Things are Complicated

Chapter 13: One of these Things is not like the Others

September bled into October before my mother showed her face in the house again. The only evidence of her return was a stack of twenties on the kitchen table with a sticky note ‘Food’. One might mistake this action as an act of kindness, but it would have been nicer if she actually bought the food since I lack vehicular transportation.

I also lack a phone since she ceased payments after our little- one sided- argument. Leah tried to give me her old one, but I accept charity like I accept Neal’s B.S.

Even with the weather dropping by several degrees every day, I still choose to run to school instead of opting for a ride. The last thing I wanted was another one of Leah’s lectures or D’s concerned looks.

My mother’s dramatic departure upset me for exactly forty-eight hours. After which, I cranked up the stereo system in my father’s office and pranced around in only my underwear. The only time I started missing her was when I had to resort to canned foods for breakfast, lunch and dinner for the last week and a half.

It wasn’t like I found myself unable to sleep or anything. Nope, not at all. Were my teachers concerned with me falling asleep in class? Yep. But I swear I still slept like a baby…

The nights were the absolute worse. I slept on the couch most nights, falling asleep to old re-runs of black and white “I love Lucy” episodes. Even with that background noise, I still woke up at three in the morning to wander upstairs and sit in front of my parent’s bedroom door. When I was five, I did the same thing, waiting till one of my parents- usually my dad- came out to use the bathroom. Even now, I could describe with absolute certainty every chip in the pain and dent in the wood, length by width and everything. There is absolutely nothing more frightening than a closed door.

Lately, I’ve been trying to stay after school to ask my teachers for help on my homework. No matter how annoyed or busy they were, I had the trump card of an injury. Even though I didn’t understand half of what most of them rambled on about- math equations, history terms about the constitution or whatever- I still nodded along.

Funny enough, my grades actually dropped after the first quarter. Did my mother care? Only enough to leave a very heated message, suggesting to “Get your *beep* in gear. ‘Cause –so help me- If I get another call I’ll *beep*beep-ed-y*beep* you alive!”

I must have listened to that message half a dozen times. I mean really. Who isn’t motivated by threats?

One afternoon D’Angelo cornered me at my locker, after I spent hours in the library trying to make sense of my algebra homework. Which-I swear- my book has some sort of evil spell on it, every time I open the cover it turns from English to Latin. No matter how long I read some formula or try to dismantle the complex explanations, I just find myself re-reading the same paragraph over and over again.

“We need to talk,” He leaned against the lockers, jacket zipped up tight and backpack hanging off one shoulder.

“And I need a ride,” I said much to his great surprise.

“Really? That’s it?” D took his hands out of his front pockets and put them up, slowly backing away. “No argument? Not even a few threats?”

“There will be if you keep this up much longer,” I pulled my running shoes out of my locker and jammed them into my backpack. Somewhere in the front pocket was all the money for groceries, but I wouldn’t reveal that until the check-out line. Who really wants to look that desperate?

D let out a sigh and wiped off his bare forehead, “Good, you’re still normal.”

Shutting my locker I rolled up my sleeves and said, “Let’s walk and talk.”