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Show 136 him looking over at me. No, more than just looking. Staring, the jerk. He's been here all summer and been looking at me like that all summer. I've mentioned it to Dublonsky. Dublonsky says I'm just being paranoid because of my skin. I tell him this guy Owen is looking at more than just my skin. Besides, he's got skin problems of his own. Every time I run into him in the hall, and it's hard not to because his room is just two down from mine, I have to hear all about it. All about his dumb tattoos. "Listen," he says, and explains again how they are, by slow degrees, being sanded off. "Look," he says, and I have to watch as he peels back a bandage to expose a new smooth scar over a faint blue outline. "You see what it is?" he says. What it was, he means. Each time it's a different scar and a different outline and I'm supposed to guess what it was_. I say I don't care but that doesn't stop him from telling me. "A beautiful naked island girl under a coconut tree," he explained last time. It was on his left arm, his bicep. "That's dirty," I said. "No it isn't. Look closer. See how her hands cover her, you know, private parts?" "Well then, how sweet," I said. I just wanted to get away from him. "Oh yeah, sweet, that's exactly right. Underneath her dancing, |
