From Bad to Cursed

Someone passed out little flags, which we flapped along with the crowd. A wave came through; we stood and sat with it. It came back, and we stood again and sat again.

“Try to look like you’re enjoying yourself,” I said to Kasey.

“It’s kind of fun…I guess,” Kasey said.

I laughed. “You look completely miserable.”

“Do I?” She waved her flag in my face.

It was so easy to get along with her now that she was making an effort. Overcome by a rush of affection, I pulled her into a sideways hug.

A few minutes later, the loudspeaker blared, welcoming the opposing team. Across the field, their ragged group of fans filled only a couple rows of the bleachers.

Then it was time for the cheerleaders’ entrance.

I didn’t plan to get excited, but it was easy to get caught up in the crowd’s whooping and clapping as the girls came ru

Then the football team came barreling out, ripping through their big paper sign, and the game started. Kasey and I watched the field in utter confusion, cheering when the people around us cheered but otherwise having no idea what was happening.

“Lex?” I looked up to see Carter standing over me, smiling.

Kasey and I shifted over, and he squeezed himself onto the bench next to me.

“Are you excited about your speech?” I asked him.

He nodded and showed us a small stack of note cards. “I’ve been practicing for hours.”

Something exciting happened on the field, and the people around us began hooting and stomping their feet. Carter grabbed my hand and held it.

Like a wave pulling back to sea, the crowd went quiet.

“Do you want to hang out tomorrow?” he asked.

“And do what?” I asked.

“Whatever you want.” He was wriggly and giddy, like a piglet.

I didn’t respond. Carter and I had never been I don’t know, what do you want to do? people. We had interests. Hobbies.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I kind of need to go shopping. At the mall.”

Carter and the mall went together like a bucket of nails and a bucket of water balloons. If absolutely forced to go, he spent the whole time whining and checking his watch.

“Sounds great!” he replied. “What time should I pick you up?”

My heart sank a little. I let my eyes drift back to the game, hoping I looked wrapped up in what was going on.

Carter touched my arm and pulled me close, his mouth next to my ear. “I have something to tell you tonight.”

I heard people shouting “Touchdown!” and everyone around us leaped to their feet. I jumped up, away from Carter, and cheered along with the crowd. The band played a few jubilant notes, the cheerleaders started chanting, and everything slid together to form a discordant roar.

When everyone else sat down, I had no choice but to rejoin Carter on the bench.

“Aren’t you curious?” Carter asked, his words almost lost in the noise around us. He said something else, but the crowd let out a giant shout, and I missed it.

“What?” I yelled back.

Then the crowd was quiet again, finished with their celebration, finding their seats.

Carter leaned toward me, holding me in a tight embrace.

“I said,” he went on, the words gauzy in my ear, “you’re a really incredible girl, and I have something important to say.”

I sat up, dazed, staring at him. Our hands were in a death grip between us.

He was going to tell me he loved me.

Of all the times I’d imagined we’d say those words—of all the places, all the situations…

“No,” I said, almost pleading, twisting my body to get free of his arms. “Not here, Carter.”

“What do you mean?”

My heart seemed well on its way to pounding right through my skin. Saliva filled the back of my throat. I needed to stop him. At least stall him.

Carter’s eyes searched my face, like a lost kid looking for someone in a crowd. “Lex, you don’t even know what I’m going to say!” he protested. “I just wanted you to know that I—”

You know you’re really special to me.

“You know you’re really special to me,” I said.

Maybe later tonight we can have a really serious talk.

“Maybe later tonight…we can have a really serious talk?”

He smiled, a little confused, and dropped my hand. But as quickly as the hurt reached his eyes, it was wiped away, replaced by blankness.

“Yes, of course. Later,” he said.

Like a counterweight to our emotions, the crowd was up on their feet again, shrieking with glee. Carter looked like he’d been dropped out of the sky into a strange, crowded place.

“I should go get ready,” he said, standing up and excusing himself down the aisle.

Kasey sat down, waving her flag. “I think I’m starting to get it,” she said. “Their guy dropped the ball, and we picked it up and that’s called a—where’s Carter going?”

“To read his speech,” I said.

She gave me a weird look and went back to watching the game.

Just sitting there was starting to feel like suffocating. “I think I might go take some pictures,” I said, reaching for my camera. “Watch my bag?”

I roamed the edge of the field while the football players scrambled around as meaninglessly as a bunch of field mice. I got some good shots—I’d never tried action shots before, due to my stinginess with film and darkroom time. But now, I knew, if I needed more film, I could get it from Farrin. If I needed darkroom time, all I had to do was breathe half of a hint, and she’d offer it up.

When halftime came, the cheerleaders’ music came piping through the loudspeakers, and then Megan and Jessica bounced across the field, landing in flawless unison.

I zoomed in and took as many photos as I could. Their intense expressions, their sweaty, muscular limbs, the vibrant red and white of their uniforms, all stood out against the black night sky and the vivid green of the field.

Megan’s face lit up as they went through the routine. She kicked, jumped, got tossed into the air, and balanced on somebody’s shoulder. As they finished, I lowered my camera and applauded, feeling almost as breathless as the cheerleaders were. Monday morning, I’d ask if I could attend some of the practices, shoot some more. The motion and energy were addictive.

“And now,” the a

School politics didn’t merit quite the same level of cheering as football, but Carter got a decent amount of applause. He took his place on a little makeshift stage, his golden hair glinting under the stadium lights. In his slim gray pants and white button-down shirt, he looked tall, powerful, and charismatic, like some 1940s movie heartthrob.

There was something different about him, though.

I raised my camera and took a few shots.

Just before he started speaking, he caught sight of me and gave me a quick smile.

That’s when I realized what was different.

In the stands, he’d been wearing a long-sleeved black sweater over his shirt. Now he’d taken it off.

And rolled his sleeves up, almost to his elbows.

Since the day we’d met, he’d never let anyone but his parents and me see the scars on his bare wrists. Now they were exposed for the whole school to see.

My eyes wandered up to meet his, to see his face, his confident master-of-the-universe grin.

For a split second, I was paralyzed.

I couldn’t see any trace of Carter behind that smile.

Just emptiness. A reaction where there had once been action.

Oh my God.

This can’t be happening.

I totally stole my boyfriend’s soul.

“People say,” he began, his voice strong, “that high school is the best four years of your life. And tonight is”—his voice was all clanging metallic sounds; did anyone else hear it?—“the culmination of that for me.”