A Brand New Goth Girl

[20]

The wedding was beautiful, and the frantic experience of shopping as a girl for the first time and everything else with the group just completely blew my mind away. No time really existed to process all that we had been through; it was just experiences flowing from one into the other. I made a quiet promise to Anthony that I would be around as much as possible to levy whatever presences had attached themselves to me for Parsley’s health and happiness. I doubted that they or I could do anything more than we had already done, but it was a sentiment I wanted in the air.

No one back at the dorm had any clue that when I returned them, it wasn’t due to a protracted lunch, a busy class, or an extended study session. My return felt like an attempt to settle back into a life eons apart from who I was now. But my friends mattered more than a crazy man in black who thought he could control everything, access rooms to the universe, and supernatural unknowns beyond my comprehension.

It didn’t take Rosalie long to ask how my class went and whether they liked my art. I laid out all the messy details, and her eyes widened. This actually reminded her of a freshman class she had where the professor made the worst assumptions about Derrick and his abilities as a student. Nothing he did got better than a B grade, despite all the extra effort he put in. She assured me that things got better after that, and she went to the right advisors for help.

Dipping her head as she fluttered her pink skirt and simple but pretty matching blouse, she quietly admitted that today actually turned around for her.

“When you were out, I actually spent a little time off campus, sort of soul-searching and looking for people I knew. At this one store, these guys talked to me for a while. And it’s totally weird, and I shouldn’t really read into it… But they looked at me the way I so often want boys to look at me. My head got all fuzzy, and I got asked out on a date. And I got a kiss… from a boy. I probably totally presented myself as crazy and wildly eager. But I was sooo happy. This whole situation is a mess, and it sucks that I can’t just be myself and express my heart. Still, there are pleasant qualities… If things have to be stuck this way.”

I didn’t expect such a shift in her perspective to occur. The preciously cute smiles that snuck onto her face warmed my heart. Without going into the contextual details, I regaled her with the other aspects of my morning. Her imagination worked overtime with what fragmentary details of clothes I could provide. Pulling up their website on my silly unicorn phone helped.

Rosalie also officially admitted that she really wanted to paint her nails a fun color. She had done it more than once before as a guy, but hid it with gloves. The prospect of really showing them off excited her. A glittering, soft container of light lavender polish from my dresser sufficed. She led the way with the procedure of nail care, grabbing a couple essentials from her dorm. Apparently, some level of communication existed between her and her roommates, but she wasn’t quite brave enough to confront them as the girl she was now.

I could’ve easily overlooked promises made last night about my art, but I brought it up. Did she want me to burn the drawing? Thinking about how we might accomplish that, I knew first off from Mitchell’s S’more experiments that there was a very low threshold for the fire alarm.

Outside, toward the pools that the fancier dormitories enjoyed, we at least retained the consolation prize of a barbecue area, which only got any use when the residence assistants forced it. Some matches would do the job. Rosalie drew her legs up as she held out her nails to dry. Despite hesitating, she agreed to go ahead with the effigy once it was assured that I had no problem with this and there were backups saved for an academic portfolio. Much more consideration than she’d given it last night.

The thought stayed with me that, perhaps my mind-altered action with the hopes of restoring the Rosalie who had never been, brought about this shift and reconciliation of her feelings. At the same time, I freed the souls from the flashlights, and they seemed to have stuck around me.

They provided so much for poor Parsley, and I had to wonder if they were acting on others around me. Just a feeling. But that feeling suggested to me that I might still manage to heal the wounds raked across this University, without the active responsibility of having to burn souls to make others happy. Whether the souls were subconsciously telling me that or if it was just a stray hope inside my head, I had no way to tell. Hanging around Rosalie had made her happier though, whether that was just me or something else.

We settled on patio chairs outside as I set my artwork on the grill and struck a match to it. Whether some precise words, an invocation, or other specific ritual needed to occur was beyond me. While I looked like this, I had been gifted no magical thinking. The paper caught slowly and crackled with methodical flame and twisting ashes. Rosalie fluttered with doubt, nervously peeking at what remained of my creation. The last thing to be consumed was her sleeping smile.

“Can…ummm… would it be OK if maybe I like commissioned you to do one that I actually posed for…?”

Readily, thoroughly, and happily, that was fine with me. Rosalie burst with ideas and feelings about intentional art made with and for her. I had to frantically jot down some notes, so I didn’t lose them. Maybe I just imagined it, but I got the faintest hint that one of the little jellyfish-like fragments of spirit around me slipped over to linger with Rosalie.

When I had some free time, I did quick, rough proposal sketches and scanned and shared them over text messaging. And I also felt the unstoppable desire to get naked for the Internet. Our fans needed something to quench their thirst.

They had comments yesterday with reserved reactions, but I spread out artistically and embraced my body with the unblinking, prying dark eye of my phone. And the assistance of editing software. I showcased things about myself that not even my practice tampon got to know. It definitely crossed the line into nerve-racking to post, but I shut up the nervous part of my brain by resolving that it was incredibly sexy. And the results proved me right.

All the statements about the visceral effect I left on my fans existed in the abstract. But getting those same reactions and more from something I decided to do was a crazy, complicated rush of feelings that I didn’t know what to do with. I got them so horny. Probably would’ve been better not to go over every single reaction, along with the private stuff, but it was also weirdly addictive. Ticklish and fun in a way that was hard to pin down. Like a surreal roller coaster that I took for a ride.

The ancillary effects included a shot of inspiration for my art and other activities before I finally had to go over the approaching requirements for the rest of the week.

Drake eventually showed up, with Kasey both drawing closer and pushing away. Her boyfriend had remarkably blue eyes. Not quite as sharp and mysterious as the ones Wade beguiled others with, but still striking. Her long, brown hair looked practically weightless on her shoulders, and she still had on her work uniform, including a pale blue top and an absurdly long, navy skirt that largely obscured her legs. So puritanical that anyone around this Christian campus, even before, would’ve found it excessive. She found it slightly sweaty, but strikingly comfortable.

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Kasey didn’t have enough air to breathe. She wasn’t mad; she assured us both as much. Well, she was angry at a whole lot of aspects of the situation, as she elaborated. But not at Drake. She found comfort in listing all of her boyfriend’s virtues. Most of them involved his muscles, his broad chest, winsome smile, flexible voice, and even more flexible tongue. On this last point, Drake asserted that her tongue had lost none of its skill. To this, Kasey fanned her hands and cupped her forehead. I could understand her panic at finding the world turned upside down and an unfamiliar-looking girl in place of the person she relied on and trusted the most.

But Drake assured her, and I backed her up that, no matter how much people connected to the campus had changed physically, we still felt and were the same. Granted, there were some exceptions, but I avoided them. This felt like a moment where the soul spirit things lingering in my presence were supposed to go off and fix this problem. Maybe Kasey admits that while she may not have physical feelings for Drake anymore, she still had emotional resonance and a heartfelt connection. And they can work on that to be close in a way that feels right again. Get on it, guys!

But nothing happened. Uncomfortable silence and unanswerable questions followed. Tears slipped between the cold cracks. They talked but also burned through as much time avoiding talking to one another. The most significant victory was when they spent some time in her room sitting together, but without the curious implications that Zach recently passed along from her roommates. Some things, it seemed, just couldn’t be easily fixed. Made sense but left me wishing I could do more. I could’ve… I could’ve continued the entrapment of the living things that found shelter in my presence. Maybe… No… It was pointless to bother with possibilities that could never happen. I made my choice, and that was still a weight I had to live with.

At least the situation with Norah and Lily remained amicable. Anything further than that was nosy speculation on my part. That’s what I told myself. The biggest relief of the day was when I found myself simply hanging out with Norah. Not “on” or responding to the visceral chaos of reality. Just some random shit with me laying out the adventure of my art course rebellion and leading into my recent online posting, which earned me a playful, “Oh, you slut!”

None of this felt the least bit familiar to my senses, but it was starting to work its way in. Norah played coy about her and Lily and I played along. She was teaching her to knit. Taste-testing lollipops. Scrutinized who had the tallest puffed collar. Collected rocks and tested minerals. And all this was capped by a lengthy, fiery sermon erupting from her on how badly WB was fucking up their most recent iterations of Poison Ivy.

All that was fun. What was less fun was when I happened to run across Beverly Marsh.

Of course, it was nothing like the encounter would’ve been mere hours ago. I ran into her while she was doing some laundry next to the restrooms. Just our little group was aware of her choices and crimes. Some shades of her interests slipped out in her words, vague impressions of feeling quite comfortable on campus. I didn’t want the spirits to restore the person she used to be. They apparently listened to me, or they couldn’t have done anything anyway.

The fury of my hidden words and feelings roiled my thoughts with untempered and pointless bitterness. Yelling at her about the actions of someone she now fundamentally was not would’ve just been senselessly cruel. Somehow, I actually found it in myself to approach her, with the stated context of wanting to express encouragement for a confusing week, and shared a quick hug. She didn’t deserve it, but she received it all the same. Ultimately, the hug was for me. For letting go. But it wasn’t the last thing I had to let go of.

Which was an odd way to put it. I didn’t have to do a damn thing. I could let things linger for as long as I wanted. But it kind of felt like the company I had acquired in orbit of me wanted me to do something about it. Maybe in my head, but I kind of wanted catharsis too. I wanted to stop replaying my failure with Persephone.

The steppingstone to that one was being cordial to Wade without dwelling on our separation. I even stopped giving a fuck about Brian when I picked up through the informal grapevine that she not only fashioned herself as big of a bitch as before, with the criticism shield of her new body, but also an immense whore. Her life and her consequences. I had my own to live.

The biggest discovery was bringing the newly married couple into our increasingly regular cycle of board games and tabletop, which I also had a club about. That one, I didn’t feel too worried about once the schedule and events started to reassert some semblance of normalcy. The others were a different matter.

Swimming didn’t intimidate me too much. I knew how to swim; my older sisters made sure of that. Photography was taken care of by my… labiastic experimentation. Theater could be winged. But I still only nervously stared at Beatrice‘s clarinet and dared not resurrect painful lessons from my mother.

Weaving my way into this life without magical accompaniment was difficult, but I had to put in the work. I still checked my messages regularly, with the tension and hope that Anthony would either follow up with good news about her daughter and that she had stabilized… Or ask me to come along one last time. If I could give her my flock of warm light, then I gladly would’ve. But they went where they wanted, and she had already done so much for the poor kid.

This lull gave me time to get back in contact with the LGBTQ church group. How could I help Phoebe recover something of Persephone though? Meeting up with her again, she seemed so cordial and cheerful and happy. People liked to be around her, and she felt that in turn. But the judgment of whether I could give her life to a better person wasn’t mine to make.

It sucked to hang around and purposefully erode what I had accidentally created. She harshly receded into the bitter, contemptible bitch when I found her. The souls did their duty. They set it right, even though right felt so wrong. I lost sleep over it, and I didn’t want to deal with or think about the little spirits or whatever still hung around me. I grumbled about when they’d finally abandon me. Just go ahead and leave me alone already… But they stayed.

When was I gonna get a decent epiphany? When would it all come together? I had the shattered fragments of truth, and just holding them into some shape felt like needles raking under my nails. Bastard in black with his backstage corridors trying to run our lives. And people with their… Everything… weren’t much better. Disappointment, uncertainty, irrational sadness, and just the stray glimmers of hopefulness. Maybe I’d feel better if I got laid… whatever.

I felt more like Anthony with each day I descended deeper into our reality. But even she found something well worth fighting for. I couldn’t help myself from sinking into my own bullshit.

Everything changes, yet I remain the same. God… I did so much to help others, but I couldn’t figure out myself.

On a quiet day, one of the quietest after all this, I got a message. One I was long fearing.

But it wasn’t from Anthony and Parsley… It was from mom and dad.