Better with Time

“What’s wrong with her mouth?” the redheaded boy whispers to his friend like I can’t hear him.

I decide to take the high road. It’s not like this is the first time I’ve heard someone say something about my braces.

“It’s called braces,” I snap anyway, something in me short-circuiting. “We all had them.”

So maybe not the high road.

Normally I can brush this kind of thing off. But considering I spent most of last night in his friend Ian’s dorm room hanging out and making out, I’m feeling particularly rejected right now and therefore unpredictable.

“I’m not disfigured,” I continue before either of them can respond. “I’m just missing a tooth. It’s genetic. I need surgery. It’s actually really common.”

Then I walk away before my voice can do that embarrassing shaky thing.

Awesome. Great start to sophomore year.

The thing is, I’ve gotten used to explaining it before people can ask. I usually find some way to work it into conversation casually so people don’t think I’m hiding it.

I’d rather have pity than hidden disgust.

I honestly thought Ian liked me too. Which, looking back, maybe was ambitious. We talked all summer on Facebook Chat after he added me. Last night we hung out.

We kissed a little.

Okay, we kissed a lot.

Enough that I straightened my usually wavy and mostly uncontrollable mud-brown hair this morning and actually tried to look pretty instead of “girl who survives entirely on hoodies and academic validation.”

Apparently that effort was wasted.

By the time I make it outside, the wind has already turned my eyes watery enough to disguise this as a weather problem instead of an emotional one. Early September in upstate New York always smells faintly wet and miserable, like the universe knows winter is coming and wants everyone anxious about it ahead of schedule.

I pull out my ancient silver flip phone and hit speed dial one.

ANNIE BFF4EVA

I should probably change the contact name at some point, but it’s been there since I got the phone when I was fourteen and now it feels historical.

“Hi Mia,” Annie answers, sounding slightly out of breath.

“Why am I so ugly?” I ask immediately.

“Mia.”

“No seriously. Be honest. Like medically.”

“You are not ugly.”

“It’s the mouth thing. People are so weird about teeth. Everyone our age already knows how to smile and laugh properly without covering half their face with their hand like a Victorian woman dying of tuberculosis.”

“Mia, braces are temporary.”

Easy for her to say. Annie has one of those artsy-girl faces that somehow gets prettier the messier she looks. Smudged eyeliner. Vintage jackets. Cool hair. The kind of person strangers probably sketch in coffee shops.

Meanwhile I look like an exhausted camp counselor.

“I know,” I sigh. “But I still fall for it every time. I notice bad teeth on people too. I’m just as shallow as everyone else.”

“You are not shallow.”

“I’m literally trying to compensate for my goblin mouth by being skinny.”

“You do not have a goblin mouth.”

“Debatable.”

She sighs dramatically into the phone. “Western beauty standards are poison.”

“East or west, baby girl, I am not exactly a hot commodity.”

That gets a laugh out of her at least.

I smile a little despite myself as I step around puddles crossing campus. Students drift past me in little groups carrying coffees and backpacks and purpose. Everyone always looks like they belong somewhere.

Meanwhile I feel like I accidentally wandered onto the set of somebody else’s college experience.

That’s the weird thing.

In high school I had friends. Real ones. Mostly guys, but girls too. I played sports. People laughed at my jokes. We hung out almost every weekend watching Lord of the Rings, eating garbage food, and making fun of each other.

College was supposed to be my reinvention arc.

Instead I somehow became more myself in the worst possible ways.

“You gonna tell me what happened?” Annie asks.

I hesitate.

“He made fun of me with his friend.”

“Oh absolutely not.”

“Yeah.”

“After last night?”

“Yeah.”

“Men should not be allowed to speak.”

“I support this legislation.”

That earns another laugh.

God, I miss her.

I didn’t realize how dependent I was on Annie until we went to different schools. I’ve known her basically my whole life. We grew up down the street from each other. Who needed other people when we had each other?

If I had a therapist they’d probably say that stunted my social development.

But other people suck sometimes.

Annie rules.

I shove my phone back into my hoodie pocket and keep walking toward the library. Music immediately floods my ears through my headphones, drowning out the noise around me.

Music helps.

It keeps me from noticing how weirdly happy everyone else always seems. Seriously. Why are college students smiling all the time?

Drugs probably.

I don’t really drink. Mostly because alcohol tastes disgusting, but also because the idea of not being fully in control of myself is horrifying.

I embarrass myself enough sober.

The library rises ahead of me in all its ugly concrete glory.

Perfect.

Nothing bad has ever happened to me in a library besides the occasional emotional collapse.

I climb the stairs to the fourth floor, already mentally preparing for several uninterrupted hours of pretending my life is together.

The fourth floor is usually quiet. Mostly seniors, overachievers, and people actively avoiding human interaction.

My people.

I weave between shelves toward my usual table by the window and immediately stop.

Someone is sitting there.

A guy.

Of course.

Because apparently the universe looked down at my day and thought:

you know what this needs?

The annoying part is that he’s attractive enough to make me temporarily forget my own name.

Not fair.

He’s wearing a backwards baseball hat with Greek letters stitched across the front, which should immediately disqualify him from consideration as a person, but unfortunately the rest of him is ruining that theory.

Brown hair curling slightly beneath the hat.

Nice shoulders.

Tight jeans.

Vans.

Definitely not a total frat stereotype.

Weird.

Real frat guys on this campus dress like Jersey Shore extras. Gelled hair, giant watches, enough cologne to violate the Geneva Convention.

This guy looks like he accidentally wandered into Greek life while trying to find a concert.

I take the table across from him before someone else steals that too.

Technically this still counts as my territory.

I start unpacking my bag while pretending not to stare at him every six seconds.

The real tragedy here is that my hair is dirty under this beanie and I’m only about seventy percent sure I remembered deodorant this morning.

Fantastic.

The one time an attractive man exists near me and I look like I lost a fight with a laundromat.

I glance toward the outlet behind his chair.

My outlet.

The superior outlet.

The outlet attached to my spot.

And this idiot isn’t even using it correctly.

His charger cord stretches awkwardly across the table instead of plugging into the wall behind him like a civilized human being.

Unacceptable behavior honestly.

I crouch beside the table to inspect the situation more closely.

Yep.

One working outlet.

Occupied by Captain Perfect Teeth over there.

I army crawl under the table toward it anyway because apparently this is where my dignity goes to die.

The carpet smells vaguely like dust and old textbooks. Above me, fluorescent lights hum aggressively enough to qualify as psychological warfare.

I carefully start crawling backwards out from under the table, trying to smoothly maneuver myself back into my chair without causing a scene.

This immediately fails.

The chair shoots backward.

My elbow smacks the metal leg.

I fall directly onto my ass with all the grace and athleticism of a tranquilized deer.

“Ow, fuck,” I hiss, clutching my elbow.

Wonderful.

Exactly the kind of mysterious feminine energy men love.

I stare at the ceiling for a second contemplating whether I can legally stay here forever.

Much like this library, I too peaked emotionally sometime around 2006.