Average Jane |Lesbian Story|

Chapter 7

Jane tried to think of a project for the science fair, but she didn't know how to begin. In elementary school, she and Emily had just done whatever project their dads suggested, from a library book Jane's mother checked out every year on award-winning science fair ideas. One year they had done something with magnets. Another year they had let mold grow on different foods: apples, bread, yogurt. That had been Jane's favorite project.

She forgot what their hypothesis had been, but she still remembered how gross the food had looked when the project was displayed in the elementary-school gym.

This year she wanted to do something different—not an experiment out of a book but one she thought up all by herself. She fantasized about the judges to be astonished that a sixteen-year-old could have thought up such a project and carried it out all alone, single-handedly pushing back the frontiers of science. She imagined herself as the youngest person ever to win a Nobel Prize.

And if she did win, she'd say in her acceptance speech, "Everything I am today I owe to my science teacher, Ms. Grace Anderson." And Rapunzel would shake back her golden hair and smile at her the way she had in the class the other day. The daydreaming was so ridiculous that even Jane couldn't help giggling to herself.

So Jane knew that she wanted her project to win the science fair, or at least, win the heart of Ms. Anderson. The problem was, she still didn't have the faintest idea what the project should be.

~*~

As she arrived at the school the next day, Jane wondered if Emily would still be mad at her. Not that Emily had acted particularly mad after the conversation yesterday. They had watched dumb TV series together, as they usually did. They hadn't talked much as usual. But this time the silence had felt different.

Emily was on the parking lot first. She made herself go up to her best friend.

"Hey," Emily said, waving.

"Hi," Jane said, patting her back on the arm. It was good to know that the Loser Club was still going strong. Or as strong as it could be with its vice president breaking its rules.

"I saw her drive into the lot earlier," Emily said then, lowering her voice to the lovesick sigh she used when she talked about Ms. Anderson. "That's her red Honda over there. See it? Next to the white Jeep."

Jane glanced over at it dutifully. She was in love with Rapunzel, too, maybe even more in love than Emily was, but she didn't feel any particular thrill from seeing her car. People must fall in love in different ways. She didn't want to talk about her, either, the way Emily did. She just wanted—it sounded corny, but it was true—to do some great deed that would be worthy of her. But so far the only great deed she could think of was winning the science fair.

In first-period science, Ms. Anderson again gave the class time to work on their projects. Most students were working in groups of two or three, so all around the room, they were busy pulling their desks together.

Jane sat alone. So did Emily. Jane hoped some kids would invite Emily to join their group. No one did. She and Emily had worked together so many times, yet no one seemed to notice that today Emily's only partner had abandoned her.

Once again Ms. Anderson circulated from group to group, talking over everyone's ideas. As she sat with Mary's group, right next to her, Jane stared at her instead of at the blank page on which she had written Science Fair Ideas so hopefully last night.

Ms. Anderson's hair was up, in a long braid twisted around her head. Jane guessed that she was desperate to look older than she appeared, but it made her look foreign—Russian, maybe. She wore a purplish dress today, as long and swirly as her skirt had been.