Inconsolable » Squid [Holes]

3: "This Aint the Girl Scouts."

The water was refreshingly cool, a safe haven pumping in a stream to shield her from the heat. If only it didn't overpower her, if only it didn't drench her and turn against her, making her feel as if she were drowning. It flowed up her nose, blocked her throat, choked off her air. Mickey's eyes flew open as she coughed and spluttered beneath the swift moving water falling out of the faucet she lay under. Holding her hands up, the steady flow splattered out on all sides. The dry dirt sucked up the water as soon as it landed, drinking it down in big hearty gulps.

Mickey scrambled to her feet, her sleeping bag wrapped around her legs. Once she managed to free herself she stumbled forward only to crash headfirst into the wall of the showers. Among the loud noise of boys' laughter she fell to the ground, holding onto her throbbing forehead.

"What the hell...?" she mumbled, rolling onto her hands and knees.

"See? I told you she looked like a drowned rat," Squid's voice stuck out against the rest as the boys continued hooting with laughter over her expense.

She would have fought against that assessment if she didn't feel like a drowned rat. Her waterlogged hair hung in her face and her shirt clung to her body like a second skin. She was glad that she wasn't wearing a white shirt or else she'd have a bunch of boys staring at her for a completely different reason than she wanted.

"Aw man, that was perfect!" Magnet laughed, holding out his hand. Squid gleefully slapped his palm against Magnet's and they finished off their handshake with a snap of their fingers. Mickey's cheeks burned beneath the piercing eyes of the boys of D-Tent. She noticed none of them bothered to get her a towel or help her out. Not even Stanley who she thought was the nicest of the bunch, but maybe she was wrong.

Maybe she shouldn't have even begin to think that she could trust any of the boys or get along with them. Maybe she should just keep to herself like she had planned at the beginning. She didn't know how long she was going to be there. What was the point in befriending someone or trying to befriend someone when she could be leaving the next day?

They all looked out for themselves, it seems, she may as well do the same.

She was like that back at school as well. She got along with people for the most part but otherwise she was by herself. During lunch she would be sitting with others she called friends but she would listen more than she would speak. It didn't help that the topic of conversation was usually about which boy was the cutest, which was the hottest, which country club party was coming up, what pageant they were entering. Nothing that she had any sort of comment on.

And they knew it too. By the time the past summer came around she knew things had shifted. Alexis, whom she considered her best friend up until that point, had every excuse under the book to not want to come over and play in the pool or make homemade popsicles.

"I have to wash the dog" or "I need to watch Bailey" or "I can't, I already have plans. You know how it is" were her most common excuses. They would leave Mickey suspicious as much as she wanted to believe that Alexis was telling the truth. She never had a reason to lie to Mickey before. In fact, she had a horrible habit of not mincing her words. Everything about her was criticized from her hair style down to the shoes she wore. But Mickey took it all in stride because that was Alexis; that was what she liked about the girl. That she wasn't afraid to speak up and let people know what she was thinking.

The problem was she let people know what she was thinking. And the last time Mickey was around that was when Alexis was screaming at her and calling her a backstabber and a whore in the middle of Travis Reed's Summer Party.