The crowds, oh you should see the crowds. They flock. It’s not just people from the city, not just from the suburban isles. They come from everywhere. It’s a tradition. The 92nd Annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. The chilled November winds shooting down Central Park West. The earmuffs and scarves and mismatched gloves, the cocoa for the kids, coffee for the parents and whiskey for the brave. The low autumn light as it ambles through Central Park’s yellowing line of bending and twisting maples, the parade’s oldest spectators.
Charlie Brown and Thomas the Tank Engine and Mickey and his whole gang, Spiderman and Pikachu and Kermit the Frog, an Angry Bird or two, the Energizer Bunny and the Pillsbury Doughboy and the iconic Macy’s Star, the titular Turkey and all the rest. None can match. All pale.
She’s the biggest. It’s her first and only year. The size, the majesty, the hundreds of color-coordinated hands holding tightly, an entire boy scout troop and then some, all proud to be a part of the greatest float of all. Cynthia Bryant. The one and only. None can compare. She is massive, sides bursting with thousands upon thousands of gallons of helium, a whole city block dwarfed, the sun struggling to peak around her bulbous sides. She is everywhere. You can’t ignore her. They all feel cheated by the rest. Bryant is the lone attraction.
Of course, it was always a possibility. But who likes to think of it? Why would she? The millions of eyes on her, some impressed, some in awe, some lost in disbelief, but all enraptured, all dreaming of the day they too could float above the city. Except for him. He wasn’t in awe. All he could do was wait for the perfect time. The turn and reveal, the moment Cynthia Bryant would go from local legend to national phenomenon, NBC anchors left speechless by her size and grace, her beauty flashing through the homes of the Turkey-basting nation. He waited till then to pop her, to thrust the pin deep and true, to shrivel the envy of all to nothing. He just couldn’t help himself.
Alan Fucking Youst.
A million eyes are now two. The wind is gone, no leaves, no mugs, no scarves, no mittens, no TV cameras, no basting. No one to envy Cynthia Bryant now. No one to look up. Only one set of eyes looking down. Cynthia can feel them even before lifting her head. This is the last place she wanted them to find her, sobbing in the third-floor, science-wing bathroom, a big, blubbering cliche.
Principal Davis is kind, Cynthia can admit that much. She may be looking out for her best interest, but all the kindness in the world could do nothing to shield the stares as they walked down the thin halls of the east-wing corridor. Envy is no longer on anyone’s mind and few make any effort to hide their derisive sympathy, their thank-god-it-isn’t-meisms.
Cynthia knows she is never one to be ignored, no matter what. She’s the girl you don’t want to bump into, the one you clear a path for, the one you leave the end seat for in the auditorium and cafeteria. She’s the fat one. She’d kill to be the fat one today. She was plenty used to that. The agony of her long walk to Davis’s office was not about size at all, it was about stupidity and ignorance and the name in big, sprayed-painted, bubble letters on the first-floor lockers. Cynthia Bryant wasn’t just the fat girl today, she was “Fatty Tits” and according to latest Defaced Locker Chronicle, she had one particular skill that made her well worth your time.
She wasn’t sure exactly what she was waiting for. She didn’t ask. Davis told her to wait so she waited. Cynthia had never found herself here, the dreaded Principal’s Office of lore, where harsh judgment passed, guillotines fell, chairs electrified and nooses hung. Davis’s wasn’t like those old stories, she made sure of it. Everything was bright, everything was nice, all the sharp edges worn away, everything fighting hard to be as unintimidating as possible.
You were supposed to want to enjoy the company of our nice, friendly Principal. Davis was set in a stoned opposition to all you’ve ever thought a principal ought to be. Davis was approachable, Davis was understanding, Davis was young, Davis was loose-down and she made every decision in accordance. It was a perfectly laid out road map to some nebulous cool she decided long ago would be her legacy at Rockwell High. The Principal who really got it.
Davis would never dream of punishing Cynthia for what she’d done. She just wanted the full story straight from the source, an exercise that would be punishment enough. She didn’t know how much she’d have to tell, how far back the tale would have to go. The first time she’d caught his eye looking at her, yes her, from across the class? The next five times she’d refused to believe, writing it off, ignoring it, pretending it couldn’t be because really, could it? The afternoon at her locker? It would have to include the note. To Cynthia from Alan Youst. No room for interpretation there. To the Fat Girl from the Handsome, Sandy-Haired Soccer Player.
Hindsight helps sort it out. Makes more sense when you know the ending. The ending that started with the simple request, the one he’d been working toward since the beginning. She’d known it was over the second it came out. She’d been a fool, drunk on his affection, high on the flip of his hair, lobotomized by the attention.
A blend of self-pity and morbid curiosity. She’d come this far, she thought, might as well go through with it. It was like finishing the final third of a bag of chips. The damage was done, what would a little more matter now? This was where she got off the Alan Youst ride once and for all, where all the whys she’d thrown up in the air finally came crashing down. So yeah, she sucked his dick. He’d asked so nicely after all.
It oozed from her, tumbling down her belly and legs onto the vivid, boxy carpet, floating across the deep brown mahogany of Davis’s knick-knack scattered desk, climbing up the bookshelves, slipping it’s way between every pristine spine, bouncing from her dusty monitor in the corner to the coat rack near the door. She told it all. Front to back. No edits, no matter how unflattering the turn of the screw. It was all out there now.
The silence was as good a response as any. She could live with Davis’s contemplative look. Then she saw it, the only piece of furniture out of place, the only thing that didn’t scream of new-wave education and choreographed understanding, this folded mesh of corduroy and flannel, a ball of timid lethargy, a whole heap of lack thereof that’d managed to sink into the room for the entirety of her story. The one and only professor Anthony Bryant, her father.
Down. She didn’t even need to tell her eyes where to go. They knew, studying the folds in her jeans, each individual stitching of her blouse. She wasn’t so keen on the silence any longer. Then it broke.
“Listen, this…”
“No, you listen. You listen, Ms. Principal Davis,” said something from the corner of the room.
“You can call me Susan.”
“No, you know what, I’m gonna call you Principal,” that same voice, that same something. Cynthia didn’t look up. It couldn’t be. “You are the Principal, right? I mean, really, I’m just checking. Cause, if you ask me, a Principal, a real one, one with power and one that, I don’t know, struck a little fear in her students’ hearts, wouldn’t be in here about to lecture this sweet, innocent girl while some pig-headed asshole is out there spray-painting lockers.”
“I assure you, really, I will get to the bottom…”
“Assure me,” he was unfolded, he was up, he was hovering over the desk. “Do me a favor and don’t assure me a goddamn thing. Cause I have a feeling all your assurances won’t amount to a hill of cowshit once this is all said and done.”
“I am sorry, sir, but you must settle down. I am the Principal…”
Before she could finish there came bang, followed by an audible gasp as every bit of her exhausting perceptive empathy flew to the floor.
He was a father! He couldn’t let this happen! This was outrageous and wrong! He wouldn’t sit here and see his little girl fall under the spells of the evil s word. He knew these boys, knew what they thought, how they thought, the evil the little trails of aggressive transgression weaving their way around their pubescent brains. She would be nothing to them, nothing but a dirty little, little…
This boy. That was the real issue. This little fuckin’ animal. He should be brought in. He should be the one in this office. He thinks he can get away with this. What kind of men are you teaching here Davis? What kind? He gets away with this and next thing you know he is getting innocent little girls pregnant and skipping town. It’s not a new story, it’s the oldest fuckin’ one and here you are, the cool principal, letting it continue its vicious cycle right here under your roof.
He wasn’t going to accept empty promises of punishment. Not from a principal who couldn’t keep kids from spray painting lockers. Was this a prison or a school? What did his daughter, smart and maybe just a little bit too innocent for her own good, do to deserve to be ridiculed so mercilessly. This is an outrage.
He flipped the chair, cursed the school, grabbed and hugged his daughter. He let her know it was okay and that he would protect her and her sadness was justified and everything would be alright. They took off, ran to the car, got the hell out the school once and for all.
She is up again, the sun and sky envious of the eyes she steals. They patched the hole. It was all thought to be over but no, the Cynthia Bryant float flies once again, free of the earth, unstoppable down the city streets, flying, hurdling, admired and beloved, all else falls away, she is…she is…
“…Well, thank you,” said the pile of clothes still thrown across the office’s leather chair. “I really appreciate you, uh, bringing this to my attention. Really I do. This is, this is serious. A very serious matter.”
“To be sure.”
“ It’s been tough, really, for both of us. Cynthia doesn’t let on, but I know she is still going through a lot. Since her mother left I mean. It’s just been a big burden on both of us. Thank you again, though, Ms…Ms.”
“Davis”
“Davis, yes. Thank you again for calling me in. I’ll talk to her and we’ll get this all figured out.”
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