Daddy Dearest

Chapter Fifty- Two

Teddy

When I was twelve years old, my family moved from Atlanta, Georgia to Los Angeles. My father, a homicide detective with a high clearance rate, wrote a memoir about his experience as a beat cop on the streets of Atlanta who was one of the youngest police officers ever to be promoted to detective. The book was number one on the New York Times bestseller list for twelve weeks and soon, Hollywood came calling.

My father moved us to Los Angeles because he was offered a two-picture deal and a TV show based on his book. When we got to LA, dad decided he loved being a cop too much to leave it for the limelight and the LAPD was only too happy to take him in.

That’s the official story. While the lure of Hollywood cash tempted my folks, they were also decent, churchgoing salt-of-the-earth people. The biggest reason we had to uproot our lives and move to the West Coast was my older sister, Violet.

When Violet was thirteen, she became obsessed with our next-door neighbor who was a married doctor with kids. She was convinced that she and this man were truly meant to be together, but his wife and kids were in the way, so they’d never be happy. Violet attempted to kill Mrs. Collins three times, but thankfully failed. She even set their house on fire, though nobody was home at the time. Violet was confined to a mental institution for six months and heavily medicated. After she was released from the hospital, my parents decided it was time to leave Georgia behind.

On the surface, my sister is a pitch-perfect American dream girl. She’s beautiful—ever since she was a little girl, people told her she looked like Ariel from the Little Mermaid—intelligent, charming, and funny. She just happens to be crazier than a barrel of monkeys dosed with LSD.

When her “bad side” is under control, Violet can be the sweetest, kindest, most generous soul you’ll ever meet. Everyone at Sacred Heart loves her and all the boys have a crush on her. But my sister is very picky and wouldn’t just date anyone. She set her sights on three guys: Alex Chambers, Father Sidney, and Mr. Davenport.

But none of them were emotionally available and all of them were connected to Melody Plum.

The thing is, my sister is also obsessed with Melody Plum. She says Melody is gorgeous, smart, kind, and all around adorable. Best of all, she is genuine. She wasn’t like the other girls who piled on tons of makeup and dressed provocatively to get attention. She got along with everybody, so no one could say a bad word about her.

I’m in love with Melody Plum. But she only sees me as Violet’s younger brother, the nerdy ginger kid. She has never been unkind to me. On the contrary, she has defended me from bullies and given me advice on how to stand up for myself and see my own worth.

I don’t have any illusions of getting together with her. It’s obvious that she’s in love with Alex Chambers and why wouldn’t she be? He’s got red hair like me, but it doesn’t look orange, and appears blond in the sun. He’s tall, athletic, charming, brilliant, and I think he knows how to speak six languages fluently. How can anyone compete with that? I’m barely five-eight and one hundred and thirty pounds soaking wet. Chambers can probably bench press three of me.

And he’s genuinely nice, too. Even though he basically rules the school, Alex isn’t a jerk. One time, a group of eleventh grade assholes decided to corner me in the boys’ bathroom to beat me up for no reason, but Alex came to my rescue. He told the losers to scram, fixed up my uniform, and told me to get to class.

Whenever he sees fighting or instances of bullying around campus, he’s always the first one to jump in and break it up. Sure, there have been rumors about him getting rid of guys who show interest in Melody, but I think it's all bunk. Chambers is the defender of the helpless and downtrodden. He would never be the bully.