The Go-for-Gold Gymnasts Read online

  “It’s not like the mall is going out of business,” I said.

  “Honey, it’s the weekend before school starts. Believe me, everyone else has the same idea we do.”

  As much as I hated to admit it, my mother was right. The department stores were so crowded there were lines for most of the fitting rooms. We were waiting for me to try on some jeans when my mother spotted the lingerie section.

  “You don’t own a real bra, do you?” she asked, just like that, in the middle of the store. The word bra fell off her lips like she was mentioning snow peas or something.

  “Mom!” I glanced around. I hadn’t seen anyone I recognized yet in this mass of people, but I was nervous. They might have been out there, watching this whole exchange and laughing at me, and I wouldn’t even have known it. Suddenly, I felt self-conscious, with my petite jeans draped over one arm and a couple of tops in the other. The top that looked like a long-sleeved shirt over a lace-trimmed camisole had looked really cool, but now I wasn’t so sure. Purple might’ve been a babyish color for someone in high school.

  “I know you have sports bras,” she continued, as though she wasn’t single-handedly almost causing her daughter’s face to implode, “but you’re almost fourteen; it’s about time you got a real bra, don’t you think?”

  “I’m fine,” I said, hoping she’d drop it.

  But she was already heading toward the lingerie section, pulling me along with her, even though it meant we lost our place in line. She started rifling through a rack of flimsy white bras, fingering the lace on one of them as though she were inspecting a fine tapestry.

  “You’re not supposed to touch them,” I said.

  She laughed. “Of course you can touch them,” she said. “They’re just clothes, Jessie.” She held up one that had two silky triangles over the chest and a little bow in the middle. Some of the other bras had cups that stuck way out, as though they were just waiting to be filled, but this bra was tiny. Obviously, I knew I didn’t have much to fill it with.

  I flushed. “I don’t need one,” I said.

  “This is pretty!” she said, looking at the bra as though trying to figure out what my problem was with it. “Do you want to get one in a color? You just have to be careful to wear it with an undershirt, or it could show through.”

  “I already have what I need,” I said. I didn’t want to use the phrase sports bra, even though I’d used it a million times when I was asking my mother if she’d done my laundry or asking Christina if she’d gotten some new workout clothes for Christmas. But surrounded by all of these lacy things, some with polka dots or black or totally see-through, it didn’t seem right to use that term.

  “Nonsense,” my mom said. “It’s your first day of high school. You deserve something that’s going to make you feel pretty. What about pink?”

  A girl brushed past me, and I instinctively moved in toward the racks to make room. When I glanced up, I saw the girl flicking her long, straight, blond hair over her shoulder, in a gesture I’d seen just the other day. There, standing among the lingerie, was Watch-It Girl, leisurely sliding bras from one side of the rack to the other, stopping occasionally to look at one. I noticed that she wasn’t interested in the plain white ones, or the ones with the cute little bows. She had set aside one that was bright turquoise with little white hearts all over it, and another that was black and shiny.

  I quickly grabbed my mom’s arm. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll take it.”

  “Which one?”

  “Either. Both. I like them both. Can we just go now?”

  “Well, you have to try everything on.” She tried to hand me the two bras, and when I didn’t take them, she draped them over the jeans. I glanced at Watch-It Girl, but she seemed totally into her shopping and wasn’t paying any attention to me. I hoped it would stay that way.

  “Fine,” I said. “Let’s get this over with.”

  We stood in line for ten minutes; I spent a lot of that time pretending to admire the stitching on a jacket that was hanging on the wall. If I kept my head turned away, and my hair hanging over my face, then maybe Watch-It Girl wouldn’t even notice me.

  Finally, I made it into the dressing room. I shook my head when my mom offered to come in with me. She used to do that when I was a little kid, but I wasn’t a little kid anymore.

  “Come out and show me how those jeans fit,” she instructed me. “If they’re too long, I can go get you the next size down.”

  “Do I have to?” I asked. I knew I was sounding like a petulant child, but I hated this part. My mother would make me lift my shirt and show her how the jeans fit in the butt, and then she’d jiggle the waistband to make sure they weren’t too loose. “I’m almost fourteen, Mom. I think I can handle it.”

  Playing the age card worked. My mother had that look in her eye that she got sometimes, like she was one second away from pulling out my baby book and oohing and aahing over how many inches my head circumference was when I was born (apparently, I’d had a very large head as a baby).

  “Okay,” she said. “But do try everything on.”

  I promised I would, but when I locked the dressing-room door behind me and tried the bras on, all I could do was stare at the three successive versions of myself looking back at me in the full-length mirrors. My red hair was frizzy from all of the humidity outside, with strands standing up all around my head as though I’d been shocked. My lashes, which were the same color as my hair, were too light, I’d always thought. It looked like I barely had any lashes at all. I wished the freckles on my face had had the same problem; instead, these stood out clear as day, little brown specks of imperfection spread across my nose and my cheeks.

  I took a deep breath, trying to remind myself of everything I’d talked about with Dr. Fisher. My body image was distorted, so even when I looked at a regular mirror, it was as if I was viewing my body through one of those funhouse mirrors that makes you seem fatter than you really are. But I was normal—better than normal, even. I was an athlete. My body was strong. It could handle everything I demanded of it.

  Still, I didn’t feel like squirming out of my shorts and T-shirt and standing in my underwear in front of all of those mirrors. I sat down on the small seat in the dressing room and counted to two hundred, figuring that would be enough time for me to have tried everything on.

  When I finally emerged, my mother beamed at me. “How’d it all fit?”

  “Fine,” I lied. And then, to make it more believable, I hung one bra back on the rack. “The elastic on this one pinches.”

  She took the bra back off the rack, stretching out the elastic band with her fingers, as though testing my claim. “It’s just like the other one,” she said. “Maybe you just need to adjust the straps. Did you see that you can do that?”

  The line for the fitting rooms was thinning out, and I saw Watch-It Girl approaching. She didn’t have her mom with her; her mom probably thought she was grown-up enough to go shopping all by herself. I tried to snatch the bra back from my mother. “Okay, I’ll take it,” I said. “Let’s just go.”

  By now, Watch-It Girl was at the front of the line; she looked up. Maybe she won’t recognize me, I thought. After all, it wasn’t like we knew each other from middle school and she’d only bumped into me briefly at the open house.

  But the instant I caught her gaze, I knew that my hopes were in vain. She raked me over with her eyes, and obviously found me wanting. Her hair was straight and glassy and perfect, and she was slim and stylish in her skinny jeans. Meanwhile, I was plagued with hair that was prone to frizz, and my jean shorts made me look like I was going to the playground later.

  Watch-It Girl glanced down at the bras in my hands, and one corner of her mouth lifted. “Adorable,” she said. Then she disappeared into one of the dressing rooms.

  My mother smiled. “Did you know her?” she asked. “A friend from school?”

  “Not really,” I muttered. My mother went on, pleased that she’d been vindicated in her choice of un
dergarments by another teenager’s opinion. I just nodded, not wanting to draw her attention to the sarcasm that had clearly been under that compliment, and not wanting to explain that Watch-It Girl was the furthest thing from a friend.

  Five

  The first day of school started just like any other day. I was at the gym early, doing reps on the uneven bars. One of the things I’d hated most when I started training to be an Elite gymnast was waking up when it was still dark outside, eating an egg-white omelet and fruit in the car while we made our way to the gym. But now I kind of liked the sanctity of those hours. It felt as if no one else was around except us, as if we were those elves that cobbled shoes for the shoemaker, as if somehow what we did was secret and important.

  High school started earlier than middle school, so I had to do my final stretches forty-five minutes before the other girls did, and then my mom picked me up. That was when it started to hit me, and I felt the pit in my stomach growing. Before that, I’d been focusing on my giant hop full, doing it over and over. It was easier to concentrate on swinging all the way around the high bar, stopping in a handstand position, then letting go of the bar, spinning like a top, and then catching it again. That was easier than thinking about the day ahead of me.

  My mom finally pulled up in front of the school, which seemed eerily quiet, like something out of a zombie movie. I remembered that it was still first period, which meant that everyone would be in their classes.

  Normally, students had to check in with the front office if they were late, but because my practice was every day, I didn’t have to do that. I wondered if this was the sort of “special treatment” that Mr. Freeman had accused me of wanting, but I tried to shake the thought. I hadn’t asked for it; it just made sense, given that I was basically doing my P.E. off campus.

  The bell rang just as I reached my locker—not that I had anything to put in it or take out of it, but I got a tiny thrill from the clicking sound of the combination lock, which I’d gotten at the open house. All of a sudden, all the doors swung open, and kids starting pouring out of them, talking and laughing and jostling me as they walked past. I knew I was short—I’m always one of the shortest kids in my class—but I felt like a piece of lint on the floor compared to everyone else. I hurried to shut my locker and escape into my homeroom.

  I had barely sat down when someone poked me in the shoulder. At first, I didn’t turn around, in case it was some kind of weird joke where the person taps you on the right shoulder and then, when you swivel your head to the right, you get laughed at because no one is there. But then the poke came again, and so I spun around.

  It was that kid who’d been in Mr. Freeman’s class before me at the open house—the one who asked if Mr. Freeman graded on a curve. He had a mess of curly blond hair and crooked glasses, which kept sliding down his nose as he talked.

  “What?” I said, not bothering to conceal my annoyance.

  “Do you have a pen?” he asked.

  “You’re holding a pencil,” I pointed out. He did, in fact, have a pencil in his left hand, with a stubby little eraser that he’d been using to dig into my back. At least he hadn’t used the point.

  “True story,” he said. “But I hate pencils. Pencils are for people who make mistakes. I don’t make mistakes.”

  “But you forgot to bring a pen,” I said. “So isn’t that a mistake?”

  He blinked at me before a wide grin spread across his face, revealing the retainer on his bottom teeth. “You’re sharp,” he said. “I’m Norman.”

  At first, I thought he’d said he was normal, which I had a definite opinion on. But then I realized he’d just been saying his name, and I was about to give him my name in return when Watch-It Girl and Ashley walked through the door.

  Norman must’ve seen my face fall, because he glanced toward the door and then back at me. “The blond girl is Layla,” he said. “If eighth grade is anything to go by, she plans on ruling the school by lunchtime.”

  I had intended not to respond—I wasn’t sure that I wanted people to think I was friends with Norman, with his retainer and his weird pen thing and his dislike of grading on a curve. But I couldn’t help sighing and saying, “She’s so pretty.”

  “Just ask her,” Norman said, and when I only looked at him in reply, he added, “Because she’d agree with you. About being pretty. Because she’s stuck-up.”

  “I got it,” I said, sinking down further in my seat and hoping she wouldn’t see me.

  “Do you want the bio?” he asked, pausing only a second before rattling it off. “She’s MTV Cribs rich, takes her two closest friends to her daddy’s penthouse suite on Central Park every summer, and was unanimously appointed captain of the JV cheer squad before the first practice. She’s a monster.”

  And she had seen—and mocked—the tiny precious bow on my first “real” bra. I wanted to die.

  Watch-It Girl—Layla—was giggling in the corner with Ashley, and a paranoid part of me couldn’t help thinking it was about me. I just didn’t understand why they would hate me on the first day. Ashley had gone to my middle school, but our paths had never crossed, and Layla had bumped into me twice. That was it.

  But it was hard to convince myself that it was all in my head when Layla started walking toward me. I turned around in my seat and willed Norman to stop talking.

  In the two minutes I had known him, however, Norman didn’t seem like the type to do anything someone else wanted him to do.

  “Uh-oh,” he said. “Incoming.”

  If Layla heard him, she ignored him. “Are you Jessie Ivy?” she asked.

  They had been talking about me. And Ashley must’ve told Layla something—but what? I had been in high school for less than ten minutes, and already I was an outcast. A pariah. At least in eighth grade I’d been invisible. This was worse.

  “Um, yes?” I said.

  She rolled her eyes. “Are you not sure?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I mean, yes, I’m sure. I’m Jessie Ivy.” I didn’t voice my biggest question, which was Why do you want to know?

  “Ashley says that you’re a gymnast,” she said.

  “Yes,” I said, making an effort to sound more authoritative, even though I wished I knew where she was going with this. If she was about to make fun of me for being a gymnast, I thought I’d better downplay it.

  For a few moments she just looked at me, as though deciding something. “Can you do a back handspring?”

  “Yes.”

  “Back tuck?”

  “Yes.”

  “Front tuck?”

  “Yes.”

  “Full twist?”

  Norman was watching the entire conversation like it was a tennis match. I could tell by the way that Layla twisted her mouth that she thought she had me on this one. I said with a certain relish, “Yes, I can do a full twist.”

  The only acknowledgment of this statement was a brief raising of Layla’s eyebrows. “Cheer tryouts are this Friday at six o’clock,” she said. “See you there.”

  And just like that, she walked away, leaving Norman looking at me as though I was one of those reptiles in the nocturnal exhibit at the zoo. Except that Norman seemed like someone who’d have found those creatures fascinating, and that was how he was staring at me now, as though he’d read on the placard that I had a regenerated tail and he was trying to get a glimpse of it.

  “Jessie Ivy,” he said. “This is going to be interesting.”

  At practice that afternoon, Mo had to tell us multiple times to stop talking and get back to work. It seemed like everyone was buzzing about school. Can you believe we have to read that whole book? Marissa got so tan over the summer; she looks like an Oompa-Loompa. Social Science is such a joke—he’s just going to show us movies all the time.

  I was mostly quiet, laughing at the appropriate moments but lost in my own thoughts. I didn’t get some of the other girls’ references, and the ones I did get made me nostalgic. I thought about sharing my story of the cheerleading tryo
uts and the run-in with Layla, but something made me keep it to myself.

  “Girls!” Mo yelled at us for the tenth time, and Britt made a show of keeping a straight face, although she couldn’t stop a giggle from leaking through. Mo shook her head slightly, but I could tell that she wasn’t really mad. It was always like this when we started school again or came back from vacations.

  With half an hour of practice still left, Mo told us to stop early, do our last stretches, get changed in the locker room, and then meet her back out on the floor. We all looked at each other with the same thought reflected in our eyes: we hoped we weren’t in some kind of trouble.

  “Mo and Cheng are moving back to China, and we’ll have to coach ourselves,” Britt predicted, pulling a long-sleeved shirt on over her leotard. “Imagine a training montage of us on the playground, doing giant swings on the jungle gym and vaulting over those springy animal things.”

  It occurred to me that Norman and Britt might really get along.

  “They wouldn’t move back to China,” Noelle said. “Especially not now, with…” She trailed off, but I knew what she was about to say. Not now, with the international event only a few months away. I wondered how long it was going to be before she and Christina stopped feeling so weird about mentioning it in front of Britt and me.

  “Springy animal things?” Christina repeated, obviously hung up on Britt’s comment. “What are you talking about?”

  “They’re shaped like tigers, or frogs or whatever,” Britt said. “And you ride them like a rocking horse, but they’re on springs. Obviously, you couldn’t really vault over them. You’d fly across the playground.”

  “What do you think Mo’s talk could be about?” Noelle asked me, while Christina and Britt moved on to discussing why Britt was throwing clothes over her sweaty leotard instead of just changing into a new outfit.

  Britt pointed out that this was what she always did, and besides, who had the time to change completely? Christina said that she made the time, and anyway, if Britt was going to wait around while everyone else changed, why not just do the same?