Mnemonics and Other Stories

By Kate Pedroso

A girl falls in love with her best friend during science class. Two girls take an inter-island post-graduation trip to give their college relationship a fighting chance. A girl takes her old bicycle for one last spin after an old lover comes back pregnant. A girl bumps into her ex in a strange city and discovers that the feeling is gone. A mixtape helps two girls navigate through their attraction. This is a collection of stories about girls who love girls. We have to tell our stories ourselves.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jan 1, 2019
• ISBN: 9780359324743

Book preview

Mnemonics and Other Stories

By Kate Pedroso

Copyright © 2018 by Kate Pedroso

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review or scholarly journal.

First Printing: 2018

ISBN: 978-0-359-32474-3

Book Design by Charisse Tacang

www.charissetacang.com

Makati City, Philippines 1200

www.katepedroso.com

Dedication

To girls who love girls.

We have to write the stories ourselves.

Author’s Note

These stories are around ten years old, and were written by a much younger self—my favorite version of me, to be honest, because everything was new to her at the time, including writing about liking girls.

I’m putting them together now to mark a decade of being a lesbian writer, and to celebrate the tenderness, the confusion, the love and, of course, the friendship that these stories have brought into my life all these years.

While these stories were written about two lifetimes ago, they still ring true at their core. I like reading old works mostly because it feels like checking in on really old friends. Most of these stories were originally written in the second-person point of view and have been reworked, so friends who may have read earlier drafts years ago are in for a (hopefully nice) surprise.

The first two stories, Mnemonics and Maps, which belong to the same universe, were originally written in the second person, and were a joy to take apart and put back together. Also including the revamped Art of bicycle rides, a reader-favorite from the old blog, and Footshooter and Footnotes to a mixtape, which are less popular favorites from the old days.

I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed revisiting them.

Cheers,

Kate

Mnemonics

1997, August

We are children, and Pluto is still a planet. The old mnemonic still goes, My very eager mother just served us nine pizzas. We sit across the aisle from each other in General Science, freshman year. The classroom is newly painted, and the teacher is trying to speak through the fading fumes. We are lightheaded.

From the opposite aisle, a low whistle; she’s passing a folded piece of paper across. I manage to snatch it in the split-second that Mrs Cruz faces the blackboard to write something—we’re discussing mnemonics, and she’s writing down the most popular of them.

The note says, Science review, Saturday? I smile, glancing sideways as I write, Yes, in red sign pen, right beside the question mark.

*

The clatter of her bicycle on our front lawn signals Tricia’s arrival that Saturday; she’s half an hour early. I rush out of the bathroom with an oversized shirt on, toothbrush still in my mouth.

When I get to the door, I find her hugging her books against her chest, grinning. I said ten, I say, swinging the door open to let her in.

You did, she says, skipping over my slippers, careful not to slip on the small puddle of water I had taken with me from the bathroom. Didn’t want to be late.

Once inside, she starts smoothing out her skirt and fixing her shirt. Why do you insist on riding your bike in a skirt anyway? I ask, arms folded.

So what? she asks in turn, plopping down on the sofa. It’s comfortable. You should try it.

I don’t bike.

How many times have I offered to teach you? She scratches the back of her head, legs apart unceremoniously on our sofa. I never really learned how to bike; this has always been a sore topic.

So what if I never even managed to get rid of my training wheels?

So what if my sense of balance is near to nil?

At this point, my mother comes in from the kitchen to tell me that my bucket is already overflowing in the bathroom.

When I come back out of the bathroom, mouth rinsed from toothpaste, hair combed and properly dressed, Tricia is already cradling a glass of juice in one hand while hunched over an open book on the table. The mnemonic’s right, she says without looking up, her voice thick with awe. Who would’ve thought?

Settling beside her on the sofa, I just say, It’s a fourth-grade mnemonic. Of course, it’s right.

I was in fourth grade once, she says, turning her head to catch my eye. I don’t remember this at all.

I laugh. She’s drawing the solar system in the margin of a page; it is totally misplaced, granted that this particular section of the book discusses the Earth’s lithosphere. That would have meant the mnemonic was a failure, I say. I mean, the fact that you don’t remember it from fourth grade.

The first time around, maybe it was, she says, penciling in the final planet as a sort of elaborate-looking dot. Now, though, I’m totally paying attention.

Right. I turn the page to where the exam supposedly begins. The thing about General Science is that it touches on everything. This time around, it’s the configuration of electrons. On the corner of the page, I start constructing the zigzagging 1s-2s mnemonic from memory.

She leans in closer, pushing her chest against my shoulder, and the softness that hits me forces my hand to a standstill. Jesus, she says, oblivious. How do you always end up memorizing all these things?

Swallowing, I reply, I pay attention. She shifts with a soft, almost mocking, Ah, rearranging herself beside me, a hand over my knee, chin ghosting on my shoulder.

Saturdays like this always have me asking, later in the night, what it is that’s going on, exactly; why the sadness I feel at the sight of her biking away from our house at sundown is different from all the others I’ve come to know.

2000, April

That summer before senior year, Tricia comes over almost every day with her bike in tow. Most days are hot and excruciating, and are spent sprawled on our front lawn, where the grass is brown and dry right where we often sit.

That day, we stare at her bicycle, resting against a lamppost. She’s wearing that ridiculous skirt again; it’s the sort that gathers far too many grass blades when she gets up.

You really are terrified, aren’t you? she asks out of the blue, nodding over to her bike. I lean back on my elbows, wiggle my toes slightly before shrugging as nonchalantly as possible. I know her