I have to edit this a lot, I changed what I was doing, so this isn't the final draft. Feel free to still comment, but I have a lot of work to do with it still.
I don’t know if you’re familiar with the term “hypochondria” but I happen to live with it and his name is Gerard. He was five years older than me and in school for photography. He was definitely my type: skinny, cute face and emo hair that flips over at his forehead. So much so that I almost believed it when I told him I loved him, which I didn’t until it was way too late. Until there was too much lost to fix anything.
I met him when I was walking home with my neighbor Polly Stance through the park and he was taking pictures of trees. He stopped us and asked if he could take a picture of us with the trees and leaves. Polly, who I really didn’t like much, looked at him with contempt and walked away. But, as I said before, he was completely my type, and I’d spent so much time around private school kids, trying to fit in, his black nail polish was enough to make me swoon.
“You can take pictures of me,” I answered, blushing when I realized it sounded kind of suggestive.
But he grinned, and gestured in front of his camera. I did, and couldn’t keep my eyes off him. I threw up leaves, watched them fall around me, posed, laughed, cracked jokes. It was like a scene from some movie. And weeks after he packed up his camera and shook my hand, I couldn’t get him out of my mind. We hadn’t exchanged numbers or anything, so I didn’t expect I would ever see him again. But I would always walk the long way home from school in the hope that I would run into him again. Polly got annoyed and stopped walking with me.
But one day, I spotted him on a bench holding two cardboard cups of coffee. I kept walking, pretending I hadn’t noticed him, but just happened to have to go that way anyway. But as I walked in front of him, I regretted it immediately. I mean, he must have been waiting for someone since he had two cups. It was stupid of me to try to call attention to myself. Even if that was why I spent an extra ten minutes walking home every day.
“Oh, hey,” he said and his voice melted away all my worries. I turned, and maybe played up the whole oh-I-didn’t-even-see-you-there face a little too much.
“Oh, hi!” I answered, sounding too eager. “Are you waiting for someone?” I eyed the cups in his hands.
“Actually, yeah. It doesn’t look like he’s going to show up, though. I’ve been waiting for almost an hour,” he answered glancing at the watch on his wrist. “Wanna grab some coffee? This stuff’s no good anymore.” He got up and threw the cups into the trash bin with a sloshing clunk.
“Uh,” I looked at my own watch; I was already late. But wasn’t that why I was so drawn to him anyway? I needed a rebellious stage. Or at least I needed to do a couple rebellious things.
“Sure,” I finally answered, and he grinned again. “I’m Liz.”
“Hey, Liz. I’m Gerard.”
Over the next few weeks, I would always go out with him after school, he would always be waiting for me on that bench, and we would go get coffee or slushies or something. He always paid, so that was close enough to a date for me.
My parents weren’t worried because I would just tell them that I just had to stay after school everyday to work on the play. They never doubted me. Why would they? I’ve never done anything like this before. Which was why I needed it.
But one night, I was just about asleep when I heard something at my window. I was on the first floor, so it’s not like it was a tree branch hitting it or something. I slowly crept to the window and opened the shades to reveal who else, but Gerard there, smiling and staring back at me. His blue eyes so bright in the dark they practically glowed.
I opened the window a crack. “What are you doing here?” I couldn’t help but grin back, even though I was scared out of my wits. What if my parents heard something and came in?
“I came to break you,” he said lightly, knowing how frustrated with my life I was.
“I can’t leave! It’s the middle of the night.”
“Exactly. Now come on. Don’t make me come in there and bring you out myself.” He opened the window wide enough for me to fit through. I looked behind me.
I pair of pale hands slid around my waist and pulled me towards the window. I turned back towards him. And his face was serious, but he kept pulling at me. I smiled and heaved myself through the window, trying to be as quiet as possible.
Before I knew it, he was leading me by the hand through the streets of my neighborhood to an apartment building. I’d passed this building about a million times when I used to take tap lessons, which was just down the street from here.
He pulled out his keys and let himself in. And then he led me through hallways until we were at number 12. I made sure I remembered what number it was in case I wanted to come visit sometime.
He let me in, and turned the lights on. All the wall space was covered in pictures, some signed by people, and some that seemed to be his own. They were all framed differently, and there didn’t appear to be any organization to the way they were laid out. There was a plain black couch in the middle of the room with a small table with an even smaller TV, balancing a VCR precariously on top. He watched me look around, not saying anything.
“Wow.”
“Do you like it?” he asked quietly. I nodded. All the pictures were breathtaking, although so cluttered it almost hurt my head to try to see it all at once.
There were two doors on the right of the TV. I assumed the lead to his bedroom or bathroom or kitchen.
“It’s really cool. How come you brought me here?” I asked, a little nervous. I didn’t know why, but I suddenly felt sort of tense.
“Because I wanted to show you this,” he said, grabbing my hand and pulling me into the door closest to us. He flipped on the light switch just as I laced my fingers with his. I felt his gaze on me as the light turned on and I saw what was in the room. It was smaller than the living room, but was also covered in pictures. There was a slanted desk that covered the entire wall opposite of the door that had a window above it. On it was stretched out dozens of black and white prints of me, playing in the leaves under the trees. In some pictures, I was giggling, and in some my hair bounced as I spun around. And that was when I realized how photogenic I was.
I mean, as a girl, you are practically by law supposed to squeal and hold your hand in front of your face when someone tries to take a picture of you. So I’d never really let myself get photographed for real. I was proud of how they turned out.
“You have a nice camera, huh?” I said quietly, not wanting to sound too conceited.
“And I had a beautiful model,” he added, inching closer to me. I waited for him to get within reach of me, but he stopped too far away. “When’s your birthday?”
“I’m eighteen,” I lied, glancing at the pictures again. I really did look good in them…
“Really?” He grinned, and then quicker than I expected, he closed the space between us.
My hands were shaking slightly as I put my clothes back on. What did I just do?
Gerard saw it, and pulled me in for a tight hug. My trembling eased as he pulled me back together. In my ear he whispered, “Are you ashamed?”
I felt insulted, hurt. As if what we’d just done had made me a bad person or something. Well, he did it just as much as I did. And he was the older one. If anything, it was his fault. So my answer sounded defensive. “No.”
He kissed my forehead lightly. “Good. I want you to have this.”
Gerard took off a ring he had on his middle finger and pressed it into my palm. I closed my fingers around it.
“I should get home,” I whispered, pulling away and beginning to tremble again.
As I walked out the door alone I heard him behind me. The words were stretched thin and sounded desperate. I know he didn’t mean it; it was just a way to fix what had happened. “I love you,” he whispered. I felt his eyes on my back, but I didn’t turn around.
He was just giving me an excuse. Something to tell myself to fix my shattered state of mind. So I lied when I answered him, something I was getting used to. “I love you too.”
The day after, when I saw him on the bench, he looked the same as always, smiling when he saw me, carefree, even. The sickening twist I’d felt in anxiety of seeing him that day all melted away when I smiled back. And we went on like that hadn’t happened at all. He didn’t mention my swollen eyes, and he never said anything about the ring. But he did whisper empty promises to me, every once in a while in the form of that dreaded three letter sentence. I would answer in the same way, but it was one of those times when the words didn’t fit right. Like when you shove a piece into a puzzle because it’s close enough and you’re sick of looking for the right one.
But pretty soon, it was back to normal. So much so that I almost felt like I was ready for it to happen again, in fact I sort of hoped it would. I lied awake and waited for him to knock on my window many nights but he didn’t. I realized that I was just freaked out at first, and I told myself that was normal. Probably even expected.
The more I hung out with Gerard, the darker my clothes seemed to get¾other than my school uniform which was khaki skirt and white blouse¾and the more make up I began to wear. And I didn’t take off the ring he gave me, ever. I’d slipped it on my thumb when I was crying myself to sleep that night, and just never got the courage to take it off. And my mom noticed.
The thing about my parents was that they always reminded me of the King and Queen of Hearts on Alice of Wonderland. She was clearly in charge, and everyone seemed to know that other than the king¾my dad. It would almost be funny, if I didn’t fight with my mom so much.
So one day, I came out of my room wearing a low cut black shirt with an oversized black hoodie over it with my grey skinny jeans and thick blue eyeliner. My mom caught me before I left the house.
“What are you wearing?” she demanded.
“Clothes?” I answered sarcastically, rolling my eyes.
“Don’t be smart with me,” she warned.
“Want me to be stupid, then?”
“Just go change,” she demanded, sounding tired.
“Into what? A pink turtleneck with frills? I like this.”
“The shirt is too low, and it’s so dark. And since when have you given me such a hard time? Just go do what I said.”
I nodded, but when she left the room I left the house just the way I was.
Before I graduated, I began thinking about what I wanted to do with my life. I knew college wasn’t right for me no matter how many times my parents pushed it. I knew I just wanted to be with Gerard and away from them but I wasn’t sure how to make that happen. At least until he invited me to live with him. It would be perfect.
The day of my graduation, I told my dad. He would relay it to my mom, and I could talk to her after she cooled down a little while. I wouldn’t want to see the brunt of that.
“Do you love him?” he asked me after I’d broken the news. I smiled. It was such a simple reaction, and I nodded, a simple answer.
“Well then good for you, Kid. I’ll talk to your mom for you,” he said with a faint smile.
“Thanks, Dad.” I kissed him on the cheek and ran to my room to pack. I got all my favorite things, leaving my books and school related things. I wanted to be able to just forget about that part of my life.
...
