The Loverboy

by Miel Vermeulen

  about Jake. After school was out they strolled to the mall. When they got to the mall they looked everywhere. No Jake. Kim was

  disappointed and Annie went to get a couple of chocolate shakes

  to take her mind of it. They had been to the mall together

  before but only rarely. They had always looked out of place but

  never so much as today. One girl dressed to fit the mall

  environment and the other rather alternatively. Normally they

  looked like a matching set, but funnily enough with one looking

  like she belonged in the mall and the other not it was weirder

  then when they both look out of place.

  At five they headed back home. They walked as the weather

  wasn"t too cold and it would give them privacy to talk rather

  than a crowded bus. They chatted about the mysterious Jake and

  laughed about the cheerleading squad. They split up and at a

  little after five thirty she got home. She stopped at apartment

  #2 to pickup Ally but Mrs. Simons informed her that her mom had

  already picked her up.

  She panicked. Mom was never home early on Fridays. Fridays

  were the best nights at the dinner. How was she going to hide

  her outfit? She had nothing to change into and her mom would

  surely ask questions. She zipped up her coat really high and

  hoped her mom would not notice. She would slip into her bedroom really quick and get changed immediately.

  Chapter 4:

  She opened the door to the apartment. Her mom was in the

  middle of the living room cutting Ally"s hair. She immediately

  noticed the clothes and inquired about it. Kim said that Annie

  had given them to her as she was getting rid of them.

  “But why?” her mom asked “They look brand new.”

  “She had them for ages but never wore them so she asked if

  they would fit me and they did” she lied again trying to be as

  nonchalant as possible.

  Her mom frowned with disbelieve but not enough to accuse

  her eldest of being a liar. Kim still quickly dove into her

  bedroom and got changed into some comfortable pajamas. Sure she

  could have kept the new cloths on now that it was explained but

  they felt heavy with guilt about the lie. Also if she kept them

  on it might cause more conversations about it and she wanted to

  avoid that at all cost.

  After she left her room and joined her mom and Ally in the

  living room her mom offered to cut her hair too. She declined “I"m letting it grow” she lied.

  Another lie, they were coming too easy today. She never

  lied to her mom but she just didn"t want to cause any problems.

  This lie was because she felt that at seventeen years of age she

  should get her hair cut by her mom anymore. It wasn"t that her

  mom didn"t do a good job but at seventeen her hair should only

  be trusted to a licensed stylist and not to her mom. Also if she

  showed up at school with a fresh haircut she would either have

  to admit that her mom cut her hair or she had to make up a story

  about going to a salon and that was risky since between all the

  preppy girls in her class they would know pretty much all the

  stylists in the area that would be worth going to and she

  couldn"t afford any of them. The girls would automatically ask

  questions and the lie would not hold true very long.

  After the last few days she could not afford any slip ups

  at school. She had to be cautious. After Ally cleaned up the

  mess from the hair cut they had dinner. Since mom was home it

  was not micro-waved for a change but fresh vegetables from a

  local stand run by one of the produce distributors. It was good

  and the strawberries afterwards were really good, not quite ripe

  but at this time of year she was not about to complain. In the

  winter these items were usually too expensive at the grocery

  store. So the little stand was the only way they could afford them. After dinner they helped clean up and Kim accepted a

  challenge from Ally for a game of Monopoly. Their mom smiled at

  her girls hanging out together and lay down on the couch with

  her book while the girls played.

  With her two jobs she didn"t get much time to read and she

  had only read four chapters in the last 2 months. Every night

  she would try to read a little but never made it past the first

  page and the next night she would just start the same page over

  as she couldn"t remember at which part of the page in the book

  she had fallen asleep. Ally was very determined to beat Kim

  tonight. They used to play a lot more before she stopped staying

  at Mrs. Simons house after school but nine out of ten times Kim

  would win. Every loss made Ally more determined to beat her big

  sister but Kim was in a different world though. She drifted

  between picturing to be walking hand in hand with Jake and how

  she was going to meet him again. She was barely able to pay

  enough attention to get game to take her turns. Ally had to

  nudge her almost every turn to inform her of that. Then she just

  picked up the dice and rolled them. That was sometimes followed

  by an ecstatic yell from Ally stating that she was on one of her

  properties but Kim could care less about that so she didn"t make

  Ally pay. Then she went through the motions of the rest of her

  turn only to slip back into her day dreams as fast as possible. Ally would luckily take forever on her turns. Should she

  buy the property that she landed on? Should she build houses on

  the one monopoly she had or not? How much would that cost? How

  much would she make on them? Or should she use the money from

  passing “Go” to take properties off mortgage? This form

  indecision would normally drive Kim up the wall “Analysis

  Paralysis” she would call after she had overheard someone in a

  group of geeks at school named it that claiming they heard the

  term on a podcast called the D6 Generation. For some weird

  reason it had stuck and she used it to hurry Ally along in their

  games together.

  Tonight Kim welcomed the long turns Ally took, the longer

  she took the more time she got to spend dreaming about Jake.

  The game apparently ended when Ally yelled “That will be

  two hundred thousand dollars please” after Kim had rolled the

  dice and moved her piece.

  Kim startled a little but it was enough for her to take in

  the board and there was no way she could pay that. She conceded

  and Ally bounced through the room from joy. Kim smiled as Ally"s

  reaction was funny. Kim hadn"t minded losing as she was never

  invested in the first place. After the game her mom put Ally in

  bed and sat down with Kim. “How are things?“ she asked.

  “Fine” Kim responded.

  “I know I haven"t had much time for you guys lately. I am

  sorry. I just have had to work so much to keep afloat. I just

  want you to know how much I appreciate all your help. I couldn"t

  do it without you” her mom said.

  Kim smiled, “I know you are working hard. I"m happy to

  help” she said.

  Her mom hugged her and said “I told Ally we would go feed

  the ducks in the morning, do you want to come?” She shrugged.


  “I can"t” she said, “I promised Annie I would go to the

  mall with her” she said.

  “Ok, good night. Don"t stay up too late” her mom responded

  and she disappeared into her room.

  She lay on the couch and zapped through all the channels

  every now and then she stopped at a channel and watched for a

  few minutes only to lose interest and zap through all the same

  channels again. Back to the Future 3 had caught her interest

  several times during the zapping but she had seen it too many

  times. She had done this routine many times before always

  cursing the fact that they didn"t have cable. This time she didn"t mind. Her thoughts couldn"t stay more than a minute or

  two on the screen anyway, they kept drifting to Jake.

  She started feeling her eyes get heavy and got up to go to

  bed. She looked at the clock and it was two AM. She hadn"t been

  up that long? Had she? It didn"t matter. She went to her room

  and crawled in bed. Ally was in dreamland and Kim was quick to

  join her.

  It was noon when she woke up. Ally and her mom had already

  returned from the park.

  “Weren"t you supposed to meet Annie?” she asked. “I told

  her I would call when I left” Kim said.

  She picked up the phone and pretended to call Annie.

  “Hi Annie” she said “I Just have to shower and then I am

  out of here. Meet you at the mall in an hour. Bye.”

  She hung up the phone and felt guilty about lying again and

  went into the bathroom to take a shower. When she got out she

  went to her bedroom and looked for clothes to get dressed. The

  new outfit was gone. She had left it on the floor next to her

  bed. In a panic she called her mom.

  “What"s the matter?” her mom asked with a puzzled look on

  her face. “Where are my clothes?” she demanded.

  “I washed them. They are in the dryer” her mom said.

  Kim rushed out of the apartment and to the basement.

  Her mom yelled after her “I just started the dryer. They

  won"t be dry yet.”

  But Kim did not stop. She got to the basement were two sets

  of washers and dryers were positioned. They were for the use of

  all the tenants and she noticed that one was running. She opened

  it and pulled out the jeans. They were still soaked and in one

  of the pockets she found Jake"s card. Or what was left of it.

  She could still make out the name but the smaller print phone

  and pager numbers were illegible. She curse and then sat down

  with her head in her hands. How could this have happened? How

  was she going find him now?

  Then the man from apartment four walked in which startled

  her, partly because she had never thought he cared much about

  personal hygiene. He was in his forties and had lived in number

  four with his wife up until 3 months ago. Then she left him for

  someone she thought she would be happier with. If she would only

  fight with her new man twice a day that would have been an

  improvement. The last three months had been nice and quiet. She

  would have preferred that he would have left; he had always given her the willies. Nothing he had said or anything but he

  had always seemed to have given her these looks. Like he was

  thinking of how it would be to have sex with her. The only thing

  that was missing from the look was him licking his lips while he

  stared. He might do that also as she always averted her eyes

  from him immediately. Sure Kim had longed for male attention but

  not this dirty old man. Then she remembered she was alone in

  this basement with this creep while all she was wearing was her

  bathrobe. She got up and hurried back upstairs.

  When she walked back into the apartment she stormed back

  into her room leaving Ally and her mom in the living room with a

  puzzled look on their faces. She got dressed and grabbed her

  coat.

  “What"s wrong?” her mom asked.

  “Nothing” she sneered and walked out the door.

  “Don"t you need breakfast…… or lunch?” her mom yelled after

  her but no reaction from Kim.

  “Make sure you are home by four thirty she said. I have a

  shift at the dinner at five” Her mom yelled.

  “OK” Kim responded short not turning and letting the door

  to the apartment building slam behind her. Her mom and Ally looked at each other and shrugged. It was

  cold today and Kim walked to the bus stop. As she turned the

  corner she saw the bus pull away from the bus stop.

  “Damn” she cursed, her mood getting fouler by the minute.

  No point in sitting in the cold. She might as well walk.

  That would keep her warmer. She walked to the mall having no

  feeling in her toes anymore when she got there. It was not too

  busy for a Saturday. She liked the busy mall usually since it

  was easier to go unnoticed but she wasn"t there to just pass

  time though. She was there to find him. Surely he would come

  here more often and with a semi busy mall it would be easier to

  spot him. She walked the length of the mall but no Jake. The

  only positive was that she didn"t see anyone from school either.

  If one of them would give her a hard time she was in a foul

  enough mood to take their heads off. She walked the length of

  the mall several more times, her mood shifting from foul to

  disappointed to sad. She would never find him again she thought

  as she noticed it was four o"clock. She left scanning the mall

  on her way out for Jake and the parking lot for the silver

  Porsche, nothing.

  She walked home in a brisk pace trying not to be late. The

  cold wasn"t bothering her anymore; she was too disappointed and

  sad. After about ten minutes she sensed like she was being followed which made her feel very uncomfortable and she didn"t

  dare to look back fearing that it would cause a reaction from

  whoever was following her. After another block she noticed a

  car creeping up on her. Her curiosity got the better of her and

  she looked over her shoulder.

  It was a silver Porsche convertible; it couldn"t be Jake"s

  car? Could it? She had to look again. It was the same car and

  she recognized him as he just pulled alongside her. He rolled

  the window down and said “Hi” as he pulled to a stop next to

  her. Her mood had never shifted so much so fast. She stopped and

  looked through the window.

  “Hi” she said.

  “It is way too cold to walk, get in and I"ll drive you

  home” he said with a big smile on his face.

  Her heart was telling her to jump in the car through the

  open window but she had to play it cool. She had to play a

  little hard to get and not seem too eager. That would be a major

  turn-off.

  As cool as she could be she responded “It"s ok, it"s not

  that far. I can walk. I don"t want to take you out of your way.” He smiled and said “Actually I am not offering to do you a

  favor but more because it would be a favor to me if you would

  ride with me.”

  “Well, in that case I guess I should as I owe you one” she

  said.

  She opened the door and slid into the warm luxur
ious

  interior of the car. She closed the door and he rolled up the

  window.

  “I had hoped to see you again” he said, “Why didn"t you

  call?”

  “I lost the number” she confessed sheepishly.

  “Well then it"s a good thing I spotted you” he said.

  She smiled and looked away. He looked just like she

  remembered him, tall and handsome. They chatter for what seemed

  like a few minutes while she stroked the soft, warm leather of

  the heated seat. Next thing she knew she noticed the clock on

  the dashboard and it said five o"clock. He noticed her shock and

  put the car in gear.

  “Where to?” he asked.

  She directed him and made him stop around the corner of her

  apartment afraid her mom might see her. She was late and surely she was looking out for her. She had to go she explained and

  opened the door.

  “Wait” he said, “Can I see you again?”

  She thought.

  “How about Friday afternoon?” he asked.

  “Sure, she said with a smile “I"ll see you at the mall at

  four by the food court.”

  He said good bye and handed her a new card. She grabbed it

  and quickly secured it in her pocket. As she hurried away she

  looked around and waved. He just sat there waving back. When she

  turned the corner and headed to the door of the apartment building she heard him pull away. This had been a great day!

  Chapter 5:

  She opened the door to the apartment building; her mom was

  waiting in the door of their apartment. She had seen her walk up

  and she was furious.

  “Do you know what time it is? You were supposed to be home

  forty minutes ago. My shift started 10 minutes ago and I already

  called that I was running late!!!” she yelled.

  Kim pushed by her into the living room and snarled a quick

  “Sorry, I missed the bus!”

  “I don"t have time to fight” her mom said as she grabbed

  her coat and left, slamming the door.

  Kim"s mood had shifted again. Sure she was late but so

  what? It could happen to anyone, she hadn"t done it on purpose

  and it wasn"t her fault that her mom had to work all the time.

  She had expressed her gratitude to Kim for being so helpful last

  night and but apparently that didn"t mean anything. One small

  misstep and she got yelled at. She fell in the couch and was pissed. She had been in such a good mood not ten minutes ago and