Apeshit (2 page)

“You’re crazy,” Crystal says.

“Not as crazy as you,” Desdemona says.

Crystal and Desdemona are the richest, prettiest,

snobbiest, most popular girls in school. They are captain

and co-captain of the cheerleading squad. They only date

the richest, cutest, toughest, most popular boys on the foot-

ball team. They are the queens of the school. They are the

preppiest of the preppies. That’s why everyone thought it

was so odd when Desdemona wanted to get so many tattoos

and a mohawk.

The tattoos happened quickly. At first, she only want-

ed a blue butterfly tattoo on her left hip. Everyone thought

it was hot. Then she wanted a red butterfly on her right hip.

Everyone thought it was kind of cool how they matched.

Then she tattooed large butterfly wings across the majority

of her back. Everyone thought it was big. Then she was ad-

dicted. She got a new butterfly tattoo every few days, a va-

riety of different sizes, shapes, and colors. She stopped pay-

ing attention to what everyone thought about them. Before

anyone knew what was going on, Desdemona had covered

every inch of her skin with butterflies. Even her hands, feet,

neck, and private areas.

She thought they were pretty. Everyone else thought

they were weird.

She charged them all to her daddy’s credit card,

but he hasn’t noticed the charges nor the tattoos yet. He

has asked her why she’s always wearing gloves and turtle-

neck sweaters indoors in the middle of spring, but he hasn’t

pushed the issue. He doesn’t even pay attention to all of the

lame excuses she makes up.

Crystal tried to stop her from tattooing too much, but

couldn’t get through to her. It’s not easy to stop an addict.

Now that Desdemona has the mohawk, Crystal is worried

that it is ruining her friend’s popularity. She is worried that

her own popularity might be in jeopardy for associating with

a punk rocker. Crystal is seriously considering breaking off

their friendship. She plans to make a decision on this matter

after they get back from the cabin.

Once Desdemona finishes her mohawk, gets

dressed, does her nails, packs her bags, perfects her

makeup, and smokes a couple of mint cigarettes, they take

Crystal’s car over to Jason’s house.

On the way, they pick up a drive-thru milkshake at

the local Steak ‘n Shake. They get vanilla. Crystal only

likes vanilla. After they each take a few sips, they toss the

leftovers at a couple of emo girls walking down the side-

walk in Jason’s neighborhood. The emo girls flip them off,

their black dresses coated in white goo like a giant bird had

pooped on them. Des and Crystal laugh at them and wave

goodbye. They love pissing off the goths and the emos.

They arrive at the biggest house in the neighborhood:

Jason’s house. Everyone else is already there, loading up the

van. Des and Crystal check each other’s makeup as they en-

ter the driveway. They are made up exactly the same. Their

clothes and jewelry are exactly the same. If it wasn’t for

Des’s green mohawk and tattoos, they would be identical.

Just last year, everyone used to think they were twins.

They both had platinum blond hair of equal length. They

always wore the same clothes and same makeup style. The

only way people could tell them apart was that Crystal had

blue eyes and wider breasts, and Des had green eyes and

pointier breasts. It’s extremely easy to tell them apart now.

“You’re late,” Jason howls at them as they get out of

the car.

“Des took forever,” Crystal says.

Crystal kisses the air next to Jason’s cheek. Desde-

mona kisses Kevin and Rick. Everyone notices Des’s mo-

hawk has been dyed green but none of them comment on it.

They pretend that it doesn’t exist, just as they always pretend

her tattoos don’t exist.

“Ready for a weekend of sex, drugs, and alcohol?”

Jason says, holding a pony keg of beer over his freckled

shoulder and trying to pretend that it’s no big deal.

“Hell yeah!” his buddies shout back while shooting

hoops.

Desdemona unloads her bags from Crystal’s car and

tosses them at Kevin and Rick so they can pack them into the

van. Kevin and Rick ignore her. They are getting serious

over their game of one-on-one. Kevin slams the ball into

the basket and yells, “Booyah!” She is pissed they aren’t

offering to help; she’s even more pissed that they haven’t

complimented her on her new green mohawk.

“Where’s Stephanie?” Crystal asks.

“In the bathroom,” Jason says. “She’s been in there

since she got here.”

“What’s she doing in there?” Crystal asks.

“I think she’s sick,” he says.

“Great,” Crystal says. “Is she going to crap out on us

again?”

“I hope so,” Jason says. “It would be a lot more fun

without her.”

Stephanie is in the bathroom, crying. She has been

crying all day. She really doesn’t want to go on the trip, but

she’s thankful she’ll be able to get away from home for a

while. She’s not allowed to cry at home.

Crystal knocks on the door.

Stephanie sucks in her breath and holds it, trying to stop

herself from crying. She doesn’t want Crystal to know she’s

having problems. She doesn’t want to have to explain herself.

“Hey, Steph,” Crystal says. “Are you okay in

there?”

Stephanie takes a couple deep breaths. Crystal can

hear her breathing.

“I’ll be fine,” Stephanie says, blowing her nose.

“You don’t have the flu or anything, do you?”

“No,” Stephanie says, fixing her black curly hair in

the mirror. “I’m just . . . hungover.”

“Was there a party last night? Why didn’t you invite

me?”

“I was just drinking with Dan.” Her voice cracks a

little when she says
Dan
.

Crystal realizes that something else is going on.

Stephanie never hangs out with her older brother anymore,

especially when he’s drinking. Dan gets way too violent and

crazy when he drinks. After that time he tried to hit her with

his car, Stephanie vowed never to drink with him again.

Dan used to be a part of their group of friends. He

used to be the one who bought them beer. But nobody likes

Dan anymore. He’s a pathetic asshole. The more his life

sucks, the bigger the asshole he becomes. And his life is 360

degrees of suck. He works a shitty job, he drives a shitty

car, he still lives with his parents, he can’t get a girlfriend to

save his life, all of his friends moved away after high school,

he doesn’t have any hobbies or goals, he’s addicted to meth,

and he knows he’s just a big waste of space. Stephanie can’t

handle being around him. She wishes that he’d go back to

jail.

Crystal doesn’t push the issue. She knows Stephanie

has major emotional issues and that she doesn’t like to talk

about them. She knows that Steph prefers to keep that kind of

stuff hidden deep inside of her so that she can pretend it doesn’t

exist. Stephanie’s good at hiding things. You wouldn’t realize

she had such painful emotional problems if you ever saw her

cheer. She is the happiest, most excited, energetic cheerleader

on the squad. She’s a really good actress.

When Stephanie opens the door, Crystal says, “Let’s

go have a fun weekend.”

Stephanie smiles wide and says, “I can’t wait!”

After the van is packed, they all cram themselves in-

side and head for the interstate.

The guys are already drinking. They started the party

early. Jason drinks the fastest, even though he’s driving. He

is already on his fifth Coors.

He says, “Who cares if we crash, it’s only a rental.”

Crystal has a beer but she is just barely sipping it.

She is acting as navigator and more importantly, music con-

troller. Unfortunately, Crystal has the worst taste in music.

She always pretends that she listens to whatever is popular

at the time, but if you let her plug her ipod into your car

stereo she is going to be playing only one kind of music:

Korean rap.

“Jesus Christ,” Jason says as his girlfriend blasts

a goofy song called
Ice-cream
by a goofy Korean rapper

named MC Mong. He hates her taste in music.

Lucky for Crystal, Des and her boyfriends find K-rap

completely hilarious, especially the group M.H. IS who try

really hard to come off as tough ghetto thugs. They dance

together in the backseat, bumping their hips together with

the music.

Jason doesn’t find it funny. He would rather listen to

something serious. He likes things that are serious. He asks

everyone if they want to listen to something different, but

Crystal and the dance party in the back seat are having too

much fun. Stephanie is the only one who doesn’t care either

way.

The hopping and dancing in the backseat causes the

van to shake and sway as they get on the interstate. As he

dances, Kevin accidentally spills his beer on Desdemona’s

bare shoulder and then licks it off of her butterfly tattoos be-

fore she can get mad at him. Rick accidentally elbows Des

in the breast, so she elbows him in the stomach.

After an hour on the road, Des falls asleep on Rick’s

shoulder and Kevin falls asleep on her shoulder. Rick doesn’t