Disruption
My high school nemesis Kathy Rice had returned to town and by some strange twist of fate moved into the house next door to mine. I had been enjoying my summer affair with my neighbour Eve but she was away on a trip. Kathy had seemingly matured, now the married and professional Katherine Hardy, but I had kept my identity from her. However she had figured out that we'd known each other. She knocked on my door to confront me which immediately put knots in my belly.
"Were you the Mallory who graduated from Central in 1999?" she asked.
Without waiting for an answer she strode confidently into my house. I sighed and closed the door to follow her. Katherine stood in the centre of the hall which was actually a bit unnerving as it blocked routes to the stairs, living room or kitchen. If I wanted to flee, which was a distinct possibility, it meant leaving the house. My house.
"Pardon?" I asked, seeing if I could bluff my way out.
"You are, aren't you?" she said. But it wasn't necessarily to me. She had a tone like she was confirming her own idea. Her eyes flicked over me and I felt like I was being appraised.
She walked towards me and then slowly around me in a circle. I felt a shiver up my spine. This was why girls at our school had called her Catty Kathy. She had this stalk, this slinky circling thing she did that was oddly predatory and unnerving. It got really scary sometimes in school when her group of girls did it too, like a lioness pride was hunting you. I'd seen girls cry from it without anyone laying a hand on them or saying a word.
"You always wore such dumpy clothes," she said behind me, "so I don't know about the body, but the height is right. You changed your hair, it used to be such a floppy mess... Almost cute now..."
I seethed. She was talking about me but not really to me, just observing, and cutting right into my youthful insecurities.
Katherine walked in front of me and put out her hand. I snapped my head back a bit but she gave me this look, this steely imperial gaze, and I instinctively stopped. Her fingertips slid along my jaw slowly, again in an appraising fashion, like someone at an auction examining an artifact more than something sensual. I bore it as long as I could and then ducked my head away. This time she let it go.
"Bone structure's there though, even if other things have changed. It's definitely you, I checked my old yearbooks before I came over."
Damn it, I thought. She would still have those.
"So you're married now," Katherine said. "And kids. Good for you."
It somehow didn't seem like a compliment, more like just further observation. Like she knew how to be polite but only did it for the sake of formalities. Oh how I loathed her.
"So does he know you're a muff-diving dyke?" she asked, putting a hand on her hip.
Oh shit.
***
Katherine's words stabbed right into me and brought up a memory I didn't even know I was trying to forget. She had always been a cruel girl, the leader of a clique, but I had managed to avoid her from grade ten onwards for the most part. But in grade nine I had been the target of some of her nastiest attention. We'd played on the same soccer team for a few weeks before I left it and moved on to other clubs. The reason why had been blocked out though, and now came crashing back into my skull.
She had already earned the nickname "Catty" in grade school where she had ruled her particular roost. In high school there were more people and different dynamics but she already had a core of followers. I hardly knew her then, having gone to a different school before, so I'd only heard rumours. At soccer she ended up captain and was a bit snippy with girls who missed a play but so far I hadn't earned her ire.
We got changed in a big room with benches and all showered together after the game in an adjacent room that was open concept, with nozzles spaced out along the walls. I had grown breasts fairly early compared to some girls in grade school so I was always embarrassed and awkward about my body, hiding it under sweatshirts and jeans. I had a floppy haircut that my mother said reminded her of a sheepdog in a Disney cartoon that had to keep blowing hair out of its face to see. My goal in life was to be unnoticed. In the shower I tried to accomplish this by keeping my arms tucked in to hide my breasts as much as possible.
On one of the first practices Kathy had been at the nozzle to my left. At some point I noticed her naked body, not intentionally or in a pervy way, but just made note of it unconsciously. Then, as now, she was almost dainty in her athleticism, slender and toned but not bulky. That first practice she had a dark bush. Well, a few weeks later, she happened to be beside me in the shower again, at random. I washed soap out of my hair and caught a glimpse of her.
"Hey, Catty, what happened to your pussy?" I asked without thinking. She was bare down there, which was a stark contrast to the previous time. Clearly she had shaved it, but I had never heard of such a thing. Pubic hair was enough of a novelty.
"What was that?" she asked, her voice laced with knives.
The rest of the room had been chit chatting or running water. The showers stopped. One of her followers spoke next:
"There's no way she just called you that."
"What?" I asked, realizing that everyone was noticing me now, my worst kind of nightmare.
"Nobody calls me that," Kathy said, her voice cold.
I turned to look at her but she had already come up to me. She pushed me into the centre of the shower room. She and her girls circled me in that terrifying way.
"Calls you what?" I said, trying to follow her with my eyes but getting disoriented by the other girls circling. "Catty? I thought everyone did..."
This earned me another push, and then another. I got pushed from all sides until I fell to my knees, all wet and cold.
"My name is Kathy. Don't forget it," she snarled. "What are you doing checking out other girls in the shower? Are you a muff-diving dyke, Mallory? Are you a lesbo?"
They all started chanting it, "muff-diving Mallory," probably because of the alliteration. I had never heard such language, I'd been pretty insulated as a kid. It made me cry, and eventually I managed to get up and run out of the circle, grab my stuff and leave the locker room. I pulled on my clothes in the hall and ran home to cry in my bed. I quit the team the next day and the coach had no idea why. I never spoke about it, stayed away from the Cat Pride as much as I could, and tried to forget. I left sports and helped out with props and sets for school plays and moved on with my life as best as I could.
Until now.
***
"Excuse me?" I asked her, trying not to let the tears that had sprung up into my eyes fall.
