In her room, Jane slid from her bed down to the floor. Sat there in silence, head bowed.
She had previously caught glimpses of Jeremy’s mean streak, his lack of hesitation in humiliating her in front of others. Now, she knew just how far he could go when his motivation shifted from boredom to revenge.
Jane took several deep breaths. She thought about what her childhood friend Matt used to call her, a nickname he had given her when he was still around. Then her lips began to move.
“You are not Jane, you are not Jane,” she whispered. “You are not Jane. You are Rain.” Jane was hesitant, tentative, easily pushed over. Always seeking the corner. Rain was defiant. Rain was feisty. Rain was powerful. Rain could rise to any challenge.
Rain slowly got up from the floor. Her parents were not home yet. She had time. First, she went to bathroom, turned on the sink, dunked her hair into the stream of water. Flipped it back over her shoulders, looked in the mirror, saw the drops trailing down the strands. Sexy.
She went into her mother’s room. Took out a scarf. Then a pair of glittering Mary Janes. Dropped back into her room, went with a shirt-skirt combo. Generally, it would take her a long time to figure out her overall look, mixing and matching different articles. But this time, she seemed to know exactly what would work.
Rain untagged herself from Jeremy’s post, then blocked him, ensuring that he would not be able to tag her again. She knew it would not make much of a difference, that the majority of the damage had already been done. School would be challenging. But she would not stay home for a few days. She would not hide. She would face the maelstrom head-on, and she would signal her intent loud and clear with her post.
Fifteen minutes later, she released her counterpunch. There she was, feet spread apart and planted firmly on the ground, left side leaning slightly forward, hands on hips. Looking directly into the camera. Runway pose. The bright green scarf catching the eye, along with the beaming smile on her face. No hint of embarrassment or anguish. Pure defiance. Pure Rain.
The caption below the picture did not mention Jeremy or his sick post. That would give him too much importance. This was all her. The caption consisted of just two words:
Game On!
Rain sat back, satisfied, as her phone began to beep, then beep again, then yet again, with increasing frequency. Comment after comment, compliment after compliment, validation after validation. When the feedback finally hit its crescendo and began to wane, she took a look at the result.
Incredible. She had gotten more attention with that one post than with all her previous posts combined. Granted, she did not post much. But this exceeded her wildest expectations. And it dwarfed the attention Jeremy’s post had gotten, which made her laugh for the first time that day. Revenge was a dish best served with flair.
A few years ago, at day care, she had told Matt her full name. Jane Merrick. He pronounced it wrong. Rain Magic. That was what he repeated over and over. At a certain point, his continuous flow made it unclear which order the names were in.
Magic Rain. Magic Rain. Magic Rain. Looking back on it, maybe he did not pronounce it wrong. Maybe he pronounced it better.
The next day at school, she did her best to keep her head high. It was not easy. Her former crew, including Becca, scrupulously avoided her. The other girls had formed their own cliques long ago. When she passed by various groups of students at lunch, she heard the trail of snickers in her wake. Rain knew she had well-wishers, but many of them were her middle school classmates who had ended up at Jeremy’s high school. A smaller number consisted of her own high school classmates, and none of them wanted to be seen in person fraternizing with the crack baby. She looked around for Kara, but did not see her. Where was Kara?
Rain went to the bathroom, paused to catch her breath. Two girls were there, adjusting their makeup. They ignored her, then left once they were done. She had come to learn that no one used the bathroom to go to the bathroom. The toilets were disgusting because a few germophobic girls would “hover,” ruining them for everyone else.
The bell rang, marking the end of lunch. When she exited the bathroom, she finally saw Kara. Relieved, she moved forward to greet her, but then stopped cold. Kara had a way of walking, a sort of shuffle that was distinctly hers. A girl was now walking slightly behind her on her side, reproducing that exact shuffle. She did it so well that the two were perfectly synchronized, mirror images of each other. Kara suddenly turned toward the girl, who stopped before she was caught and skipped off to rejoin her friends, who were guffawing. The imitation had been so spot-on that Jane herself would have laughed, had she not herself been humiliated so recently.
Kara looked at Jane. Again, the hopeful expression in the good eye, along with the fear that Jane remembered from years before. Jane wanted to come to her, to support her, to protect her. But she held back. She broke the eye contact, then hurried along, passing Kara, who stood there, unmoving.
She knew it was the wrong thing to do. She hated herself for not having more guts, for being such a coward. She could slip into Rain when it mattered most for her, but not when it mattered most for her best friend. She resolved to call Kara that weekend and reconnect. There was so much she wanted to tell her. That Kara had been right. That Jane had been wrong. And selfish.
The weekend came, but Jane was not in a rush. She kept finding reasons to delay. Whenever she felt like she had enough courage to reach out, her mind would shift to what she would say and how she would say it, and she would hesitate again.
Then she got an idea. Why not call Becca first? That conversation would be easier, and it could function as a “warm-up” conversation. It was only after she hit “Call” that she remembered what Becca had said about blocking her if she called again. For a second, she panicked. But then something told her that Becca was exaggerating.
Becca did not answer. Jane decided to send her a message on social media. But she could not find Becca. Her anxiety rising, she discovered that she could not see Becca on any social media platform. Had Becca followed through on her threat?
Not possible. There was no way she could block her that quickly. Maybe Becca was just taking a social media break. She remembered other students doing that kind of thing every once in a while, especially during exam week. Maintaining a robust online presence could be exhausting.
She was about to put it out of her mind when her phone buzzed. She picked it up eagerly, then frowned in confusion. The text was not from Becca, but Stacey. Hey Jane if u hear anything frm Becca, lmk ok? she’s not answring my txts or calls.
So the radio silence had nothing to do with Jane. Something was going on with Becca. What had happened?
On Monday, Jane noticed that she was no longer the unofficial center of attention. All the students seemed distracted by the Next Scandalous Thing. But she had no idea what that Thing was. In second period, she glanced at Becca’s empty seat. Was it Becca?
Then, at the start of sixth period, there was a knock on the classroom door. Two police officers walked in.
“Oh, shit,” the boy next to her said under his breath.
The first officer conferred with the teacher in whispers, and Jane saw the teacher’s eyes widen. Oh shit, she found herself thinking, despite not knowing what was going on.
The teacher cleared his throat, pulled at his collar uncomfortably. “Ok class, looks like there’s been a situation, and these officers here will need to question each of you individually. Also, they will need to look at your phones.” The students all looked at each other. Suddenly, the day had become a lot less boring.
A student raised his hand. “So, how long will this take?”
An officer whispered to the teacher, who then turned back to the class. “As long as it needs to. No one leaves school grounds until it’s done.”
One by one, the students were called outside the classroom. The teacher, sensing that no one would be able to focus on anything academic, rolled out the TV and put on a documentary.
Jane’s name was called, and she got up, trembling. The officers sensed that she was nervous and smiled at her reassuringly. “This won’t take too long,” one of them said.
Then the questioning began. “Do you know a student named Becca Pimentel?” She nodded. “Have you heard anything about her that you feel we should know about?” She thought for a moment, then shook her head. “Verbalize your answers, please.” She nodded.
“Are you aware of the existence of any pictures of Becca Pimentel where there is nudity?” She shook her head, said no. “Do you have any such pictures on your phone, or in any other device?” She shook her head again, said no. “May we see your phone?” She handed it over. “What’s the login?” She took the phone, put it in, handed it back.
“Good choice. We would have had to hold on to your phone otherwise.” She glanced at a large cardboard box on the side, which contained a number of phones. Every so often, one of them would buzz, beep, or ping.
Then it was done. As she sat in class and watched the documentary, her mind wandered back to what the officers had said. Becca? Pictures? Nudity?
Later that afternoon, when Jane was back home, her phone buzzed. She looked down at the name. Becca. Hey, can u com ovr?
Jane did not reply. She did not want to be tangled up in anything that involved the police. After an hour, Becca texted her again. Plz? I rlly need company.
Jane put her phone on Airplane mode. Grabbed her tablet, started watching a series on streaming. She felt satisfaction. Why would she go out of her way to comfort the person who spread her secret about what happened with Doug, the person who enthusiastically joined the others in excommunicating her at school? Let Becca have a taste of her own medicine.
Later that night, Jane realized that she now had the perfect conversation piece that she could use with Kara. She could start by talking about the Becca situation, then slowly steer things toward more complicated territory. She called Kara, but a robotic voice said the number was no longer in service. She went onto social media, but Kara was invisible to her. A feeling of déjà vu. No, Kara could not be as dumb as Becca.
The next day, she actively sought out Kara, who, like Becca, was nowhere to be seen. After asking around, she received the news.
“Don’t you know what happened? Where have you been this whole time?” a girl exclaimed. “Well, I guess it got drowned out when the sexting stuff happened right after.”
A girl had befriended Kara, gained her trust, exchanged phone numbers with her. Shortly afterward, Kara began receiving text messages from dozens of phone numbers:
yeckk
ho bag
uggliest
thot NOT
Some texts included a link to a fake social media profile of Kara, which contained candid shots of her walking around campus, usually with unflattering poses and facial expressions. The comments were longwinded diatribes about how drastically she lowered the average attractiveness of girls in the school. Kara had kept all this to herself, perhaps hoping it would all go away if she ignored it. But the texts had only ratcheted up in intensity, perhaps in a bid to elicit a reaction, any reaction. Demands that she kill herself already, assurances that no none would miss her, declarations that she would be utterly forgotten after two days. She had remained stoic. Then one night, several boys had sexted her within minutes of each other. All were flaccid, and all included colorful commentary about how the sight of her made them “shrink.”
Shortly afterward, Kara had transferred to a school outside the district. Her parents never knew exactly why, just that she never really seemed to fit in and wanted a fresh start.
The news hit Jane like a gut punch. Just a few days ago, Kara had been right there in that hallway, pleading silently to Jane for help. And she had walked away. Matt had abandoned her, and now she had abandoned Kara. Her best friend was gone, and it was her fault.
After school, she texted Becca back, asked for her address. A half hour later, she was knocking on her door.
“No reporters!” someone yelled from inside.
Jane knocked again. “I’m not a reporter,” she said loudly.
The door opened, and a woman glared at her suspiciously. “Who are you? And what the hell is wrong with your voice?”
“My name is Jane Merrick. I’m Becca’s friend at school. My voice has always sounded like this.”
The woman blinked, surprised, as she took in the frail, doe eyed girl who stood on her porch. “Oh, I’m sorry. Didn’t realize…please, come in. It’s just been stressful. There, you can go straight to her room. First door on the right.”
Jane knocked softly on Kara’s door. “It’s open,” Becca’s voice said. She opened the door, but Becca was nowhere to be seen. Instead, there was a girl sitting in the corner who Jane did not recognize. She had a really bad case of acne.
The girl rose and walked over to Jane, who almost asked her where Becca was, until she realized that the girl was indeed Becca. She had never seen her without makeup before. What did Stacey and the others look like without makeup?
A memory surfaced within her mind from just a couple of months ago, before the Doug incident. She and the girls were at the mall, eating in the food court. A man who Jane did not recognize walked up to her and introduced himself. He said he was from an “agency.” He handed her his business card, then asked her if she had ever thought about modeling. She stammered out an incoherent reply. His eyes narrowed quizzically when he heard her voice. He glanced down at the business card he had just handed her, then back up at her face, and then excused himself politely and walked away. It was so sudden and surreal. Jane sat back down, glanced at the others. She expected them to joke about how weird that was. They did not. She expected them to call the man a weirdo for the way he had acted. They did not. Instead, they looked aggrieved, almost angry. None made eye contact with her. The rest of the meal transpired under a stony silence.
Becca hugged Jane, sobbing, distraught. Jane wanted to comfort her, but first, she turned to a mirror in the room, gazed at her own reflection, almost as if for the first time, while Becca’s arms remained wrapped around her shoulders. Only then, in that moment, did she truly begin to understand how attractive she actually was. When the girls had first reached out to her at the beginning of freshman year, she wondered why. Now, it hit her: without makeup, without the facials, without the hair stylists, she looked almost as good as they did with all those crutches. No wonder Stacey felt so threatened by her.
“It’s good to see you, Jane,” Becca said. “Oh, Lord, I’m so stupid, I’m so stupid. He sent me a pic of his abs, then asked me to send him a pic of mine. Then we exchanged more pics, back and forth, and it was happening so fast, and I didn’t have time to think about how far it was going. I’m so stupid!”
“Relax, it will pass,” Jane said. “Doesn’t seem that way right now, but it will. Remember what happened to me? That passed, and so will this.”
“Yeah, but the police are involved. I heard they went and questioned everybody at school. Is that true?” Jane nodded. Becca sat on her bed, buried her head into her hands. “I can’t believe this. How could he share it with anybody?”
Jane was silent a moment. Then felt a flicker from within. Rain. Rain knew exactly what to say, what to do. “In some ways, the police involvement is a good thing.”
Becca looked up, aghast. “What are you talking about?”
“You’re underage. That means there’s no way the pics can survive online, even on obscure social media. They’re radioactive. They’ll be taken down, all of them, because anyone who doesn’t comply will land in some serious shit. This will blow over faster than you think. You’ll be fine.”
Becca stared at her. “I’ve never seen you this confident before. What happened to the Jane everybody knows?”
Rain smiled. “Something more you should be aware of. Nobody will bother teasing you about this, because they’re too busy worrying about themselves. Lots of kids are more stressed than you are, believe me. At school, they searched everybody’s phones. Everybody’s. And you know what they found? Lots of problem pics, but not just yours. Pics of girls and boys, on the phones of boys and girls. And not just pics. Videos, too. If the police wanted to press charges, they’d have to haul half the student body into court, which is impossible. Plus, I’ve heard the mayor doesn’t like all the reporters coming in from everywhere and making him look bad, so he’s putting pressure on the police to just let everyone off with a warning. So, nothing will happen. But make sure you’re not dumb like this in the future, when you’re an adult. The law won’t do very much to protect you. This isn’t California.”
Becca looked amazed. “How are you so smart? I never realized…well, you’re usually so quiet. Nobody knows what you’re thinking.”
Rain sat down on the bed next to Becca. “I don’t like to say something unless I have something to say. After you told me that I had dodged a bullet with Jeremy, I did a little research to find out how deadly the bullet was. If I can survive crack baby whore, you can survive this.” They both laughed.
Rain looked at the two of them in the mirror, sitting side by side. Her gaze shifted to Becca’s chest, and she felt confused. Why–
Becca, paying close attention to her gaze, caught her peeking. “It’s called a pushup bra. Haven’t you ever done it? Everybody’s done it.” She glanced at herself, scrutinizing how she looked without the aid of any “pushup” material. “It’s fine, right?” she said quietly, almost to herself. She cupped her right hand over the left one. “It’s pretty much a handful. A girl handful. Maybe not in Stacey’s hand, but that’s because she has man hands.” She chuckled nervously.
Rain chuckled too. She thought back to the time when Becca had teased her about her itty bitty titties. Now, she realized that both of their endowments were roughly the same size. When Rain took a bath, she loved how hers would float just above the water. She would absentmindedly pull each one up by the nipple with her index finger and thumb, then let go, watching it splash and then bob up and down. She was beginning to feel more comfortable with her body and how it was changing. It dawned on her that people sometimes poked fun at others over what they themselves were most insecure about.
Jane hated what happened to Becca, but she loved one of the consequences. Stacey immediately cast off Becca, now that she was damaged goods. Both Jane and Becca were now united in their ejection from the queen bee’s hive, and they found solace in each other’s company.
The school would periodically hold rallies in the big gym. The entire student body sat in the bleachers, and watched spectacles unfold on the basketball court. Cheerleaders executed their routines, student government reps led chants, and a guest speaker urged the importance of doing well in school. Jane and Becca sat together, avoiding eye contact with Stacey, who sat on the other side.
The football team came out in full gear to heavy applause. The team was actually quite good, regularly beating better-funded teams from High Falls. The coach listed dates of upcoming games. “We want to see you all out there supporting us,” he declared. “We’re going for the big one this year.”
The quarterback, Brian, removed his helmet and handed it to a teammate, then stepped forward to take the mic. Jane recognized him immediately because his face was prominently featured in posters and other promotional material throughout the school and across social media. Although a junior, he was more popular than the student body president and head cheerleader combined. The administrators treated him like royalty, and for good reason. He hit full potential during sophomore year, a fact the school took as a godsend because the delay prevented schools in High Falls from snatching him away when they still could. Now, he was being aggressively courted by Ivy League schools.
Brian grasped the mic, cleared his throat. Silence enveloped the entire gym, as ears strained to take in every word from the champion. He spoke about the importance of preparation during the offseason and made references to suspenseful moments, including a memorable Hail Mary that inched them ahead with just seconds left on the clock, clinching a victory. Jane leaned forward, engrossed in the narrative. Not only could Brian throw a pass mere inches above the fingertips of potential interceptors and into the grasp of his teammate. He could also describe his talent with talent. He was a master storyteller.
“How can one guy be so good at everything?” Becca whispered to Jane.
Jane smiled. Those were her thoughts exactly.
“Oh, and one more thing,” Brian said. He walked to the sideline of the basketball court, toward Jane and Becca, and scanned faces in the audience. Then he looked down at the mic and began to sing.
Oh God, even his voice is perfect, Jane thought. She expected the song to be about teamwork and school spirit, but curiously enough, it was a generic pop song about romance. A jolt of electricity surged through Jane as she realized he was looking right at her. The eye contact did not waver. He continued to sing acapella, and she became dimly aware of Becca nudging her.
“What’s going on?” Becca whispered.
Other faces turned toward Jane as they followed Brian’s gaze. She was the center of the attention of hundreds. She would have wilted under the pressure had it not been for Brian’s warm smile. He launched into a crescendo, and then dropped down on one knee.
“Holy shit,” Becca whispered.
One hand wrapped around the mic, the other now covering his heart, Brian continued to serenade Jane. She felt lightheaded as she struggled to comprehend the surreal moment. At last, Brian finished.
“Game on,” he whispered into the mic, loud enough to be heard by everyone but low enough to sound sexy as hell.
Brian walked back to his team, and they marched out to thunderous applause. Jane hunched over in her seat, dazed, as the rally continued. She barely followed any of it. Becca was saying something to her, but the words failed to register.
As she walked the school hallways afterward, she was aware of the stares. It was as if she had just won the lottery, as if her uploaded song had gone viral and led to a record deal. Even the teachers looked at her differently.
After school, she headed directly to the football field, where the team practiced. They were running scrimmages. Brian noticed her and gestured for her to wait. She sat in the bleachers. She could wait five minutes. She could wait five hours.
During a water break, Brian jogged over to her, huffing and puffing from exertion. “Got plans Saturday?” he asked. So direct.
Yes, she thought. She was supposed to take care of chores at home.
“No,” she said.
“Great,” he said. “Direct message me and we’ll coordinate.” And just like that, he was back on the field, coordinating the next play. Efficient.
On the bus ride home, Jane stared out the window and savored the moment. The trees whizzed by in a dreamy green haze. At home, she took out her phone and sat, stunned. She generally kept it on silent at school, so she had not noticed until now that her social media account had blown up. Connection requests clogged her updates. Existing connections were canvassing her recent posts and affirming everything in sight. As Jane scanned the requests, one named jumped out. Seriously? Stacey, who had blocked her, now wanted to reconnect.
The surreal feeling came over Jane. She pinched herself to make sure the previous several hours had not been a dream. Jane spent the rest of the week getting chores done in advance, so Saturday would be wide open.
They met for ice cream. She got a double fudge sundae, while he went with vanilla. They sat at a table outside the shop, in the sunshine. Cars drifted by lazily.
“You’re probably asking how I know you, right?” Brian asked, a twinkle in his eye.
Jane nodded. The question had tormented her ever since the rally. They shared no classes, had no mutual friends.
“I noticed you sometimes, in the hallway. I wondered who you were.” He grinned sheepishly. “I sort of covertly followed you on social media, to see what your life was like, what kind of person you were.”
Jane blushed. “I’m not too active on social media,” she said.
“Yeah, I know,” Brian said. “So I just minded my own business. Then I saw that awful post, with the two images side by side. And I saw how you handled it.” His face turned serious. “And I was just blown away. You showed strength, but also class. You weren’t afraid to put yourself fully out there, but you did it in your own way, on your terms. I loved that. There’s a lot of messed up stuff in school, on social media. What you did brought out the best in people, and that’s so rare.”
Jane could barely look at him. Again, the surreal feeling came over her, the fear that it was all a dream. She trained her eyes downward, on her half-finished cone.
Brian was talking again. “In football, everything I do is so calculated. It’s the result of so much planning and practice, you know? And at the rally, I felt an urge to just break away from all that, and take a risk without knowing the outcome. Like you did, with your post. The moment I took the mic was the moment I decided to sing to you. And it felt like the most natural thing ever.”
Brian had finished his cone. He leaned back, gazed at her adoringly. “Even if you got up and walked out, it would have been worth it. But obviously, I’m glad you didn’t.”
“I’m glad too,” Jane said, after a long silence. “I was tired and didn’t feel like walking just then,” she quickly added. “Needed some R&R.”
Brian chuckled. “Feisty. I like that. I’d also like to get to know you better, Jane.”
Jane looked him directly in the eyes. “Likewise.”
Jane attended every football game. She celebrated their wins, rued their losses. At that point in the season, the number of wins exceeded the entire regular season total from two years ago, before Brian was varsity.
Jane had never paid much attention to sports, but she now familiarized herself with the rules for Brian’s sake. What appeared to be a random assortment of bodies colliding against each other soon morphed into a discernable structure, as elegant as it was complex. Each touchdown by the school team brought her to her feet in the bleachers as the players whooped on the field, slapping each other’s asses. Brian stood apart from the rest, his eyes trained on the other team. He studied them, attempted to penetrate their psyche. Each touchdown by the opposing team led to downcast glances, pats on the shoulder. Brian would stare at the other team. His reaction was the same regardless of which team had scored. Only at the very end, and only if his team won, would he celebrate as raucously as his peers.
The players would all hang out afterward, and Jane would join them. Some of the other players had girlfriends, and she talked with them while the guys engaged in hot sauce gulping competitions and other silliness. Brian sat off to the side, scrawling formations on a notepad. His mind was always on the next game. Jane and the others knew not to bother him during these moments.
Jane worried about Brian. He endured fewer collisions than the other players, but he was also on the field longer, especially in close games. The playing time took its toll. During one nail-biter, Jane noticed him emerge from a pile-up with a slight limp. He appeared to shake it off, but the next play was a disaster. The coach benched him, then conferred with him privately. Brian limped to the locker room, then emerged a couple of minutes later. He remained benched until halftime, then headed back onto the field at the top of the third quarter to deafening applause. It was a home game, and the crowd craved the only player who could turn everything around. Brian did not disappoint.
Afterward, the team members and a few girlfriends lounged at someone’s house. For once, Brian was not occupied with scribbling notes for an upcoming game. Instead, he appeared lost in thought, his thumb hooked under his jawline. His eyes were slightly glazed over. Jane embraced him from behind, rested her cheek against his toned upper back. She wanted to somehow heal him with her affection alone.
The boys soon started playing football. Not like out on the field an hour earlier. A video game, in which a dozen people could play at once, six per team. Jane never understood why they loved to play the sport virtually, since they practiced and played it so much in real life. Then she thought about Brian’s fall, his limp, the tense moment when he remained on the bench and no one knew if he would return to the field. The video game was a risk-free simulation. They could try various plays without fearing a concussion. Howls erupted in synchrony with virtual interceptions, touchdowns, and field goals.
After the completion of a game, a girl asked, “Hey, can I play?”
The boys glanced at her incredulously.
“Really?” a running back asked. “You’re interested? This is the combination of two things girls don’t like the most: video games and sports.”
The room erupted in laughter.
The girl, undeterred, pleaded, “Come on, I wanna play. Just once.”
After a brief pause, a boy handed her his controller. “Here ya go,” he said.
The other girls demanded a shot at playing. The boys handed her their controllers. “This will be entertaining to watch,” one said, smirking.
“Jane, what about you?” a boy asked.
Jane remained with Brian. “I’m okay,” she said.
“Oh come on! Stop suffocating your boyfriend and try it out!” More laughter.
Brian grabbed a controller from a boy, handed it to Jane. “You might like it,” he said.
Jane sighed. “Okay, fine,” she said.
As the game unfolded, the girls wailed in confusion.
“My guy’s going the wrong way!”
“How do I pass it?”
“Why is it so hard?!”
The boys jeered. Brian resumed staring off into space. Jane remained silent. Her hands cradled the controller. Her fingers caressed the buttons. She studied the screen, took in everything. She had never felt a sensation like this before.
“Wow, Jane’s smiling!” a boy suddenly said. “She never smiles!”
Jane’s mind barely registered the words. She was waiting for –
“Now, now!” Jane yelled. “Pass it to me now! I’m open!”
“Wait, what?” a girl asked. A split second later, she groaned. “Got tackled again.”
As the game progressed, Jane felt her fury rising. “Come on, get serious!” she exclaimed. When the game ended, the boys joked about how low-scoring it had been. Jane dropped her controller in frustration, glanced over at Brian. He was scrutinizing her, his eyes narrowed in intrigue.
“Hey guys,” Brian said suddenly. “Let’s play Death Match.”
“What’s that?” a girl asked.
“You’ve seen it before. It’s basically a shooter where everybody kills each other until one survivor remains. And that’s the winner.”
Someone loaded up Death Match. The intro sequence was familiar, Jane realized. She had seen them play it before. The boys started to take back their controllers, but Brian halted them.
“We’ll do a match with just girls, then one with just boys. Then a third match with the top halves of each,” Brian announced. He was speaking in his quarterback tone, and the boys quietly obeyed.
After Jane won the first round, Brian congratulated her.
“For what?” she shot back. “I had no competition.”
“Oh shit,” a boy said. “Jane’s on the warpath.”
Brian sat out the second match. “Just not feeling it,” he said, as the other boys took their controllers back.
“Somebody wants to get laid tonight,” a boy murmured, and the room erupted in laughter.
“Oh, shut up,” Brian said, blushing. Jane barely noticed. She gritted her teeth, studied the avatars the boys selected. Each avatar had a unique mix of stats. Some were faster but took damage more easily. Others were built like tanks but lacked agility. She wanted to be familiar with them all.
The third match commenced. The other girls were quickly fragged until only Jane remained. All the boys’ avatars were still in action. She felt as if her breath were suspended as she raced for cover.
“Defense, defense,” she whispered to herself.
There! An opening! Her rocket launcher took out an avatar, and the boy who controlled it slammed down his controller in frustration. Unlike the first and second matches, which were routinely punctuated by cries of emotion at frags and near-frags, this match was deadly silent. Hardly a word was spoken.
Jane took out the next avatar, then the one after that.
“My god,” a girl whispered.
One opponent remained. Jane realized she was sweating. She had never felt pressure like this before. The match was stressful, but she also found it exhilarating.
She caught a blur of movement, and fired in that direction. Suddenly, her avatar refused to move. The camera switched from the first person view to a full 360 degree circling around her avatar.
WINNER! the screen read.
Jane cupped her hand over her mouth, hardly able to believe it. Then she whooped, leaped from her seat, and started an impromptu dance, pumping her fists up and down. No one joined her.
Jane turned to the others. Brian was smiling broadly, the depth of his dimples proclaiming his pure admiration. The girls looked up at her with awe. The boys, on the other hand, studied the floor intently. Jane became increasingly aware of a bad vibe in the room, an invisible blanket of resentment that threatened to envelop her.
“I don’t wanna play anymore,” a boy said. “I’m going home.”
“Yeah, I got stuff to do too,” another boy said.
The boys got their stuff and prepared to leave, and the girls obediently joined them. The host excused himself and wandered into the kitchen. What had happened? Ordinarily, the boys would have played far longer.
Back at Brian’s place, he gingerly lowered himself onto the couch, then burst out laughing.
“What’s so funny?” Jane demanded.
“The way they reacted,” Brian said. “You really knocked them flat.”
Jane asked him why the boys had acted that way.
“Isn’t it obvious?” he responded, massaging the back of his neck with his hand. “Nobody likes to lose.”
“Yeah, but they never act like that when they lose to each other,” Jane protested. “They just cuss each other out and get right back to it.”
“Sure, but they weren’t losing to a girl. It’s different,” Brian said, shrugging his shoulders, and then wincing.
“I can’t believe this,” Jane said. “They were fine with seeing the girls play so they could make fun of how bad we were. They loved that. Then they all looked at me like I was a party pooper. Why is it so funny to you? It’s not funny.”
“That’s just how they are. I’m gonna go to the bathroom,” Brian said. “Be right back.” He tossed his phone onto his desk, then headed down the hall.
Jane sat, lost in thought. The truth dawned on her. The only thing that frustrated the boys more than a girl who struggled to play was a girl who could beat them. They could tolerate, and even find amusement in, the former. The latter, they could never forgive.
“They’re football players,” she whispered to herself. “They’ve lost plenty of games. But they were never like this.”
Brian’s phone buzzed, and Jane absentmindedly glanced at it. Froze. Her stomach clenched.
On the screen was a naked girl, someone she recognized from school. Jane shared a class with her, and now the girl’s fully exposed body was splayed over half the screen. On Brian’s phone. The girl had just sexted him.
Part 3: https://medium.com/@phenomgamer/game-on-part-3-f4644b8e80c9
