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Standing in the doorway in a soccer jacket, snowflakes caught in her hair. Timid smile. I was taken aback by her beauty and caught in the impact of how much I had missed her.
I let her inside. This girl, Shannon, is nosey. She is full of vigor and music. She is trusting (perhaps far too trusting) and tries to be kind. Optimism and individualism flood her wake yet she doesn’t often come across as fake. Messy ringlets like a movie star. Wide, slightly almond shaped eyes with giraffe lashes. Hourglass figure. One of my best friends in the entire world.
I did some dishes at the command of my dad, nervously, wondering what to say. She plucked around on the guitar I have not learned to play and stalked her crush via facebook (haven’t we all had a cyberobsession?) which many of my friends do. I felt a twinge upon seeing her on a path similar to the one I traveled alone and unawares in the 8th grade. I have long since learned that stalking gets you no place. It’s the very opposite that will gain you notoriety with the opposite sex.
In my room, dimly lit by a lava lamp, bitter smoky flavored air, we ate chocolates on my bed, crushing our fingers into them one by one. They all look the same, rectangles, squares, circles, but their similarities are deceiving. If you want to know what they’re really made of, you have to crush them or take your chances.
I drew her as we talked.
“Michelle and I are done with the musical.”
“That’s neat. What’s it like having all that new free time?”
“Very empty.”
Pencil rough sweeps of her cheeks curve.
“How’s life been for you Rebecca?”
“Excellent. I spent yesterday with Jacob and Daniel.”
She snickered.
“How did that go?”
“Pretty well. We went to Castlewood Park.”
Carving dark, thick eyelashes into the paper.
“Yeah, Daniels’ mom is paranoid.”
“How so?”
Full lips. Slightly parted to reveal dovey, straight teeth.
“Well, she made him turn out his pockets before we left the house and we had to give her our names and numbers so she could contact us at any time. Didn’t help her opinion of us that we looked like a couple of hippies.”
“She sounds crazy.”
Graceful sweeps ending in shivers of curls.
“No, that’s not the worst of it.”
“What else?”
“On Friday we called him to hang out with him and Amy and her new boyfriend Ben. Amy always has a new boyfriend.”
I paused the way I always do before I tell a lie and swept the ball of her nose into lead.
“So we were heading to his house to pick him up and he was going to call Amy but his mom heard him say ‘We’re going to get them” and thought that by them, he meant drugs.”
Here I lied. In all truth, Jacob and I were planning on getting our hands on some shrooms. But I can’t tell Shannon that. It’s the most sick thing in the world. I can tell my deepest most illegal secrets to complete strangers and acidheads but struggle with the compulsion to lie to my best friends for fear of judgment. It’s a fear of her caring too much. It’s a fear of my parents finding out and feeling like they failed raising me. I could never live with myself having made my parents feel like they screwed up. Because they didn’t. They did a fantastic job (though I am a biased source). I just happen to believe in all things in moderation. And a few of these things happen to tilt gently against the law.
I feel awful when I lie to Shannon. Even little things like the Friday plans that fell through. But I’m practically a pathological liar now. I’ve told so many to her now that they just flow like water off my tongue. It has been this way ever since I lied to her and Michelle and found that if they believed my story, I was able to believe it too and feel better about shit that was happening to me. I have gotten good. I’m like that unreadable poker player.
But she has figured me out. I’m trying to get things straight now. The first time around. I took a big stride in the right direction recently, telling her something I could never have uttered to another soul only two months ago. But that is a story too complex and personal for a simple Blog. Perhaps some day when I am more confident, I can break it into manageable chunks and post it, on bit at a time until the story is complete and the entire truth is out there, for the world to read. I will apply radical honesty to all that I type. Three cheers to Scott Westerfeld for all of you out there who know what I’m talking about.
After I finished drawing Shannon, we tramped down to the basement armed with Orville Redembockers and Kiwi juice and chocolate cake left over from Valentines Day.
Shay played a song for me on the piano while I set up the movie and just listened and let it wash over me, the way I do Pink Floyd.
“That’s nice,” I said after a while.
She smiled this secret Mona Lisa smile, her hands read the keys like secret braile I’ll never read.
“I wrote it,” Shannon said.
“No Shit!” I cried, losing my ladylikeness for a moment.
“What do you think?”
“I love it!” Flabbergasted.
“Really?”
“Yeah! What’s it for?”
“It’s a song for a girl scout ceremony. Joe’s going to cry.”
“You bet she’s going to cry, there won’t be a dry eye in the whole place! Its lovely. When did you write it?”
“Well, that part you JUST heard I wrote while you were drawing me.”
“Nu-uh!?”
“Yeah,” she said, slightly abashed.
I just stood there and shook my head at her talent. Cubed in impression by her modesty.
Later, we climbed into the fold out bed, after the movies had finished flickering on our faces and in our eyes, talking and giggling. But when I got up and turned off the light, Shannon rolled onto her side away from me and was silent.
I held my breath and knew with pain, that she can never talk to me in the dark again. For fear she will not be able to see my face, and that I would lie to her.
And the worst part is, I wonder if I would.
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