The phone rings.
“Hello?” Janie says.
“I miss you like hell,” he says, laughing.
“Where are you?”
“At U of M. I had a thing to go to.”
“Fuck.”
“I know.”
There is silence.
“When will you be home?”
“Late,” he says. “I’m sorry, sweets.”
“Okay,” she says with a sigh. “See you tomorrow, maybe.”
“Yeah. Okay,” he says softly.
BIRTHDAY, UNDERCOVER
January 9, 2006, 7:05 a.m.
Janie wakes up on her birthday feeling terribly sorry for herself.
She should know better.
This happens every year.
It seems worse this year, somehow.
She greets her mother in the kitchen. Her mother gives her a half-grunt, fixes her morning drink, and disappears into her bedroom. Just like any ordinary day.
Janie fixes frozen waffles for breakfast. Sticks a god-damn candle in them. Lights it. Blows it out.
Happy birthday to me, she thinks.
Back when her grandma was alive, she at least got a present.
She gets to school late. Bashful gives her a tardy, and won’t reconsider.
Janie always hated Bashful.
Stupidest. Dwarf. Ever.
Psychology is interesting.
Not.
Mr. Wang is the most incompetent psych teacher in the history of the subject. So far, Janie knows more than he does. She’s pretty sure he’s just teaching until he makes his big break in showbiz. Apparently he likes to dance. Carrie told Janie that Melinda saw him in Lansing at a club, and he was tearing it up.
Funny, that. Because he seems very, very shy. Janie makes a note, and then spills her red POWERade over her notebook. It spatters on her shoe and soaks in.
And then, in chemistry, her beaker explodes.
Sends a shard of glass, like a throwing star, into her gut.
Rips her shirt.
She excuses herself from class to stop the bleeding. The school nurse tells her to be more careful. Janie rolls her eyes.
Back in class, Mr. Durbin asks if she’ll stop by the room after school to discuss what went wrong.
Lunch is barfaritos.
Dopey, Dippy, and Dumbass are all on their toes today. Somebody falls asleep in each of those classes, even PE, because they’re doing classroom studies on health today. Janie finally resorts to throwing paper clips at their heads to wake them up.
By the time she gets to study hall, she feels like crying. Carrie doesn’t remember her birthday, as usual. And then, Janie realizes with that keen, womanly sense of dread that she has her period.
She gets a hall pass and spends most of the hour in the bathroom, just getting away from everybody. She doesn’t have a tampon or a quarter to get one from the machine. So back to the school nurse for the second time that day.
The nurse is not very sympathetic.
Finally, with five minutes left of school, she heads back to the library.
Cabel gives her a questioning look. She shakes her head to say everything’s cool.
He glances around. Slides into the seat across from her. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, just having a shitty day.”
“Can I see you tonight?”
“I guess.”
“When can you come?”
She thinks. “I dunno. I’ve got some shit to take care of. Like five, maybe?”
“Feel like working out?”
Janie smiles. “Yeah.”