Young Writers Society

Eight

I reach my car and I find Ales, Halli, and my mother sitting on the hood. Chad probably wanted to step back while I had my “girl time” as he liked to call it. I think I know what they are going to ask me.

“So, how did it go?” asks Halli. Alas, the question that I foolishly hoped would not be uttered.

“None of your business,” I say. “Now will the three of you please get off my car?” They listen, but a hand blocks me from opening my door.

“You’re not getting off that falicimente,” says Ales. “Now will you please give us la violento details? Per piacere?”

I look from her, to Halli, to my mother, taking in their expectant, if not hopeful looks. “Fine,” I mutter. The three of them almost let out a simultaneous squeal of glee, but stifle their excitement once they see my venomous gaze.

We wander around the area as I describe to them my encounter with Pauline. My mother looks ready to smack me for my recklessness towards standing in the way of a moving vehicle, but regains control of herself.  Through the course of the next ten minutes or so, I give them a gist of everything from when Pauline and I went swimming to when we exchanged our goodbyes.

“Did you exchanges phone numbers or emails?” asks Halli.

“No I did not,” I say. It is not a surprise when Halli and Ales groan.

“Alright, I understand the no email part,” begins Ales, “but, seriously? Not even phone numbers?”

“I was too busy having a nice conversation with a beautiful girl!” My hands shake as the words spew out of my mouth.

“‘Beautiful girl’,” repeats my mother. I groan as I sit down on a nearby bench overlooking the lake. The three of them join me. My mother on my left and Ales and Halli on my right.

“I promised myself a romance-free time through the rest of my high school years and I am trying extremely hard to hold up to that,” I say, tracing invisible patterns into the whispering water with my eyes.

“Who said there had to be any relazione?” asks Ales. “Are you attracted to her?”

“No!” I think that that came out too quickly for it to be convincing. “Maybe.”

“Hey, buddy, don’t let the shadow of—”

“Don't…you…dare…finish that sentence!” If I had any thought that my outburst would put a look of fear or hurt into my mother’s blue eyes, I was wrong. Her calmness only makes my sense of guilt reach a boiling point. I stand up suddenly and I head for the parking lot.

“Where are you going?” Halli calls after.

“Home, and Mom, please just spend the evening with Halli and Chad; I need to be alone.” I say it with as much emphasis as I can, letting Ales know just as well that I need my solitude. I know all too well that the chances of her actually obeying my request are fifty-fifty.

I head to my car and, tuning to the local rock station, I am on the road within minutes. I pay attention to the road only to the extent that I know what’s in front of me and how fast I am going. No matter how well I pay attention to the road, my imagination is still as vivid as ever.

My phone rings and I answer even though I am behind the wheel.

“Hey, buddy, are you coming over this evening?” asks Cherise.

My eyes widen. I totally forgot all about our plans. “U-u-um, yeah, I’m still up for dinner. I’m heading over right now. And I would like to continue this conversation, but I am driving.”

“Why are you still on the phone with me, you idiot?” the line disconnects not a second after and I am left with a bright smile. I am already at a point in my journey to my house that I realize I have to turn around. I turn into the closest parking lot I see and make a wide turn.

As I journey to Cherise’s house, my view of trees and sporadic country homes is replaced by uncomfortable closeness of suburbia. The only thing that saves it from my utter distaste in the variety in the shapes of each house. I know Cherise’s house not so much by address, which I have perfectly memorized, but by its color and shape.

I come upon it and I smile a bit. The average-sized cream-colored house looks like it could almost be spilt in two. The first half is the house with a small porch that is little more than one small step and another larger step overcast by an overhang. The first floor has two windows next to the doorway and the second floor has three windows, each with blue shudders. The second half is the two-car garage that I know is usually occupied by Cherise’s family car and her beloved Harley Davidson motorcycle. I park in the driveway closest to the walkway to her front door.

Out of habit, I ring the doorbell even though Cherise made it explicitly clear that it was totally unnecessary. I barely reach the count of twenty before the door swings open.

“YOU ARE UNDER ARREST!” squeals that cute little voice I can never cease to smile at.

“What am I under arrest for, Harry?” I ask the little boy half my size. “This time?”

As an answer, the boy haltingly reads off my Miranda rights as I let him put his toy handcuffs around my wrists. I smile over my shoulder, hoping to give him a vote of confidence. He chokes when he reaches “you have a right to an attorney”. The six-year-old boy still had trouble saying the word “attorney”.

He gives up and brings his hands down in frustration. “Oh, darn it!” he exclaims. If my hands weren’t cuffed behind my back, I’d put a comforting hand on his shoulder. Just then, his mother, Cherise appears.

“Oh, Harry, I’m afraid you are going to have to let Uncle Karrie go,” she says, her hands on her hips. “You messed up Miranda.”

Harry grumbles. “Okay, fine.” He comes into my view and gives me a sideways glance similar to his mother’s when she is in the middle of an interrogation. “One day I will get Miranda down you will be locked in the dungeon!” The “dungeon” he is speaking of is his makeshift cage that I helped him make out of cardboard in the basement. It would not be particularly comfortable for me as there is barely enough room for me to stand. The little twerp knows it too.

He unlocks the toy handcuffs from my wrists and runs back inside. Cherise and I watch as he runs back inside. When he disappears I step into the house.

“So how have been lately, old friend?” asks Cherise as she closes the door behind me. “You told me that your mother was getting her checkup today?”

“I did,” I confirm. “She’s in remission.”

Cherise smiles broadly and pulls me into a one-armed hug. “That’s wonderful news!”

“I may have shared your excitement when my mother gave me the news, but honestly I’m worried.”

“Why would you be worried?” asks Cherise, dubious.

“Don’t get me wrong, Cherry, I am…thrilled that my mother is in remission, but will she stay in remission…or will her cancer come back with a vengeance?”

Cherise puts her hands on my shoulders and gives me a stern look. “Kieran, you are worrying over nothing,” she makes very clear. “Yes, those are things to worry about, but for now, just be happy that your mother is in remission.” Cherise always was one for living in the now.

I nod ruefully. “Okay.”

“Now let’s put a stop to this moody atmosphere and tell me about your summer,” she practically orders. “What’ve you been up to since you returned to the states?”

“Oh, nothing too much since I got back from my Mediterranean cruise,” I reply, turning away to look out the window. “And the end of summer party that I attended with Ales at her house last night.”

“Total teenage decadence?”

“Very much so.”

“Did you dance?”

I roll my eyes. “Yes.” I’m not looking at her, but I think I can feel Cherise scrutinizing me. “I get the feeling that you know that there is something that I am not telling you.”

“I am a detective,” says Cherise matter-of-factly.

“Really, I thought that you were my babysitter-turned-friend.” She doesn’t say anything. I exhale, rubbing figure-eight’s into my temples. “I didn’t want to have to say this, but it looks like you’re next in my circle of closest friends to hear this.” I turn around and face Cherise. We go into the living room and sit across from each other. I explain everything that I’ve already told Ales and my family about my encounter with Nigel Payson and Pauline Marek. Cherise listens intently and quietly until I finish.

“Sounds like something that a passerby might think was sadomasochism,” she sums up.

“Sadomasochism implies consent,” I point out. Though that doesn’t mean that I find sadomasochism, or anything under the BDSM umbrella was right or even…romantic. If anything, it’s gross and is just plain wrong. “And from what it sounded like, there was no consent.”

“First degree rape is a serious felony, but it’s you and I both know that it is not your testimony I require to warrant an arrest.”

“I know,” I mumble. A moment of silence passes between us as we both understand that it has to be Pauline to testify. I don’t like seeing a rapist walk free, but at the same time I don’t want to pressure Pauline. I barely know her. Cherise unexpectedly smiles.

“Did you teach the S.O.B. a lesson?” she asks.

I shrug, a little abashed. “I…may have given him a taste of my baton and threw him out of the house by the ear.” We both laugh.

“If you planned on being a cop, you would definitely be a bad one,” says Cherise still laughing. She knows I have no desire to get into the police force, but we do love toying with good cop/bad cop scenarios.

“Are you going to help me make dinner or what?” asks Cherise.

“Cherry, have you forgotten who the better cook was?” Cherise tries to look infuriated, but we are still laughing. Plus, she knows that I am no novice when it comes to culinary arts.

Over the next hour we make a taco salad while we talk about each other’s summer. I let Cherise talk about her summer first. I am really intrigued because before I left with Ales, Cherise was still in uniform. She got her promotion to detective in July while I was Monaco. I had to celebrate with her through my laptop. 

From that point, little Harry seemed to view her officer’s cap as his rightful property, often wearing it around the house and sometimes even in public. From the pictures that Cherise always sent me, he always looked goofy as the peaked cap went well over his eyes. She doesn’t go into much detail about the cases that she has worked, but she does tell me that she and her partner take turns with the good cop-bad cop cliché. More often than not, they do their best to disappoint suspects by not sticking to the stereotypes surrounding the police. Donuts were out of the question due to her partner not even liking donuts.

When Cherise asks me about the Mediterranean, I do my best and Cherise is one of the few people I know from growing up with her that is patient with my impediments. Which is really saying something, given her patience hangs only by a thread in the interrogation room.

My trip was basically a series of cruises from Athens to Rome to Monaco to Corsica to Lisbon. Not mention the stops at some of the islands in between. Along the way I went shopping quite a few times with Ales, adding to my already substantial collection of designer clothing and accessories. I joke that my whole wardrobe put together is probably worth more than my house was when my mother first made the down payment on it—something that she continues to refuse any financial aid for. Not that she was in any state of financial crisis; she just wanted to feel like that she could get some things done on her own. I think I inherited that from her.

I was also given the opportunity to paint some of my loose, but very expressionistic, depictions of some of the attractions at the locations. In Rome, as it was not my first visit, I painted a depiction of the Fontana di Trevi using a color scheme of bluish white and dark orange—a remarkable contrast that even I am still trying to figure out how I managed to pull off.

I continued to paint depictions of several attractions throughout each of the cities I visited to the point that I had to purchase more paint at least three times. That was particularly interesting as I still had some paint from the places I visited. Some of them were exclusive to those places and I haven’t brought myself to actually use them as I wish to keep them as souvenirs.

“Are any of your paintings up for sale?” asks Cherise as she fills Harry’s plate with only taco meat, shredded cheese, and tortilla chips.

“Some of them, yes,” I reply. “And I will remind you again that, while I’ll admit I am not cheap, but I do give everyone an opportunity to buy one of my paintings if I feel that they really want it.”

Cherise smiles. “That’s one of the things that I love about you, buddy. Given your talent, I basically support your asking prices, but I do love how hold to that moral.”

“Hey, it all depends on who wants it the most,” I state as I finish dishing my plate. “And even though my condition makes it difficult for me to empathize with people, I have developed a way of telling who wants it the most that has nothing to do with whatever the depth of their wallet is.”

Cherise laughs again. “Have you set up a place to host an art gallery?”

“Yep, the school principal gave me permission to use the gym a week after school begins,” I reply proudly. “And you, my friend, do not need a ticket. Your name is on my list of special guests.”

“How did you ever get so sweet?” asks Cherise, giving me a sideways glance as she takes a bite of taco salad.

“Have you noticed the number of women in my life?” Cherise considers this and we laugh again and it is not untrue. There have been more women to influence me than there were men.

“Okay, Harry wants to watch Avengers. You have time?”

I grin toothily. “Of course I do.” We walk back into the living room to see the little rascal jumping up and down expectantly. I never grow tired of being there to make a fatherless child happy.