Margaret Lacey is a Lesbian

Margaret Lacey could not feel any tangible change in the air when she stepped into her school the next Monday. There was no hush and whisper when she walked into the room. She’d already built a reputation as something of a whore, so the news that had wagged from John’s very reliable tongue hadn’t wrought general outrage among the students of Quarry High. No innate sense of wrongness infiltrated her senses. No jocks in letterman jackets approached her about her decisions in life. The teddies snickered at her, but then, they were snickerers to begin with.

John Lennon had spread the word that Margaret Lacey was a lesbian. He hadn’t spread it loud enough that she could get arrested, but people had begun to give her sympathetic glances that she didn’t notice. That poor girl, cursed with a pervert affliction. That horrible sinner, who will never be redeemed. The good Christian gals were the absolute worst to those, the most wholesome of sinners. Their compassion was unbearable.

It wasn’t until Katherine, the kindest mathlete in a powder blue dress, grasped Margaret Lacey’s hands in her own and said: “I do not judge you for your sins,” that Margaret Lacey suspected something was up.

At lunch, she settled next to Gwendolyn in the grass behind the school with her sack lunch. She was irked enough that her hand was shaking and it was difficult to light her smoke. Gwendolyn reached over and lit it for her.

“You look miffed,” she stated, taking a drag on her cigarette and unwrapping her sandwich.

“I’m not miffed,” Margaret Lacey said, closing her eyes and lying back in the grass. She neglected her lunch, instead turning her eyes to the clear autumn sky. Her skirt had inched up to her thighs as she’d stretched along the grass, and she was sure she looked rebellious and sexy. Except, no, she was sure she looked like her ass was going to be green from the grass all day, which continued to irritate her.

“Oh man you’re super miffed,” Gwendolyn observed.

“I might be a little miffed,” she grumbled.

“It’s starting to sound less like a word. You’d better explain yourself before I start speaking French out of confusion.”

“You speak French?” Margaret Lacey shifted in the grass to look up at Gwendolyn, who shrugged.

“Nope! Better explain yourself, then!”

“Apparently one John Lennon has been spreading it that I’m a lesbian,” she muttered, massaging her closed eyes.

“Who’s that?”

“Oh I don’t know how to describe him. He’s just kindof normal looking. I think he’s a year ahead of us, but I don’t know. Kindof a big nose, he’s a teddy, fine piece of ass,” she listed his qualities on her fingers. “Oh, and he’s a huge twat.”

“Uh,” Gwendolyn responded, pretending to try and remember.

“He’s cute as hell. But he’s a huge…misogynistic…cunt,” Margaret Lacey said through gritted teeth.

“If he’s a cunt then it seems you’d eat that up, then, wouldn’t it?” Gwendolyn said, grinning.

“If I’d eaten my lunch I’d throw it up all over you right now,” was the only reply.