The John Hughes Club

Chapter Seventeen

Chas

Girls: such complex things at times.
First Ros, then Mindy.
I often upset Ros because of my lack of interest in her, while I think I sometimes upset Mindy because of my interest in her. I've gotten used to Ros' outbursts, but I'm not familiar with Mindy's. I think I've exposed a scar about her relationship with her mother, but now she's just ran from the media room with a face full of restrained emotion, and I don't know whether it's because of something I've done, Ros has done, or something entirely different to that. The thing is, I work from the heart—always have, always will. With Mindy, my heart is telling me that there's more to all she's ever shared with me. Which is okay, because there's more that I'm needing to share with her. We like each other, and people who like each other, share their thoughts and feelings. While I'm wanting to draw open the curtains of my own life to Mindy, I'm also wanting to pull back the curtains of who she really is. Sometimes, when I'm looking at her, I'm trying to figure out the puzzle of her vulnerability. Other's might not see it, but I do.
It's there.
Always there.
Underneath all of that attitude and makeup; it's there.
With all that I'm feeling for her, I'm now wanting to know why it's there, why she keeps it so well hidden. I sense that it's much more than the usual teenage angst, I'm sensing it's something much more than that. I sense, that it's something I have experienced...loss, that's what I'm picking up on. I've already shared with Mindy the loss of my grandpa, but I've not yet shared the loss of my mum. Not because I don't want to, it's just hard to talk about someone that I seem to be forgetting more and more every single day. It's hard to admit that the face of my mother in my memories, are beginning to fade. The loss of her never fades, but my memories of her, they are. It's just as hard to talk about all of those memories being replaced with the horrible one's that my dad has given to me. In my head, memories are nothing but a messy maelstrom. Thankfully, grandpa was there to hold me together. He gave me the glue of life, to keep myself together, for all the times when he wouldn't be there. Because of him, I know that one day, I'm going to become the man that my dad should have been. Yeah, I know loss. I know the gaping hole it leaves behind in your soul. Which is why I need to find Mindy. I need her to know that I'm here, that I'll understand whatever she's hiding away inside of herself...because, I've been there.