Chapter 10
The next morning I woke up with a light head and heavy feet. I sat up in the bed and rubbed my eyes until the room materialized around me. The first thing I noticed, right away, were the brown cardboard boxes sitting on and next to my desk labeled “storage” across the sides with a heavy black marker. I was puzzled for a moment, before I remembered that my younger sister's marching band was supposed to be gathering items for the annual rummage sale any day now, and that she had probably left them for me to fill with old clothes. It wasn't the first time she had used a bobby pin to break into my room, intent on stealing my clothes. At least this time it was for a good cause, I laughed to myself. I rolled out of bed and started to make my way past the desk, grabbing my hairspray and cell phone, preparing to go take my shower. As I got to the desk, however, I happened to catch a glimpse into the box sitting open on the very edge of the desk. A flash of blue happened to catch my eye. I turned to get a better look. Right away, I noticed my favorite pair of blue jeans sitting in the top. I picked them up to make sure, only to see a whole pile of clothes that very much still fit me folded all the way to the bottom. In the box by my feet, I could see all the books from my shelf, including my treasured Edgar Allan Poe collection, stacked both ways. Figuring this was her way of making some suggestions, I just emptied the books back onto my desk, rolled my eyes, and decided I would deal with it later. A little annoyed, I started up the stairs from my bedroom to the hallway bathroom, wondering why my sister would have taken the liberty to pack up half my stuff.. The brown throw pillows on the couch, where my dad had been asleep the night before had been placed neatly back on their respective sides of the couch and the cushions had been straightened, like dad had never been there. The blinds from the back windows of the house gave way to the warm sunlight, which seemed to illuminate the entire hallway. The house was silent and for a brief moment I wondered where everyone had gone before I realized I should just enjoy it while it lasted. That's when I felt it for the first time. I could tell something felt different about me that particular morning. I sensed a something welling up inside me. It felt similar to excitement, or anxiety, but I felt very free and under my own control at, yet the very same time. I wondered if maybe I just needed some coffee. Sometimes I felt off when I woke up without it. I tried to push the feelings aside as I convinced myself that's all it was. I would feel better after a hot shower.
Walking by the mirror, I had to do a double take at the pale, tired looking girl standing in front of me. I ran my fingers through my hair, rubbing my scalp, my fingertips cold against it. Two drops of red fell warm against my forehead. I looked around to see what it was and where it was coming from, my eyes scanning the white textured ceiling. Holding my arms up directly in front of me, I suddenly saw the lines of red running from my wrists to my elbows. It was blood. The drops sprinkled onto the stony-tiled floor, drop after drop, like rain. Hating the sight of blood, I closed my eyes tightly, holding my arms against my body, feeling faint. When I opened my eyes, I looked back down at my wrists, preparing to grab the nearest towel and apply pressure. I took a deep and shallow breath. To my shock and surprise the blood was gone. I blinked twice and tried to catch my breath, grasping at my arms and trying to make sense of it all. Maybe it had just been a daydream, an awful daydream, I tried to tell myself, still shaking from the terrifying image. I stepped backward into the bathroom wall, and slid downwards toward the floor, holding onto my knees. I buried my face in my hands and took a few more deep breaths. When I finally felt like I could stand on my own two feet again, I reached forward for the counter and pulled myself back up. I looked back down at my arms one last time, to make sure one more time, there was no blood. I thought I must have been going crazy. When I found no blood, I fixed my stare, once again back onto the mirror.
“Well this is attractive.” I laughed at myself. Coffee wasted and diet coke trashed as Tony would have called it. I turned my head sideways as to assess the damage. For a brief second, I caught a glimpse of my eyes. Mom’s eyes. Just like in the dream. My mind flashed back to the morning of my high school graduation, almost two years prior, and how the same thought had crossed my mind as I’d examined my made-up face. I’d never escape those eyes, I thought to myself, before shaking the train of thought and continuing to assess the rest of the damage. I figured there wasn’t too much I could do about it to look decent, and since I was only on my way to Jolene’s house, other than brushing my teeth and briefly running a brush through my hair, it was a sweats and t-shirt kind of day. Jolene had lived with me for almost a whole year. She had seen much worse. That in mind, I took a quick shower, splashed some water on my face, and made my way down the street to her house to catch up on every piece of gossip she hadn’t bothered to put into a text during the summer and any new ho rules she had designated during our time apart.
“Girl, that was the trip straight from hell!” Jolene threw her clean laundry on her bed and tossed the basket over into the doorway.
I pulled the bottom drawer of her dresser open and started folding and placing her jeans into it. Jolene, and her neat and tidy ways. Had we been in my room, laundry might have gone in the dresser, but folding was definitely not a priority. I must have been doing it wrong because a minute later, she came around to my side and started unfolding the jeans, spraying them with wrinkle release, and then rolling them tightly instead as she chatted away about her vacation adventures. Jolene was a perfectionist and I was used to her obsessive compulsive ways.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m sooooooo ready to go back to school.” She sighed. “Never thought I’d see the day…!” She trailed off, examining her pile of white socks, intensely. I could tell she was trying to decide whether or not to run them through a second time with bleach or not. The things that plagued my poor, dear friend’s mind. She must have finally decided, because she scooped the pile up and put them back into the basket she designated for white clothes only. Once, she seemed to have made her full circle back to earth, and the sanity returned back to her eyes, she exclaimed, “Ooooh, girl! So tell me ‘bout this little bit of lip action with Danny!”
“Oh, god.” I groaned. I forgot I had even told her about that, briefly as it had been through a short text message. Something along the lines of:
“So I’m thinking about cutting Danny’s tongue off with a machete today…Just thought you should know.”
“Please,” I pleaded, “Let’s talk about anything else.”
“Oh hell naw.” She cracked. “Don’t even think you’re getting off that easy! I been stuck in the car for three days like a MOFO! Most interesting conversation I heard the whole vacation was about hemorrhoids. Please, child, enlighten me!”
“That’s too bad.” I tried to push what she had just said from my mind. One day I’d have to draw up a contract that informed her that we were on a need-to-know basis. “But I’m taking it to my grave.”
“Girl, now it couldn’t have been all that bad.” She said, searching my face, though I wasn’t budging. “You didn’t like it? Even just a little bit?”
“Nope,” I answered her, “continuing to fold laundry.
“Well, damn,” she said, after a long pause. “Probably just as well. He’s not the cutest. You could definitely do better.
I was doing my best to ignore her, hoping she’d change the subject.
“Don’t worry, girl. We’ll get you a few hos when we get back to school.” She nodded, completely serious.
“No thanks.” I was quick to answer her. “I’ve had enough of this game to last me the rest of my life. I was perfectly fine before people started wanting to put their tongues in my mouth like some kind of epidemic!”
Traumatic flashbacks flooded my mind. It was literally like a zombie apocalypse from the movies I had watched with Tony.
Jolene was cracking up at this point. “Well girl, lemme tell you! If them tryna stick their tongues in your mouth has you this freaked out, just wait! Because it only goes downhill
from there! Literally!” She laughed.
She tried to compose herself as I tried yet again to push unwanted images from my mind.
“She’s probably right.” I thought to myself.
I had never had this problem before. Back in high school guys were my friends, my classmates, or they blew me off completely. Then, all of a sudden one day I woke up and tongues were swooping in ruining my life and stealing my sanity. Cat ladies didn’t have to deal with dilemmas like this. The thought crossed my mind. Yes, I could be a cat lady. Just move somewhere really far away, since I didn’t really do Indiana winters, anyway. I’d call myself Millie, buy twenty cats, and live all alone in the middle of nowhere. Then all my troubles would be over. Or I could could be a nun. I remembered reading one time in high school about a convent in Spain where nuns prayed and baked cookies all day. I wished it was that simple. The thought crossed my mind with such seriousness that it scared me.
Growing older was a terrifying plan.
“So…?” Jolene asked me, “Since you’re clearly no fun, did you do anything else this summer besides work you life away at hardware hell?”
That was a good way to describe my job, I remember thinking to myself. Luckily and unluckily, with it being towards the end of the summer, I was getting fewer and fewer hours as they had less customers. It meant less extra cash for school in the upcoming fall, but I had saved up so much anyway that it was really my sanity that was being preserved by not having to put up with customers quite as often.
“Not really.” I said. “Worked, hung out with Tony, ran…the usual basically.”
“TONY!” Jolene made me jump. “Now THAT is a piece of ass I wouldn’t mind chasing all summer!”
I just laughed. “SMH, Jolene.”
“Seriously though, girl. Tall, fine, and a white boy with some swag! Mmmmhhmmm!” She exclaimed, cracking up. “Girl, don’t be actin’ like you don’t know your friend is hot. Can’t be stuntin’ on him like that!”
I grabbed a sock bundle and wailed it at her head.
I barely missed her. Laughing, she said, “You’re lucky I like you, but throw one more thing over here and I swear Ima put my foot so far up your ass, we’ll need surgery to remove it.”
She pointed her finger at me to emphasize her seriousness. She’d been making that threat since I met her, and as far as I could tell my ass was still fully intact.
“Don’t think I’m stuntin’!” She shrieked with laughter when I didn’t seem to be taking her too seriously. “Shoot, I’ll mess you up for throwing shit…lucky you missed!”
She stood up to walk across the room to turn the radio up, which has been on low for a little while.
“Uh-oh!” She screamed. “Me and Nicki Minaj ‘bout to tear it up!”
Jolene was a huge fan of Nicki Minaj, as white as Jolene always reminded me that I was, thanks to her, I know knew almost every word to most of her songs.
I was singing along quietly when Jolene jumped on to p of her bed and began to attempt to win the BET awards.
“EXCUSE ME!
I’M SORRY!
I’m really such a lady!
I rep young money.
You know Slim. BABY!” She sang as loud as she could and then gasped for air.
It was always entertaining to watch Jolene “go Nicki,” when her songs came on. She started pulling out dance moves I had never seen before. Dance moves I could have gone the rest of my life without having seen. She was a stick person with a curvy soul, and in complete denial that she was a black girl born without an ass.
I was still laughing in my mind about the comments she had made about Tony. I’d have to let him know that he had swag. He’d appreciate that…If we ever spoke again. Things had been so awkward since that afternoon on my front porch a few days before. Neither texts nor calls had been exchanged in either direction. I was beginning to notice a pattern with that front porch.
I was so confused. Tony’s kiss hadn’t been like Danny’s. It hadn’t sent me running for ipecac and the commode. It hadn’t made me sick at all. It felt normal…and ok. Too normal…and I think that’s what scared me most of all.
“That front porch is ruining everything,” I laughed to myself. I knew it was much deeper than that, but the thought of it gave me something to smile about.
….......................................................
It's hard to believe that it's been three years since that afternoon at your house, Jolene. I know your life went on, and I hope it's everything hoped for. The presence of the words unspoken is never far from my mind.