What if the one element that has always defined you as a geeky outcast has the potential to catapult you into being the next big thing?
A Black girl adopted into a White family, Jodie has always felt out of place, especially at her mainly middle-class, white high school. Used to being a ghost in the halls, she has always found solace alone in her room surrounded by a world of Stephen King novels, Oreo cookies, Dave Brubeck jazz riffs and origami. Forever classified as a geeky outcast, she finally finds two unlikely friends who share her interests and accept her as she is—Bethany, the visually-impaired new girl, who has autism, and Jared, the home-schooled, self-proclaimed nerdy frozen-yogurt clerk who she’s crushing on big-time.
But when the origami tutorial videos she creates go viral and have the potential to thrust her into the center of popularity, fortune and fame, Jodie is faced with a decision. She needs to choose whether to expose her identity and capitalize on the chance of being accepted by all those who have always shunned her or run the risk of jeopardizing the only real friendship and true relationship she’s ever had.
Reader advisory: This book contains scenes of bullying. There is a secondary character in an implied abusive relationship and demonstrations of racial prejudice.
General Release Date: 24th November 2020
The whispers are like waves rippling through a mountain stream. They start out at the far side of the room then cascade into a waterfall of stolen glances and hushed tones. Their eyes briefly meet mine, then quickly look away as if caught in a trap. The rumor continues like a string of dominoes that has just been flicked, until it’s made its way through the entire class and everyone is left looking straight at me.
Again.
For the zillionth time during my painfully wretched start to high school.
What now? I think to myself. What could I have possibly done this time to deserve all this glorious attention?
“Hey, Jodie, what’s the target for? You trying to attract a bull with that red splotch? I heard they really like the smell of blood. You really should have remembered your diaper today, girl.”
Sean Fedun. Ridiculously handsome Sean Fedun, with his side-swept surfer hair, his fresh, sun-kissed skin that always holds a golden glow, even in the depths of winter… Sean Fedun, who, on top of being handsome, smart and popular, is also the biggest jerk in the school and the bane of my existence.
Of course, it is Sean who notices things first, and he’s the one who so callously starts the tidal wave that threatens to further drown me. I hear the gasps and murmurs before I see them, although it isn’t until the wave of whispers reaches its crescendo at the other side of the room that I recognize exactly what they’re all laughing about.
And that’s when I feel it, damp and sticky between my legs. My face immediately flushes bright red as the moment of realization hits.
My.
Worst.
Nightmare.
Ever.
As if I’m not already teetering on the periphery of high school’s social order, now my body has failed me in the most brutal way. And I know… Immediately I know and I’m hit with a panic and shock so intense that I lose my breath. I have no reaction, no solution. I know right here and now that this is the one thing—literally the one thing—that if it were to happen, would ruin me forever. I am forever ruined. No one will forget this. Ever. There is no coverup possible. There is no recovery. Slowly, as if time is suddenly filtered through an impossibly small hourglass, I turn my gaze downward to the red bullseye everyone is pointing at—the one quickly seeping through the crotch of my otherwise-white jeans.
In another reality, it could be Kerri Parker sitting across from me. Sweet Kerri Parker, who would quietly come over to me and whisper in my ear, “Jodie, I think you should excuse yourself and go to the bathroom.” I would be able to slink out of the classroom without anyone even realizing I had been there in the first place.
Or it could be Maela Xing. She barely speaks English at all and would sit quietly with my secret for the entire year.
Or it could even be one of the robotics nerds. Most of them are so wrapped up in the games on their cell phones that the entire incident would go unnoticed completely.
But it’s not. It’s Sean Fedun. And like a zillion times before, Sean Fedun finds a way to ruin me.
It’s the week right after spring break, and the entire ninth-grade class has just gathered in the auditorium to hear about the parts for the upcoming freshman spring musical. As usual, Miss Pennefore flits around like a sparrow, sorting out music sheets and audition papers, and is barely aware the class has even come in and settled down. Earlier in the afternoon, she had arranged the choir risers into something of a semicircle so that the stage would hold all one hundred and ninety-six of us a little more easily. Yes, almost two hundred ninth-grade witnesses to what is undoubtedly the most humiliating moment of my life.
Most of the kids are sitting and chatting in small groups, excited about the prospect of being one of the leads in this year’s freshman production of Annie. As if I care one ounce about being in this play… In fact, I wouldn’t be here at all except that it was mandatory. Yep, every single one of us is going to be given a part to try out for, even if we have no interest in the stupid play! An apparent attempt at letting every student feel like a star. Yeah, great idea. Make us all sing the chorus of It’s a Hard Knock Life to the rest of the class, only to be humiliated and sent to the back row of the choir anyway. None of these kids even know what a ‘hard knock life’ means. It’s clear by the way they’ve been belting it out in the hallway all week long, ever since we found out that Annie was the musical of choice this year. The fevered smiles plastered on their faces, raising their arms to the sky as they attempt to hold the final note in a fake vibrato…
I’m sorry, but if you actually do have a hard knock life, you don’t go around singing about it in the middle of a suburban high-school auditorium. No, you’d be sitting in the gutter somewhere wondering why your life is a pile of garbage—which is sort of how I’m feeling now to tell the truth.
But, as it turns out, I’m a rule follower. So, despite my better judgment, I had silently trudged to music class today to get my assigned role, and I’d attempted to shrink into oblivion behind the frizzy shield of my hair. I’d even purposely sat down in the front row, the lowest riser, with the hope that no one would attempt a conversation with me. I shouldn’t have worried, because, to be honest, no one typically even notices I’m around—except for today of all days, when we sit facing each other in a stupid semicircle of trust, and Sean Fedun happens to be the person sitting exactly opposite me.
Whoosh…thunk.
I feel it before I see it…the first one, at least. A slight tap on my left shoulder, as if someone is trying to get my attention, then it drops softly at my feet. And before I know it, there are dozens hurling past me, zooming past my face and knocking against my body. Before I recognize exactly what it is that they are throwing at me, another tampon bounces sharply against my chest, resting squarely in my lap. I survey the situation—tampons, pantyliners, maxi-pads and even a used tissue, all being thrown at me, all collecting at my feet like a pile of dead moths, attracted to the bug-zapper in my backyard.
And amid the snickers and belly laughs, I can make out Sean Fedun’s cocky voice. “Jodie McGavin… Such a disgusting pig. What a waste of a life.”
And I decide I’m not going to take it any longer. I can’t. I fumble with my books when I try to stand up, spilling the entire contents of my science binder on the floor. As I reach down to pick everything up, I can’t help but bend over with my rear end sticking out into the middle of the semicircle of laughing students, giving them an even better look at the bloodstained splotch than they’d had before. And what’s even worse, some of the papers that have strewn all over have landed on the spots of blood I’ve unwittingly left on the carpeted riser. As I pick them up and try to stack them in order, bright red droplets of blood seep from one to the other, like my own personal seal. The burn in my face grows unimaginable, and it takes every ounce of strength in me not to let my humiliation spill over into a heap of tears. I will not let them see me cry. I will not give them that satisfaction.
I hastily grab the last of my belongings and bolt from the room as the class erupts into full-blown hysteria. I can just barely hear Miss Pennefore’s shrill attempt at maintaining order as she tries to make out what has just transpired behind her back.
The incident.
I know this will remain a black splotch on my memory of high school. And as I run from the laughter and the mocking, all I can envision is the spreading red stain of me that will remain in the room long after I leave.
Jennifer Walker is a teacher and writer from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. She lives with her husband Ian, her two children Everett and Kennedy, and her impossibly sweet Bernedoodle puppy Leo. When she’s not teaching, writing, or reading, you can most likely find her in a yoga studio, in the kitchen baking muffins, or running off the calories of the muffins she’s just baked. She’s famous for publicly embarrassing her family by singing terrible show-tunes and practicing 90’s dance moves, and if this whole writing thing doesn’t work out, she’s pretty sure she could make it as the fifth Wiggle.
You can find out more about Jennifer at her website, and follow her on Instagram.
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