when I got home, I was so excited I sat straight down and turned to a new page and started writing. About Carolyn, and kissing, and everything else that was in my head. When I was done, I was so exhausted I fell straight into bed.
The next morning, I remembered the letter to Sharon, and I went over to tear it out of the notebook, and—
No, wait, no. I still felt half drunk, so I slept through my alarm and I was going to be late for school. I was trying to drink orange juice and eat a donut and get my books together all at the same time, and I spilled my juice and—
SHIT. SHIT, SHIT, SHIT, SHIT, SHIT.
Harvey. HARVEY.
I spilled my orange juice and it got all over me and I had to change my skirt. I didn’t have time to clean up, but it got all over my notebook, too, and—
OH, MY FUCKING GOD. ORANGE JUICE. I KNEW THIS WAS ALL ANITA FUCKING BRYANT’S FAULT.
Harvey. I remember now.
Oh, my God.
I was in such a panic to get out the door without anyone figuring out what I’d been doing. I just tore out the pages out of the notebook without paying attention and put them in the envelope.
I remember now. It was a thick envelope, the way they always used to be back when I wrote her longer letters. I thought that was because it was wet, but—
Oh, holy fuck. HOLY FUCK, FUCK, FUCK—
Sharon knows. She knows.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, what if she tells someone????
She won’t. She won’t, she won’t, she won’t.
But what if she does??????
I got a letter from her today, but it’s obvious she wrote it before she got mine. She said she wanted to keep writing, but—
That’s because she didn’t know the truth, Harvey.
We swore we wouldn’t tell anyone what we wrote, but what if she thinks she needs to save my soul, or something??
Harvey! What the fuck am I supposed to do now??
Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
I’m going back to bed.
Tammy
Saturday, November 19, 1977
Dear Diary,
Well…I went out with Kevin again last night.
We’ve been spending more time together than usual this past week, ever since I got that bizarre letter from Tammy. Mom hasn’t really noticed that I’ve been staying out late, even on school nights. She’s going to bed earlier and earlier lately. Peter’s been teasing me for suddenly starting to act like the girls at school who spend all their time hanging on their boyfriends, but it’s still been fun, mostly.
Last night was kind of strange, though. Kevin was off work, and I brought him with me to a show for the first time. He doesn’t know much about punk—he mostly listens to Journey and the Dead—but he agreed to come up to North Beach to see the Dils and DV8 with me. I could tell he wanted to give it a chance, for my sake, but it wasn’t really his scene.
“IT’S LOUD IN HERE!” he shouted at me for the third time, after we’d only been inside two minutes. From the way he kept balling up his fists in front of his shoulders, I could tell he wanted to clap his hands over his ears. He kept darting his eyes around, especially at the guy in front of us with his hair spiked straight up and the girl next to him with the leather choker and the safety pin stuck through her ear. I was wearing one of my boring schoolgirl sweaters, but I’d paired it with a new short bright blue vinyl skirt I’d bought a couple of weeks ago with my babysitting money, and that seemed to make him nervous, too. I kept catching him glancing down at it and then back up at my face, as if he wasn’t sure it was me.
“JUST LISTEN!” I shouted back, but Kevin shook his head and pointed to his ear, uncomprehending.