My Foster Mom Wanted A Daughter - Book 2 Of A Series

Chapter 8: School

As the school year began, Angelo's worst fears about starting, largely failed to materialize.

While it was true that he was one of the shortest and slenderest of boys, he was hardly noticed among the many diverse students in this arts high school.

There were both boys and girls with crazy hairstyles, many in all sort of unnatural hues. A lot of the boys had earrings, and some of the girls dressed in baggy, macho, unflattering outfits.

Among the many minority students (at least half the school was a minority), there were extreme styles too. There was one black boy in particular that Angelo noticed.

He was a slender, effeminate boy, who wore a pair of tight-fitting skinny jeans with a silvery sheen, topped off with a deep purple unisex blouse, and several silver necklaces. He exaggerated his effeminacy and was always surrounded by a gaggle of girls, with whom he was giggling and using outlandish gestures.

The boy performed for his admiring group of females but seemed to have the rapt attention of one particularly attractive blond girl.

Angelo watched him intensively, marveling how such a boy, an obvious sissy, could be so attractive to girls. Briefly, he imagined himself in the boy's place. He imagined himself looking even more girlish and finding even more admiring looks.

Suddenly, his daydream was interrupted when a group of husky, ill-dressed boys burst into the group, roughly pushing the effeminate boy out from among his female friends. They were calling him names: "Eddie the effeminate fag," "Fruitcake," and "Sissy."

The boy seemed to slink away from the bullies, who continued moving on down the hall looking for their next victim.

Angelo watched as the boy moved to a small alcove and cowered up into isolation. Angelo could swear he saw tears in the boy's face. The blond girl moved to his side and offered comfort.

It was a moment of truth for Angelo; certainly, he might soon be victimized in the same way if he continued to display his femininity. He had to be careful, he realized. Being new to the school, Angelo had no friends or acquaintances there. In fact, every face was a strange face.

He realized he was seeing everyone for the first time in his life, as he attended his classes; homeroom, then algebra, a study hall, English, dance class, lunch break, drama, and general science.

No one talked to him in the early classes and he shyly sat at his desk, identifying himself through his voice as he responded to, "Angelo Davies," with a "here" which sounded girlishly high.

It appeared no one seemed to notice the high voice, but Angelo knew that anyone looking at him had to see the deep red of his face when he spoke.

The class Angelo had right before lunch was a dance class he chose in lieu of gym, which was an option for theater program students.

Since this was the first day of school, the dance students remained in their street clothes. They were told to sit in a circle around the floor as Miss Satterstein told them how they would be working hard in her class.

"You'll work harder here than any gym class, so if you chose dance to avoid hard work, you should leave now," she warned the students. Angelo looked around but no one left.

As the teacher continued to talk, Angelo looked around, counting perhaps twenty kids in the class, and was surprised to see only one other boy.

It was Eddie, the effeminate boy Angelo had seen bullied in the hallway. At a quick glance, Angelo realized the class seemed to be composed of all girls since Eddie had longish hair and had seated himself with his legs tucked, in the girliest manner, to one side. Looking down at himself, Angelo realized that he was seated the same way and probably looked just as girlish as Eddie did.

Returning his attention to Miss Satterstein, Angelo heard her asking the students to introduce themselves and to state why they chose dance class and whether they had any previous training.

The introductions droned on and Angelo's mind eventually began to wander again.

Looking at pictures of ballerinas on the wall, he day-dreamed of someday getting to wear a tutu. He imagined himself first as a ballerina and then as a professional ballroom dancer in four-inch heels and a beautiful, flowing gown that touched the floor in the back and was short enough that it left little to the imagination in front. His day-dreaming was interrupted with: "Now Miss, what is your name?"

"Me?" He looked up startled, seeing the teacher pointing at him. "Yes, you. Miss. And what is your name?"

Angelo was tongue-tied but soon blurted out, "Angelo. Angelo Davies."

The voice came our high and frantic, and to make matters worse, he quickly brushed his hair out of his face with a flick of his wrist.

"Angelo," the teacher repeated. "Angelo. Oh yes, the other boy in this class."

Angelo sat down feeling shamed in front of his new classmates. He turned his head downward, feeling totally humiliated. He knew that his classmates were now probably examining him in a most curious fashion. He felt so inadequate trying to be a boy when he could easily have been in the class as a girl.

"Well students," the teacher went on. "We'll start off slow and see what each of you can do. It's too bad we don't have any more boys in the class since it'll restrict some of our dances."

Angelo was sure that the teacher must have also lamented that the two boys she had in the class were no stronger than the girls and too weak to do the muscular roles demanded of male dancers.

Miss Satterstein began explaining that beginning tomorrow the students would have to wear shorts and tank tops for dance class, just as the bell rang.

"Hi Angelo," said a high feminine voice behind him as he, was about to enter the cafeteria for lunch. He looked around to see a short, somewhat fleshy girl who had identified herself as Cecilie in class. He acknowledged her with a nod of his head, and she walked up next to him.

"You're new here," she stated confidently.

"Yes, I am," he said. "I don't know anyone."

"Well, you know me at least," she said with a wide grin on her round, freckled face.

"I guess I do. You're Cecilie, right?" He smiled at the friendliness of this girl.

"Yeah, I am, Angelo. Why don't you come join our table for lunch," she offered, pointing to a table with four other girls and two other empty stools.

It turned out that this table seemed to be populated by the brainiest, but hardly the prettiest, girls in school. Two of the girls, Maxine and Janet, were much like Cecilie; they were chunky, but also warm and friendly. Another, Marie, was tall and blonde, but wore no makeup and let her hair flow freely, and apparently uncombed or brushed.

The last was, Henrietta, a light, dark-complexioned girl of slight stature. She had a pimply face, but like the others had dancing, bright eyes.

They welcomed Angelo without ceremony, giving him a cursory "Hi" or "How are you?" They were deeply involved in giggling over the remarks that emerged from the speaker system earlier, by the principal, commenting how inane his remarks were. Soon Angelo was giggling along with them, and he was adding some comments of his own, no longer trying to hide the girliness of his voice.

It was obvious the girls liked him and he was welcomed into their group. It was like being "one of the girls," he would tell his mom later.

Cecilie, Angelo observed, was truly bright and observant. As they walked together to the next class (history), she confided in him that there were a group of bullies in the school and that they loved to pick on younger and smaller boys.

"Try not to walk alone," she said. "My girlfriends and I like you. We'll walk with you so that maybe they won't bother you."

Angelo blushed at this, realizing that these girls were offering to protect him. Was this not the most awful irony of all? A boy needing the protection of girls.

"Oh you don't have to," he protested.

"But we like you, Angelo. We want to walk with you."

Angelo smiled to himself. He had already found friends on the first day. Friends that were all girls he was going to enjoy being around and hanging out with.