Imogen obviously, p.4
Imogen, Obviously, page 4
I think about Lili, and how her face lights up every time she talks about Blackwell. It’s like she’s fallen in love with this whole entire place.
So maybe I’ll fall in love with it, too.
The sun’s just starting to set as we make our way back to the dorms—the group’s disbanding, but only temporarily. We’re meeting in about an hour for a trivia night in the student center.
“It’s super chill,” Lili assures me.
“The most chill,” Tessa adds. “And you can win money.”
“Except we don’t, because we’re really bad,” Lili says.
“Okay, but hear me out.” Tessa points at her. “I think tonight’s our night.”
Lili smiles a little. “Oh yeah?”
“I’m just saying. We’ve got Imogen now.”
I let out a startled laugh. “What?”
“True.” Lili grins.
“And Jean-Claude,” Tessa adds. “He’ll definitely come through on all the French questions.”
“There has never, ever been a French question.”
“We just have to be strategic! Play to our strengths.” Tessa pokes my arm, and my heart does the quickest half flip. “What’s your area of expertise?”
We reach the dorm, and Lili swipes her keycard to open the door.
“Um.” I pause. “Overthinking?”
“Ooh, nice. Yup. Always need one of those on the team,” Tessa says.
“She’s being modest,” Lili says, glancing back at me. “Immy, you’re a literal award-winning chef. You’re just not going to mention that?”
Tessa stops short. “You’re an award-winning chef?”
“Yeah . . . I don’t want to brag, but”—I bite back a smile—“I kind of swept the ten-and-under category in the Li’l Cookies Library Fundraiser Bake-Off.”
“Yeah you did.” Tessa high-fives me.
“Best Rice Krispie Treat of my life,” Lili says.
“Thanks! It’s the recipe from the back of the Rice Krispies box.”
“Still counts!” Lili presses the elevator call button. “And—let’s see. She makes the absolute best vision boards.”
“Like at the eye doctor?” Tessa tilts her head. “Read this line of letters and numbers? Which way is the E pointing?”
I laugh. “No. It’s like a visual aesthetic collage, kind of?”
“Wait, let me pull up my Notes app and write these down,” Tessa says, tugging her phone from her pocket. “Okay, Imogen’s . . . areas . . . of expertise. Rice Krispie Treat making, vision boards—”
“And typing with a cat in her lap,” Lili adds as we step inside the elevator. “She’s great at that. Oh, and emoji precision.”
“What?” I smile.
“Like, you’re really good at finding the exact right emoji.”
“Thank you?”
“Most people get lazy about it. But not you.” Lili presses the third-floor button, turning back to Tessa. “Ooh, put down that she’s good at looking like she’s not paying attention when she’s actually paying perfect attention. Like, it’s actually kind of creepy.”
I nod. “These all sound like very normal trivia categories.”
“Yeah, we’ve got it in the bag,” Tessa says, tapping her toe against mine with a grin.
7
Lili shuts the door, plopping beside me on the edge of my bed. “How are you holding up? This is a lot, I know—”
“No, it’s great! I’m good.”
She stares me down.
I laugh. “Really!”
“You’re not overwhelmed?”
“Why would I be overwhelmed?”
“Um. I don’t know.” Lili leans back on her palms. “Being here? Meeting everyone? Having to play along with my big dumbass lie—”
“But it was fine! It wasn’t even a thing.”
I mean, it’s just backstory, right? The past is always just backstory.
I think about that sometimes—how the only way to let someone into your reality is to retell it. Even true things come out filtered, imperfect, and muddled. So what’s the harm in Lili taking it a step or two further?
“Okay, but it’s stressful! And Immy, I know you! I know your little hamster-wheel brain was already freaking out about whether my friends were going to like you—which, for the record, Kayla’s already texted me to say you’re awesome, and Mika said you’re—and I quote—‘transcendently sweet.’”
My cheeks go warm. “That’s so nice—”
“And don’t even get me started on little miss flirty-pants Tessa—”
“She’s—what?” I look up with a start.
“Oh, don’t worry! It’s Tessa. She does that.”
“No! Yeah, no—I wasn’t worried.” I pause. “Did I seem worried?”
“Not at all. I’m just saying—”
“Because it wouldn’t bother me. You know? Like, I’m not freaked out by it.”
“By Tessa being a flirt?” Lili looks slightly bewildered.
I blush. “By, you know. Girls in general. Sorry.” I cover my face with both hands. “I’m acting really straight right now, huh?”
Lili laughs. “What?”
“I just don’t want to make anyone uncomfortable. And I don’t want to blow your cover.” I peek through my fingers. “I know I’m not the most believable queer girl.”
“That’s—sorry, but what? Immy, I don’t even know what that means. ‘Believable queer girl?’” Lili blinks. “What makes a queer girl believable?”
“I don’t know,” I say softly.
The truth is, I’ve never quite been able to pin it down. The way queerness announces itself. And how it seems so intuitive for people. How people just seem to know.
I mean, there’s Gretchen’s whole unspoken-recognition gaydar thing. But it’s more than that. There’s a certain aesthetic to queer girlhood. Or maybe it’s several aesthetics, but I don’t fit any of them. I don’t have Tessa’s tomboy energy or Gretchen’s pink hair, or a jean jacket like the one Edith wears every day. Even Lili, in her ringer T-shirt and gym shorts, looks potentially queer. Like she could be queer.
I wouldn’t even know where to begin. Bulk order of enamel pins? Some kind of hair transformation? I’ve never dyed my hair, and it’s never been shorter than shoulder-length. And I probably wear dresses and skirts more than pants. I’m pretty sure there were a few years in elementary school where I only wore dresses. All my socks had to have either lace or ruffles.
I’m not explaining this well.
I try to put it into words, and it just sounds like a list of surface details and stereotypes. I bet I’d be laughed off campus if I said any of this out loud. Or canceled. Probably both. But there’s got to be some kernel of truth buried in there, right? There have to be some sort of visible markers of queerness. Otherwise, how could so many people know at a glance that I’m straight?
Maybe it comes down to vibes. Or that particular sort of awkwardness straight girls sometimes get around queer girls. Gretchen called me out for that over the summer.
The entire conversation is burned into my brain, beat by beat.
We were cross-legged on the floor of her bedroom, analyzing a bunch of DMs and texts she’d gotten from this girl named Ella. They’d met a few weeks earlier at one of those summer STEM enrichment programs. Gretchen couldn’t decide if the texts were flirtatious, and she kept talking herself in circles about it. And since I don’t have a clue what flirting looks like, I was basically just nodding along.
Until Gretchen stopped mid-sentence. “Hey, can you try not to do that?”
When I looked up from her phone, she was blinking back tears. She wiped her eyes with the heels of her hands.
“I—I’m not sure what I should stop doing,” I’d stammered.
“You seriously don’t see it.”
I shook my head.
“Well, just so you know, it’s been pretty hard to talk with you about girls I like. And I’ve been feeling that way for a while now.”
I remember it felt like my lungs had stopped working. “About—girls?”
“You’re, like, palpably uncomfortable! You don’t even make eye contact when I talk about Ella. And it’s every time. Whereas with Caden—anytime it’s a guy, you’re all in.” She lets out a breath. “And I get it. I get that you can relate more when it’s a guy. But my crushes on girls are real too! And they’re important to me! And yeah, it’s funny that you get so flustered about it, but it also kind of makes me not want to share them.”
Her voice cracked a little when she said that, and I sat there, half-frozen, half-frantic. I cast my thoughts back to all the other times Gretchen had talked about Ella, about Caden, about anyone. Had I felt uncomfortable?
I didn’t think so—but then again, would I even have realized it if I was? Unconscious queerphobia does exist, after all.
I was so flooded with guilt and shame, I could barely wrangle the words. “Gretch, I’m so sorry. I don’t even know what to say.”
“It’s fine. You didn’t know,” she’d said. “I appreciate you apologizing, though.”
“I can’t believe I made you feel like that.”
“Yeah . . . it’s kind of one of those things. Like, we live in a queerphobic society, you know? It’s almost impossible not to internalize at least some of that. But it’s good, because once you’re aware of your biases, you can actually start to work on them,” she’d said. “And I’m always happy to help with that stuff. Always.”
Texts with Gretchen
IS: Okay so
IS: Just got back from dinner, heading to trivia in a sec
IS: But M is totally cool; and down-to-earth, zero influencer vibes
GP: AHHHH that’s so great
IS: They’re pretty quiet in person! Like waaaay more introverted than they are online
IS: You know how there’s always that one person in the group who doesn’t talk a lot, but they’re always super engaged
IS: Like they’re clearly taking EVERYTHING in?
GP: Uh, Immybean, that’s you
GP: you’re the Mika of pride alliance!!!
IS: HAHAHAHA
IS: Wow
IS: That is extremely flattering
IS: So like the thing about Mika is they’re completely not awkward
IS: Quiet but not awkward
GP: The rarest combination!!!!
GP: Ahhh this makes me so happy
GP: Look at you, all grown up
GP: Your first night out on campus!!!
8
My first night out on campus.
I know it’s just trivia, not an orgy. Not even orgy-adjacent. But there’s no stopping the rush of butterflies in my stomach as I follow Lili and Tessa up the central staircase of the student center. There’s a lounge area tucked into one of the back corners of the space—bland and functional, like a waiting room, or one of those seating areas at the mall. Other than a few square tables in the center, it’s mostly just chairs and couches arranged into clusters.
“So, there are usually, like, five teams,” Lili says. “Three or four people per. We’re always the biggest group.”
I spot Declan and Kayla in a pair of blue-gray armchairs on either end of a short, rectangular table. In between them, Mika’s perched on the edge of a couch, leaning forward to write on a white board. Just enough room for Lili, me, and Tessa to scoot in beside them.
A moment later, a Black girl in a beanie steps into the center of the space, trailed by a white girl holding a miniature dry-erase board. “Hello, hello! Where are my trivia fiends?”
A loud woooooo erupts from a trio of girls in bodycon dresses and heels.
“All right! Let’s do this. For those who don’t know me, I’m Sasha, and this is Erin.” Sasha pauses, peering around the space. “Okay, cool, lots of familiar faces, a couple new people. Let’s run through the rules really quickly. So, we’ve got twelve questions. Erin’s going to read each one out loud, and then we’ll start the clocks. You’ve got three minutes to confer with your group and write your answer on the white board.”
Erin holds up her white board, beaming like a TV presenter.
“When time’s up, drop your markers, and we’ll see what you’ve got. One point for every right answer—wrong or incomplete answers get nada. No partial credit. Um. And then there’s the wild card round at the end, where you can wager your points. The team with the highest point total at the end gets the jackpot.”
Erin rubs her thumb and forefinger together and mouths the word ooh.
Sasha continues. “And I know you wouldn’t dream of it, but just a reminder! No googling, no texting your space-engineer auntie or whatever. Honor system, okay?” She gives an exaggerated thumbs-up. “Okay! Let’s lock in those team names.”
Mika holds up the dry-erase board, displaying the words l’equipe: Jean-Claude LePoisson in elegant cursive.
Lili does finger guns. “Funny.”
Minutes later, Sasha claps a few times to get everyone’s attention. “Okay! Diving in. Erin, take it away!”
Erin glances down at her paper. “All right! Question number one! What is the body’s largest organ?”
Skin. I think?
Mika’s already uncapping the dry-erase marker.
“Skin. Definitely,” says Lili.
“Definitely,” agrees Kayla.
“Markers down, boards up!” Sasha declares. “And the answer we’re looking for is . . . skin!”
I shoot Lili a grin. “Aren’t we supposed to be bad at this?”
“Oh, they’ll get harder.”
“Okay, let’s see . . .” Erin scans her page of questions. “The 1999 film 10 Things I Hate About You was inspired by which Shakespeare play?”
The Taming of the Shrew, I think.
“Much Ado About Nothing?” says Kayla.
I stop short, all my certainty gone in an instant.
Could it be Much Ado? Did Taming just burrow its way into my head somehow?
Maybe I’ve been wrong about this for years.
Although.
It kind of has to be Taming, right? The plot tracks pretty closely—even the character names line up. Does that mean Kayla’s wrong?
I rub my cheek, feeling weirdly unsettled.
Gretchen told me about this experiment once, where a psychologist asked groups of people to compare the lengths of different lines. Solomon Asch—that was the psychologist’s name. I love when the syllables of someone’s name match with mine.
Asch was studying conformity, but he was sneaky about it. He’d always put one clueless subject in a group of people who were secretly in on the plan. Then, sometimes the undercover people would all say the same wrong answer on purpose—just to see if the real test subject would go along with it.
“Most of the time, they did,” Gretchen had told me. “Even when the right answer was completely obvious. But these people actually convinced themselves they were wrong. They overruled their own visual perception.”
Gretchen had been dumbfounded by this, but to me, it made sense.
Perfect sense. Too much sense.
It’s definitely The Taming of the Shrew, right? One hundred percent. So.
I draw in a deep breath and say it.
Kayla smacks her forehead. “Yes! Thank you. No, you’re totally right.”
“Two for two!” Tessa high-fives me. “What did I tell you? Tonight’s our night.”
And by the time we hit the halfway point, I’m starting to think she may be right. We haven’t missed a single question yet.
Erin clears her throat. “Next up! What animal is featured on California’s state flag?”
“Oh, come on. State flags?” Declan says.
“Not California!” Tessa shakes her head. “Look at us. A Philadelphian, a Minnesotan, a New York City kid, and three upstate New Yorkers.”
“I literally don’t know what my own state flag looks like,” says Mika.
I pause. “Is it a bear?”
“Oh?” Declan asks.
“I don’t know! It might not be—”
But I’m right. And then the next question’s practically made for me. “What actress starred alongside Noah Centineo and Madelaine Petsch in the 2020 Netflix romantic comedy Shop Talk?”
“Kara Clapstone,” I say.
Lili grins. “Your sister would actually disown both of us if we missed this one.”
She’s not even joking—Shop Talk has basically been Edith’s religion since the trailer dropped. Even though Gretchen says it’s assimilative, unrealistic garbage made for straight people. Not just Gretchen, I guess—lots of people online seem to feel the same way about it, especially because Kara Clapstone is straight in real life. But Edith doesn’t care about the Shop Talk discourse—I’m not sure she even knows about it. She doesn’t seek that stuff out the way I do.
Like the first time I watched But I’m a Cheerleader. Before I’d even left Lili’s house, I was already scouring the internet for other people’s reactions. But that just made me more confused. Every think piece felt like the definitive final word—and then I’d be fully convinced by the exact opposite points in the next one. I was a human sailboat, blown in every direction by a storm of decades-old media discourse.
Am I allowed to love this? That was always the question.
When Sasha confirms our answer, the whole group lets out a cheer and high-fives me.
“Killing it!” Lili says.
“Wait.” Kayla’s hands fly to her mouth. “Lex Appeal missed that one. Are we actually—”
“Next question,” says Erin. “What singer was born with the name Robert Allen Zimmerman?”
“Uh,” Kayla says.
Declan shakes his head.
Mika and Lili both tilt their palms up.
“Don’t know, but he sounds Jewish!” says Tessa.
Five pairs of hopeful eyes turn to me.
I wince. “I’m sorry. No idea.”
Lili elbows me. “Stop feeling bad.”
“I know, but—”
“Nope. Not on you. This is an act of collective dumbassery.”
We end up guessing Robbie Williams. It’s our first wrong answer of the night.
Then Erin asks what breed of cat has no tail, and we miss that one, too. Every single one of us thought the word was minx. But it’s manx.
