Kissing Doorknobs Read Free Page B

feeling had replaced all my bad ones. I felt great. Open. Present. Alive. I hadn’t felt that good since feeding the peacocks in Michigan with my mother so many years before.
    I learned a lot about my friends at that time. We slept at each other’s houses and talked on the phone every night. It was comforting to discover that they had problems they were dealing with too. I guess I’d been assuming I was the only one in the world with problems.
    Kristin was blond and lived next door to me. She was weird because she always worried about her weight even though she wasn’t even close to being overweight.She analyzed the fat grams of everything she put into her mouth.
    Keesha was black and full of theatrical attitude. Her parents and grandparents had been part of the civil rights movement and, as she told us frequently:
    “Hawney!
My
mama
and
daddy
and aunties and uncles did
not
risk their lives
fightin’
for civil rights so that I could sit next to
Kristin
here whining about not looking like a straw with a
head.
If we’d a known that y’all were gonna talk so
stupid
, we’d a
begged
for
separate
schools.”
    By fifth grade, Keesha was already no one to be taken lightly.
    Anna was the jock. The summer before, Anna had taught Keesha and Kristin to dive in perfect arcs off the high dive at our local community pool. It was so amazing to see someone with the ability to do beautiful, athletic, incredible things with her body and the mastery to teach others how to do it too.
    I myself never tried. I said I was scared of the height, but actually I thought that swimming pools were communal toilets. Spas for germs. So even though there was enough chlorine in the water to turn us all into summer blondes, I hung out on the side of the pool, where it was dry and germs would have to travel into my system by air.
    My friends didn’t push me, though. Our relationships were easy. We knew each other’s parents. I even felt comfortable enough to bring up the subject of my fears during a lunchtime conversation about horror movies.
    “Freddie Krueger,” said Anna while eating her sandwichand spraying us with tiny wads of bologna and spittle. “I had nightmares about those nails!”
    “Pffft!” scoffed Keesha. “Nightmares about a creep who needs a manicure? Now, Dracula, he was something to worry about, girl.”
    “Did anybody see
Interview with the Vampire?”
Kristin asked.
    We all screamed happily. “Um … I’ve got something to ask you guys,” I said. “And I’m serious, so listen.”
    Keesha, Anna and Kristin turned toward me. There was a dramatic pause. “Do any of you ever get scared of your own thoughts?” I asked. My friends looked at each other and shrugged silently. It felt as if years went by as I waited for an answer. It was the first time I’d ever admitted that my thoughts scared me.
    “No,” said Keesha. Then, after another long moment during which my stomach felt as if it was doing a figure eight on a roller coaster, Keesha added, “We always been scared a
your
thoughts.”
    Everybody laughed. Even me. Keesha put her arm around my neck, kissed my cheek and stole a chocolate chip cookie from my lunch box. Then the bell rang and we had to get ready for my most hated subject—gym. I groaned.
    “Come on, Tara, I’ll show you how to put on a gymsuit,” laughed Anna, and we tumbled out of the cafeteria.
    I knew how to put on a gymsuit. In fact, the exertion of putting on my gymsuit was usually the extent of my exercise. I was terrible at gym. When my school picked teams, the jocks picked kids in wheelchairs before me.
    But I didn’t care. I liked daydreaming and hated running. I didn’t want to learn how to dribble or volley or press my own weight.
    “Tara! Let’s go,” screamed Wendy, the captain of our volleyball team. I mumbled something about how stupid it was to have gym after lunch. Then I threatened to hurl, and took my position on the court while sticking my finger down my throat. Almost