He was absent on Tuesday, too, and by the time he returned on Wednesday I had reverted to my standard slacks and blouse. It was obvious at a glance what had kept him away from school. He’d developed a bad cold over the weekend. I stayed for practice after class, so I didn’t see him on the bus, but he smiled at me once in the hall.
I finally got a chance to talk to him on Thursday afternoon. Barbara and I were heading out to the main door when we saw Heath at his locker. We had to walk right past him. Barbara, who had heard all about my visit to his house, signed to me with her eyes and turned into a side corridor, going another way.
Left alone, I felt my courage fail me. But I forced myself to approach him.
“Hi, Heath.”
He turned and glanced down at me, a loose leaf binder in his hand. He seemed startled.
“Hi, Gaby.”
I swallowed. “Are you going out to the bus?”
He shook his head. “No, I’m going over to the mall to do some shopping.” He examined me with his hazel eyes. “Want to come?”
The mall was a short walk from the school. He was inviting me to go with him. My heart leaped. But I would have to let my mother know.
“I’d like to, but I have to call home first.”
He reached into his pocket and produced a dime. He nodded to the pay phone in the lobby, handing me the money. “Go ahead.”
I told my mother that I was going to the mall, but not with whom. Luckily she was busy with a meeting of the hospital volunteers at the house, and didn’t question me further. I told her I’d call her if I needed a ride.
Heath was waiting for me with his books in a backpack. He took mine and unzipped the bag, adding them to his and then shouldering the double burden. The weight didn’t seem to bother him at all.
We walked to the shopping center as he told me that he wanted to buy some clothes. It seemed strange to me that he was going by himself—I thought of shopping as something you did with your mother or your friend. I couldn’t help feeling a little sorry for him.
“I’ve got to get some things like the kids around here wear,” he said. “Roger bought the stuff I’ve got now from my measurements before I came down from school,” he said, gesturing to himself. “They’re not exactly helping me to blend in.” His smile was sardonic. “I don’t really know what to buy.” He looked at me. “Maybe you can help me.”
“I’ll try.”
He reached over and smoothed my hair with his hand. “I believe you will.”
It was the first time he had touched me. I felt the warmth of his fingers after he’d withdrawn them.
We paused in the parking lot and he glanced around at the stores. “Well, where shall we go?” he said.
“My mother and I usually go to Maxwell’s,” I suggested. “They have a big teen department.”
“Maxwell’s it is,” he said with finality. “As long as they take VISA, MASTERCARD, or American Express.”
My eyes widened. Where had he gotten all those cards?
He saw my expression. “Daddy’s,” he explained. “It’s either use one of them or wear these duds until they come back in style again.” He grinned.
I grinned back. There was nothing odd about Heath; he knew he was dressed wrong, but the butler who had outfitted him knew nothing of what kids were wearing. I wondered where Roger had found Heath’s current wardrobe. Probably in some expensive but hopelessly square men’s store, one of those places that sold smoking jackets and pipes.
I took Heath to the third floor, and the man there was very helpful. It wasn’t long before Heath was heading to the dressing room with a stack of jeans, pullovers, and work shirts. While he was gone I rummaged around and came up with a few novelty items: a down vest, a navy zip front hoodie, and a Pink Floyd T-shirt.
The new clothes transformed Heath, just as the gym suit had done. Instead of looking like a misfit, he now looked like a cute guy with a short haircut. And his hair would grow. In a few months, he’d be dynamite.
This knowledge didn’t make me as happy as it should have. As soon as others began to notice what I could already see, the Daphne Morris contingent would be on him like green on grass. I might not be as fascinating when the cheerleaders and baton twirlers began to take an interest.
I was distracted from these gloomy thoughts by Heath’s reappearance. He was wearing the Pink Floyd T-shirt. While he had been able to get away with the other outfits, the day-glo lettering and outrageous decals on the shirt looked ridiculous with his military hairstyle.
He saw it, too. He studied himself in the three way mirror for a moment, and then said thoughtfully, “I look like a West Point cadet wearing a Halloween costume.”
This so accurately described the impression he made that I collapsed in laughter. Even the salesclerk smiled. Heath winked at me and went back inside to change.
He bought everything except the T-shirt. The clerk called Heath’s house to make sure that it was all right for Heath to be using the charge card. Roger must have okayed it, because we left with the packages.
On the way out we stopped in the shoe department and Heath bought desert boots and a pair of deck shoes. By the time he was through we were staggering around with so many boxes and bags we could hardly make it to the door.
“I should have thought to bring a packhorse,” Heath said dryly.
“You thought to bring me,” I said.
He chuckled. “I would hardly describe you as a packhorse,” he said.
I knew that was a compliment. I was pleased with myself.
Heath called Roger to pick us up. Roger arrived in record time in a black Buick that looked like a funeral car.
“You remember Miss Dexter,” Heath said to Roger as we got in the car. Roger nodded at me and turned back to the wheel.
Heath repeated my directions to Roger, and I was home sooner than I wanted to be. I had been sort of hoping that Heath would ask me to go for a soda or something, but it was late and also it would have been awkward with Roger involved.
Roger pulled the car into my drive and Heath got out to open the door on my side.
“Thanks for the help,” Heath said. “I had a good time.”
“So did I.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow in Mackley’s class,” he said. “‘Bye.”
He was inside and the car was vanishing down the street in seconds. I stood watching it until it was out of sight.
Chapter 3
Heath made the basketball team. The list was posted on Friday. I thought it would give me a good excuse to talk to him, to congratulate him. But he just got up and left quickly at the end of Mackley’s class, which depressed me. I had been hoping he’d wait for me.
He sat with another senior on the bus, and didn’t even glance up as I walked by him to take my seat. I felt like crying. Had I imagined our little shopping spree yesterday? Why was he acting so distant? Or had I been looking for too much as the result of just one afternoon? I didn’t know the answers to these questions, but I wasn’t in a very good mood for the coming weekend.
I moped around the house Friday night, and took up Saturday with straightening my room and washing my hair, getting some clothes ready for the next week.
We had pizza for dinner, and Craig and I agreed on a program on TV, which was an unprecedented event. We were watching it in the den when the phone rang.
My mother answered it and came back into the room, raising her eyebrows. “It’s for you, Gaby. Somebody named Heath Lindsay.”
Mindful of my audience, especially Craig, I controlled myself and did not run to the phone. But my walk was pretty fast.
“Hello?” I tried not to sound out of breath.
“Hi, Gaby.” His voice sounded different over the phone, deeper. Older.
“Hi, Heath.”
“How are you doing?”
“Fine.” This was wonderful. The conversation so far could have been taking place between me and my Great Uncle Ralph.
Heath cleared his throat. “I wa
s wondering if you were busy this coming Saturday night.”
Busy? I would have cancelled an appointment with the governor if I were. “No, I don’t think so.” Good girl, Gaby. You said that very calmly.
“There’s a dance at the country club, and I wanted to know if you’d like to go with me. My father’s bringing a date, he can drive us.”
Was he kidding? But the parents had to be asked. “I’d love to, Heath, but I’ll have to talk to my parents about it. Can I let you know?”
“Sure. How about if I call you back tomorrow?”
“Great. I’ll let you know then.”
“‘Bye, Gaby.”
“‘Bye.”
I returned to the den, walking on air.
“Somebody’s got that boy trained,” my mother commented when she saw me. “I picked up the phone and he said, ‘Mrs. Dexter, this is Heath Lindsay. I’m a classmate of Gabrielle’s at Oakland High. I wonder if I might speak with Gabrielle, please?’”
“He used to go to military school,” I explained. “He calls all the teachers ‘sir’ and ‘ma’am’, too.”
“If that’s the result it produces, all you kids should go to military school,” my father said darkly, rattling his newspaper.
“He wants me to go to a dance at the country club with him Saturday night,” I said.
My parents exchanged glances. It wasn’t every day that a boy asked me to a dance at the country club. It wasn’t every day a boy asked me anywhere.
“We don’t even know this young man,” Dad began.
“His father is going with us,” I said hastily, not giving my dad a chance to start. “He’s going to drive.”
I didn’t add that his father was going with a date. I knew they wouldn’t like the sound of that. Divorce does not go over big in our house. The fact that it was hardly Heath’s fault wouldn’t matter. “His mother’s dead,” I added, hoping for the sympathy vote.
“I don’t know,” my father said doubtfully.
I shifted from one foot to the other.
“You can stop dancing around, Gabrielle,” Mom said. “If you bring this boy in to meet us beforehand, and his father is driving, I don’t see any reason you can’t go.”
I jumped her and hugged her, yelping with joy.
Craig made a disgusted noise and turned the television louder.
“Turn that back down, dear,” my mother said to him calmly.
“No drinking,” my father announced in a strong voice. “No drugs.”
“Now, Jack,” Mom said, “Gabrielle knows our rules about that. One date does not mean she’ll be involved in an orgy.”
My father mumbled something as I shot my mother a grateful glance. “Be back by eleven,” my father added more audibly, not giving up yet.
“Daddy!” I wailed. “It doesn’t even start until eight-thirty!”
He looked at my mother.
“We’ll discuss your curfew later,” she said with finality. “You may tell Heath you can go.” She paused thoughtfully. “Is this the boy you were concerned about last week?”
I nodded, blushing.
She shook her head. “You insult him, and he asks you for a date.” She raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Who can fathom the mind of the young?”
“Not I,” my father said, and returned to the sports section.
* * *
I forced myself to wait until I confirmed the date with Heath the next day before I called Barbara. I wanted to be sure it was actually going to happen before I broke the news.
Barbara’s sister Margie answered the phone. “I’ll get her,” she said. “She’s drying her hair.”
Barbara came on the line. I could hear the roar of the hair dryer in the background. I pictured her standing in the upstairs hall of her house, with the dryer on a long cord from the bathroom outlet.
“Barb, Heath Lindsay called me,” I said.
“What?” she screamed.
“Turn off the dryer!” I yelled.
“What?”
“Turn off the dryer!” I bellowed, frustrated. She was always trying to carry on a conversation while running some noisy appliance. If she was upstairs it was the dryer or the electric razor, if she was downstairs it was the blender or the dishwasher. She could never do one thing at a time.
She got the message and turned the dryer off. Into the sudden silence I repeated, “Heath Lindsay called me.”
No answer.
“He asked me to the country club dance Saturday night.”
Still no answer.
“Barb, are you there?”
“Gaby!” she shrieked. What she’d lacked in reaction time she made up for in volume. “I can’t believe it.”
“Neither can I.”
“What are you going to wear?”
That was a good question. “I don’t know.”
“I’ve got an idea. Remember that pink ruffled dress I got for my cousin’s wedding? It’s hanging in the closet right now, all covered in plastic and everything. I only wore it once, and it has a deep hem to let down, and a top that can be taken in. My mother could do it. I’ll bring it right over and you can try it on.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
“See you in ten minutes.”
Barbara arrived with her damp hair stuffed in a knit hat, the plastic bag slung over her shoulder like a fireman doing a body carry. She said hello to my parents in the den and then we headed upstairs.
The dress fit, after a fashion. It was woefully apparent that Barbara sported a good deal more cleavage than I did, but the bodice was of a type that could easily be adjusted, as she’d said. And it was only a couple of inches too short. We studied my reflection in the full length mirror on the back of the door in my parents’ bedroom.
Craig paused in the hall on the way to his room with a fistful of cookies. “You’re not going anywhere in that,” he said around a mouthful of chocolate chips. “You look like you’re wearing grandma’s bedspread.”
“Get lost, junior,” Barbara said sourly.
Craig made a face and disappeared. I heard his door slam seconds later.
I glanced in the mirror again. Craig was right. What had looked so good on cute, pert Barbara looked terrible on me. I just wasn’t the fluffy, ruffly type.
My mother came into the room with some laundry she was putting away. She eyed me in Barbara’s dress without comment.
“It doesn’t look right, does it?” I ventured.
It was obvious that she agreed, but didn’t want to slight Barbara’s dress in any way. “We’ll go shopping tomorrow afternoon,” she said, sliding a stack of my father’s shirts into a drawer. “I do wish this boy had given you more notice. Barbara, why don’t you ask your mother if you can come along with us? I’ll pick you ladies up after school.”
Barbara and I grinned at each other.
* * *
On Monday, we tramped around from three-thirty to five to every dress shop on Main Street, and found nothing. Everything I tried on made me look all bundled up, like a fourth grader at a birthday party. The salesgirls saw a teenager and immediately brought out dresses covered with bows, lace, and ribbons, and they just didn’t suit me. I’m too tall and reedy for Alice in Wonderland outfits. My mother always takes these occasions to remind me that I’ll be grateful for my height and slimness one day, when my more curvaceous friends are getting dumpy, but of course that doesn’t help me now. Now I feel like a giraffe being fitted for a lace collar.
My mother called Craig from a pay phone and told him to put the roast in the oven. Then we made our last stop, Tricia’s Bridal World, where Barb’s cousin had gotten her wedding gown.
It was an expensive place, sophisticated, with lots of slinky cocktail dresses as well as bridesmaid’s gowns and the like. The clerk saw me and right away started gushing about how easy it would be to find something appropriate for such a charming girl. Sure. She should have been with us during the past two hours. Maybe I’m cynical, but the salesgirls in such places always sound so
insincere to me, as if they compliment everyone that way. If they do it must be pretty hard to keep a straight face with some of the ugly people they see.
She started yanking the same old cutesy dresses off the hangers, but my mother headed for another rack. She was the one who found it.
It was emerald green, simple, tailored, the only fancy touches the see-through, billowy chiffon sleeves, and the row of rhinestone buttons down the front.
As soon as I put it on in the dressing room, I knew I had to have it. I looked beautiful in it, like a model in a perfume ad. The color enhanced my hair and eyes, the covered belt emphasized my small waist. The material was soft, clinging, feminine. Oh, it was lovely.
I looked at the price tag and my heart sank. The dress cost $75.00.
I walked outside to the standing mirror on the selling floor. Everybody stared at me. It was obvious from their reaction that they knew this was it too.
I looked despairingly at my mother. “Seventy-five dollars,” I said.
Barbara was crestfallen, and the clerk chimed in with how well made it was and certainly worth the price. She didn’t have to sell me.
Mom walked over to me and looked at my face in the mirror, the price tag, and my face again. “We’ll take it,” she said.
Barbara yahooed and I felt a big smile splitting my face. Mom was great. I knew I would probably be working this one off for years to come, but it would be worth it.
“You won’t be sorry,” I babbled. “I’ll get a lot of use out of it, I’ll wear it to everything. I’ll get married in it if you want.”
“I don’t think that will be necessary, Gabrielle,” my mother said dryly as the salesgirl carefully wrapped it in tissue and put it in a box. No tossing items in plastic bags at Tricia’s Bridal World. Not at seventy-five smackers a clip. “Just let’s not tell your father about it until he’s had dinner.”
I walked out of the store with the box tucked under my arm like a secret treasure.
* * *
The week seemed endless. I was convinced that Saturday would never come. When I saw Heath in class, he smiled his almost smile at me. On Friday, he waited in the hall for me after the bell. The next period was lunch for both of us, so there was no hurry to get on to another class.
Gabrielle's Bully (Young Adult Romance) Page 3