A Density of Souls PART TWO

So last time we talked, we left off at Stephen crying in the nurses office, wishing they would just leave him alone. I don't feel like this needs explanation really. Its a feeling all queer kids have, why can't other people just not care about me? Think about this thought for a moment, most high school students want people to be thinking about them, to like them, to include them. As a queer kid out, you're usually just wanting the opposite. How powerful...

So Greg Darby is one of the three boys in the story, the ones who in the beginning was caught having sex with Stephen. Its a very dramatic scene, I left out of the quotes on purpose. Worth reading the first time, but they are in a cemetery in playing hide and seek, the four main characters (Meredith, Greg, Brandon, and Stephen) and Greg and Stephen are having sex, when Meredith comes upon them.

This was the beginning of the book, and since then many things of course have happened.

At one point Greg Darby and Meredith Ducote have been dating for a while, and while studying at her house they start making out and stripping clothes off. They begin to fight about having sex or not, but soon after the argument turns into more. The fight becomes about Meredith "being a bitch" to become homecoming queen her senior year, and Greg acting in order to prove himself to Brandon. Meredith is accused of changing, by Greg and she responds by telling him he's not the same person either...

This is where the biggest debate about this book has occurred amongst my friends, a good friend of mine was offended because he thought the book implied that all men are attracted to other men. I don't think this is what the book is saying, although I'm pretty much certain that is true to an extent. All men once in their lives are sexually drawn to other men, may not act on it, but that's another blog weeks from now...

Meredith hits back hard during the fight by saying essentially that if Greg thinks he hasn't' changed in high school, to ask Stephen. The response; hitting Meredith, across the jaw with his fist, chipping her tooth and knocking her over. She makes him leave.

After he slammed the door behind him, she righted herself. She lifted her bra off the comforter and strapped it on. She didn't bother to put her shirt back on as she crept to her bedside mirror and stared at the first signs of a bruise beneath her bottom lip.
Greg had a dozen good defenses he could use against the mention of Stephen. Brandon had made sure of that. Stephen was a fag; he broke the rules; he betrayed the world they now lived in, and had never even apologized for doing it. Why did Greg have to hit her to prove that? Hadn't the note they taped on Stephens book bag made it all obvious?
I know things.
The thought struck her instantly. She cocked her head as if fascinated by the developing bruise. I know things. Greg fist had shown her that her words were more powerful than she realized.

This is the beginning of a very important message in this novel, and something that has been said many times before. That old rhyme is not at all true, "stick and stones may break my bones but words can never hurt me." In fact, Maya Angelou says words are the most powerful and hurtful weapon we have, and I think most people realize that, or hope they do. This is important in this novel, because its also often made cleared that words are not only weapons for pain, but also can be weapons used for defense of self or others. I wish we lived in a world that it wasn't necessary, this sort of weaponry and such, but c'est la vie, no?

Later Meredith starts sneaking bottles of Stoli up to her room at night (My kind of girl) alone, and writing drunken streams of consciousness in her biology notebook. Including a letter to Greg she will never give to him.

I don't want the responsibility of you. Because some day something's going to tear open that hole I pierced last night -- like two fingers gouging through a tiny slit in paper and wiggling until they tear the entire paper in half. And when that happens, Greg, you're goignot fall through. And the chances are you'll try to take someone with you. And it that someone isn't me, if you try to take other people in the fucked-up madness that you're trying to coat with muscles, then I'll rush to save them before I even think about you.

The beginning of Meredith finding herself, and her grounding is important in this novel. Meredith becomes a person who's strength and resolve, but also ability to survive and act with the boys is remarkable. Because Meredith has to fit in with the guys and the girls of jock and cheerleading high school, she learns to make the best of her intellectual and emotional upperhand and to really stand up when necessary for the boy she loves but can no longer demonstrate.

Stephen gets the lead role in the musical "The Mikado" during the freshman year, and Meredith is the only student in the school to show up. She sneaks in after lights down, and watches from the back, crying during his solo, but leaves before the cast comes out for curtain call.

I know more of your whispers than you think I do. And sometimes I think both of you would do to me what you did to Stephen. But instead, you both kept me. That's really why you wanted to do it, isn't it Greg? Not because you like my bosy. But maybe because the only way to keep me from beginning a link to the past, a link to what you want to forget, is to fuck me. Am I different now? I think so. One time, a time that seems so long ago but really isn't, I was one child among four. Now I'm owned by two.

This is Merediths writing in her journal after having sex with Greg, and dealing with him and Brandon bragging and joking about it all night. Ownership, control, power, life deals us insane power balances in life. We have to find a way to survive, and even overturn those, and Meredith is an inspiration for that...

Michelle's favorite part of this blog

To Be Continued...