Amber Eyes (3 page)

“Mom, you’d never leave me, would you?”

Mom rolls her eyes. “I’ve told you a million times not to call me Mom. It’s Laura. Call me Laura.”

I wipe my cheeks and sigh. “Why call you Laura, Mom? You’re my mom, not one of ma’friends.”

She takes my hand and we start walking toward the exit. “Cause you make me feel old. Besides, it’s better if guys think you’re my sis before they learn you’re my daughter. See that guy over there? The one standing by the blue convertible? He’s Alphonse, my new boyfriend. Don’t call me Mom when we’re with him. I’m deadly serious.”

A jock in Tommy Hilfiger clothes is leaning on a super cool convertible parked outside the school. I wonder whether she may run away with him and leave me behind as had happened to my friend. The though overflows my mind with dread, accelerating my heartbeat.

“But, you’d never leave me, would you… Laura?”

She rolls her eyes again. “I didn’t dump you when I should’ve. I see no reason to do it now.”

“Promise me.”

“I promise I’ll never leave you. Happy?”

# # #

It seemed she finally found a reason to break her promise. I wanted to run after her, but I couldn’t move. I remained frozen on the sofa moving only my fingers, twirling my apron laces. Thousands of questions flooded my mind: Who’d take care of me now? Would Yago allow me to stay? Should I find a job? I hugged my knees to my chest.

Wild guffawing came through the open window. Maybe the twins—it sounded like them. I glanced sidewise. Yes, it was the twins in hysterics, rolling on the flowerbed by the trailer and crushing the flowers, pair of li’l cuckoos.

I sobbed, “Jennifer.”

Of course, Jennifer couldn’t hear me. I broke down, weeping like crazy and only stopped when it was dark and the kids came in asking for dinner.

June 29

I never told Yago Mom ran away. Nevertheless, he learned about it and didn’t show up until the next day totally drunk and freaked out. Afterwards, he kept freaking out. At the drop of a hat. I preferred to avoid him; the twins did likewise.

Of all my mom’s stupid little boyfriends, Yago sucked the most. Don’t think the rest of them didn’t. Bernard, for example, owned a large house by the beach, but he stood permanently drunk. Cesar lived in this fancy apartment but he enjoyed cocaine. Daniel used to buy us all the clothes we wanted each time he had to apologize for beating Mom—I could go on all day long with the list. However, Yago’s making us live in that filthy, half-vacant trailer park took the cake. I totally hated the freaking place.

I didn’t belong in that trailer park. No teenager did. It was full of white trash and drug dealers. Gave me the creeps after sunset because it was so dangerous. I still wonder why we had to move in with every guy Mom hooked up with, no matter how crappy his place or the guy himself.

I didn’t know how long Yago would let me stay in his trailer before he would kick me out. All the time, he either leered or glowered at me, and none us spoke a single word about Mom. I found Mom’s little green notebook and had looked up my grandma’s phone and address, but I hadn’t called her yet. To contact my grandma would mean leaving Somerset and I didn’t want to. I wanted to live close to Jenny—I wondered if her folks would allow me to move in with her.

When Yago arrived home from work two days later day, a woman from the Social Services was waiting for him outside the trailer. They talked for about an hour, or I should say they
argued
for about an hour. I could hear Yago shouting while I cooked dinner. As soon as she left, he came in, slammed the door and started to curse—no big surprise. “It’s damned hot outside! And that damned woman kept talking and talking. Yada, yada, yada. Damn her! I’m hungry. Alexandra. How about dinner?”

He was so upset, his eyebrows had joined into an actual unibrow. His face looked reddish and his forehead was furrowed like a plowed field.

“If you want dinner, be back in a few,” I barked back. If he was not in the mood, neither was I.

“You’ve only got five,” he grumbled. Then he spanked my butt. I yelped.

He entered the back bedroom, but he didn’t close the door. I saw him taking off his shirt, unbuckling his belt, and unfastening his trousers. I turned away and concentrate on the dinner. If he wanted me to watch him stripping, he was mistaken from A to Z. I swear if I saw his ‘thing’, I’d throw up. God, I didn’t even want to think it!

Five minutes later, he came back boasting his naked chest: he’d only donned some old, faded blue jeans and sandals. Hadn’t anyone ever told him how gross his hairy armpits looked?

Yago threw his humongous self on the couch—it squeaked like he was sitting on a bag full of cats—and grabbed the TV remote to start endlessly browsing the channels.

“Hey Dad, we were watching TV!” little Louis complained. His eyebrows also joined into a unibrow.

“Guys,” he said hugging them, “you’ve had the TV for yourselves all day long. It’s Daddy’s turn now. Here. Have ten dollars each. Alexandra will take you to buy something after dinner. Now, go and play outside. Deal?”

At the speed of light, a wide grin drew itself on Louis’s face. He looked at his brother with mischievous eyes, obtaining the same look in return. They nodded at once, took the bills, and left the trailer. Louis stopped when he passed by me and said in his high-pitched li’l voice, “Daddy said you take us to buy candy after dinner.”

Of course, that’s what slave-nannies are expected to do, to take their master’s kids everywhere they want to go. Once the kids made their exit, Yago crossed his arms and his countenance mutated: His face recovered the reddish hues and his forehead furrowed. He pursed his lips and any trace of a smile vanished. “That goddamned bitch.” He snapped his fingers. “Alexandra, hand me a cold beer.”

We had a small refrigerator under the kitchenette’s cabinet. I bent to pick up a Budweiser, and Yago scanned my buttocks. The perv was drawing my panties’ shape in the air with a finger. In a second, my face turned hotter than a frying pan and I couldn’t help it.

“I like it when you blush.” He snatched the Budweiser away from my hand—like a lost Sahara traveler grabbing the only glass of water left. “Makes you look sexy, like a Hooter’s girl.”

He gulped a large swig of beer and spat, tightening his neck muscles—just as if he’d drunk acid. “Puaaj!” He wiped his mouth with his forearm. “It’s warm, you stupid bitch. Bring me a cold one, damn it!”

Hoping this wasn’t the start of an argument that would end with me kicked out or beaten, I sprung back to the fridge, quickly touching each beer can. A cold one… a cold one… a cold one… Omigod! All were warm.

“Like… that’s the coldest one…” I pursed my lips.

“What the hell’s going on? Why aren’t my beers cold?” His eyebrows joined again into a unibrow.

I gulped. “It’s not my fault. I had to bathe the twins and there was nothing for dinner. I had no money, so I went to Mrs. Olsen’s first, but she—”

“What has all that crap got to do with my beers?” He was totally pissed off now. His unibrow stood out even more, and he turned off the TV. Pin-drop silence followed. I curled the apron’s laces around my fingers. “Talk to me girl. Is your first name ‘retarded’? Why aren’t my damned beers cold?”

This time, he shook the beer can right in front of me, almost touching my nose. I had to cross my eyes to focus and then I tilted backwards. Sweat droplets trickled down my armpits.

“Like… I think… I forgot to put them in the fridge.” As I talked, an airplane passed over us. The window panes vibrated.

“You think what? Talk louder, you freak, I can’t hear you.” It wasn’t just the plane’s uproar. Yago enjoyed making me repeat things, even if he’d heard them right the first time. I was paying for Mom’s running out on him, just as I’d feared.

“Like… I think I forgot to put them in the refrigerator,” I repeated louder. Then I dropped my head, staring at the floor. My hands feel numb so I clenched and opened my fists several times.

“And I think you’re a stupid li’l lesbian. Do you expect me to drink hot beer, dumb? Ehh? You’re retarded, aren’t you?” He hammered my head with a finger. I ducked and backed off one step.

“It’s very time consuming to babysit the twins,” I whined. “They’re so demanding!”

Yago passed a trembling hand through his balding, flaxen hair and snorted.

“Of course they’re demanding!” He waved both hands in the air, as if he were juggling. “They’re four years old. But you’re fourteen and
you’ve nothing else to do
, so you must take care of them. I kill myself every day at work and what do I find when I get home? A damned social worker at my door and warm beer? Is it money you need? The Olsen witch is not lending you money anymore? Here, have money!” He produced a roll of bills out of his wallet, all twenties and tens he threw on the little table. “Three hundred bucks. Is that enough for you? Just remember, your dear Mommy just ditched you so it’s my money supporting your dirty dyke butt. Stop being a good for nothing and earn your living here.” He raised a finger, like a school principal. “And don’t even think about bringing your lesbo friend over when I’m not at home. My place is not a whorehouse for you dirty dikes to make out in front of the twins.”

A wave of heat traveled my body. That had been totally unfair. He had no right to call me ‘good-for-nothing’ and no right either to despise Jenny because she’d preferred me. We were not a pair of dirty dikes, not at all. At least I couldn’t think of myself that way.

“I know. I know it’s my duty. But it’s because of the twins I forg—” The pain in the cheek came instantaneously. The snap sounded in the air half of a second later. Yago had just slapped me pretty hard.

“So it’s the twins’ fault, is it?” The man’s face was purplish. “You’re retarded because of the twins, is that what you mean?”

Now my cheek burned and throbbed and I could taste blood. Tears welled up in my eyes, yet I shut them to prevent any of them trickling down my cheeks.

“Sorry, my bad,” I said, dropping my head.

I shouldn’t have mentioned his children. If I knew he freaked out every time, why had I brought them up? Because losers enjoy screwing up all the time, and my forehead bore a capital L branding me a proud member of their club. Mom had dumped me for that very reason. Who would enjoy sharing their roof with a pathetic loser? Yago had guessed right, ‘retarded’ suited me freakin’ well. Would I ever learn?

Note to self:
Google how to stop being a jackass.

“Put this darned hot beer in the freezer and bring it back in ten minutes,” Yago thrusted me when he handed me the can and I lost my balance. My right foot darted backwards, my left one darted even faster and then I missed my third step. The wall behind me prevented my falling—first time ever living inside a metal box proved useful.

“Are you gonna put that in the freezer, or dance like an idiot all around the place?”

“Sorry.”

“Sorry what, freak?”

“Sorry… Sir,” I whispered.

I pulled the little fridge’s door open, squatting beside it. This time I stuck my back to the wall. I wouldn’t allow the moron to scan my butt again, no way.

Yago snorted and, fortunately, as he turned the TV on again, he found a WWE broadcast—it would hold his attention for a while.

It should have ended there, yet it didn’t.

June 30 12:29 pm

Last day of school. Lunchtime almost over. Halls crowded with kids eager to flee once the last bell rang. Excitement filled the air with so much electricity it almost made the hair stand on its own.

I was about to enter the girls restroom on the first floor but stopped because I’d just heard voices inside. I started to breathe hard, imagining the girls inside were Clara Benson and her gang—for some strange reason, those guys lived in the restrooms. I imagined Clara exiting ahead of her gang and saying: “Oh, look who’s here, girls, Somerset’s favorite teen lesbian.”

I clenched my fists and my stomach knotted up. I wanted to leave and come back later, but I really needed to go. The door flung open and four girls came out. Thankfully, not Benson and her gang. I sighed so loud in relief that one of them turned and scowled at me. She said, “It’s nobody, only that freak lesbo with dark sunglasses.”

I bolted into the restroom and locked myself inside the first available stall. As always, I had to be fast—Benson and her friends were not the only girls who bullied me. I’d just flushed the toilet and was about to leave when I heard the restroom’s door opening and closing.

Damn, no!

I stood frozen, tapping the stall’s lock with my fingers, but I heard nothing. Maybe it was a single girl—even two girls would be noisy as hell. I listened. She was neither getting into any stall, nor washing her hands. Maybe she only wanted to check her makeup.

I waited, still tapping on the lock. I bit my lip. Who was she? Somebody who knew I was in the stall? Maybe it really was Benson’s gang this time, all silently waiting for me. A month ago, they’d waited for Mary Delaware, stripped her, stole her panties and hung them from a tree. The idea I might end up like her made me feel sick. By all means, I wanted to avoid a similar fate.

The restroom was still as silent as a graveyard. I could even hear a faucet dripping. The bell rang.

Rats!

I had run out of time. Whomever remained outside, she or they had to go to their classrooms too—at least in theory. Suddenly, I had this idea somebody might have flung the restroom’s door open without actually going inside, in which case, I was making a fool of myself. I turned the lock and exited the stall.

Jenny was leaning on the restroom’s door blocking it and nobody else was inside. My heart missed a beat. “Jenny!”

“You’ve been avoiding me for three days,” she said—not an accusation but a fact. She didn’t seem upset.

Yes, I’d been avoiding her because I’d been scared, scared of what might happen if our hands interlocked again, or if our lips approached each other once more. On the other hand, I was happy she’d found me. Mom had left three days ago and I hadn’t told anybody, not even her. My life had turned into a huge mess and I needed Jenny, however afraid I’d been of being alone with her. Her flowery aroma flooded my nostrils and my mouth watered in anticipation for the bittersweet taste of her skin.