Tales of a Broken 19
Laura L. Hewitt
Copyright © 2012 Laura L. Hewitt
Chapter 1
“And you’ll always be my pretty little girl.” Mom used to tell me when she combed my hair. I still remember sitting at her vanity next to the window with the green see-through curtains that fell to the floor.. I could hear the trees swaying every time the wind blew threw her bedroom as she would stand behind me running the comb through my long, dark hair. The more time that passes, the harder it is to distinguish my dreams from my actual memories of her. Sometimes I wonder if she really said that to me. Perhaps, I just hope she did. I almost never took her necklace off. It always felt good to have the silver key so close to my heart. Maybe the heart needs memories of a past, fictional or true, just as proof that it was beating all along. Like if someone loved me back then, maybe it was possible to be loved again.
My first kiss…
I was a 19 year-old kid, as I stood on the front porch of the house my family called home. Leaning forward for the usual, quick hug goodbye, I remember wondering how in the world we had made it clear to date number four when we had nothing in common. Lost in my own thoughts, I guess, I didn’t notice him staring intently into my eyes. He was a nice guy, at least an okay guy, anyway. Maybe he would have been cuter without all the face piercings and tattoos, but I was never too bent on trying to figure it out. There was no way of telling what he really looked like. Tattoos and long hair shielded his face from the world or the world from his face. He was bold though, and I think part of me kept going on these dates just to figure out if that boldness would go anywhere. Lesson number one: when you have no clear expectations, expect nothing… nothing good, anyway. My clearest memory of Danny is the day he first came into the hardware store where I was working as a full-time cashier over my summer vacation till mid-August hit, when I’d be able to ship myself back to the college town an hour away that my family made look like paradise. A scrawny, and seemingly bashful Danny, who had been in my line the day before, had driven all the way back just to ask me out and I was just bored enough to remember that I had nothing else to do. I still remember to this day exactly what he had bought in my line the day before. One roll of duct tape, some rope, and a very large piece of plywood. It wasn't really a habit of mine, to remember every customer's shopping list, but this particular combination of items, coupled with his sharp looks had me thinking “serial killer.” So, needless to say, I was a little nervous the first time that purple honda of his pulled into the drive to pick me up with the same piece of plywood strapped to the top and the duct tape and rope lying in the backseat.
My college roommate Jolene had always commented that I had a thing for serial killers. I had a serious knack for attracting creeps. I had never dated much, but Jolene was terrified of the guys I pointed out to her. It didn't help that I was a huge Dexter fan, which also never settled well with Jolene Once when we were away at school, riding a city shuttle, she had been with me when I gave my number to a guy named Justin who asked for it after talking with us on our way to class. I wasn't really interested, but he seemed like a normal guy. Not wanting to offend him, I went ahead and gave it to him. I hadn't expected him to really call. So, when he did, I was a little surprised. Since our first phone conversation included a vivid description of a dream he claimed to have had about me the night before, and that apparently his hobby was setting fires for fun, Jolene and I decided that maybe he wasn't the one for me. I guess I never really learned my lesson. If Danny had been a serial killer, I guess I would have made a pretty easy target, but floating in the White River for a few months didn't sound all that bad in comparison to an entire summer at home with my “family.”
I half smiled and told him that I 'd had a good time, then, leaned in for the quick hug. Tired out of my mind, I guess I didn’t really think about it when he hugged me a little tighter than usual. The hug itself definitely lasted slightly longer than that two point five second window of get the hell off me I tended to keep, but since he had given me an escape from the brick prison I was about to walk back into, I decided to allow it. It wasn’t that I didn’t like him. He was one of the most gentlemanly guys I had ever met. He wasn't too pushy and didn't ask any questions. It was nice just to talk to someone who wasn’t an irate customer, a screaming child, or one of the constantly yelling voices from the doors behind me. Even though all we usually ever did was drive around and listen to music, I was fine with that. I think he mistook my usually quiet demeanor for a sweet, shy girl and, for the most part, I thought he was a nice guy. But we’re all wrong sometimes.
I had never been a physically affectionate kind of person. No one in my family was. We hugged when there was a death in the family or engaged in those awkward holiday hugs when people no one really liked came to visit. As I leaned away from the hug, I realized, quite to my horror, that Danny’s face had, what shall forever in the history of forever be deemed, “the look”. I’m talking about the expression that takes hold of someone’s face, right before they are about to do something to you. I'm not talking about something normal. It's usually something they’re not quite sure about; something that will only typically go one of two ways...really right or so wrong. It was like watching a scary slasher movie, right before the main character with big boobs is about to walk into the woods wearing heels. The only problem was that I was just a B-cup, and there are no pause or fast forward buttons in real life.
Maybe if I hadn’t been so frozen in terror, I could have prevented the salivating, foreign threat heading straight for my face. Perhaps, I could have stopped Danny as he leaned closer, brandishing “the look” for all the crickets and God to see. But it happened so fast. I stood there, motionless, on the front porch as his lips met mine. It was just like the movies. My head was spinning. My knees went weak. It was my first defining moment of that summer vacation that I remember. Kind of like your first food poisoning. Or your first shot in the ass on a cold doctor’s table, which if done wrong can leave you scarred for life. Something you never forget for all the wrong reasons.
I guessed, I was supposed to be moving my lips and tongue around a little bit too, like Danny was, but didn’t know how, so I didn’t bother. So, to spit on someone was disgusting, and an insult, but to put all of your spit into their mouth at once was okay? Guess I’m the one who had it backwards. Danny must have picked up on my enthusiasm. A moment later, he was staring down into my eyes, not inches from my face. We both had that dazed look. I mean the dazed look of star-crossed lovers, like Romeo and Juliet. Him longing for me…me longing to kill myself like Juliet. Some moments in our lives don’t require words. I thanked God for that, whether I believed in him or not, as the taste of, seemingly, everything Danny had ever eaten floated around in my mouth. He whispered good night in the most awkward and serial killer type way, then, turned to walk back down the driveway to his black Honda, glancing back a few times as I stumbled through the front door. He probably mistook my nauseated clumsiness for a head-over-heels schoolgirl sort of thing. Poor, stupid boy. He had no idea I was about to be heels over head into the hallway toilet with ipecac and a bottle of Listerine (2nd lesson of that summer: don’t put ipecac and Listerine together…ever).
After I managed to puked a few times, then drowned out the taste of all things unholy with cheap mouthwash and salvaged what was left of the burnt skin on my tongue, ready to go to sleep and pretend no such thing had ever happened, I was slightly surprised to hear my cell phone buzzing with a text so late at night. I looked down at the lit up screen to find a message from Danny that read:
“Good night, beautiful! (; hope I didn’t make things too awkward…just been dying to do that!”
Still, standing over the toilet, I suppresse
d the urge to text back, “Do I look like a lifeguard to you? (: (: cause I’m definitely not..”
Nineteen was such an awkward age, somewhere right between an adult and a child. This time of year always makes me remember. It's getting colder now. I think it's going to be cold for quite a while. Sometimes the mind starts to remember things the heart would rather forget, but the leaves piling up on that slab of stone make it nearly impossible to forget.