Brandy Colbert: Pointe

McMillan’s voice softens. Just a bit, but enough to make a difference. “Ms. Cartwright, did you have sexual intercourse with Mr. Fenner?”

Every corner of the room is silent. So silent I hear Judge Richey’s quiet, even breaths to the right of me. Even the stenographer is still, his fingers poised over the keys as he waits for me to speak.

“Yes, sir. I wanted him to be my boyfriend. I loved him.” I pause. “I’d never had a boyfriend before. I was only thirteen.”

THE DAY I MET CHRIS SEEMED MEANT TO BE.

It was the winter of our seventh-grade year and school had been shitty that day. No, shitty didn’t begin to describe it. I’d gotten a C-minus on my math quiz—which I’d skipped lunch to study for, so I was starving. I was late to my class after lunch because I’d gotten so wrapped up in studying, I didn’t hear the bell in the library and was loudly informed by Ms. Batson that this was my “final warning.”

Earlier, I’d been in a bathroom stall where I overheard Trisha Dove debating whether or not to invite me to her birthday sleepover. She and Livvy Franklin were standing in front of the sinks, basically listing my pros and cons as they refreshed their lip gloss. As nonchalant as if they were discussing the weather; they didn’t even check under the stall doors. The consensus was that I was nice and had never done anything to piss them off, but I didn’t have a lot of girls for friends and I was a little too obsessed with “that dance thing.” God. I had known both of them since kindergarten. It’s not like I was a new girl they had to feel out. Just because I spent most of my free time at the dance studio or with Donovan and Phil didn’t mean I was a weirdo.

By the time I met Donovan at the bus lines after school, I was fuming inside my parka. I wanted to get home because I had the night off from dance and it meant I could spend the evening curled up on the couch in front of the TV. My parents would make a fire and we’d watch mindless sitcoms and the intense hospital dramas they loved and I’d forget about every shitty part of my shitty day.

But Donovan wanted to stop by Big Red’s on the way home to check out the new X-Men. I wasn’t in the mood. I was still new to pointe work and the lesson the night before had been brutal. I was half limping because of my sore feet and I didn’t feel like standing around watching him look at comics while one of the grumpy cashiers watched both of us.

Donovan was insistent. He promised to buy me anything I wanted if I’d come with him. I knew that wasn’t saying much—after all, the most expensive items at Big Red’s Gas n’More were things we’d never buy anyway, like jumper cables and bottles of liquor. And it’s not like his allowance was so extravagant. But it was still a nice offer. And I was hungry from skipping lunch, wouldn’t mind spoiling my appetite for dinner with a candy bar or chips and a soda. So I went.

The glass door of Big Red’s had barely suctioned shut behind us before Donovan nudged me. His eyes were trained on the front counter, but I’d already noticed. In place of the middle-aged woman with the bad skin, or her husband—Larry, the owner, who was just as inexplicably cranky—was a new guy. He was older, but not by a lot. Maybe college-age at the most.

His head was bent over a cell phone, his thumbs moving rapidly over the keys, but he looked up as the bell on the door jangled above us, as we stomped the lingering bits of snow and ice from our boots. He looked up and he smiled. Said, “Hey, guys” so warmly, like he’d known us forever. Like we were friends.

Donovan and I were speechless, almost frozen in place. No one had ever greeted us like that here, if they greeted us at all. Larry and his employees had no problem reminding us that we were just dumb kids who were lucky enough to have money to burn or else they’d kick us out in an instant. They were always more concerned with their magazines or the person on the other end of the phone. We were an inconvenience, another reason they had to pay attention.

But something about this guy seemed different. He was cute, for one thing, with a grin that made me look away and then back at him, a grin that made me feel grown-up and nervous at the same time. He ran a hand through his thick, dark hair as he looked at us, as he asked, “Anything I can help you with?”

My God. He was treating us like adults. Or at least actual teenagers, which I appreciated, since I knew I still looked like more of a child than a girl on the verge of womanhood. Or whatever that video said in health class last year.

“Uh, no, thanks,” I said, stepping out of his line of vision. Sort of hiding between the racks of candy and gum because he was the cutest guy I’d ever seen in person.

It was stupid to be so nervous. He was probably just a high schooler who was being nice to us as some kind of joke.

Donovan didn’t say anything. He walked around the corner to the comic books almost cautiously, as if we were being set up. I made my way down the candy aisle, then slowly down the next one, inspecting noodles and ice cream and tuna in a can. I was pretending to look for the item Donovan had promised to buy but I couldn’t concentrate; every part of me was consumed with the new guy behind the counter.

Guys had never really paid attention to me. I got looks sometimes and no one seemed like they wanted to puke when I was partnered up with them in class, but no one ever asked me out, either. I was always the friend. Known for ballet and being sidekick to Donovan and Phil. I’d never been kissed, not even in a game of spin the bottle or a sneak attack during elementary school recess.

I moved to the back and stood in front of the refrigerated wall of drinks for a while, perusing my options as the coolers hummed steadily on the other side of the doors. Nothing. I moved on to the freezer with the pints of ice cream and frozen treats lined up in neat stacks. I don’t know why ice cream sounded good when it was forty degrees outside, but it did. So I was standing there, so intent on choosing between an ice cream sandwich and a wrapped ice cream cone that I didn’t hear him come up behind me.

“Finding everything okay?”

I jumped. Then I looked up at the open glass door in front of me, my fingers clutching the handle. “I’m sorry.” I slammed it shut so quickly, the whole case shook.

It was Larry and his wife’s pet peeve. If you had the door open longer than two seconds, they would scream out from the front counter that you’d better close it unless you wanted to pay the store’s electric bill that month.

But this guy just flashed his grin and said to let him know if I needed any help. Then he moved down the aisle, whistling a clear, cheerful tune that stuck in my head for the rest of the week.

At the register, he made a big show of ringing me up before Donovan, made a sweeping gesture with his arm as he said, “Ladies first.” Which was kind of silly since Donovan was paying for my ice cream, but I let him do it anyway. And that’s when, up close and able to stare at him while he was preoccupied, I noticed just how gorgeous his eyes were. A magnificent shade of amber, so clear and beautiful that it looked like his pupils had been trapped there by mistake. I could get lost in them. I already was.

“You guys go to the high school?” he asked as he swiped the bar code of my ice cream sandwich package across the scanner to his left.

“ Us? ” Donovan practically snorted in his face, because he looked just as young as I did. His voice was only starting to change and he was still skinny and small back then. “No way. We’re only in seventh grade.”

I shot him a look. I didn’t want this guy thinking we were babies, because then he’d start treating us like babies.