Dumplin - Julie Murphy Page 0,50

about what I saw in the mirror. But Bo ruined that. It’s supposed to be easier to like yourself when someone else likes you.

But that can’t be true. No matter how much I tell myself that the fat and the stretch marks don’t matter, they do. Even if Bo, for whatever reason, doesn’t care, I do.

Then there are days when I really give zero flying fucks, and I am totally satisfied with this body of mine. How can I be both of those people at once?

“Do you have anything else to add, Will?” asks Millie.

I blink once. Twice. “No. No, I guess not.”

Hannah slides out of the booth. “I’m out of here.”

Amanda slurps her soda until the straw screeches loudly.

I turn and call after Hannah, “What changed your mind? When Millie first asked you, you said no, right?”

She turns back. “I get called a freak every day. I might as well make a show of it.”

“Straight from the horse’s mouth,” mumbles Amanda after Hannah’s a safe distance away.

Millie kicks her underneath the table. “That wasn’t very nice.”

“Well, neither is she,” says Amanda.

THIRTY-THREE

This time I tell Mitch that we can meet at his house. He invites me over to watch movies and I guess I just assume that his parents will be out for the night.

When the front door opens, I find the female version of Mitch wearing a light yellow T-shirt with kittens rolling in yarn. This woman who can only be Mitch’s mom throws a dish towel over her shoulder and brings me in for a hug. “Oh my word!” she says. “Mitch said you were pretty, but he didn’t say gorgeous.” She lets go of me for a second before grasping my cheeks and pulling me in through her front door.

The entryway of Mitch’s house is a bottleneck. Small and congested. But his mother doesn’t move. “Let’s get a look at this face.” She slides her thumbs across my cheeks like she’s wiping away tears.

“Mom!”

She steps back and I see Mitch there in the narrow hallway, his cheeks a deep magenta.

“Hey.”

“Hey, Will.” Mitch clears his throat. “Uh, Mom, we’re heading upstairs.”

His mom nods. “Leave the door open.”

“Mom, we’re fine!” Mitch waves for me to follow him up the stairs.

“For the Holy Ghost!” she calls after us.

Hanging on the posts at the head of Mitch’s bed are his mum garters from freshman and sophomore year homecoming. Mums are one of those things that are so specifically southern that I both love and hate them. The best mums are homemade with giant artificial chrysanthemums on cardboard backing with huge streams of ribbon hanging from them. Since they’re for homecoming, they’re made in school colors and the ribbons usually have glitter letters that spell out different things, like you and your boyfriend’s names or your school mascot. It used to be that girls would pin them to their shirts, but, like most things in Texas, they’ve only gotten bigger. Now, mums are so heavy that they have to be worn around your neck. And guys—especially football players like Mitch—wear miniature versions of garters around their arms. It’s all pretty ridiculous, but in a Dolly kind of way.

On the walls of his room are a few random video game posters, but one in particular sticks out to me. A girl’s torso takes up most of the poster. She holds a machine gun with a horde of zombies behind her. Taped over whatever she might be wearing is a knee-length dress made out of a paper grocery bag. I point to the poster. “What happened there?”

“Ugh, my mom. It’s my favorite game—or at least it was before the sequel came out—and she always hated the poster.” He lifts the paper bag dress to reveal a low cut crop top and olive green shorts so tiny they could be underwear. “She wasn’t too crazy over me having a half-naked girl in my room. Even if she was 2D. This was her compromise. Every time I take it down, she cuts a new dress.”

“Why don’t you just take the poster down?”

He sits on the edge of his bed. “I don’t know. I like the game. I don’t really care about the naked girl.”

“Okay?”

He waves his hands, like he’s trying to erase what he said. “Not that I don’t like naked girls. I mean, I don’t go looking for naked girls. I”—he takes a deep breath—“I meant that I play the game because she’s a badass. Not because you can see her ass cheeks.” He whispers