Bird Girl

by Megan Rose

  “Mm-hmm.” Lacey clamped her mouth shut before she said something incredibly stupid like, “Actually I would like to be your girlfriend, thank you.”

  “Nice day,” he said.

  “Yeah.”

  They both took a bite of their sandwiches and sat in silence. Was this excruciatingly awkward just for her? Or did he regret his decision to join her too? They sat and Lacey hurried, trying to devour her sandwich so she could run away. Then she unexpectedly got the feeling that something wasn’t right. She didn’t know what it was.

  Her Fishbowl State had come and gone too quickly. She had felt as though it was too good to be true, and she was right. Walrus Girl was emerging yet again.

  Maybe it was the lack of candy she had consumed so far that day. She needed her sugar. But not here. Too many people (namely, one).

  She began feeling worse and worse and, although she looked perfectly calm, she was panicking on the inside. Fumbling around, trying to grab all her things before she started crying of all things (just because of a candy bar), she murmured “I have to go,” and upon standing up tripped over the tree roots. The contents of her bag went flying.

  Deja freaking vu.

  Lacey stared in humiliation as about 16 packages of candy came pouring out of her bag, looking as if a piñata had just been broken open. Except piñatas didn’t have King-Sized candy bars. Or empty wrappers. (She felt a little faint earlier when she was walking to her bench, so she had needed to eat some candy for her blood sugar.)

  God, she must really have a problem. She considered leaving all her things and running to another park, another town, another anything. But she couldn’t leave her beautiful (albeit now dirty) Kate Spade bag behind. And her legs were busy being giant blubbery walrus flippers that couldn’t really walk.

  Tripping had finally triggered it all. She had gotten her leg and knee scraped, her dress was dirty, her lunch was scattered across the ground, birds already eating some of it (the bastards), her candy obsession had been discovered, her skirt had flipped over her head when she fell and now her Spanx had been exposed, her almost-perfect slightly-dented sandals were no longer almost-perfect and were now supremely-dented, and the Perfect Man was probably finding this all very entertaining.

  “Are you okay?” His voice sounded concerned, like a Concerned Man, like he cared. For some reason that made her even sadder. Then, abruptly as she sat up and wiped dirt off her hands and onto her dress, she saw tears start to fall in the mulch.

  She kept her head down and her mind went into panic-overload. There was no way out. She had to go before it turned into the ugly cry, the one that you always do in the bathroom so you can look at yourself in the mirror and make yourself feel even worse because look how ugly you are.

  She sniffed and wiped the tears under her eyes with her knuckles. Taking a breath she stood up – Concerned Man helping her – and looked at his shoes. From what she could see, he had a bag of candy and her Snapple in his hands. Well, he could have them. She turned to flee when his hand planted itself on her shoulder.

  "Hey, seriously. Are you okay?”

  And there it was. The ugly cry. The loud, obnoxious, sniffy, drippy, disgusting cry that you save for your stuffed animals. Through her tears she said, or rather, hiccupped, “Yes, thank you.” She wiped off her face and tried to turn and walk away, but she looked at Ryan Gosling Man and he was looking like he wanted to help. Or like he was mildly frightened.

  “Why don’t you sit down?” he suggested. “Here, have something to drink.” He handed her the yet-to-be-opened Snapple bottle and bent down to pick up her purse, covered in wet dirt. Of course the sprinklers would have gone off that morning. Unsure what to do with it, he leaned the bag against the tree with the offending roots and came back to sit down next to her.

  “Here,” he fished through the bag that had somehow magically filled back up with her candy. “Have a Snickers. It’ll satisfy your hunger. Right? Isn’t that what they say on the commercial?”

  ✽✽✽

  Mark was just blabbering, desperately trying to get this extremely clumsy girl to stop crying. He had decided that morning he was going to try to be friends with her. His sister had called that morning and scolded him for not being more social in his new town. He had made the mistake of complaining that there was no one there who he got along with, and she told him that he just wasn’t trying. So here he was. Trying. And now this.

  Although in life he tended to be more annoyed at girls crying than concerned, this seemed like especially tragic crying and he began to panic, as he had never known what to do in a situation like this.

  “What will make you stop crying? I don’t deal well with people crying – I had a sister who cried sometimes but she had my mom, and there aren’t many other girls I’m friends with. I had this girlfriend once…but that was…Maybe we should get one of your girlfriends. Is it that kind of thing?” He paused. “Oh,” realization dawning, he said, “is it a ‘female’ thing?” That explained all the chocolate as well as the crying. Okay, it was all alright. She was just doing what women do.

  Lacey stood up and turned to him and he stood as well. She looked directly into his eyes and he was waiting for her undying appreciation for his understanding and helpfulness. What he actually got was a big punch to the gut.

  The wind rushed out of him and he stumbled backwards. “What the hell?! What’d I do to you?” he said, straightening. “I’m not the one who tripped you! I was just trying to help! And I was kind enough to spare you any sarcastic comments I might have had regarding tripping or Skittles or anything.”

  She had finally settled down a little bit and she looked like she was turning back into a rational adult again (or maybe for the first time) until he reminded her of the other day. At that, fresh tears formed in her eyes and Mark groaned inwardly. He wanted to walk away and wash his hands of this mess, but he couldn’t help feeling a little bad.

  “A female thing? You think this is a female thing? You think that every time a girl cries and buys herself chocolate, it’s because her ‘special friend’ is visiting? You think that a girl on her period is always emotionally unstable and prone to unnecessary upset?” Interesting. She was seething with rage. He hadn’t seen that coming at all. Mark took a step back. She spoke again. “Is this what happens every time your sister gets her period? She acts like she’s absolutely crazy? Like all women do?”

  “No, that’s not what I meant at all. You’re not crazy!” He really hoped his lying skills had improved since the time he ate all of his sister Natalie’s Halloween candy and told their mom that a robber had come and taken it. “You poured feminine products on me yesterday, so you can’t blame me for assuming.”

  “Those are for next week!”

  “I was just trying to figure out why you were upset so I could help you. That’s all. Jeez, you try to be nice…”

  “Oh, and how would you have helped me if that had been the truth? You wanna go buy me a package of Tampax and some Midol? Gee, how thoughtful.”

  “Well…yeah, I guess I could do that. Although, I don’t think you’re in desperate need.” She stomped her foot and looked around, like she was trying to find someone else to back her up. “I could call one of your girlfriends or someone to come down here.”

  “And being that it’s 2017, you assumed naturally that I don’t have a phone – because they’re so rare and because I’m a woman – the lesser gender.”

  “No, I just…” Why had he even come out here in the first place? What good had he thought was going to come out of this interaction with this girl who he kind of thought was cute but also kind of knew was crazy?

  “I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry. I was just trying to help; I didn’t mean to upset you more. I didn’t want to just leave you there crying – “

  "You want to do something for me?” Lacey asked, the tears on her face finally drying and staining her with black mascara spots. “Go back into Julio’s and buy Maxi Pads, the red kind, overnights�
�triple layer,” she thought for a long moment, “placenta protection, with wings.”

  “I thought you didn’t –“

  “Maybe I need some in the future. Now, run along and when you come back I will most likely forgive you.”

  Mark, puzzled, walked back to the store as if he were possessed. He didn’t know why he was doing it, but his feet kept moving toward the store. Why would this make her forgive him anyway? Why did he even have to be forgiven? He hadn’t done anything wrong.

  Once he was inside, he found the correct aisle, looked around to make sure there wasn’t anyone he knew around (which would just be Lacey, though he still ducked behind a shelf every time the door opened). He spent what must have been five or ten minutes looking and then finally asked someone.

  "Who told you to get those? Triple layer? Placenta protection? That doesn’t make the least bit of sense,” the sandwich maker on her break said.

  “Just…this girl got mad at me so she told me, you know…that I should come in here and…” The sales assistant started laughing and patted him on the arm.

  “I don’t think you’re gonna find those here, buddy.”

  “Wait – I can NOT go back out there without something.” He hated to admit it, but he was slightly afraid of his new acquaintance. What started out as him trying to be nice had turned into him shopping out of fear.

  “Well, pick whatever seems closest. Placenta protection,” she muttered under her breath as she walked away.

  ✽✽✽

  After what must have been 10 minutes, Lacey found herself gathering her things and walking towards the shop. She figured he had suffered enough, and she wasn’t so offended anymore. He really was just trying to help. Walrus Girl had just been really upset and had been feeling sensitive at the time.

  Just as she started towards the building, the door opened and Ryan Gosling Man strolled outside carrying three or four bags. She looked at him with confusion and then put her stuff back down on the bench. She sat and waited for some sort of explanation.

  Ryan Gosling Mann dropped the bags at her feet when he arrived and gave her a smug smile. “There you go. That is every single type of pad in that store that exists. Wings, no wings, extra long, overnights, ultra-thin, maxi pads, panty liners…please don’t tell me what any of these things are, it’s bad enough that I know the names of them. Oh, in case you’re interested they have this little case for tampons that looks just like a tube of Chap Stick or something – I didn’t get them, but I almost did. They have cute little patterns and everything. It’s on a really good sale, too. Very discreet.” Maxi Pad Man stopped talking and suddenly looked like he wanted to slap himself.

  Lacey stared at him wordlessly. “You figured out that I got mad and sent you on an impossible mission and instead of coming out here to yell at me, you came out here with goody bags of feminine products?”

  She looked up at his face. He looked uncomfortable, and she figured he was just a nice guy who was trying to help a needy, pathetic girl. Lacey stood up and hugged him, which seemed to surprise him, and thanked him. “No one’s ever bought,” she glanced around at the contents of the bags, “17 different types of feminine products for me before,” she said, getting choked up again.

  ✽✽✽

  “Please! Don’t cry again. That’s how we got into this mess in the first place. Let’s just sit down and relax, and we can have a normal conversation without tripping or menstruating or crying.”

  Lacey’s giggle turned into a hiccup. “That sounds good,” she sniffed. She sat down and opened her Snapple then looked at the cap. “In ancient Greece throwing an apple to a woman was considered a marriage proposal.”

  “What?” Mark once again pondered her sanity.

  “It’s the Snapple fact. Haven’t you ever had a Snapple before?”

  “No."

  “No?! Well, each bottle cap has a fact. That’s pretty much why I buy them. And also cause they’re good. And healthy.”

  “They’re probably full of sugar. Plus, you can probably just look up ‘Snapple facts’ on the Internet and read them there,” Mark said, unimpressed with this whole bottle cap scam.

  “But there’s no surprise in that! And you’re not supposed to read a whole bunch of facts at once – they’re supposed to be spaced out so you look forward to your next Snapple, so it’s special and exciting every time you open one!”

  “If you say so,” Mark said as he crunched up what remained of his lunch and threw it in the nearby trashcan. He had no clue what had transpired within the last 20 minutes, but he knew that this girl was far from stable. He’d be friendly, he’d help her when she needed help, but there was no way they could ever become close – friend-wise or other-relationship-wise.

  This was his last day sitting on this bench for his lunch, and he wouldn’t be going to the salon anytime soon (not that he would have anyway).

  “I’m sorry, I should probably explain myself,” Lacey muttered sheepishly. “I’m just having a bad day. Either I forgot or my friend forgot to tell me that she was going away for a week and a half and we were supposed to hang out tonight, and I don’t think you get a lot of time for texting at seminars. Anyway, she’s leaving tomorrow. Meanwhile, my least favorite person in the world has moved back to town and is working at the salon. I don’t even know why; she doesn’t need the money. She probably just wants to torture me.”

  “Oh, come on. Girls wouldn’t purposely torture each oth –“ Mark glanced at Lacey’s face and decided that maybe they would and maybe he shouldn’t comment either way. He guessed this was more of a listening thing.

  “So, it’s just a bad day. And now I have to go back to work all dirty and gross and endure Ms. Perfect’s passive aggressive comments. And I can’t even hang out with my friend tonight like we were going to, because she’s leaving in the morning, so we won’t even be able to gossip about the Demon,” she said with a pout (well, a pout kind of split in half).

  “I’m sorry…” he said, at a loss for words. He decided not to ask what “the demon” was. How did girls come up with so many things to say all the time? All he could think of was, “You’ll get over it,” and he had a feeling that wouldn’t go over well.

  Quick, he had to say something or else she’d think he wasn’t listening or thought she was weird.

  “I’m not doing anything tonight.” Where had that come from?

  “Really? Oh my gosh, you should come over! We were going to have a Susan Sarandon marathon, but we can change the theme. That would be so fun!”

  Mark pondered his own sanity as he made plans with this girl who had experienced every emotion in the world in the past five minutes. His sister had told him to put himself out there, make friends, be more open, so that’s what he was doing. He just hoped he wouldn’t regret it.

  They exchanged numbers and addresses, made plans for the night, and decided on the movie theme (cheap horror movies). Mark said he’d bring the takeout and Lacey said she’d bring the movies and candy, blushing slightly. They began to part ways and then realized they both had the same way to go. It was obvious that they didn’t want to endure an awkward walk back to work, but there really weren’t many other options.

  “Well, I’m going to skip along the curb, so it’s going to take me a little longer. You should just go on ahead of me.”

  “You’re still going to skip along the curb?” She nodded. “What’s so great about it?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. It’s fun…unless the weather is really bad and the sidewalk’s slippery.”

  “Okay, well the weather’s good. You lead the way.”

  Lacey was confused but started on her journey back to the salon. She felt self-conscious flying down the curb with Movie Night Man watching behind her, but when she turned around he was gone. He probably went some other way, so it wouldn’t be awkward. She tried to ignore the disappointment she felt.

  Then she saw something out of the corner of her eye and glanced at the other side of the street. Mov
ie Night Man was walking along the curb, looking very focused and somewhat dainty, as if he was afraid he might fall into the street.

  “What are you doing?!” Lacey called. Movie Night Man jumped out of his skin yet somehow gracefully floated back down to the curb. “I thought you said it was dangerous!”

  “I did,” he called, concentrating on walking and forming syllables at the same time, “for you.” He glanced over at Lacey, who was stunned at that statement, and gave her a shrug. “You can’t deny you have a propensity towards falling down!”

  “Well, you’ve only known me two days! I’m really not that clumsy! You’re the one who looks like he should be worried about falling – “

  “Lacey – “

  “No, I maintain that I – Ow!” Lacey walked directly into a sign. Darn it. She usually skillfully avoided that sign, staying on the curb the whole time. Now he wouldn’t see her true prowess, her Matrix moves. Mark ran across the street looking concerned. Concerned Man.

  ✽✽✽

  “One day,” he said, “you’re going to knock yourself out because you’re doing something stupid like skipping along the curb.” He observed the sign-shaped dent in her face and dreaded telling her that her appearance had further deteriorated (not that she wasn’t pretty – she was very pretty, even with the dirt and dent and all that – he just knew what she would think when she saw herself and he knew it wouldn’t be good). He didn’t want to get punched again. She was about to walk into a store full of mirrors with her supposed arch-nemesis, and this time the accident was his fault.

  “I feel fine. Does it look bad?” she asked earnestly.

  “It…um….could maybe…use a little….”

  “Oh my God! How bad is it?!”

  “It’s not bad, you’ve just got a slight dent – “

  “Dent?!” She pulled a compact out of her purse. Clearly, he was doing a great job.

  “This…” she whispered. She looked completely distraught. Honestly, it really wasn’t that bad. “This…” Hurriedly, she closed the compact and turned around, going back from where she had come.