Читать книгу Peach - Joanne Green - Страница 10

Track 5:

Ball and Chain

Janis Joplin

I go to mass with my mother and my brother. My brother ditches us right away to go sit with his buddies—he says, so he can make arm farts, but I know he's embarrassed. People still stare at me, Our Lady of the Miscarriage. I try to keep my eyes on the windows and the ceiling. In the chapel on the side aisle, there's a creepy statue of the Blessed Mother. I always feel like the BVM is eyeballing me, and that she doesn't like what she sees. When I look away, I glance back quick to see if her eyes have moved. My mom elbows me and tugs down her lace mantilla. Then I study the windows, two long rows of tall stained glass picturing the holy virgin martyrs. Like the saint they named my old school for, St. Agatha, who was some chick who got her tits lopped off for refusing to put out. It's like the Virginity Hall of Fame.

Father Nick usually beats this topic to death. Maybe because in confession all the St. Ag's girls tell him how they whisper the St. Aggie Story to their boyfriends when they're parked down the Lakes. Or is it paranoid to think Father nags because of me? When I told him about the rape thing Father Nick thought I made up a fairy tale.

“And who knows more about fairy tales than him?” Luna hooted.

I know she was just trying to make me feel better, but I thought lightning might strike her.