Jane Tomczak wasn't my friend. After so many years, I can't say if she even wanted to be. Jane might have just wanted to borrow my purple corduroys and white leather, high-top Nikes with the silver swoosh. If she had hoped for a real friend, I let her down.
We were in Junior High and discovering that tiny things, like a minuscule difference in how plump your lips were, could make all the difference in how pretty the boys thought you were. A cowlick could ruin your feathered hair and your popularity standing. Even two girls who fit into the same pair of Jordache jeans could have differently admired butts.
I was also learning that a popular girl (with the right lips, feathered hair and butt) could still be unsure of herself. It was flattering and reassuring to have someone around who wanted to be just like me. It made me feel better about myself to be envied. I was never mean to Jane but that doesn’t make me feel any better. She was an audience and an admirer, not a friend. We both knew who the other kids liked better and I never thought much about her beyond how she made me feel about myself.
The grownups all thought we were friends though. We were in the same Sunday school class and the teacher commented on how alike we were: same age; same straight, brown hair; same fair skin and same freckles on the nose. In grade school, we sat by each other and hung our coats on neighboring hooks in the closet -- Catholic schools were big on lining kids up and organizing them alphabetically. Eventually, we formed a bond around our common interest in boys, Van Halen and eye shadow.
Jane was adopted and her parents were older and strict. Her sister, Jenny, was a burn-out who skipped most of her high school classes, hung out behind the mall and smoked weed. Jane's parent's were determined not to fail with their younger child too. Even though my parents were divorced, I was still a good girl from a good family and Jane was sometimes allowed to come to my house after school. I never went to Jane’s house though, she was not allowed to have friends over.
She loved my bedroom. I had a record player and was allowed to close my door and play Journey Escape, Foreigner 4 and Rolling Stones Tattoo You over and over and over. I was allowed to hang pictures of Eddie Van Halen on my wall. When I was 13, I was even allowed to wear eye makeup and lip gloss. My dresser was covered in bottles of hair spray and jars of goop. After school, when I changed out of my uniform, I pulled designer jeans and puffy sleeved, Joan Jettesque tops out of my drawers. Jane wasn't allowed to do or wear any of those things.
It’s not like I was allowed to run wild or wear whatever I wanted; I fought long, hard battles in the fitting room with my mom to get those designer jeans. She made me bend over and try to touch my toes and she'd try to cram her fingers into the back pockets. She'd tell me they were too tight and send me off to get the next size up. When we finally bought those not-as-tight jeans to the counter, I had to pull out the birthday and Christmas money I had saved. My mom saw no difference(other than cost) between Gloria Vanderbilt, Jordache and perfectly good jeans from JCPenney.
8th grade was a big year for both of us, I started going with my first boyfriend and Jane ran away from home for the first time. She came to my house and when her mom called to see if we had seen her, my mom took her home. She was grounded for much of that school year and I didn't miss her, I had the boyfriend. When Jane started to come by again, she was different. She mostly wanted a place to change clothes and put on makeup before heading to the park to meet her own boyfriend. I could tell she wanted me to be impressed and maybe envious of her for now: he was an older boy, a smoking boy, a boy who drank, a boy who came from a house where the parents were not around much, and a boy with a mini bike. I let her borrow the clothes but I wasn’t impressed or envious. I was different by then too: I had replaced the pictures of Eddie Van Halen with pictures of androgynous male underwear models; my allowance money was saved for Izod polo shirts that I could layer and wear with the collars up; I was wearing skirts down to my ankles instead of tight jeans; and I was even contemplating a short-in-the-back, asymmetrical hair cut to replace my feathered bi-level. I handed over the clothes and never saw Jane (or them) again. It was the summer before high school and we were going to different schools.
During freshman year, Jane ran away again. When her mom called our house to see if she was there, we learned that she had been lying for a long time and saying she was with at our house. Jane Tomczak wasn't my friend and I'm ashamed by how self-centered I was and how little I cared about the troubled, lonely girl that people said was a lot like me. If I ever heard how her story ended, I don't remember now. I assume her parents found her and brought her home.
That year,Bon Jovi's Runaway was all over the radio and to this day, every time I hear it I imagine Jane, on the back of a mini bike, wearing my Jordache jeans, sputtering down a suburban side street.
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