Finished this today. As usual, comment if you read it please. Thanks!
♥
-J-
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Chapter 4:
One thing about being high is that you think someone will be there for you when you really need it. I’m sure that is a common misconception, especially if the people you think are your friends are also so involved their own dissociative that the next day, they barely even remember you were there. I guess I’d have to say that not all people are like that, but the people I associated with were.
When I finally got myself cleaned up and out of the shower, I went back to Megan’s room to find her gone. The room was completely empty and, after searching for a good fifteen minutes, I gave up and called my mom. I told her that Megan’s mom had an appointment and they had to leave before she got there to pick me up.
I waited on the front porch for a while, having not given my mother enough notice to be ready to come and get me, until I saw a bright yellow sports truck flying up the road. It came to a halt in front of Megan’s house and whoever was driving it rolled down the barely legal tinted windows. I stood up and peeked inside to find Brad smiling at me.
“Hey there. Megan wanted me to tell you that she had something major come up this morning and she didn’t want to wake you up. She said she’s sorry and she’ll explain on Monday. Need a ride?”
“No, thanks. I already called my mom. She should be here any minute because I called her almost a half an hour ago. You drove all the way out here to tell me this? I would’ve definitely left me hanging.” I threw what I thought was a sexy smirk in his direction.
“No worries. I don’t live very far from here. Well, I’ll go for now. I’ll be calling you soon though. Maybe we could go catch a movie or something.”
Before I could answer, he was speeding off down the road. I couldn’t believe he wanted to take me to the movies. The only problem was how I was going to get away with it. There was no way my mother would ever let me go anywhere in a vehicle with a guy, let alone one that was 19. As usual, though, I would find some way to get around it.
My mom pulled up moments later and I was chauffeured home in peace and quiet. I could tell she had been sleeping because she had nothing to say other than ‘how was it’ and ‘do the dishes when we get home’. I did those dishes, too, but not before downing the last eight pills I had leftover from the party. Once I finished I trotted to my room to lie down. Not long afterwards, though, I heard my mom yelling all the way from the kitchen. Moments later, my mom came bursting into the bedroom.
“What the hell is this? Did you even look at these dishes? I almost ate dried up spaghetti just now! You need to go check them.”
“Sorry about that. I was a little distracted I guess.” I said, which was true. The pills hadn’t kicked in yet, so that’s the only thing I could think of. “I’m coming.”
I stood up from the bed and immediately fell back down on to it. I got high every day, but never did I ever bring it in front of my mom. I guess she’s what kept me from digging too far of a hole, because I wouldn’t be able to stand lying to her face and saying nothing was going on. My head began to swim and my heart started to race, not only from the pills, but from the fact that I was about to get high in front of my mom for the very first time. It wasn’t a pleasant experience either. I quickly perfected the dishes and ran back to my room.
“You wanna watch a movie?” I heard her bellow from the other room.
Oh God. Time for more lies.
“Uh, not right now, mom. I didn’t get to bed until late last night and got up kind of early.” Okay, it wasn’t really a lie. It’s just that that was not the reason I wasn’t going to watch a movie with her.
“Okay. I’ll wait until you get up and maybe we’ll watch ‘An Affair to Remember’ again.” That was always one of her favorite movies. It eventually became one of mine, too. Something about Cary Grant made me want to watch him forever. Between that movie and ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’, we never got anything done. Throw in some ‘Steel Magnolias’ and we’d be on the couch all day; either cracking up or pretending we weren’t bawling.
I knew I would miss those things if my mom ever found out what I was doing, but at the time it just didn’t seem that important. I would still see her, right? That’s what counted at that time, anyway. I spent my days lying about being sick and going home from school early. I spent my afternoons sleeping off the high that I had finally come down from. It’s actually hard for me to remember doing anything besides sleeping, unless it came to Brad.
Brad called me a few days after we met, asking to take me to a twenty-four hour restaurant in town. I went with him and ordered everything I wanted, only for him to only order water because he didn’t have enough money to feed the both of us. Apparently being an apprentice at a tattoo shop didn’t pay very well. I shared my dinner with him and from that night on we were inseparable. I was pretty famous for putting all my hope into one guy and leaving everyone else behind. I guess you could call me a hopeless romantic.
The night of our second date he gave me a kiss and I was immediately stuck in the ass by cupid. Nobody could tell me that I didn’t know what love was. Love was when you wanted to be with someone day and night, no matter how they might treat you during those times. Now that I look back on it, it didn’t seem like the best way to express our love.
One Friday afternoon, Brad called me. “You wanna go to a movie?” He asked, with no noticeable enthusiasm in his voice.
“Sure. What time?”
“As soon as you can. I got shit to do tonight so I can’t be out forever.” He really had become one hell of an asshole.
“Alright. Pick me up in half an hour.” I replied.
I ran through the house to find my mother in the living room. She sat silently smoking her cigarette.
“Hey, mom. Brad wants to see a movie. Can I go?”
We had come to terms with the fact that I wasn’t going to leave Brad no matter how much she wanted me to. She glared at me and replied, “I guess. You better be home in two hours, understand?”
“Yeah.” I was really letting that guy come between us. After just a few weeks of dating Brad, I had completely stopped spending any time with her what-so-ever. She worked Monday through Friday and had a weekend job watching an elderly woman, so she would be gone from Friday night until Sunday afternoon.
“Oh, and I have to work tonight, so make sure you keep this house cleaned up while I’m gone.” She added.
I continued walking without responding. For some reason I always found a way to turn those comments into arguments, but I just didn’t feel like it. I was going to go have a good time with Brad and didn’t want to have anything else on my mind.
About twenty minutes later, Brad pulled up in his yellow pick-up. He waved a hello at my mom as I jumped in the truck and we drove off. He barely spoke to me the whole ride to the movie theater. I just let it go as we drove down the interstate at alarming speeds. When we pulled into the parking lot, he parked on the back side of the building and turned off the engine.
“The movie isn’t for another half an hour. What you wanna do?” Really? Why didn’t he tell me this before he came to pick me up? It’s not like he ever had anything to say to me anymore anyway.
“I don’t know. There’s not much to be done in the parking lot of a theater, you know.”
“Well, actually….” He trailed off as he reached down and unzipped his pants.
I realized this is what was missing from our relationship. We never had the ability to spend any time alone so we were completely lacking a sexual connection. For the next twenty minutes, we committed completely unspeakable acts in that truck. I’m not proud of it, thinking back on it now, but when it was happening, I thought I was the coolest chick on the planet. I knew how to keep my man happy.
We walked into that movie theater a new found happy couple, and came out of it even happier. It was amazing how many things you could find to do in the darkness of a theater.
As we stepped out of the truck at my house, Brad noticed that my mother’s car was gone. “Are you home alone tonight?” He grinned at me.
“Yeah, I’m alone until Sunday.” I flashed a sexy smile back at him. Oh my God. Was he really going to stay with me? I was so excited I could barely control myself.
“Why don’t I stay with you for a while tonight?”
“I thought you had plans?” I asked, remembering his asshole comment from earlier.
“I can reschedule.” He put his hands on my hips and guided me through the front door.
Needless to say, I didn’t come up for air until about four hours later. I walked to the bathroom and popped eight skittles while cleaning up. I hadn’t had any all day and I wanted them, especially after that marathon I had just gone through.
By the time I re-entered my bedroom, Brad was already up and fully dressed, while I was walking around in my underwear. “I gotta go. Thanks. I had fun. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He kissed me on my forehead and walked past me.
“What? I thought you were going to stay? You said you could reschedule!” I was amazingly pissed at being treated like some sort of whore.
“I know, but I got a call. It can’t wait.” He strode past me like I wasn’t even standing there; like I wasn’t standing there damn near completely naked, wanting him to come back to bed with me.
After I heard the front door slam, I fell back onto my bed. My shoulder hit something hard and I turned over to find his cell phone. I may have been trying to be an honest, trusting girlfriend, but there was no way I was going to sit there and not go through that phone. I came to find that his last call was from a girl named Stacy and it was during the five minutes when I was in the bathroom. Man I had some good judgment. Right. Moments later, I heard him knocking on the door. I took my time getting dressed and walked it out to him, with his call history pulled up so that he knew what I found.
He gave me the ‘what the fuck is wrong with you?’ look, and I slammed the door in his face.
Immediately I heard my cell ringing in the bedroom and I answered it on the last ring.
“Yes?” I answered.
“I’m just not a relationship kinda guy, Jenn. I was planning on telling you today, but then everything went so smoothly that I thought I could. I guess I realized it was impossible when Stacy called me, begging me to come shower with her.” One honest guy that Brad was. At least I didn’t have to get on to him for lying to me.
“Wow, okay. Thanks for telling me after I fucking slept with you for the last half of this fucking day!” I tend to say ‘fucking’ a little much when I’m angry. It’s a habit. I didn’t care though. I learned soon enough not to let a guy have all of me, especially when I knew how shady he had been in the past, like Dean.
I hung up the phone to find it ringing once again as soon as it left my hand. “What?!” I answered.
“Hey, it’s me.” Dean. Of all the things that could have happened tonight, Dean was calling me, sounding like he was crying. He cried more than any guy I had ever known.
“Can I help you?”
“I miss you. Can’t we just go back to the way things used to be? I know we can’t be together, but I want to be your best friend. I can’t even listen to Manson without wondering what you’re doing.” He sniffles.
“I trusted you. You broke my heart. What makes you think you are worthy of my friendship?” I wasn’t going back to him without a fight, though I did plan on going back to him eventually. Who knows why? Not me.
“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! I told Christine that it was over and I never wanted to see her again. She was just supposed to come over to hang out, but I messed up. I told her we weren’t together so she wouldn’t feel weird about being there. I should have told you. I’m sorry.” Again with the sniffles and tears.
“I need time to think, Dean. I can only take so much shit before I kick you out of my life completely.”
“I know. Go think. Call me when you get some time. Jenn? I love you.” Click.
Jesus. Is all this drama really necessary? Apparently so, because it just never stops no matter how old you get. I spent the rest of my weekend wondering how I was going to go about getting my life straightened up. Was I supposed to give Brad a chance to be my friend and become a real boyfriend, or did I go back to being with the other cheater? I just didn’t know anymore. Maybe I should just take both of them and play them both.
And I did just that. |
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