one, until we’re all tripping over ourselves. Nice.
My hair is so black and so straight. No waves or anything in the way. Sometimes, it's tied back tight and smooth. Maybe I look like a seal, I dunno. Other days, it falls down my shoulders, tickling my chin like boys’ hands do sometimes, like when they’re being stupid boys. Today I have the black claw clip in, so my hair’s somewhere in between up and down. Mom got it down at the Dollar Store. She said I needed it. She said she wanted to see my face. We usually spend about twenty bucks at that place, so like Dad says, “that dollar thing is all a bunch of BS.” Dad cusses all the time when he thinks I don’t hear. I drag Mom in the Dollar Store whenever, because she’s a total sucker for a deal. Sweet.
I’m smiling all weird because Bryan just popped into my head, and my teeth feel so slippery, because I just got the braces off. To test out my teeth, I bit real hard into a whole green apple, and I ripped into that skin like a tiger. Last week, Bryan made some poetry, and he told me my face was as smooth as a freshly painted wall. He’d know since his Dad’s the town painter. Sometimes, after Bryan touches my chin or my cheek, he stares at his hands to make sure they're not stained white. I guess that’s what he’s doing. Strange, because whenever I check myself out in any mirror or window, I think my skin has a rough, yellow glow, like some joker just rubbed my face with Cheetos. I dunno, I’ll ask Christine at school later. She always tells the truth, which makes her only kinda cool, not totally cool, because she wouldn’t lie for me if we were in the principal’s office. That kid Jess is the same way – medium cool, never lies. I think they’re in love or whatever, which can be annoying.
The bell rings, and I think I’m a kangaroo for a second, the way I jump out of my seat. Always, I’m the first one out the door, the first one at the lockers because that makes me super cool. Everyone knows it.
All around, feet are pounding and people are yelling like animals. The boys stick together in choppy runs. The girls scurry into the bathroom. They never go alone. This is their only chance, for real. Later, they’d have to squirm in their seats and hold it. Or, they could raise their hands and ask the fake-blonde Social Studies teacher if they can get up. If her husband wasn’t out all night at the Do-Right Pub, she’ll let them pee, and they’ll get up, and everybody will stare at them and laugh, just to laugh at something, like the way we laugh at someone’s stupid no-name jeans. No loser wants that.
Slamming my locker shut, I peek into my brown bag of gross lunch. Some bigger girls will beg me for my sweets, and I'll trade them, because I like the taste of something another Mom made, something that fills me more than a Twinkie and some beef jerky, geez. My Mom is chef at the rich people’s Highland Restaurant, so when she gets home, the last thing she wants to do is make another meal. Dad always laughs and tells Mom that her dinners are dog food. Nice.
Lunchtime, yeah. We’re in our seats, passing food around. Some girls give me bad looks. I'm the only brave one who moves to a boy table. Those girls want to hate me, but I smile at them, showing them my new straight teeth. Kill them with kindness, Mom always says. I try thinking about what Joan Jett would do, what her face might look like right then and there, and I make a cool face.
Dirk pats me on the back.
I roll my eyes and munch on Doritos. He wasn't saying "hi." He wanted to feel my shirt to see if there was a bra strap there, which there wasn’t. Sorry to bum him out, but I'm still boobless, skinny Shelly. One of the boys, for real.
Bryan checks his reflection in a spoon. He’s the boy leader - brown-eyed, brown-haired, tall, and no doubt, he’s the most curly-headed deviled egg around. He's new. New kids in the valley are auto-cool.
Bell rings. Our stomachs full, we run to recess. Faces trapped in grins, we’re like little snakes. Someone has Twizzlers. The girls all try to beat my hopscotch record, but I win the game, one-footed and proud. Okay, sometimes I cheat. Bored, I cross the playground to the boys’ side.
They throw the football around. I don’t think they know what they’re doing, but they act like they do. Sometimes they even punch each other. Even Jess, the buzz-haired quiet one, is catching some. Mike, the shortest of them all, takes off his glasses, cleans them with his shirtsleeve, and looks at me all weird.
I feel like a loser, remembering the time I didn't dance with him in sixth grade, so I act like I don't see him. Sitting down on a log, I pull a heavy metal magazine from a hidden, inside coat pocket, flipping through pages of bands, tattoos, and tongues. Ratt is my favorite. They rock.
Bryan bounces back and forth, shouting, “I’m open!” He’s always open.
Mike comes over to bug me. He looks over my shoulder at the pictures.
I hand him the magazine, stealing his place in the football game.
“Hey!” Mike yells and laughs.
“Sorry, yeh snooze, yeh lose,” I tell him, catch the football, and run.
When I’m out of breath, I look over at the Latin teacher. She shakes her head, gripping her bell like a recess boyfriend. By her look, I know she's thinking, Shelly will be pregnant at sixteen, another kid lost in the mountains. She’s right about one thing. I’m going to end up in the mountains, living in a log cabin like that guy on TV with the beard, Grizzly Adams. I love him. Just me and my half-wolf, blue-eyed dog, Tesla, hanging out in the cabin with Grizzly. I know, “Tesla” is a bad name for a dog, but I was listening to that band when I named him, so whatever, everybody has to deal.
I smile at the Latin teacher. Kill her with kindness.
She smiles back, scaredy-cat like.
Science room. I take my assigned seat next to Christine. She’s obsessed with some book, something told through the voice of a wolf I guess. That’s what it looks like from the cover picture, but sometimes I think I know what I’m getting into, and then I open some book and get a big, fat surprise, which is annoying.
I pull the headband out of Christine’s hair and throw it to Bryan, who’s behind us.
“Hey, give it back!” Christine yells out. She laughs, feeling her hair. It's thick and perfect, like Tesla’s coat. I wouldn’t say I hate her for it, but she’s not my favorite either.
Bryan throws the headband to Jess, Jess to Mike, Mike to Lisa, Lisa to Stephanie, until everyone touches it. Everyone except Lara, the part-albino girl who sits in the closest seat to the teacher. Lara’s almost blind; she can’t even see the big E’s on eye charts. Sounds sad, but I think it’d be cool to be an alien.
The Science teacher runs into the room. He’s losing his hair, but what’s left of it is full of static cling, so it looks like he’s got wings on his head. “Sorry I’m late,” Bird Head says, writing definitions on the board. There are chalk hand prints on his butt.
Jess walks up to Christine, looks at the ground, and hands her headband back. “Here,” he says, shuffling back to his seat. He looks like Tesla did when he had worms, when he walked around our house, dragging his behind all over the carpets. Sick-o.
Christine blushes, going back to her book.
She’s bad too. Just not yet. It starts with the hair. Pretty soon, she’ll stop blow-drying. She’ll start wearing it messy, like it’s supposed to be, and Jess will make her squirm around like a belly-up hornet.
I pass Bryan a note that says, “Come over later.”
He passes me one back that says, “You got it,” with a smiley, winking face, which is ridiculous.
Lara sits alone in the front of the room, her Science book pressed close to her face, the light hitting her skin like the sun on mountain snow. She follows the lines of words with her finger, because it takes her forever to read. Every day on the playground, she sits on the same log, peeling an orange. I don’t know if she ever eats anything but oranges. Crazy, but I'm a sucker for her. She’s not cool, but she’s not a nerd. Lara’s in a whole other world all together. Kill her with kindness.
Lara looks up, staring my way, squinting her pale, blue eyes.
I know she can’t see me, but I look away at the clock, just in case. Watching the second hand, my eyes and ears lose focus, and the teacher’s words blur, tangled together like hair. The hand moves in its steady, slow, beat. I can almost hear it. I’m sorry, but I drift off.
Shocked awake, I feel a tap on my back, and I open my eyes to Lara’s half-blind, soft stare.
Lara’s thick, white hair blends into her skin. “You slept through class,” she says, floating out of the room, hunched over like old Suzanne, the Health teacher who lets us call her by her first name. She’s not fooling me, though. She’s still a teacher.
I'm an angry raccoon, because I’m supposed to be the first one out the door. I yank a hair from my head, leave it on the desk, and stand up, anxious. I grab my book pile. Book bags are for losers.
Home. I slip on my acid-washed jeans with the zippers at the ankles, my burgundy, thrift shop sweater, and my blue rain boots. I hear the sounds of dinner-making: the wrappers, the freezer opening and shutting, the beep of the microwave, Mom’s pant legs rubbing together as she paces, worried about Dad again, and “DarnitMaryMothertoHell” when she cuts herself. She never cusses like Dad does, because Mom takes Church seriously. I like the donuts.
There's a knock on the door. I rub the top of my head for good luck.
Bryan stands behind the screen, but it’s scary because his face is all blurry behind the gray, wire netting. Like a ghost, for real.
I sneak out, which is easy, since Mom’s buried in grease.
We run through the horse field and up the mountain to our waterfall, sitting on our favorite, wet rock. It's a biggun, like a boulder. I think it has a face too.
“Glad you came, but we don’t have much time,” I tell Bryan.
“Well let me just spit it out. Just in case you wondered, I love you, Shell,” Bryan says, kissing me sloppy.
I let him kiss me, and then I stand up, knowing Dad will let me have it if I’m out too late. There’s a long howl. I picture Tesla stretching his neck, pointing his nose up in the air, opening his jaws, letting the sound creep out. If I shut my eyes real tight, I can almost imagine the feel his thick, fur coat. “You know I gotta go,” I say to Bry. My bottom lip feels funny because he’s been sucking on it.
Bryan grabs my hands. “Not yet, Shell,” he says, pulling me down to him.
Tesla’s pitch grows higher.
Bryan pulls my sweater over my head.
I start to unbutton his shirt, but I get confused, so he finishes for me.
He looks at me, his mouth trapped in some serious, thin line, and says, “I’m...a virgin. Don’t tell anybody.”
“I know,” I say. "Me too," I lie. I'd already done Dirk and Mike that year, but whatever.
I move to a higher rock, put my arms around his neck, and kiss him, listening to the rush of water, which makes me have to pee. Tesla’s howl turns lower, sounding more like a moan, the kind that Mom makes at night, in bed, when she thinks I’m sleeping in my attic. When I listen to her cry, it's like metal music. I love Axl Rose.
Naked, shivering something crazy, we move to a flat, wet, grassy spot. I think it’s all moss, because it feels like Styrofoam on my back.
Soon, Bryan's on top of me, making noises.
I am quiet, for real, feeling him inside me. In the distance, Tesla is barking. By the sound, I can tell he's on his way home. I put my hands in my hair and grip it.
Bryan presses his weight into my ribs, his fingers moving across my skin. Insects.
When it's over, we grab our clothes from the ground. As I struggle with my jeans, Bryan brushes twigs off me. Then he reaches to pick leaves from my hair.
“Don’t. I’ll get it,” I say, making fists with my hands. Like I'm queen of some jungle.
Our boots heavy with mud, we walk back, lifting our legs high, careful not to trip. When we reach the bottom of the trail, Bryan runs down the driveway, his footsteps beating it up like hail on the attic roof.
I look down at my hands. One, open. The other, still clenched in a fist. I spread my fingers, one at a time. A small clump of hair in the palm. I brush it away with the other hand. Bad, Shelly, bad. I run fingers over my arms, legs, head, chest, until I feel like I’ve erased myself, the way rats slip into the wall cracks, disappearing for a while. But it’s weird the way they always come back. I watch and wait for them to come back. I stay ready because sometimes traps don’t work.
Home. At the table, my ankles are crossed. My hands, folded.
Dad sits next to me. His dark eyes stare hard at whatever. Dad's in serious mode. He looks handsome, and he smells crispy, like bacon smoke and mountain air.
Mom picks at the chicken on my plate. If it’s not on her plate, the calories don’t count. Mom thinks nothing counts if people don’t see it.
“How was your day?” Mom asks, dropping some peas on her lap. She laughs, nervous. Mom never stops moving. Even when she sits stuffed, leaning back in her chair, her lips quiver. Might sound creepy, but I’ve gotten used to it.
Dad nudges me and says, "Answer you Mother, pretty."
“Okay,” I say, pushing food around with my fork. “The day was okay.”
“Did you do your homework?” Dad says, shoving a roll in his mouth. He swallows without chewing.
“Done,” I say, studying his mechanic hands. No matter how many times he washes them, the skin cracks are still black. Like paws.
“Good girl.” Then with his mouth full of food, he says to Mom, “What’s really for dinner?” He laughs a little.
“You’re looking at it,” she says back, looking down.
I sneak away from the table before the heavy metal begins.
That night, I listen to Tesla scratch at the door. Paw to wood, paw to glass. Nights like this are always the same. Dad's tired again. Later, he slaps Mom around. No big deal. Nothing like Lara’s house. I hear there’s a reason why she was born half-blind; her mom got knocked around when Lara was in her stomach. Just one of those mountain stories. Well, they’re all pretty true, now that I think about it. I mean, nobody’s seen Bigfoot around, but we all know he’s there.
I pull the covers over my head, thinking about Tesla’s blue eyes, eyes as blue and clear as Lara’s. And I wonder, when Lara squints all funny and tries to see, I wonder if her eyes sting like a Daddy spank. I feel the top of my head. There is an empty circle, that spot in the back. Man, I need the claw clip. It’s no biggie. Soon, it will turn to long, jagged stubble. It’ll grow back in.
Morning is silent. Mom and Dad are gone at work already. Since I’m bigger, I guess they trust me to go to school alone now. Nobody told me that. It just kind of happened. One day, I woke up, and they weren’t around. So I am naked. I push the covers away and shuffle across the floor, and I feel the goose bumps on my skin. I hear Tesla’s paws hit the steps. Then his pounce comes. He pushes the door open and licks my face. Before I have time to wrestle with him, he's gone. Nuts.
I pick my purple sweatshirt and Forenza jeans off the floor, slip them on, and look in the mirror. I pull my hair back in my claw clip, fixing it so no one will see the empty space. Yes, I brush my teeth and all that. I wasn’t born in a barn. Christine was, but that’s just because she came out early and thought she was a horse or something. Anyway, carrying my books, I drop the History one while I’m running to the bus. I just leave it in the puddle for the stray cats. I take my seat in the back, the place where I can write on the seat in front of me and no one will see. No one will see my writing.
Bryan’s stop is next. Slowly, like the cool boy he is, he makes his way down the aisle and sits right next to me. His curls are all wet. At least his hair’s clean for once, geez.
“Hi, trouble,” I say. Someday, I might want him. I might be able to want him. I think of the way Lara can sit alone and just seem all right. How, with where she comes from, I have no idea. They all talk about her. They make fun of her. They say they hate her guts because she’s blind, but they can’t hate her. They want to be what they most hate. Because deep down inside her quiet, she’s as strong as a lion. I can see it there, that king, that wild, fierce hole. Everybody wants to be secretly tough.
Bryan nods, says "hi" back, and he acts like he’s reading.
Then he touches my leg. Got him. Could throw him like a stone. Could land him on any hopscotch number, hop over him, squish him, and win the game. Whatever.
Homeroom. I chew on a piece of hair, anxious. My stomach rumbles. I think of the night last week when Dad pulled me outside. I thought we were going to catch lightning bugs, but instead, he told me about his bad, bad days.
“Shelly,” he said. His dark eyes were wet and swollen up.
“Yeah,” I said, curling up on that old chair Mom never got rid of.
“I want you to know why I'm the way I am,” he said.
Then he told me how lucky I was. He told me about being little, that he barely ate because they were so poor. In a basement. Left there. Rats would crowd around. He thought about eating the rats. That his brother didn't make it. And most of the time, Dad wished he didn't. “I'm closer to you than I am to your Mom,” he said. He put his arms around me. He held his arms around me.
I was scared, because I never saw Dad cry before. I’d rather see him throw stuff around. And I couldn't pull loose. His cries were like music. High notes. Like Tesla’s nighttime cry. Like the screaming of a hard rocker. Like Skid Row. As Dad got up to go back inside, I put my hand on my head and pulled hard. I couldn't find Tesla. I hoped that dog didn't run away again, because Dad said he might shoot Tesla if he didn't shape up. And Dad had a loaded rifle in his shed. It was ready to go.
A soft tap on my shoulder snaps me back. Lara says, “Shelly, we have to go to class.”
"Oh, hi, Lara, all right,” I say, looking up at her glowy, white face.
"Thanks," she says.
"For what?" I asked her.
"For saying my name. No one ever does," Lara says, grinning. She's almost see-through.
I nod. I don't know what to say to invisible people.
I count. Mom always says that calms her down. Ten. The Latin teacher walks in. Her hair is blonde, long, and thick, like a horse tail. Today, we get our tests back. Nine. I have to get an “A.” I’m bad. Eight. My eye twitches. Seven. I look around. Six. Dirk carves something into his desk. Five. Bryan tears a piece of paper from his notebook, slowly, as if no one can hear. Four. Margaret and Christopher touch each other’s feet. Where am I? Jess watches Christine, who is buried in the same wolf book. Yes, three. As the Latin teacher passes the papers back, I feel them looking at me across the room, from the corners of their eyes, staring. I wonder if they can see it - the empty space. Two. Touching the top of my head, I remember that once, just once, in bed, when I was almost too young to remember, I think Tesla kissed me there. It was dark, super dark, so dark, I was half-blind like Lara. I could feel him above me, panting. Yes, for real, Tesla was panting. He wasn't going to run away. He kissed me there. One, breathe. She hands me the paper. Good enough. Saved by the scribble of someone’s hand. Never use my own hands. My own hand can only hurt and pull, hurt and pull, until I was left with only the memory of one kiss. Then the empty space. Because Tesla ran away before I could even tell it was him. Because Mom didn’t believe me. She said that Tesla and our family were good people, that I was making up mountain stories. She said that some secrets had to stay in Tesla’s ears, secrets like rats in the house walls. He kissed me there. It was him. In my attic room. And I knew that one day, he was coming back. Head banging is so cool.
Lara holds her paper close, trying to read the tiny writing.
I tap her back and say, “Hey, you got a hundred."
“Thanks,” she says, her red lips spreading out like a cut.
“How did you do?” she asks, touching me with her white hand.
“Bad,” I tell her.
Recess. Lara is nowhere. She must be at the nurse’s office again. I saw a bruise.
The English teacher is in charge, the one with the bell. She's pretty with reddish-brown hair. At recess, she pays attention to what kind of birds are out, and sometimes she forgets about us kids. Sweet.
I stole some cigs from Dad the night before, so I pull two smoke treats from my bag, sneaking into the woods on the side of the playground.
Bryan follows. “Shelly! Wait!” he yells after me.
I keep running. Like Tesla, I give his words, his howls to the wind.
It rains. I light up anyway, hearing Bryan’s footsteps. He’s coming.
“Why are you always running?” he says, pushing fingers through his curls.
I put out my cigarette, cough, and start to leave. I'm all head-rushy like a freak. Sick-o.
Bryan grabs my shirt. By accident, he pulls on some of my hair.
The claw clip falls out, and the pieces slide down and separate.
Bryan stands closer and sees it. The empty space. He stands back, like he thinks the bald place might be contagious.
“I have to go,” I say, running, the rain hitting my face. Tiny fists.
Back in Science class, everyone whispers. Everyone but Lara, who can’t even see the big E’s on eye charts. Bryan must've passed it around. Everyone knows. Shelly pulls her hair out. Soon, they'll make songs out of it. Get together and giggle and point. All but Lara, who could never see the notes. She’ll hear their whispers, but she can’t see it. They laugh. Bad, Shelly, bad. But someday, when they sit in their attic rooms at home, when they hear Tesla howling just outside the door, when Dad shakes a fist over something bad, when he cries and holds you and you can’t get away, they’ll know what it’s like to put a hand to the head, and pull out hair, strand by strand, until all dogs are gone, gone, gone, extinct. Kill them with kindness. For real.
