The Short Life of Carly Lannigan (Ch 2; 3/20)
Time for a new chapter to update you on Carly’s too-brief life…
(2) Thus It Begins
Mr. Grayson’s office turns out to be a whole lot bigger than my counselor’s back in Elmdale. He not only has a chair to sit in; he has a freaking couch! And there are potted trees all over the place along with bookshelves full not only of college brochures but actual reading books. Like you could come in here, sit down (or lie down) and read! And don’t even get me started on the windows. Half the room is windows! So much light I can’t believe it. Mrs. Jacobson’s office didn’t even have a window. Sometimes I wasn’t sure they were legal in Elmdale. Seriously: last year I had a whole schedule without a single classroom that had a window. I remember some from freshman year, so I know they are there somewhere, but WTF?
He’s sitting at his desk when I enter: a youngish man with wavy brown hair and oversized ears. He’s looking over a file, probably mine, and the look on his face is inscrutable. If that folder tells the story of my last school, I won’t be off to a good start here. Ah well. He beckons me and I sit on his couch and wait.
Shortly, he puts the folder down on his desk and looks at me for the first time. His eyes are unfathomably blue; I mean it’s really ridiculous. And he’s smiling. Maybe not everything is in the folder.
“Good morning, Carlotta. Have you been finding everything so far?”
I return his smile, not even wincing at my grandmother’s name. My turn. “I go by Carly. Yes, actually. Mrs. Girard was very nice. She showed me where the nurse is, so I could drop off my diaper change supplies there before coming here.”
If that throws him at all I can’t tell by his expression. Oh, this guy’s good. He probably saw it in my records, but still…no reaction to my frank statement: well done!
“Mrs. Feathers is very experienced,” he says. “I’m sure she’ll be able to help you just fine.”
Bravo! No trace of irony. No hint of anything. “Yeah, she seemed really nice. I didn’t exactly get the impression I was the first incontinent kid of her career.”
He laughs. “I’m sure you’re not. Most are probably handled in Special Ed, but there must be many others who’ve been in the main population.”
“Not quite like me, though,” I offer.
He nods. “Well, I guess you’re a bit of an unusual case. May I ask why you’ve decided to be so open about what most kids your age wouldn’t talk about to save their lives?”
And here it is. He’s been dying to know, but he waited patiently for the perfect moment for the question to come up naturally. He’s really good. I’m going need to watch out for this guy. He leans back in his chair, as if this is NBD to either of us. Just another conversation with a kid. What is in that file, anyway? It would probably be helpful to know, but I don’t, so I just stay in the moment.
“No big mystery, Mr. Grayson.”
“Call me Mr. G, Carly. Pretty much everyone does.”
One of those teachers. OK. “That’s cool, Mr. G. Well, as I said, it’s no big mystery. I had all sorts of emotional issues at my old school, and I blame a lot of them on the fact that I was constantly worried about people finding out. And when they did, well, it was pretty much every bit as bad as I thought it would be, just the way it was in middle school and elementary school too. So when we moved I made the decision that I’d just own the thing. It’s not as if I can do anything about it anyway.”
He nods, as if I’ve just said the most natural thing in the world. The tone of his voice when he responds is, if I have to categorize it, interested. “That’s a most…unusual decision, Carly.”
I smile. “I’m sort of an unusual girl.”
“Yes,” he says, and he pauses a bit too long. It is in there. He’s trying to figure out whether to bring it up. “You know you’ll still get teased,” he says.
I’m almost disappointed that he’s decided against it. Wonder where that conversation would go. “Yeah, I know. But this time it will be on my terms. And if I treat it as a matter-of-fact medical issue––which is what it is––I don’t think things will be too bad.”
He pauses, glancing back at my file. “I see you’ve moved around quite a bit.”
I shrug. “Mom keeps changing jobs. She’s good at what she does and lots of opportunities come her way.”
“I see,” he says. Another pause. This time I can see he’s only looking at my schedule. Things are about to get pretty normal.
“You have a very mature attitude for someone in your situation, Carly. Good for you. Now I see you have three AP classes? English, History, and Spanish? And most of the others are Honors level. Tough schedule.”
“It’s actually a little easier than what I was taking back in Chicago,” I tell him. “You don’t offer Chem AP here, so I’m taking it Honors.”
He looks at me and closes the folder. “Well, you’re an ambitious girl,” he says. “I see you were a field hockey player at your previous high school. We don’t have a team here; any idea what you might want to do for extra curriculars?”’
It’s true I played JV field hockey, not that I was ever any good at it. I was always way too nervous because of the diapers. I had a private place to change, and I was lucky enough never to have a messy accident with the team, but worrying about exposing my secret drove me nuts. I think the coaches thought I just didn’t have the drive. So I never would have made the team this year when it’s either varsity or nothing. Of course, this season everyone would already know. Anyway, last season was when all of the weirdness started, so I’m not even sure you can really say I was a part of the team at the end anyway.`
“To tell the truth, I haven’t much thought about it.”
His smile again, and those eyes… Does he know their effect? “I think you should consider joining something, Carly. ECs look good on college apps, and you need to start thinking about that. We’ll talk volunteer work later. Meanwhile, I think you’d better get off to…” He checks my schedule. “…math.”
I shudder involuntarily.
“Not your fav?”
With a small laugh, I reply, “Let’s just say math and I have had our differences.” I rise and shake his hand across his desk. It’s something strangely electric. For a fraction of a second, my whole arm seems charged; it seems almost separate from me. I don’t know if he notices. There’s no indication of anything in those eyes.
“Um…I guess I’ll talk to you later. Mr. G,” I say, and leave his office.
I’m wet, I know, but not so much that I need a change, so I head for math. Class has already begun, so I guess the New Girl gets to make a grand entrance on her first day. Through the window on the door I spy an open seat in the aisle nearest the close wall; I decide to head for it. Opening the door as quietly as I can, I enter the room. The teacher, Mr. Truskin, is at the board. He’s a large man, slightly bald, and he’s…talking in tongues? I freeze in my tracks just inside the door. Oh God, it can’t be. Not so soon. I hoped I’d have some kind of break. But he jabbers on in some crazy cartoonish voice spouting gibberish and I just stare, feeling my diaper getting wetter. Suddenly, though, I realize that his voice isn’t the only sound in the room: the other kids are laughing, their attention so rapt at their teacher’s antics that they haven’t yet even noticed that I’m standing here, open-mouthed, my expression almost certainly one of abject terror.
He’s doing some kind of bit.
I let out a breath, and I realize I haven’t been breathing since I walked in. It’s at this point that Mr. Truskin notices me. Taking me in, he smiles and walks over.
“They told me I was getting a new student today!” he says in a booming voice nothing at all like whatever he was doing a moment ago. “You must be Carlotta!”
“Carly,” I tell him and the whole class.
“Carly!” he corrects himself with so much enthusiasm that I start to wonder if he’s on something and if I can get hold of it. “Welcome, Carly! You’re from…Illinois, right?”
I nod. “Yes, near Chicago.”
“Well, you escaped just in time. You won’t need to worry about those midwest winters here! OK, I think we have an open seat right over here.” He points to the seat I noticed earlier and I go to sit in it. “Do you have your book yet?”
I shake my head. “No problem,” he says. “Look on with Marina, there, for today.”
He indicates a girl with short styled brown hair, dressed in some kind of designer jeans and a Simpsons cropped t-shirt I think I’ve seen at Hot Topic. She nods as I sit next to her. I haven’t a clue about what they’ve been studying, but Marina promises to meet me at lunch to help me catch up. One class down. English is next. Since I’m on time for this one, I go straight to the teacher, Mrs. Weller, and introduce myself.
“Hi, Mrs. Weller. I’m Carly Lannigan, your new student.”
Mrs. Weller, a young teacher, seemingly fresh out of grad school, smiles in greeting. “Nice to meet you, Carly. They told me you were coming.”
Here goes. “Did they also tell you of my medical issues?”
She looks puzzled. Clearly, if they did, she missed the memo. “I don’t think so.”
I give her my best smile. “I’m completely incontinent and rely on diapers to contain my waste. The school knows this. There will be times when I will arrive late because I’m getting changed in the nurse’s office, and there might be other times when I need to leave class urgently so that I don’t expose you and the other students to…well, let’s just say to olfactory insurgency.”
By the time I finish, a couple of other students have come up to Mrs. Weller’s desk for one reason or another and hear at least the end of my spiel. I finish with the same smile and volume at which I started. I turn and smile at them also. “Hi. Carly Lannigan.” Their eyes are exactly where you’d think they would be, but I’m wearing a skirt so nothing at all shows.
Mrs. Weller’s voice turns me around. “I don’t think that’s…polite, girls.”
I laugh. “It’s OK, Mrs. Weller. I guess it’s only natural curiosity, don’t you think?”
The other girls return to their seats, and I hear them whispering to others as they go. There are quiet exclamations and giggling and a couple of “What?”s and other responses bouncing around the room.
Mrs. Weller is speaking to me. “That’s pretty gutsy of you,” she says.
I shrug my shoulders. “Tired of the alternative.”
She gives me a long look. “I think,” she said, “I’m going to like having you in this class. If you’re half as interesting as a student as your introduction suggests you can be.”
“Mrs. Weller,” I say, “you have no idea.”
By lunchtime, I think the whole school knows. Which is fine. Some kids give me a wide berth in the hallways; others giggle as they pass. But I’ve already met several who just don’t care, and I sit with them at lunch. Mrs. Feathers and I have also already developed a deep bond: I can easily change myself when it’s just wet, but when it’s messy I really need help, and that sort of thing bonds you quickly. That happened in Chem class. Rumors about it probably account for the wide berths.
Anyway, I’m sitting here with four other girls: Marina from math, who turned out to be cool with the whole thing even though she didn’t know at the time; Sarah and Madison from English, who were both part of a group project we did in class and we sort of bonded; and Janelle, a girl I met in my study hall. I’m exempted from phys ed this year for medical reasons (which isn’t exactly making me cry), so they assigned me to a study hall for that period. Janelle told me that upperclassmen don’t usually have them here; she’s a sophomore but she’s taking a bunch of junior classes.
“What’s it like?” she wants to know.
“My pizza?” I ask.
She slaps me playfully and Madison and Marina shake their heads at my intentional obtuseness. “No,” Janelle replies. “The diapers.”
“Well, I want to know about the pizza,” Sarah says, and they laugh. “I might get it tomorrow.”
Miranda laughs. “Isn’t it the same pizza as last year?”
Madison turns to her. “Didn’t you eat here last week? We have a new food service.”
“A new service? God, I hope they still have the cheesy fries.”
This time Sarah jumps in. “They do. I had them on Friday. I think they’re the same, mostly.”
I laugh along with them. “Well, either way, the pizza sucks. Don’t bother. But I’m spoiled; I’ve been living in Chicago. As to the diapers…I mean it’s hard to say. When you need them, you need them. So they’re just like…thicker underwear, I guess.”
“But why do you need them?” Janelle asks.
“Because I’m incontinent,” I say simply. But that’s not a good enough answer, and I know it. “OK, OK. I’ve been incontinent all of my life because of some birth defect. No one has ever been able to analyze it or point a finger to what it is specifically or what caused it, but somehow my bladder and sphincter muscles just don’t work. When I wasn’t toilet trained by 5, my parents had all kinds of tests done but no luck. So I just stayed in diapers.”
“God,” Marina says, “that must have been horrible.”
“What makes it a bit worse is that I have a hard time changing them myself.”
They all seem surprised, which isn’t exactly…surprising. I mean they’ve probably all babysat before and understand that the basic mechanics aren’t that hard. It’s Madison who asks me why.
“I had a bad fall in the playground when I was little. I was on one of those climbing things, at the top, and I somehow fell off.”
There is a collective gasp. I knew there would be. There always has been when I’ve told this part.
“Anyway, I landed on my shoulder and ripped up something called the brachial plexus. It’s a major nerve bundle that controls most of the arm, so things could be worse. But in the end, I don’t have a lot of rotation in my right arm, and my use of my right hand is a little spotty. I can change myself when I’m just wet, but…anything else and I need help.”
Janelle shakes her head. “That’s just unfair. I mean totally unfair.”
Sarah is deep in thought. “I feel so bad for you.”
“It made for a pretty hard childhood. We moved around a lot. There was only one school––the one where I went in grades 1-3––that handled it well. The others were…less than perfectly helpful.”
“Meaning?” asks Sarah.
“Meaning I was teased and ridiculed for still being in diapers ‘at my age.’”
The others are aghast. “By teachers?” a couple say together.
“By teachers, by my so-called friends when they found out, by their parents… As I said, it wasn’t a lot of fun. We started moving and changing schools so often that my parents ended up fighting all the time.”
“Uh oh,” says Madison.
“Yeah,” I say. “You know how kids whose parents are divorced blame themselves and it’s usually silly, and the parents assure them it isn’t their fault? Well, mine can’t do that. Cause it most definitely was my fault.”
Madison reaches for my hand. “That is not fair. It isn’t your fault that you were born with…with…defects. If anyone is to be blamed, and I don’t think anyone should be, it ought to be them. I mean it was their genes that made you.”
There is a general echo of agreement at the table, and I feel a couple of tears slipping from my eyes. This is new: I don’t even remember the last time I felt compassion from classmates. Not real compassion. I mean, “Sorry we didn’t win today” isn’t very personal, right? And after that mess last year no one even talked to me…though I desperately needed someone to. Only Dr. Sessions talked to me. None of my “friends.” Did I even have any?
“Carly?”
Marina has been saying something and I’ve been totally spacing. “Sorry. Zoned out there for a moment. What did you say?”
“I just asked if you ever see your dad?”
I sigh. The truth is that, at first, back in 5th grade or so, I did see him quite a lot. It was as if he wanted me to believe it wasn’t me even though there was no way for me to believe that. He picked me up every weekend without fail, and we did all sorts of fun things together: the zoo, museums, movies, even water parks (I have quite a collection of swim diapers) and state parks. But as time went on “every weekend” became twice a month, and that became once a month. By the time Mom and I moved to Elmdale, leaving Dad several moves behind in Ohio, he apparently decided I just wasn’t worth the trip. My whole two years in Elmdale I only saw him twice, both in the first semester: once he came to see a play I was in, which frankly surprised me. And then, two months later, he decided to ask me to visit him in Cleveland for Christmas break.
I was excited, actually. I thought he clearly wanted me back in his life. Looking back, I can see that Mom wasn’t as enthusiastic as I was: she had her suspicions of her ex-husband. But even she could never have guessed what he was about to unleash into our world.
“No,” I say. “He’s…out of the picture.”
Her face falls. “Oh, I’m sorry.”
I look her directly in the eyes. “Don’t be. He was never my father. I’m not sorry he’s gone.” That stops the chatter for a bit. I mean there’s not much you can do to respond, is there? So for a few minutes we all work on our “meals” in silence. It’s Marina who finally speaks.
“I guess I should help you with that math stuff, right?”
And we’re off into more “comfortable” territory. The rest of the day pretty much goes the same way. When I’m done, I Uber home, change, and try to get my homework done before Mom gets home. She’s going to want to know everything, and she always manages to get me to tell. I’ve got about two hours.
I should be fine.
