This is the second half of chapter 2 in the novel I'm working on. I post it in segments because I know it's long and long pieces don't get many reviews. With that said chapter 1 (topic56770.html) and part 1 of chapter 2 (topic56910.html) did not get very many reviews. I like to know my weak points, even if they're nit picky so feel free to tear this up with suggestions!
To get a good feel of what's going you may choose to go back and read the previous segments. Basically, it's the week of Dakota's wedding, and she has stumbled upon a diary from her youth. She's been reading it and reminiscing on past hard times as she looks forward to the future she's about to choose
“10/6/99
A day in the life of me:
It’s against the rules. But, Dad has to be home for rules to get enforced and he’s here for eight hours a day. To sleep. So, with a smile and a skip in my step I arrive home from school and unlock the front door with a line of friends behind me. I throw my book bag onto the reeking sofa in the living room without a worry. ‘How will he ever know that the homework waited until the fun was done,’ I laugh to myself. Cole, Cadence, and Danny circle around my dining room table, letting book bags carelessly plop into chairs as they make themselves at home.
“So, Dakota, what are we gonna do?” Cole asks me, winking. I’m stepping over the baby gate that separates the dining room and kitchen. The kitchen is home to a dachshund and two poodles. The gate restrains them so their feces can’t taint the hard wood floors that never got coated with polyurethane. The kitchen’s linoleum floor is disgusting.
“I want to watch ‘Grease’! I borrowed it from a cousin and I want to wear my new pleather pants to match Sandy’s.” I respond as I open the kitchen’s back door, freeing the dogs into the fenced in back yard. I leap back over the gate into the dining room and do a small performance “You better shape up! ‘Cause I neeeed a man!” I hold my hand in a fist at my mouth mimicking a microphone and point at Cole, dancing toward him. He blushes while Cadence and Danny burst into laughter. “I’ll be back, I’m gonna change. Get comfy in the living room, if you wanna.”
I sprint up the dark stairwell, not bothering to touch the squeaky, barely there banister. Dust and dog hair have been building up in the corners of every hardwood step. My white bedroom door is waiting at the top, and when I reach it I give it a careless shove. There are no blinds in my bed room, so the room is bright in contrast to the rest of the house. It’s full of color: purple and pink walls with furniture painted to match, a floral comforter stretched across a water bed, mismatched pillows still covered in popular cartoon characters, and the various colors of the clothes sprawled on the floor. I begin to root around for the black hand-me-down fake leather pants from a church who had left several black trash bags full of old clothes on our porch over the weekend.
“Here you are.” I say out loud to myself as I pull the pants up from my closet floor. The seams are worn, and the fake shine is flaking off at the knees, but that doesn’t make them any less cool to me. Its eighty-seven degrees today, but I wore blue jeans to school. As I peel them away from my skin I pay careful attention to be gentle with the swollen mass of cuts on my thigh. My pants had been stuck to the scabs and pulling them ripped the healing wounds open. I intentionally disregard using peroxide, or neosporin to clean the cuts or help them heal. I deserve this pain, and I keep the self inflicted wounds a secret from everyone.
The pleather pants are baggy around the waist and gather at my ankles, but they stretch over my butt and thighs. I throw my school shirt to the floor and pull a v-necked, tight, black shirt over my head. I look at myself in the full length mirror that hangs on my closet door, looking at my butt to make sure I’ve achieved the desired effect. I stumble over some discarded shoes and make my way to my vanity to apply some cheap, scentless, red gloss to my lips.
I don’t worry about taking my time down the steps and slam through the door at the bottom. It bounces off the wall behind me and closes its self. I hear the previews for the Grease soundtrack and realize my friends must have found the movie on their own and started it with out me.
“What do ya think?” I ask while slowly spinning in a circle for my grand entrance.
“I think you can sit next to me.” Cole remarks as he pats the space next to him on a recliner in the corner of the sectional. I welcome the attention and squeeze myself next to him.
By the time the fun filled characters of “Grease” are bursting into the song “Tell Me More” Cole has entwined his fingers with mine. His palm is clammy, and I can tell he’s anxious about something. Cadence, sitting safely out of touching distance from Danny, has been glancing at us with wild eyes. I can’t really tell if she’s angry, jealous, or just surprised but her eye brows creep higher and higher on her forehead as I continue to accept Cole’s affection. By the end of the ballad Cole and I have locked eyes and our faces are inching closer and closer toward each other.
My stomach is flipping and flopping and my hands are sweating like his. ‘I’ve never kissed a boy before,’ I think to myself. My heart races and my face feels hot. I wonder if he can see it in my eyes, and then our lips touch. There are no bells or fireworks, only nausea from the nerves, so I break it off before I puke on him. ‘Now, that is SO against the rules, that there’s not even a rule about it yet,’ I think.
“What?” Cole asks when I jerk away.
“Nothing kid, it was great…” BAM “…Oh, Crap!” I gasp at the sound of a car door. I leap to the front window and see Dad’s red jeep. My younger brother’s already out of the car and headed to our front gate where he’s greeted by the dogs. Our dad is still gathering his things from the jeep. “Everyone out! Dad’s home early, out the back door! I’ll tell you when he goes upstairs so you can sneak around the front yard and leave.” They’re all gathering they’re book bags and running for the door before I’ve even finished. I snap the front door locked to buy a few extra seconds while my dad searches for his keys.
Everyone makes it out.
Dad doesn’t bother with his keys, and instead begins to pound on the door. “Open the damned door, DAKOTA!” The screaming makes me want to hide, but the voice in the back of my head reminds me that hiding will only make it worse, so I open the door. “What, in the HELL, is going on here?” He demands. He doesn’t even wait for my answer before he snatches me up by the hair. “Tell me!”
“I’m watching a movie I thought I’d have enough time to get my homework and chores done before you got home even if I watched it first.” I’m shaking violently, and holding my head around the hair he’s pulling. I don’t stop to breath during my explanation.
“You’re a dirty liar, and a slut. I’m not stupid, Dakota. I can’t be here, but I have people who watch the house while I’m at work. The neighbors saw you let those three little boys in!” His face is turning red, and while he spits ‘slut’ in my face he throws me to the ground. “Do you know what kinda reputation little girls get when a community sees ‘em inviting little boys over while no parents are home?”
“Nobody’s here, Dad!” But my friends are attempting their escape as we speak, and Cadence doesn’t duck low enough while she’s passing under the windows of the dining room. At that same moment my dad notices Danny’s abandoned book bag in a dining room chair.
“You deliberately disobey me, and then lie to my face.” He growls as he hurls a telephone at my head. I hear it whiz by me and then it smashes into pieces against the wall behind my back.
“I’m sorry, Dad, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I just didn’t want you to be mad.” Hot tears flow openly down my red swollen cheeks. “If I waited for you to come home I’d never see my friends. Please, please…”
“Shut up!” He smacks me clear across my tear streaked face. He’s so frustrated he’s shaking.
“I HATE YOU! And I want my mom!” I scream with all my force. I hope all the neighbors hear, and I hope it ruins the reputation he values so much. I hope the words cut his heart to match my thighs, and I hope they sting his soul to match my face.
I see the hurting in his eyes, but it quickly turns to furry. I run. Up the stairs and to my bedroom, but he’s behind me. He wraps his thick fingers around my throat and lifts me up. I reach for his hands as he murmurs, “Don’t you back talk me” and drops me to my water bed. He turns his back to and leaves me to sulk in my lonely world.
‘Where’s my razor blade?’ I think as I start rummaging through my bedroom’s debris.
The End.”
I placed the diary on my night stand, and fell to sleep before my head even hit the pillow. My sleep was restless and filled with nightmares.
I’m running and panting, holding my wedding dress over my feet as I search for Michael’s face at the end of the aisle. I’m passing thousands of blurred, nameless faces and before my eyes can find Michael’s the runner shifts under my feet. I fall forward, catching myself with my face and roll to my back to see my father charging at me with a face contorted in anger. I raise my hands in defense.
purple elephant to you!