You can read an update version of this at post648355.html#p648355. It's now a piece in a novel I'm writing.
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, unlocking 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, and the gate restrains them so their feces can’t taint the dull hard wood floors that were never 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 built 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 the haven of 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 waterbed, 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. A church 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 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 valuable to me. Its eighty-seven degrees today, but I wore blue jeans to school. And, 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 I know.
The pleather pants are baggy around the waist and gather at my ankles, but they stretch over my bottom and thighs. I throw my school shirt to the floor and pull a v-necked, tight, red shirt over my head. I look at myself in the full length mirror that hangs on the closet door, checking my bottom to make sure I have achieved the desired effect. I stumble over some discarded shoes as I make my way to the vanity and apply some cheap, scentless, red gloss to my lips.
I don’t bother to take 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 ‘movie title’ and realize my friends must have found ‘Grease’ on their own and started the movie while I was changing.
“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 comical love 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 distacne 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, my hands are sweating like his now. I’ve never kissed a boy before. 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; 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 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 ‘Grease’ 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 the insult ‘slut’ in my face he throws me to the ground. “Do you know what kinda reputation little girls get when a community sees them 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 passing under the windows of the dining room. And 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 screams as he hurls a telephone at my head. I hear it whiz by me and then it smashes into pieces against the wall to 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, and shakes violently with his frustration.
“I HATE YOU! AND I WANT MY MOM!” I scream with all the force my lungs will allow. I hope all the neighbors hear, and I hope it tarnishes 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.
The hurt registers in his eyes, but swiftly 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 from the floor. 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 me, leaving me to sulk in my lonely world.
Where’s my razor blade, I think as I start rummaging through my bedroom’s debris.
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125,018 Literary Works • 672,856 Reviews
Great job on this! I don't know if there are other parts before this (I'm guessing there are), but this was fine on its own. I can't wait to read more. I'd give you a full review, but I think Flying caught everything! Also, if you review my story (link in my sig)I'll be sure to get to review the next part of yours as soon as it's posted.
--Dreamy
Wow! thanks so much! I've missed seeing you around
There's actually an updated version of this posted now "Dakota's Diary Chapter 2" there's parts one and two because it turned out pretty long when I added all the present day events around the diary entry.
I understand how school should be damned. Straight to Hell.
Keep writing, I can't wait to see what's going to happen to Dakota!! I just saw a couple of mistakes in punctuation, and the amendments should be very minor! I love this piece, it shouts to people some of the hidden reality of this world. Also, in your first piece (chapter?) of this story, Jennafina commented that you should continue with color-coding some of your most integral concepts, or feelings, and I like this idea. You can tag some kind of an action, like when Dakota cuts herself, with a color, like when she gasps from the pain from the process, for example. And I'm really sorry, I wasn't able to comment on your post for a long time - let school be damned.
Hey everyone!
RedSmiles
I'm just a wee bit sad that I haven't received any reviews on this one yet, especially since I've been giving about three a day to other people.
Feel free to give me a hand here!