“I know it’s silly, but it helps me not feel guilty about breaking the rules. I’ve never had a boy in my room before.”
I looked around her room. It looked like a hurricane had hit it. There was stuff everywhere: empty soda cans on the nightstand, books scattered across the floor, and she must not have owned a hamper because there were more clothes on the ground than in her closet or dresser, combined. I could tell because every drawer was open.
Her walls looked amazing though. There was one full wall dedicated to words she had cut out of magazines. It must have taken her a lot of time, cutting and taping, fitting the words together on the wall like a big puzzle. They all said things like “love” or “beautiful” or “adventure” or something. Every word on the wall could have been used to describe her. Plus, they were different colors, sizes, fonts. It was really neat.
The wall next to the word wall was covered in little hooks. There must have been thirty of them. Each hook held a long line of large shiny beads and they were all placed strategically so that where one ended the other would begin. It looked like she had taken one of her mom’s old beaded curtains from the 70s, chopped it up, and hung it on her wall. The other two walls had paintings, maybe by Mrs. Peterson. I recognized the brush strokes; they looked similar to the one I had admired the last time I was here.
Lucy’s walls were painted a sage green color, and her bed was crowned with a huge white headboard. Her unmade bed was smothered by billowy folds of a bright blue and orange bedspread, orange sheets, and a completely random red bed skirt. It was so different from my beige room and black comforter. In my room, nothing was out of place. I hated the feeling of chaos and lack of control that came with things strewn around. But Lucy looked completely at ease with her room like this; she didn’t even look like she cared that I saw it like this.
“So, you heard all that?” She was looking down at her hands as she asked. I reached over to her, picked up the hand she was concentrating on and brought it up to my lips. I kissed her knuckles and looked her straight in the eyes.
“Lucy.” I didn’t know what else to say, but in that moment I felt like her name was enough. I moved my hands to her hips and steered her over to me, readjusting my pose to Indian-style, and sitting her so she was perched on my crossed legs. I put her head on my shoulder and realized that I was really stupid for not doing this the second she had come to talk to me in the alley.
“I’m sorry, David,” she whispered in my ear as she put her arms around my neck, not moving her head from my shoulder. Her breath tickled before sending a buzz down my spine. I felt like I was home in her arms.
“Oh hush.” I squeezed her tighter.
"You know, David, the worst part was that Rachel got to kiss you and I didn’t.” She looked heartbroken and it made me feel weak.
"You’re right." I whispered honestly. It was the first time I had put my face down, ashamed. I had told myself I wasn’t going to do that, but before I could correct myself Lucy caught my chin and lifted it so my eyes were inches from hers. She put her left hand on my right cheek and her right hand on my left cheek. I grabbed for her left hand but she shook it off. She didn’t lift my hair up; she just held my face in her hands, looking at me, considering me.
“I missed you, David.” She bent slightly and kissed my forehead; then she kissed my nose. I put my face up towards her even more, inviting her to kiss my lips. She smiled at me and bent her face down and kissed me gently.
There was no urgency on her lips; they were meek and hesitant. It was a small kiss, but filled with more passion than Rachel’s. Even though it was short, it was sweet and sincere. Lucy dropped her hands and climbed off my lap, turning my chair around and wheeling it towards the window.
“You should leave; I’m feeling guilty!” She laughed when she saw the smile on my face.
I pulled up the glass and leaned out the window to get back on my ladder. I was pleased to see my friends had kept it there for me, even though they were nowhere to be seen. I hadn’t really expected them to stick around for an hour in the freezing cold.
“I have an idea,” I said, taking one long look at Lucy before I descended, “how about you just agree right now to be my girlfriend? Then I won’t have to agonize over it.” She laughed and kissed my nose again.
“Can I answer that stunningly romantic request tomorrow?” Her voice was high and happy, which gave me a boost of confidence.
“Does that mean you’ll be calling me?” I asked, reaching my face into her warm room and giving her lips another light peck.
“I will call you in the morning.” She kept giggling as she shut the window quietly and drew the curtains closed, not waiting to see if I made it down safely. I guess I earned that.
Once on the ground, I picked up one end of the ladder and headed back towards my car, dragging the ladder along and practically skipping like a complete idiot. I didn’t even care if I got caught now. I turned the corner, where I saw Johnny and Isaiah in my car, heads back, sleeping.
I banged on the glass, making them both jump awake in confusion and terror. I laughed as I opened the driver’s door, putting the key in the ignition to warm up the Volkswagen.
“Dude, what the heck man?” Isaiah rubbed his eyes and looked around, confused, before climbing out to help load up the ladder. Johnny followed without speaking.
As we finished tying the beast back on the roof, Johnny looked at me sideways, “So?”
“Do you have to ask, dude? Look at that stupid grin on his face. She kissed him.” Isaiah spoke matter-of-factly. I didn’t say anything; I just chuckled and worked merrily on tying the last knot.
As I climbed into the warm car, I felt my cell phone buzz in my pocket. I looked down, expecting to see my grandma’s name and was shocked to see Lucy’s.
“Hello?”
“I just looked at the time. It’s 2 a.m., David.” Her voice was serious.
“Wow, is it that late?” I was hoping that she hadn’t gotten caught, or decided to be really upset with me.
“I was just calling because, you know, its morning.” I heard her breathy laugh, and my heart literally jumped into my throat. I wished I could melt through the phone and hold her in my arms again.
“Yeah, and what do you think?” I tried to make my voice sound casual, aware of how flirty I sounded. Both Isaiah and Johnny’s eyebrows were up under their scalps somewhere, and Isaiah was elbowing me in the ribs as I spoke.
“I think that I would love to be your girlfriend, David.”
“Seriously? Wow. I have a girlfriend.” I said the words not to her, but to the world. I said it just to say it.
It was the first time in my life that those words had ever come out of my mouth and they sounded amazing. Especially because they were tied to the amazing girl only a block away.
“Oh my gosh. Hell has frozen over," Johnny spoke, as he patted my back in a gesture of congratulations. Isaiah started making exaggerated faces of shock and awe, like a Miss America winner.
“David,” Lucy said, bringing me back to our conversation.
“Yeah?”
“I love you, too.”
13. GOING STEADY
I have a girlfriend. A beautiful, funny, messy, loving, chaotic girlfriend.
Lucy, my girlfriend, began calling me every single morning. It was the best part of my day. I usually got up at least an hour before I had to leave so I could get my clothes, face, and hair perfect. Lucy would call me, sleepy-voiced, twenty minutes before she left for school. I was amazed that she could get out of bed, brush her hair, put on makeup (if she was in the mood), put on the cleanest thing she could find, and still manage to be stunning. She would always tell me she hoped I had a good day, and that she missed me, and couldn’t wait for the weekend.
Ah, the weekends. Once upon a time I hated weekends because they meant I had to be alone with my father for two whole days. Now they were something I literally counted down to. Every night before I said my goodnights on the phone to Lucy, I w
ould say something like: “Only three more days till I get to see you.”
I had turned into a complete fool and I loved every single second of it.
We would rotate weekends. I would go to Kalispell one weekend and then she would come to Whitefish the next, usually spending time with me and my grandma. My grandma was more excited about those weekends than I was. Lucy was always there on Saturday mornings when I woke up, sitting with my grandma, having coffee and talking. Usually she was sitting at the kitchen table, listening to old stories about my grandfather when he was younger or about my grandmother’s kids when they were growing up. Then, when I came out, the two of them would make me some kind of gigantic breakfast that I had to clean up after while they went and talked some more. It was like a dream that I had been hoping for my entire life, and now that I had it I hoped I never woke up from it.
The weekends I went to Kalispell were usually filled with visiting friends, mine or hers or sometimes both. Lucy liked hanging out with my guys, and those little punks absolutely adored her. She could do no wrong; every single move she made or thing she said was adorable. After a month or two, Michelle even started to like her a little, which was amazing because Michelle didn’t even like us all that much.
Then there were a few of Lucy’s friends that I was really starting to like. There was Sean who I’d met bowling. And, of course, Jennika was never far off. She was turning out to be one of the coolest people I knew. She could counter any sarcastic comment I made with her own bigger, badder dose. We could go back and forth all day.
As amazing as the weekends were, my favorite part of every week was Saturday night. Lucy and I agreed early on that, during the day, we would hang out with other people, but Saturday night was ours. We never had to ask the other what they wanted to do Saturday because we didn’t care, we knew we would be with each other. Alone. I particularly liked Saturdays at Whitefish because Lucy was allowed in my room. At her house we hung out on her couch or went to a movie.
One week, we sat in my room after having a big dinner with my grandma. After the two of us cleaned the kitchen we had been released by Grandma to go hang out, just the two of us. These times, when we were alone without interruption, were the times I really looked forward to. We could sit for hours and talk. And when I say we, I mean we. There were a few times I realized I had been talking for over an hour, which was totally unlike me. Who knew I had so much to say?
Of course, there was Lucy, hanging on to each word I was saying.
“Sorry, I’m talking so much,” I said that particular night, laying back on my pillow with my hands behind my head.
“Oh please, I love knowing what’s going on in that brain of yours!” She looked at me seriously. “I have to ask you something, David.”
I instantly got nervous. Old habit.
“Yeah? Okay.” I patted my hair down against my face. I could tell by her eyes that she was hesitating, like this was something that she had wanted to bring up for a long time but never had the guts.
“How do you get your hair so perfect?” Her perky face crinkled up in embarrassment.
“What?” I said, starting to laugh in relief. “What do you mean?”
“The color, I swear, I have been waiting for months to see your hair grow out so I could see the roots! Your friends all have dull spots in their hair or it’s grown out. But it’s like you get up and dye it the perfect black every single morning. You never have any patches that don’t match perfectly, or anything. It’s bloody perfect!” She chirped the last part in an impeccable British accent.
“You think it’s perfect, huh?”
“I’m not even kidding, how often do you dye it?”
“Every other morning,” I said, managing to pull a super-serious face before I started to laugh again. She looked at me like she couldn’t tell if I was kidding or not, which made me laugh even harder. Her eyes darted to my bathroom. I could see her brain calculating all the places I might be hiding hundreds of boxes of “midnight” black hair dye from Herbal Essences or something. I sat up on my bed and put my hand against her cheek.
“I don’t dye it,” I said quietly. She opened her mouth like she was saying “Ooooh” silently, then combed her fingers through my hair. It felt amazing. She started at the root of my hair on the left side and combed it to the ends, down to my shoulders. She looked like she was looking closely for a flaw.
“Wow,” was all she said. I moved my face to the side a little so I could kiss her palm that was resting near my scalp.
“It’s so black it’s almost blue in the sun.” She still stroked my hair. I just shrugged and smiled at her. My hair was always something that my friends made fun of me for. Whenever someone had to go and dye theirs they would make sure I knew that I was a little princess for having such perfect hair. It was actually something I really liked about myself. The natural-color trump card.
“So is that your natural color?” I asked Lucy, gently tugging on the ends of her hair. It was longer than it had been when I first met her, almost touching her hips now. She was sitting cross-legged on my bed and the tips of the longest strands were laying on her thighs.
“Oh no, I pay a ton of money for this amazing mouse-poop brown.” She picked up a stray piece and put it in front of her nose, looked at it cross eyed because it was so close, and laughed. “All the celebrities are sporting this high-end color.”
“You should put some highlights in it.” I pulled my fingers through her light waves. It was soft, it felt like velvet between my fingers, I did it a few times; it was so long that I could play with the ends and not even move my body closer to her.
“You don’t like it?” Her big lips went down in a fake frown.
“Lucy, you could be bald and I would adore it; it’d be so rockabilly. And blond or red highlights would be killer. You’re gorgeous no matter what.” I reached out and kissed her freckled nose, holding her face with my hands. She sighed which meant that she was going to pull away from me.
It had been three months and we still hadn’t kissed.
Don’t get me wrong, we did little mini-kisses, the junior version of a standard church-kiss. But the impromptu make-out session with Rachel the Sneak still remained the only “big” kiss I’d ever had. It was frustrating.
No, let me correct myself.
It was agony.
I wasn’t sure if Lucy was still upset at me, or if it had to do with that little ring on her left hand. She fiddled with it sometimes when she was backing away from me, like a talisman against the big bad kissing machine. I had asked her a while back why she was wore a ring on her wedding finger and she told me it was a purity ring. Her parents had given it to her when she was thirteen, and the whole thing involved the understanding that she was wearing the ring as a symbol that she wanted to stay pure until her wedding night.
I could see giving my kid one of those purity rings when she turned into a young woman, especially if she was as beautiful as Lucy. But, as the boyfriend, I hated it. That stinking little ring was like an invisible wall that I wasn’t allowed to cross or even go near. I wasn’t even sure if I was allowed to think about it. I’d picked up the habit of picking up her hand and kissing the little thing when I was having this internal struggle and feeling like a stupid teenager. That always made her lighten up. I could tell she struggled a lot with some kind of resolution she had given herself when it came to me. I guess I should be flattered that she looked like she was stressed out whenever we were alone. I really hoped that the looks she gave me and the way she pulled away was because she wanted to be with me, too, not because she didn’t trust me. Asking her about it straight out didn’t seem right, either. Every time I considered it I quickly began figuring out ways to argue her out of whatever imposition she was holding over us. It seemed better just to wait.
There was that time in the lighthouse though, when she’d almost kissed me. I can tell you right now, if that stupid old man hadn’t interrupted us that it wouldn’t have been a small kiss. So why
was Lucy so hesitant now? That’s what I couldn’t wrap my head around. It had to have been the Rachel thing, I figured. I really didn’t know, but I was just happy to be with Lucy, to be near her and have her laugh at the things I said. Basically, I was just glad she was in my life.
“So, you’re turning eighteen in a few months. What do you want to do?” Lucy’s question broke me out of my contemplative mode. She turned her body around so that she was sitting up against the wall, facing me. She pulled on my arms and positioned me against the wall with her, putting my arm around her shoulder.
“Honestly, I haven’t even thought about it.” It wasn’t quite the truth, but it was close enough. The only real thought I’d given it was what it would mean for me legally. I hadn’t considered it in terms of a fun, party kind of thing, that’s for sure.
“Can I think of something for you and surprise you?” Lucy popped up and spun around on her knees to face me, excitement etched in each little smile line around her eyes.
“Sure.” I shrugged. I had never held out much promise for my birthdays in the past, they were always filled with disappointments.
My grandma always came through for me, with a call and a card. She would sometimes even come down on, or around, my birthday to take me to dinner. But she was the only one. Mostly, I just spent the day forgetting that it was supposed to be special.
I turned eighteen in exactly twenty-two days. Looked like I’d make it to adulthood without being forced to move around anymore. My father had never tried to get me back, which I was pleased about. I’d found myself learning, growing, and flourishing in this house, especially with Lucy in my life. Pulling that girl’s butt out of the lake had been one of the best decisions I had ever made, even though I don’t really remember making it consciously. But consciously or unconsciously, I’m glad I did it.
“What do you want?” Lucy asked me.
“For my birthday? I have no idea.”
My Stupid Girl Page 17