Barbie Girl (Baby Doll Series) (6 page)

What does he wants an apology? Well he can forget that. I am not about to apologize.
Well
s
orry buster you are going to be waiting a long time if you think I am going to apologize
. “It was a really good party you missed.” There was no party, but I did stay awake late waiting for my mother to come home. He makes no attempt to invite me in, his large frame filling the door. “Look are we going to study or not?” I ask. He is now starting to annoy me, not cool.

“Not,” he starts to shut the door. I didn’t go through all this trouble to have the door shut in my face. I had to hitch
hike a ride with a very questionable man, who gave me his phone number. I stick my foot in the door preventing it from closing.
Ouch
. “That’s not fair,
” I pout. “Come on don’t be mad,” I reach out placing my hand on his chest. He cocks his eyebrow at me looking at my hand on his chest, he is about to break, I can feel it, but he just shakes his head at me. His jaw working, “Go home, Barbie,” and he shuts the door again. This time there is a loud thud when the door shuts. I am standing there shocked for a moment. He did not just shut the door in my face.
Jerk
.

I push open the door, he didn’t lock it so that must mean he wanted me to follow, boys they love being chased. I step into a bright yellow
hall;
it is lined with black and white family photos.

“I can have you arrested you know, for breaking and entering,” he says.

I can’t see him, I only hear his voice. “I did no breaking, I just entered.” I continue to make my way into the house. A large living room, same bright yellow walls, is to my
right;
it is lined with big, blue plush couches.
SpongeBob
plays on the biggest TV I have ever seen. I make my way over to more portraits on the wall. A man in his late forties clutches the hands of a woman with dark hair and the same dark eyes as Dylan’s. I think I am going to puke. I look at another picture of the man and woman with Dylan and his little sister sitting on rocks at the beach, they are all wearing matching white shirts. How sweet.

“You are pretty,” Dylan’s little sister is staring up at me.

“I know,” I smile down at her.

“What’s your name?” she asks.

“Barbie.”

Her eyes get huge. “Are you the real Barbie?” She whispers, “You look like her.” She looks at me with star-struck eyes.

I kind of like this kid, “Yep, the one and only.”

The little girl’s smile grows until it reaches her eyes.

“She is not
the
Barbie; she is more like those dolls you are not allowed to play with.” Dylan is standing in the doorframe with the same glare and stance he wore before, arms folded tight across his chest.

Emmy’s eyes wrinkle up like she’s trying to think really hard about something, then she relaxes and smiles again at me. “Bratz!” she squeals. “I love those dolls, they are so cool!” she skips off.

I smile after her. “Smart kid,” I say.

He sighs through his nose. “Don’t flatter yourself, she is only six. What do you want?”

What do I want? That’s the question of the day. “Um, you are supposed to be tutoring me, remember the deal? I hook you up, you get me an A.” I close the distance so we stand toe to toe. “I am also going to pick your virgin flower,” my finger trails up his chest, I am trying to make him nervous, but it is my heart that is beating erratically.

“Yes at ten o’clock this morning, it is now two thirty,” he looks at his watch on his wrist.

“So…” I say. His nerdy cuteness of his is starting to wear off.

“So this is not going to work out.”

I stare at
him;
I am the one who calls the shots.

“Me tutoring you,’’ he says like I am too dense to understand. Images of no diploma fill my mind; my mother never graduated.

“Look I am late, sorry, it will not happen again.” Now my arms are crossed. I am pissed; he got an apology out of me.

“Sorry is not going to cut it. You are an irresponsible spoiled brat and I don’t want to deal with it,” he snaps.

“I am not irresponsible!” I yell back. He has no clue of the responsibility that sits on my shoulders every day.

“What do you care if you pass anyway,” he says.

So I am not like my mother. God, I don’t want to end up like her. That is why I want to graduate and get the hell out of Dodge. I take a deep breath, making him angrier is not going to help me, and he is oddly immune to my womanly ways, maybe he is gay and is in denial, Katie does have the body of a thirteen-year-old boy.

“Will you
pleassse
tutor me,” I bat my eyes, trying to change my approach with him. “Please,” I try again.

I can see his façade begging to falter. “I will agree to it…only if you agree to my rules,” he says walking into the kitchen.

“Yeah.
Like what?” I follow him; I jump up on the kitchen counter and swing my legs.

“No more getting high,” he says like this might be a deal breaker.

“Done,” I say.

“And no more cutting classes, you have to be on time and stay until they end,” he raises his eyebrows testing me.

“Anything else, Dad?”

He sighs again dropping his hands to his side. “And you cannot be late to your tutoring session anymore,” he says, his hair falling into his eyes.

“Fine,” I push my chest up so my boobs look bigger. His eyes dart to my chest then back to my face.
Definitely not gay
.

“And you have to wear something more conservative around my impressionable little sister,” he says trying to stay focused on my face.

“I have a Liberian costume I wore for Halloween, I can dig it out,” I tease.

He lets out a long breath. “No! Just cover up,” he says his cheeks a bright shade of red.

“So are we going to do this thing or what?” I ask, jumping down off the counter so that I am standing close to him again, he smells like fresh cut grass and Irish Spring soap. He looks down at me.

“Can’t, I have to watch my little sister, and I am late to our tea party.”

Okay now I am laughing, I grip the counter so I don’t fall over from laughing. “A tea party…wait are you serious, this I have to see!”

He glares at me again. “Fine, but you can’t say anything…or do anything inappropriate around Emmy.”

I follow him upstairs into a very pink room. It is little girl’s dream room, a twinge of jealousy plucks at me. A fluffy leopard bedspread sits on a brass canopy bed. Dolls and toys spill off white tall shelves.

“Emmy I brought the doll to the tea party,” he calls.

Emmy sits at a small white table dressed in a yellow princess dress. “Another guest,” she says in an English accent, clapping her small hands together. “How delightful,” this kid is a riot.

“Why yes, I thought so.” Dylan tries to copy the accent but it comes out more Australian then British.
Cute
.

“Why, Lady Rose Petal, you have no hat!” Emmy gasps.

I look around to see what she is talking about. Oh she means me. “Well yes, I wasn’t prepared, invited last minute by a very rude boy.” I say matching her English accent and shooting Dylan a smug smile.

“Some people are so rude,” she says looking at Dylan.

“What?” he laughs.

“No worries, he is a big, fat fart head,” I snicker and he attempts to glare but a small smile tugs at the corner of his mouth.

Emmy digs out hats and plastic jewelry from a trunk; she places them on my head “And Lord Stinky Pants you have none either,” she tssks placing a pink hat on Dylan’s head

“Lord Stinky Pants!” I snort.

“Tell anyone and die,” he glares at me.

I walk down Dylan’s long road, my head spinning the way Dylan was with his sister. I thought I knew where I stood with Dylan. He gets me a good grade I get him the girl. So why is my heart pounding at the thought of him, and my chest is swelling with a warm sensation. I chuckle to myself thinking about him wearing that goofy pink hat and the fake, bad accent he used when he said, “ I Bid you good day my lady.”

He really loves his little sister, what teenage boy plays tea party with a six-year-old? That must be it. I don’t like him; I merely feel a connection with him because of Everett. The way he cares about her, the way he did everything just to make her smile. So why was it when I hugged him good bye my heart skipped around like I just ran a damn marathon. I need to get a grip.

* * *

“Find a partner,” Mrs. Green sings. Groans and chairs scraping the floor echo around the room. I stand. Normally I would head over to one of the kids that hang under the bleachers smoking pot, but then I spot Third, I am supposed to be Dylan’s girl, so it makes sense I would pair up with his BFF.

“Howdy partner,” I plop into an empty desk next to him.

“Sorry, he already has a partner,” a little skinny redheaded kid with glasses and bad acne leans around Third. I glare at him and he looks nervous.

“Tell you what, scram and I let you tell your tech buddies, you’ve seen my boobs.” I smile at him. I am an evil, evil girl. The poor kid looks like he is about to have a heart attack.

“Beat it Ronald,” Third says shaking his head, an amused smile on his face. Too bad Dylan can’t take a joke like Third can.

“Fine,” Ronald stomps off to find a new partner.

“I thought he was going to a have an aneurism.” Third laughs.

“That’s me killing nerds in my spare time with just the thought of my boobs,” I laugh.

Mrs. Green sits down on the end of her desk, her ankles crossed swinging slightly. She would almost be likeable if she wasn’t so damn excited over every assignment she gave, like she was thinking outside the box in hopes to connect with us, and help us grow to love for literature. Not that I don’t like books, hell I wish I could be one of those girls who could get lost in a book, transported to another time and place, but I can’t. Reading is something I can’t afford to do. Hell, trying to keep Everett safe and happy kind of trumps everything else. No time for friends or a social life, but I love my little brother; I would do anything for him.

“Fairy tales,” Mrs. Green gives a dramatic pause glancing around the room, before she continues. “Who had them read to them as children, or watched the movie, the happily ever after?” Mrs. Green says.

I snort. I never had them read to me, and I sure as hell don’t believe in them.

“How did they affect the way you view relationships?” she smiles looking around the room. “Tell me what girl in this room does not dream about prince charming riding up on his white stead to rescue you?” she asks dreamy eyed.

“I have a white stead right here, that you can take for a ride.” A guy from the back row says making an obscene gesture. It earns him a round of high five from his idiot friends, and a few giggles from some of the girls.

“Charmed I am sure,” Mrs. Green says as she hops down off the desk to make her way around the room. “But the fairy tales you have come to know are not the original ones; they have been turned and mutated into sappy romances with happy-ever-after’s. You and your partner are going to research the story, where they originated from, what was the reason behind telling these stories, how does it change your view on prince charming?” She narrows her eyes at the kid who made the gesture who squirms a little in his seat, uncomfortable.

“Choose a story from the basket,” she passes around a basket with tiny folded-up white pieces of paper.

“Sleeping Beauty,” a girl sighs.

“This is juvenile,” another girl announces.

“Well then, I will expect a ten-page report on why you feel it is juvenile, from you and your partner Kylie. Instead of the oral report the rest of the class will be doing.”

“
Ohhs
”
and a few
“
oh snaps
”
fill the small overcrowded room. Mrs. Green holds up her hand to silence the class. Mrs. Green means business.

“The Little Mermaid,” Third reads the tiny strip of paper.

Mrs. Green gives us the rest of the hour to do research at the library. Third claims a computer and checks his Facebook page, while I pull open a book of
The Little Mermaid
and start to read. The whole story feels like a punch to the gut as I read. This poor girl or fish whatever falls in love with this prince who cannot see what she is, he ends up breaking her heart and marrying some stuck-up chick and the poor mermaid dies. He ended up killing her, why? Because she was different from the norm, she couldn’t speak. This is the most effed up story I have ever read.

“It is pretty cool what you are doing for my boy,” Third leans back in his chair breaking my concentration.

“That’s me, using my charm to spread good around the world.” I joke feeling a little uncomfortable with his comment. “Now don’t go telling anyone I am really a good person deep down.”

He smiles. “You are a good person to do what you’re doing.”