Gold Dust Woman- Lip Gallagher

you can get back to your whore

After receiving the news, I went home and lay in my bed for a good two hours just staring at the wall. For two hours I fully dissociated.

Maybe I was overreacting, though. I mean, how could we be so sure it was even Lip's? The girl goes through so many different guys. Who knows whose it was? Hell, it could even be Frank's. But if it was Lip's? Then what? Would he drop out of school to take care of the kid and the mother who didn't give a rat's ass about him?

The next day was worse. I felt too depressed to get out of bed. By ten, Diana came into my room.

"Brought you some coffee," she said.

"No thank you," I mumbled.

"No, thank you? You never say no to coffee," she said.

"Yeah, but coffee keeps me awake, and I don't want to be awake," I said, "I just want to take sleeping pills until the summer ends."

She sat down on my bed and put the mug on my nightstand, "Alright. What's going on? You're always up by seven even on weekends, and you're out of the house by eight-thirty at the latest. You and Lip get in a fight or something?"

"It's a lot more complicated than that," I said, "It's also a long story."

"I got time. No camp on weekends."

I sighed, "Ok, so. Basically, at Debbie's party, when Lip and I went upstairs, we talked, and he told me that having sex was a mistake. He's still on Karen to the point where he's paying Carl and probably Blake to stalk her, which is next-level creepy. And then yesterday morning, Karen came over and yelled at him because he'd told Mandy to go over to Karen's to try and seduce Jody, which didn't work because he turned her down and told Karen everything. And then she springs on all of us that she's pregnant."

Diana's mouth was open, and she was speechless. 

"Wow, I- wow," she finally. said, "First off, Lip's a dick. Second of all, we all knew that bitch was gonna end up pregnant."

I chuckled.

"She claims she's on the pill," I said, "But just because you're on the pill doesn't mean you shouldn't use protection, you know?"

"Oh no, I completely agree," Diana said, "Sex education here is fucking amazing at telling us that."

I laughed, "Thanks for listening, D."

"No problem,"  she smiled, "Let me know if you need anything."

_____________________________________________________________________

After my coffee, I walked to the Gallaghers because Ian had to tell me something. I went to the boy's room and saw Ian sitting on his bed, pondering.

 "Hey, you ok?" I said.

He pointed to the envelope on his nightstand, which had the words and emblem for West Point.

"West Point?"

"It's an application," he said.

I smiled, "Oh my god, Ian, that's great! Congratulations."

I looked at him, expecting him to be happy, but he still had that same stunned look on his face, "You know, for someone who just got an application letter from his dream school, you don't seem that happy."

"It's because it's not for me," he said, "It's for Lip."

I raised my eyebrows, "What?"

"Lip's been trying to help me get recommended," Ian said, "But apparently, he ended up getting himself recommended."

My face fell, "Oh, Ian, I'm so sorry."

Instead of responding, Ian just started doing push-ups and counting. By the time he got to sixty-five, Lip came in. I grabbed the pipe that Lip set down, packed some grass, and started hitting it. I think I'd probably throw myself out the window if I had to deal with his ass sober. 

"Went to Karen's."

"Seventy."

"Tried to step up," Lip said, "She told me to fuck off. You believe that?"

"73, 74, 75, 76, 77-

"Rather play house with Keanu."

"80, 81, 82-

"You hear what I said?"

Ian got up, "How many push-ups can you do?"

"What, right now? Stoned?" Lip said.

"Your best day."

"I don't know. Five, six."

"How many miles?"

"Depends. Who's chasing me?"

"I can do a hundred push-ups, run a six-minute mile, and hit a freckle from 200 yards with an M16."

Lip scoffed and took my bowl, "Dude, you need this more than I do."

"Do you know what it means to have a war hero recommend you for West Point?!" Ian said.

"I told you. I'm working that angle," Lip said, "It takes time."

"No need," Ian said, throwing the envelope at him, "It worked."

"What, McNally brought this for you?"

"Not me," Ian said, "Congratulations."

He walked out of the room, so I scoffed and stood up.

"Look, I didn't have a chance to mention you, alright?" Lip said, "It was a misunderstanding. I'll find him tomorrow."

"Don't worry about it."

Ian took off his sweaty clothes until he was in his underwear. 

"Ian, I'm sure everything will be fine," I said, "So what if you don't understand sin and cosine right away?"

"Look, don't be a baby about this," Lip said, "You're the only reason I was hanging out with that waterboarder McNally."

"I don't need your help," Ian scoffed.

"Oh! Well, you should've told me that before I spent my summer trying to explain fucking trigonometry. I didn't even want you to do this-

 "I'll do it on my own now, okay?!" Ian yelled. He left to go take a shower and Lip scoffed.

"You can't do shit on your own," Lip said.

"Fuck you, Lip!" Ian said, "You can get back to your whore, who can't be sure if her kid is your son or your brother."

Lip turned around and lunged at Ian, starting a fight. 

"Guys, stop!" I said, trying to get in between them. 

Ian catapulted Lip into the bathtub, and I tried to pry Ian off Lip, but Lip ended up grabbing me and while trying to push me to the side, he made me slip and hit my head on the wall. You could hear a loud smacking noise when it happened. Ian tried to help me, but it only made things worse, and my hand moved toward the edge of the tub as Ian's elbow dug into it.

"OW! FUCK!" I yelled.

I tumbled downstairs, opened the freezer, grabbed frozen peas, and put them on my head. A few minutes later, as I curled my fingers in and out, Lip came downstairs.

"Are you ok?" Lip said,  "I'm sorry, I didn't mean for you to hit your head-

I was pissed off, and I didn't want his stupid apology, so instead, I took the frozen peas and threw them at his face. 

"You never fucking mean to," I said, "That's the whole point, isn't it?!"

As Lip held his face and grimaced, I pushed him to the side and went out the back door.