My Stupid Girl (5 page)

"I have a grandma. She lives about an
hour away." I didn't want to move an hour away. I wanted to finish high
school where I was right now. The people in this town were at least used to me
and my funky style. I didn’t want to start over. Especially not if I was going
to get sent back again halfway through the year.

"David, I know you’re not enthusiastic
about this, but we have to pursue it. Can we have your grandmother’s number,
please?” Officer Cosby was still speaking in a low voice. His eyes didn’t leave
my face and his eyebrows were raised with concern.

I shrugged. "Yeah. Whatever." I
looked down at my hands as I recited it for them. My bruises weren’t that bad.
It had been a few weeks back and he had been drunk. Definitely not as bad as
some of the incidents in the past.

"Is there anything you need or that we
can do for you?" Officer Dean asked.

"No." I just wanted them to leave
so I could be by myself for a moment before the nurse came in and started
bugging me with ear temperatures or something.

"Please let us know if there is
anything more you want to tell us, okay. David?"

I nodded. They both stood up and Officer
Dean held out his hand for me to shake.

"I heard about what you did for Miss
Peterson. You are a town hero, son." I shook his hand quickly and let sink
in what he‘d said for a while after they’d left. Town hero?  Joy.

Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if I moved an
hour away.

* * *

I heard a timid knock on the door a few
hours later as I drifted in and out of sleep. For the record, hospital beds are
crazy uncomfortable. The knock couldn’t have been my new nurse. She just barged
in every hour or so, knuckling the door as it swung open. 

"Yeah?" I said, hoping it was
Lucy, but scared to death that it was probably, you know, Lucy. A set of sky
blue eyes peered thru the crack she made by opening my door. 

It was Lucy. 

"Hey!" she said sweetly. She
looked like she had just woken up. Her hair was tangled in the back, and her
big eyes were droopy and puffy. She was shuffling over to me with her hospital
socks, wrapped in a giant grey blanket. She’d ditched the beanie. With no hat
on her head and no blanket bunched up around her chin, her neck looked longer.
She was really pretty. I tried not to notice her shape, but she made it
difficult because she was climbing onto my hospital bed.

It was a good thing that the railing was up
on the left side or I would have gone spilling off onto the floor.

There I was, pinned up against a hospital
safety railing next to a hospital-gowned beauty freak. I felt ridiculously
uncomfortable with her that close to me and it surprised me that she was even
willing to do that. She was always such a good girl. What was she doing this
close to a male? Especially a dressing-in-black-and-wearing-makeup male like
me.

"Why are we here?" She held up
her hand, gesturing at the situation more than the room. I chuckled. I knew
what she meant.

"Because we live in the kind of town
where all the police officers are sent to a little fender bender. You’re okay,
that’s what matters." We were going to be something they talked about for
a long time.

"Yeah. I wish we didn't have to be
here at all!" She turned her full face towards me and bit her bottom lip.
I closed my eyes. A kind of primal instinct to protect myself from whatever it
was that was causing me to go into a stupor. I really did not want to deal with
this gorgeous girl, chatting about the most epic event of her life like it was
nothing.

“I’m sorry,” she said, dropping her eyes
down. I knew she dropped her eyes because I peeked.    

"Listen," I replied in a rush,
"I’m guessing you feel bad, but… whatever, it happened. I'm glad
everything worked out. You’re okay and that’s all I wanted." Dang, I just
said that. "So, we don't have to talk about it anymore." I felt
embarrassed and I was willing her to speak again. I wanted her to start up on
the gowns before I started confessing that I would have drug her out of the
lake with my teeth if I’d had to.

"Yeah, OK!" She beamed at me.
"What should we talk about?" She put a lot of emphasis on the world
should. Unfortunately for Miss Peterson, she was asking the wrong guy. I was
perfectly content with just sitting and listening to her talk. I held my breath
for a minute hoping she would get it going for me. Eventually I had to breathe,
and I shrugged my shoulders when I saw that she was still waiting for me to
respond.

It was moments like these when I realized I
had been robbed of Social Skills 101 by having an adopted, alcoholic father.
He’d never wanted kids in the first place but adopted one to appease his
persistent wife. Then, she passed away in a car accident three months later. We
didn’t talk about it. We didn’t really talk about anything. But even though the
guy was a jerk, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him, being stuck with a kid
he never wanted and losing someone he loved.

“Your girlfriend is pretty.” She spoke
quietly.

I looked up quickly but all I saw were her
eyes glancing sideways in my direction, not committing her entire face to me.

Girlfriend, what?

Then it clicked.

She must have been talking about Michelle,
which was as funny as it was wrong.

“How do you know that she’s pretty?” I
asked, feeling a touch flattered by her jealousy.

“Umm, I, ahhhh,” she stammered, unable to
answer. She started gathering the blanket she had wrapped around herself and
bunching it together. It was surprisingly adorable how she was unable to answer
me. I wondered if this was her way of asking me if Michelle was, in fact, my
girlfriend.

The idea that she even cared made me happy.
THAT led me to believe that I should inquire about the psyche ward. Possible
Post Traumatic Syndrome was a definite possibility.

“I was just saying, she seems nice.” Lucy
finally answered, still not looking at me. If she had, she would have seen that
I was smiling.

But I’m glad she wasn’t looking. I let out
a chuckle. I was caught. Time to be honest.

“I think your ‘pretty’ line was better than
your ‘nice’ line,” I said. She laughed that loud laugh she and her mother
shared, but she looked questioningly at me. I let her suffer a few seconds
before I ‘fessed up.

“She isn’t my girlfriend,” I finally
admitted. I don’t know why I felt it was important that Lucy knew this. I was
going to be moving an hour away as soon as I got out of here. Chances were good
I would never see her again.

“Oh?” she said, the octaves in her voice
going up a few pitches.

“Nope.”

“She kissed you, so I assumed.” Lucy was
looking at me now, so she caught my “I’m not following you, you crazy person”
look. The closest I had ever been to being kissed was about four hours ago, and
it was by Lucy’s MOM!

“You saw this?” I asked her, my voice
dripping with doubt.

“Well, yes. After the nurse closed the
curtain, I heard her kiss you …” she trailed off. It dawned on me that she must
have been referring to Isaiah making kiss noises at me. I was relieved to
realize that she didn’t know it was on her account.

“She isn’t my girlfriend,” I said again.

“Oh,” she said quickly, dropping her
strangled blanket and letting it breathe.

"I like your lip rings." She
changed the subject. "What are those called?" She took her pointer
and middle finger and made a kind of peace sign and touched them on each end of
my bottom lips.

"Snake bite," I answered as I
nervously fiddled with the right one.

"I wanted to get my belly button
pierced last summer but I chickened out." She seemed uninterested in the
belly button thing but I knew she was trying to find something for us to have
in common and I appreciated that. Nice gal.

"You know what you should do is get a
sleeve," I blurted out. What can I say? I was starting to warm up to her,
beside me. How could I resist? Both of us looked like Death had warmed over us,
chewed us up, then spit us back up because we were so disgusting it offended
him. She looked at me questioningly.

"A what?" Her right eye quirked
up in sync with the right corner of her lips. It was the cutest facial
question-mark I’d ever seen in my life.

"A sleeve is the tattoo that goes up
your whole arm." I reached across my body and touched her arm that was
squished next to me. “You need something with a ton of color.”

"Ah, right! That’s a fantastic idea
David! Maybe you can take me?" Her voice dripped with sarcasm but she
actually seemed kind of interested. I bet her parents thought tattoos were the
devil’s work.

"Sure, we can go get you an entire
sleeve. We’ll go tomorrow." I answered her excited face with a half-smile.
She answered my smile with one of her own and then lay back on the bed and
didn't speak for a while, staring at the ceiling. I noticed her head drifting
over, eventually resting against my shoulder. It was getting heavier and it
wasn't comfortable, but I wasn't going to ask her to move it. I might be
awkward and socially constipated but I’m not stupid. 

I really wanted to put my arm around her. I
felt my resolve ping-ponging back and forth. I didn't feel like it would be
unwelcome; she had climbed into my bed, after all. I decided. My arm slowly
wrapped around her head and she readjusted, turning her body slightly toward me
and sinking deeper onto my chest. Her neck was resting in my armpit and my arm
draped over those hips. She let out a little sigh. I pulled up the blankets
around her shoulders, straightening the hemline so it lined up with my own
covering. Then I put my cheek on the top of her head and I laughed softly to
myself. This whole situation was absolutely absurd.

The day was turning out to be ok, after all. 

3. OVER THE RIVER AND THROUGH THE WOODS

All good things must come to an end, so they say.

The only good thing about the next morning
was when Lucy’s parents and boyfriend came to take her home from the hospital.
Nurses and orderlies freaked out for a few minutes until they discovered her in
my room. The look on Mike’s face when he saw Lucy asleep in my bed, tucked
under my arm was priceless. Pure comedy.

I was happy to play a role in teaching an
impressionable young lad some life lessons about being such an impressionable
young lad. Like, give a crap about your girlfriend, for one.

What I didn’t like was how they were all
looking at me like I was the culprit. Sure, I wasn't kicking and screaming
about the gorgeous creature curled up next to me, but I certainly didn't invite
her. She was a big girl, she’d done it all on her own. But Mike didn’t seem to care;
he had instantly dropped the grateful facade and his face had picked up a sour
look, judging by the angry curl of his mouth. Lucy’s mom looked horrified, and
her dad seemed concerned. A little thread of guilt started to curl around my
stomach. I ignored it. Probably wouldn’t see these people again, anyway.

Mike’s anger got worse when he had to poke
Lucy awake. The first thing she did when she was awake enough to register there
were people around, was look at me and say "oh, good morning David! You
saved my life!" Then she giggled. Seriously. An early morning giggle from
the most popular girl in school. Twilight Zone, check.

As Mike’s face cycled through six shades of
red and purple, Lucy stretched, scooted over, and flung her legs over the bed.
Her parents’ faces changed from concerned, to relieved, as soon as their
precious chick left the evil zone-my bed. But Mike still looked baffled. Lucy
gave me a little wave and shuffled to her room between her parents, Mike
trailed behind them with his tail between his legs. I patted my hair down
quickly and decided to buy a real beanie as soon as I got the chance. The last
24 hours had been surreal and amazing. And they were done. I knew it and tried
to avoid thinking about what came next. Within a half hour I was on my way to
my grandmother’s house in the back of a police car.

I was expecting to go to my father’s house
to get all of my things but they told me that a social worker had packed up my
things into a box that had already been delivered to my grandma’s. I couldn’t
stop worrying that my stuff would be in less than perfect condition when I got
there. If whoever packed me up knew anything about me, they were probably
surprised when they walked into my room and saw how clean and orderly it was.
They had to have been imagining a Goth kid’s room: black paint, posters of
people cut in half, and a mess of clothes piled up waist-high. Some of my
friends had rooms like that but I couldn't handle it. I liked to know were all
my stuff was; I liked it all to go exactly where it belonged. I did have a few
gargoyle statues, I guess that could have been weird but I liked the way they
looked, like they were standing guard over something. They had this
don't-even-think-about-it look on their faces that I could relate to. Besides,
they were perfectly spaced on either corner of my dresser. Yeah, they were
Goth, but they were meticulously placed (and dusted) Goth.

I wondered briefly how my father was doing
and if he was going to have to go to court again because of this. I'm glad I
didn't have to see him. I know he wouldn't have done anything to me. He
probably wasn’t drunk, and he sure wouldn’t have touched me with the police
escorting me. But I just didn't want to see the shame on his face. I knew that,
no matter what he did, he didn't want to be who he was. I didn't know much
about alcoholism because I wasn't interested in the least in drinking after
years of living with my dad. From what I saw, I could tell that it was
something he hated but had convinced himself he needed. I think his loneliness
was part of it. And then there was the stress of having a kid around that
reminded him of his late wife. And how I had made her so happy. But then I also
reminded him that she wasn't around anymore.