Back When We Were Wallflowers

The Beginning of the End

The day we met is the day I've begun considering to be my last day of being a normal girl, living a normal and sadly ignorant life with no real concept of how limited my view really was. How different the world was from how my mama always taught me. I wish I had opened my eyes for even just two moments and seen the world how you saw it. Maybe if I did, things wouldn't have happened the way they did. Maybe you would still be here.

I went prom dress shopping that day. It had been planned last minute as my mother tended to live her life. I had forgotten to tell Marie-Ruth that we were going and the more she drooled over old-fashioned dresses the more urgently I hoped to see a white phone booth. As much as I love my mama I wanted a different opinion, one that would leave me feeling pretty in a modern dress, not like I had magically woken up in the wrong century. My mama was infamous for trying to make me look like a flapper from the 1920's, I always told her she's about forty years too late but she didn't ever listen. I guess I can see where I got that trait from.

"Mama!" I said as we finally passed a white telephone booth "Mama, I'm gonna call Marie-Ruth and I'll be right back." She must have been entranced with the dazzling and complex gowns in the front window of the shop because she didn't say anything in return besides give me a small nod. I didn't expect anything different. When I told her about prom she had been so excited to get to go dress shopping, and to carry on the tradition her mom had with her. We didn't have very many normal mother daughter moments since my father and her were always so busy building up his campaign for office and trying to get his name known around town. Well known and liked was what they thought would get him the win. Little did they know this endeavor left me on my own a lot of the time. The freedom was nice but a girl can only try on her mother's dresses so many times and imagine how she might be proud of her before things start to get a little lonely. A little boring.

I turned around and picked up the phone in the booth on the little corner without her direct approval. This was one of the very few little things I did without her approval. At this moment I was thankful that I had been bored enough to start saving up my own money by doing extra chores around the house and a couple times I even got my hands dirty and did some gardening work for my next door neighbor, Mrs. Smith. Mrs. Smith was my favorite to work for because we would work together and talk about anything and everything under the sun, in a way she was almost like my second mother. She paid me five dollars everyday that I came over and helped her tend to her garden. It was nice and brought some tranquility into my life. I looked around me as I listened to the ringing sound for a moment as if someone listening in on my conversation was even important in this case or likely to happen.

"Number please" The answer was quick and to the point, like telephone operators tended to be.

"918-555-5555"

"Just one moment" The sound of ringing filled the call again and it was less than two minutes before a new voice answered.

"Hello?" It was her mother of course, Marie rarely ever answered the phone even though I knew she was sitting not 10 feet away studying for our next test. This one would make or break most grades and hers was one it would break if she didn't do well on it. I was tired of testing time, while Marie-Ruth and I could be out and about, she was there studying and I spent most of my time sitting in my room alone, reading or cleaning something, sometimes I snooped in the kitchen but I didn't want to do that too much.

"Mrs. Johnson, how have you been? It's Lois Anderson"

"Oh, Lois, I've been doing very well thank you. I'm sure you're calling for Ruth?" in the background I could hear a faint correction coming from her daughter,

"Marie-Ruth mom, it's Marie-Ruth." This simple interruption caused her mother to make an exasperated sound that Lois was sure included rolling her eyes.