Chapter 2
Regan’s fingers dig through the letterman jacket into Toni’s biceps as they walk through the hall to find their lockers. They stop in front of Toni’s for some good old fashioned PDA before the first bell rings.
A gaggle of football bros walk by and the quarterback, Andrew, shoulder checks Toni hard enough to make her stumble into her locker. She turns around to confront him but Regan grabs her sleeve to hold her back.
“Happy first day of school, dykes,” Andrew says as he high fives his friends.
Toni lets it go like she knew Regan would want. Sometimes Regan can get controlling about that stuff but she was mostly low maintenance so Toni gave in. Everybody knows Andrew and knows how he acts like he’s hot shit. The worst is that half the school thinks he’s hot shit too.
Toni gives him the finger without looking away from Regan, a little smug knowing that she has slept with dozens more women than he has. Plus she actually made them orgasm.
A familiar voice from beside her pulls Toni out of those memories. “I see our resident horndog has seen the new girl.”
“Apparently she’s fuckable,” Regan says.
“I agree,” says Fatin.
Toni chips in. “You saw her?”
“Yeah she isn’t bad.”
“How would you rank her?”
Fatin thinks for a second then goes with, “Eight.”
“So not quite to Toni’s caliber then.” Regan says with a possessive arm around Toni’s waist.
Fatin winks at her. “Toni wouldn’t look twice.”
It isn’t until lunch that Toni thinks of the new girl again. Regan, who has decided to join them for lunch this year instead of sitting with the band nerds, feels up Toni’s abs before stealing a fry from her plate.
“Check this out,” Toni says, scrunching up her straw wrapper.
She puts the wrapper down on the table with a flourish, and picks up her glass of water.
“You ready for this?” Toni asks, raising an eyebrow at Regan. She nods, laughing already. She likes the stupid shit that Toni does, which is one of the reasons that Regan likes her so much. The only other person who finds her amusing is Martha. And Fatin in bed.
Toni drips some water onto the straw and it starts to wiggle and move around. “Voila.”
“Wow, Toni, you’ve got game,” Rachel says.
Just then, Martha approaches the table with a blonde girl in tow. This must be the new girl everyone’s talking about. Toni doesn’t get the fuss. Sure she’s pretty enough, clothed in the cheerleading uniform with a short short skirt and halter top, pompoms to the side. Okay, maybe she’s hot.
“Oh my goodness, are you doing the straw wrapper worm trick?” the girl who needs no introduction asks before anyone can introduce themselves. She puts down her tray across from Toni. “Have you done the rose one?”
Shel-whatever carefully removes her straw wrapper and starts folding it. Unlike how Toni just scrunched up her wrapper, the blonde chick makes careful folds in the wrapper until she’s made a literal fucking rose out of it. Toni doesn’t like to be outdone.
The new girl holds it out for Toni and, in an effort to be polite, Toni accepts it. She sets it down beside her own wrapper creation and drops some water on it. New girl looks crestfallen when it just gets wet.
“What’s it supposed to do?”
“Oh, nothing,” the new girl says. “It’s not a trick or anything, just a rose. I like making them at restaurants.”
“Nice, Toni,” Fatin says. Then she smiles at the new girl. “I’m Fatin.”
“Shelby Goodkind,” she responds cheerily. She goes around the table and everyone introduces themselves to her. Toni feels a little embarrassed about misinterpreting the straw thing. It makes her feel stupid and that makes her hate this perfect girl in front of her who can make roses out of straw wrappers. It isn’t logical, but Toni wants her to go sit with someone else.
“I’m Toni,” she grumbles after everyone else has introduced themselves.
“Nice to meet y’all,” Shelby beams.
The only thing more annoying than her sunny disposition is the way that Martha looks at her, like they’re actually friends after touring her around this morning. Toni reminds herself that it’s only been a few hours since they met. It’s not like Toni’s being replaced. She still wants to do a Gillooly to little miss Kerrigan Lite sitting in front of her.
“Look what Shelby gave me,” Martha says, pulling up her sleeve to show everyone a bracelet around her wrist.
“Wow, jewelry already,” Fatin says with a smirk. “I would have waited until at least the third date, Texas. You don’t want to seem too desperate.”
Shelby’s smile drops for a moment. Nobody else seems to notice, but Toni does. It was unmistakably disgust. Maybe even fear. That, on top of the two (two!) cross necklaces around her neck make Toni wonder if new girl is a tad homophobic.
“It’s a friendship bracelet,” Shelby says, her smile back on. “I made a couple in my church group yesterday.”
“Oh, church group,” Toni says, not bothering to hold back a smug smile. “Make any new friends?”
Everyone except for Shelby knows what Toni’s hinting at. There’s a small but loud group of kids in their grade that attend the local Baptist Church and their church group every Sunday. They call them the God Squad and their leader is none other than Andrew himself, who just so happens to be trying to read an upside down book across the room right now.
Hopewell Lake is a somewhat liberal place but, like many rural areas, it has its conservative faction. The God Squad might be small, but they’re powerful. If she’s being honest, Toni’s actually a bit scared of them. They patrol at night sometimes. Principal Klein would never take proper disciplinary action against the football team’s star rear fielder. Toni used to fight back, but Regan begged her to stop and she’s been really trying to let it go. Shelby seems unaware of this. Or maybe she just doesn’t care.
“Everyone at the church group’s super nice.”
Leah scoffs. “Yeah, to you.”
“What do you mean?” Shelby asks. There’s something resembling concern in her voice, but Toni knows it has to be insincere. “Are they not nice to you?”
Leah shakes her head. “They’re not big on anyone who isn’t straight and white.”
“Like a lot of us,” Fatin says. Shelby suddenly looks nervous, and Toni can only read it as blatant homophobia.
“Is that a problem?” Toni asks.
“No, no,” Shelby says quickly. “I’m just not used to places like this. Where people are so open.”
Her gaze darts up to a pride flag that hangs in the cafeteria.
“Well get used to it,” Toni says. She takes no small delight in making Shelby squirm. “You’re not in Kansas anymore.”
“Texas,” Shelby corrects.
“Whatever.”
Shelby seems considerably spooked by that conversation and excuses herself soon after, but not before sanctimoniously describing the eighteen Habitat for Humanity projects she participated in during trips to rural Texas, and her tenth grade winnings from beauty pageants fully funding the repairs on a Proton Therapy Machine at a local children’s hospital. Toni rolls her eyes.
“At least she won’t want to hang out with us anymore because we’re gay,” Toni whispers to Regan after she leaves.
As it turns out, it does not mean that. Over the following weeks, Shelby continues to sit with Toni and her friends at lunch. She’s also in Toni’s psychology class, which Toni finds annoying. Shelby sits in front of Toni and always has her hand up answering questions. Every time Shelby shoots her hand into the air, her perfectly coiffed ponytail swings violently, but falls back in place as if every hair on her head is just as perfect as she is. It pisses Toni off. It’s like it thinks it’s better than Toni or something. She kind of wants to grab it and pull, but she resists that urge because she knows Regan would want her to.
“You have got to take that off. It’s ridiculous to wear friendship bracelets, are we in the first grade?” Toni says to Martha, pointing at that stupid friendship bracelet when they sit down in Psychology class two weeks into classes.
Mr. Young assigned Toni and Martha to sit beside each other. Toni’s thrilled about it, even though she knows that he just did it so that Toni would behave. She has a bit of a reputation for being unruly, but this is actually a class she’s interested in. It would hurt that he’d just assume she’d misbehave if she didn’t know why he makes that assumption.
“I like it,” Martha says. “Shelby’s really nice, Toni, you should give her a chance.”
“Yeah, I’ll give her a chance as soon as she starts believing that gays shouldn’t get the death penalty,” Toni says. In the past couple of weeks, Shelby has been hanging out with Andrew and his friends after school. She’s definitely a part of the God Squad now, though her tendency to sit with Toni and her friends at lunch is completely unexplainable.
Martha sighs. “She told me that she comes from a really religious family. She doesn’t seem hateful, maybe she’ll be a good influence on the rest of the church kids.”
Toni brings her hand down hard on the table between them. “You’re so naive sometimes, Marty. She’s just pretending to be nice to you, she probably thinks of you as some kind of charity case. Just wait, pretty soon she’ll ask you to join her church. Don’t you see the way that she looks at Regan and I in the hall? She hates that I’m gay.”
“We went to the mall last night and she said she wishes you liked her better.”
Toni feels rage build in her chest. She didn’t know that Martha and Shelby were hanging out with each other outside of school. Or that they’ve been talking about Toni behind her back.
Just then, Shelby walks into the classroom and takes her seat beside Andrew in the row in front of Toni and Martha.
“Morning, Martha,” Shelby says, turning around so she’s facing them.
Toni feels jealousy twist in her lower abdomen when Martha greets her with way more enthusiasm than she greeted Toni with this morning. Martha will probably spend all of her time talking to Shelby and forget all about Toni. Then Toni really will have to act like she’s a goose and Shelby’s Fabio on a roller coaster in 1999.
As if reading her mind Shelby turns to her with an annoying smile across her face. “And hello again Toni. I really like your letterman jacket. Do you play a sport?”
Toni has worn her letterman jacket every day since school started, hoping that Regan might comment on how fit she looks in it like she did last year. She hasn’t, but Toni’s still hopeful. At least someone recognizes that she looks cool in it even if it’s coming from a pious bitch.
“Basketball,” Toni says.
“You any good?”
“Used to be,” Toni replies with a cocky smirk. “I was a beast on the court.”
“You don’t play anymore?”
“I got cut from the team last year for unsportsmanlike conduct. This bitch from another team kept fouling me, so I pissed in my hand and I threw it at her.”
It’s a moment that Toni’s particularly proud of and she likes seeing the expression on Shelby’s face shift to something that Toni can’t make sense of. It isn’t disgust like she was expecting. Shelby quickly puts on a fake smile again.
“Well I’m sure she deserved it,” Shelby says.
That wasn’t what Toni was expecting at all. She wanted Shelby to react with anger or stop talking to her, but there’s a twinkle in her eye. It almost feels like respect, only that can’t be right.
“Toni makes it sound worse than it was,” Martha says. “She attended some anger management classes over the summer and she’s allowed to try out again this year.”
Toni glares at her second best friend and punches her in the arm. It’s true, but that’s really not Martha’s story to tell. Especially not to a God Squad princess.
“I’m glad to hear that and I look forward to watching your games,” Shelby says before turning around to take out her notebook and pen from her bag. Toni reminds herself that none of that fake niceness is real. Shelby probably just sees Toni as some gay girl with anger issues. She’ll be spreading the gospel of Christ in these halls in no time. From then on, Toni resolves to avoid Shelby as much as she can for the rest of their time in high school. She does so successfully for a while.
To Toni’s irritation, Martha and Shelby only get closer as the weeks go by. Shelby gets closer with the others as well. Even Regan likes her despite Toni pointing out all of the freaked out looks on Shelby’s face when they make out in the halls or in the back of class rooms.
“She hasn’t been anything but nice to us,” Regan reminds her one day when Toni goes on a rant after Shelby started dry heaving when she saw Toni and Regan holding hands. “She’s probably just not used to it. I wish you would let things go.”
Toni finds herself canceling on sleepovers and hangouts whenever she finds out that Shelby’s going, which means that she’s been alone a lot more than usual.
Toni’s able to successfully avoid Shelby for a couple of weeks until Shelby chases her down after psych one day, pulling gently at her sleeve. Toni wrenches her arm away from her and throws a glare back over her shoulder, not stopping.
“Hey, Toni,” Shelby says, following her.
“What do you want, Shelby?” Toni spits out. She keeps walking, forcing Shelby to pick up her pace to keep up.
“I’ve just noticed that you haven’t been coming at sleepovers or anything with us outside school lately and I wanted to check if you’re okay.”
Toni rolls her eyes and stops walking. “Don’t act like you care.”
“I do. I do care.”
Toni turns on her by making herself bigger like Shelby’s a bear who’s stumbled upon the delicious picnic spread that is Toni. I’ll tell you my problem. I don’t know what you’re playing at, but Martha’s been through some shit, princess, and she doesn’t need someone using her and dropping her.”
Shelby furrows her brow. “I’m not using Martha. What would I be using her for ? She’s my friend.”
“Whatever,” Toni snarks before walking away.
“Wait, Toni,” Shelby says, running after her so they’re in step again. “What have I done to make you not like me?”
“I see you for what you really are, Shelby.”
Shelby abruptly stops walking. Toni considers continuing on her own path, but she’s curious about Shelby’s response so she stops and lets Shelby pull her into a classroom by the front of her shirt.
“What do you mean?” Shelby asks quietly.
“It’s pretty obvious that you’re a fucking liar and you’ve got a lot of people here thinking you’re all rainbows and unicorns and shit, but I see you. You tell Marty that you’re okay with me, but every time you look at me it’s like pure hatred. If you’re going to hate, at least own it.”
“I don’t hate you,” Shelby says.
“Whatever,” Toni says. “Let’s just agree to keep our distance from each other.”
“Okay,” Shelby says. “But can you at least start coming to things? I can not go if you don’t want me there, but Martha misses you. She mentions it all the time.”
That tugs at Toni’s heart a big, so she nods. “Fine.”
She’ll start going to things. For Martha. It brings her to a house party in Andrew’s house, the head of the God Squad and star rear ender himself. The sacrifices Toni makes for Martha. She has to get drunk to start enjoying herself and to her surprise she actually does.
Regan has band practice tonight so Toni dances with Fatin with no touching. The heat in her eyes as her body moves a few inches from her own, it all reminds her of how easy it used to be when she was fucking Fatin casually. Before Shelby arrived.
Her good times are brought to an abrupt end when blonde hair moves into view. Shelby’s stumbling, leaning against a doorway for support as she drinks from a solo cup. She looks around wildly and for the first time Toni sees how lost she is. Alone. Maybe it’s the alcohol talking but Toni feels almost… bad. She shakes her head and wills herself to snap out of it.
Shelby seems to right herself, composing herself as she continues to scan the room. She makes eye contact with Toni, notices how she has been staring, and her face shifts again. From fear to anger to confusion to rage and then to something else entirely.
Before she knows it Shelby is across the room and has her hand wrapped around her wrist. It reminds Toni of the last time she confronted her and she can smell a strong whiff of cheap vodka and Mariah Carey lollipop bling honey perfume as she’s pulled stumbling to the bathroom. Once inside, Shelby locks the door and pushes Toni up against it.