My Stupid Girl (41 page)

“When I turned eighteen, I moved in to help
her,” I lied quickly. I realized that I might have to tell Anthony what happened
someday, but it wasn’t going to be right now. The man looked like he was ready
to cry when talking about giving me up for adoption, then rip his own face off
from grief when I’d told him about my mom. I wasn’t going to tell him that the
man who was my dad had beaten me on a regular basis. Talk about causing a nice
guy never-ending guilt.

My birth father just nodded at me, like he
was forcing himself to believe what I was saying. He could see my scar, and he
had to have wondered why I wore make up and dressed in these clothes. The huge,
colorful tattoo that stretched to my forearm probably rounded out the “what did
I do to him?” package. 

“Whatcha’ guys doing?” Dillon walked in and
climbed straight into his father’s lap, fresh clean face and wet curls. The
tips of his hair were making his Superman pajamas wet on the shoulders. Marty
followed him in, smiling and wielding a towel, which she used on his curls
before popping out again, leaving Dillon with us.

“We’re talking, son, what are you doing?”
My heart ached at the word son.

“Getting weddy for bed.” He looked over at
me and frowned in concentration. “What’s your name?”

“David Johnson.” 

“I’m Dihwwon Daviiid ANfonie FFFFawmer.” He
spoke with a finger up in the air, like he was making a great point that should
be remembered. Jealousy surged through me. So he had named his second son almost
the exact same name as the first and after himself? If at first you don’t
succeed…

My birth father saw the emotions trying to
take over my face, and put his hand on top of mine. I tried very, very hard not
to jerk it away. 

“He is named after you, not after me,” he
said, kindly.

“I’m named after my big brudder!” Dillon
said loudly, not realizing that I was the one who he was named after. Before I
could answer we heard a knock on the front door. It was soft, barely audible.
My dad got up cautiously, pacing himself and trying to compose whatever was
going on in his head. He placed Dillon on the floor absent-mindedly.

My heart started racing again, realizing
who was there. Anthony walked to the front door and opened it at a measured
pace. In the porch light stood a woman who looked older than she must have
been. Her long, blond hair straggled to a stop near the middle of her back. Big
blue eyes were dulled like someone in too much pain. Her face was wrinkled
around the mouth, like a heavy smoker’s. And her nose was red, just like my
dad’s. I almost took a step back, looking for somewhere in the kitchen to
disappear. This wasn’t really how I had imagined my birth mother – as the
perfect dysfunctional match for my alcoholic adopted dad. Dillon’s little hand reaching
for mine steadied me.

“Lindsey. He’s gorgeous.” My birth father
spoke first. I started to walk over to the little woman whose face held every
feature I saw when I looked in a mirror. But I didn’t know what to say or what
to do. This woman looked terrified of me. I didn’t know how to react towards
her hesitant face. So, when I got to the door, facing her on the porch where
she still stood, I just waited for her to say something. We stared at each
other for several moments, her swaying on her feet like she was going to faint,
looking even more stressed than I felt. 

“David.” She held her hand out for me to
shake. I took it politely. Then I started to laugh. Everyone else, even Marty
who had snuck back in after she’d heard the knock, looked at me questioningly.
Apparently laughing wasn’t totally appropriate, given the situation.

“I’m sorry; I’m laughing because I am
beginning to see where I got my shyness from.” That made my birth father laugh,
as well. He slapped my back affectionately and shook my shoulder a little.
Lindsey started giggling quietly into her hand and walked over the threshold to
give me a soft hug. The top of her head came up to my chest, almost exactly
where Lucy came up to. My birth mother was soft and smelled like stale
cigarettes.

“Hi, Mom,” I said. For the first time in my
life.       

23. MICHELLE

It was the most amazing weekend I’d ever had. I
spent time with both of my birth parents, got to know my little brother, and
actually met my father’s mother – my birth grandmother. She was a happy little
woman who was soft spoken. She also cooked some of the most amazing food I had
ever eaten. Unlike Grandma, Anthony’s mom still looked very young. She had
obviously taken good care of herself. She was beautiful with the same black hair.
Good looks ran in “my” family, I couldn’t deny it. I was beginning to think
that maybe I had gotten a little bit of those genes.  

My birth mother Lindsey was very quiet, but
happy to be a part of everything that was going on. A couple of times throughout
the weekend she would disappear. I would look around and usually found her on
the back porch smoking, or in a corner of whatever ever room we were gathered
in, trying not to be noticed. I sat next to her often, trying to pry some kind
of emotion out of her which was hard because she didn’t have much to say. What
I gathered from my birth father, and from bits and pieces that she accidentally
let slip, she had a hard life after she had me. Although I could guess at the
kind of stuff she had gotten into, I didn’t really care. She was my mom and I
loved her.

With that said, I was sure that Marty, my
step mom, was going to be more a part of my life than Lindsey was. Being around
an alcoholic my whole life, I recognized the shame that addiction caused Lindsey.
But my goal was to avoid the “what ifs” and just love her for what she was to
me right then: a shy, quiet woman who cared for me very much.

I spent most of the weekend talking about
myself. My parents asked me every kind of “baby book” question in existence.
When did you start crawling? When did you start walking? What was your first
word? What kind of things do you like to do? Do you have a girlfriend? I made
most of the answers up because I had no clue when I started walking or any of
that other baby stuff. It’s not like me and my dad had sat around chatting
about the good ol’ days in the last month or so.

But I wanted my birth parents to think that
I had been raised the way they’d dreamed when they had made the decision to
give me up for adoption. I wasn’t even angry anymore about the way I actually
had been raised. I finally saw that my father was a broken man, put in a
situation he had tried so hard to avoid, and then had kept trying, in his
limited way, to make it right. Lately, I’d wondered (a lot) how much better I
might have done in his same situation. Mostly, the answer was that I probably
would have done even worse.

I told Anthony and Marty about Lucy. I told
them about how I had helped her out of the lake and then she wouldn’t leave me
alone and, in turn, I fell helplessly in love with her. My messy,
unconventional, sporadic, hyperactive little beauty who turned my world inside
out became well-known to the Pfalmers that weekend. We spent a lot of time
discussing the night when she had given me her purity ring, and how much it had
freaked me out. It was so incredible to hear their perspective. Their
encouragement and acceptance was priceless.

“I’m so proud of you, David. Most boys
would have jumped at Lucy’s offer.” My birth father said it like I was the
greatest person in the world and Marty nodded in agreement. It was nice to talk
to a father about girl stuff, and it came surprisingly naturally. It helped
that he was the most welcoming and wonderful person I had ever met in my life.
The three of us talked for quite a while about what it was that had motivated
her to do what she did, and why I had responded the way I did. We didn’t solve
the world’s problems or anything, but it helped me get a little clearer. It
also clarified where I still needed to work and, the best part of talking with
them, on how I could change some things. That “how” part was what I’d been
missing for so long.

It was like my life had become perfect,
except it was missing something. Someone. It was missing Lucy herself. I didn’t
miss the firecrackers that went off every time I saw or touched her as much as
I just missed my friend. Lucy had become my best friend, and I missed seeing
her amazing blue eyes and listening to her constant babble. It was so weird to
have this big event of meeting my birth parents and not being able to talk
about it or share it with Lucy.

I gave Lucy a lot of thought as I flew back
home. It had been six months since I’d seen her and, for all I knew, she had a
new boyfriend and they were deeply in love. But maybe not. I really believed,
still, that she had been in love with me when we were together. I just didn’t
know if she still was. Sometimes I would pat my chest to feel the little ring
that hung on a long chain around my neck, under my shirt. It was like my own
little secret I kept to myself, the one that said I still wanted what she had
offered me, just not yet.

I figured I could call her, what was the
harm in that? Even if she was with someone else, there was no reason I couldn’t
call a friend and tell her about my weekend with my parents. I knew that if I
heard her sounding happy that that would make my weekend complete. I set my jaw
determinedly and decided that, once the plane landed, I was going to call Lucy.
Excitement started building in my chest as I thought about hearing that sweet
voice and answering all the questions she would ask about my birth parents.

Once I was able to turn my phone back on at
the gate, I saw that I had a voicemail from my grandma. 

“Davie, Johnny is coming to get you. I am
not feeling so well, so I asked him. I can’t wait to see you, hon.” This was
different, and not good. The once spry, independent old lady had been sick a
lot lately. Strength that she’d had only a few months ago was fading fast and I
felt like a helpless onlooker. I had been toying with the idea of getting a
home-health nurse to come over regularly, someone who could help Grandma shower
and do all of those things that she refused my help on. I would do anything for
that woman, but I wanted her to feel comfortable. This was one area where I
knew she would protest and throw a hissy fit, but we were at the point where
she needed it. And hopefully, with her fleeting strength, she would give up
faster and give in to me and a nurse helping. With that decision made, back to
business.

I looked down at my phone, went to
favorites, and pressed Lucy’s name. My heart started pounding again. What was I
going to say if she picked up? Hi? Hey? Hello Lucy? Can we please make up and
pretend that sexual request slash violent outburst thing never happened?

I should have thought about this before I
just up and called. 

But then again, if I had thought about it I
probably wouldn’t have called. It was better this way; I just had to get it
done. I was disappointed when I heard her voice message, but my ears burned
when they heard that familiar voice.   

“This is Lucy. Leave a message.” 

“Hey, Luce. It’s me, David. I just wanted
to call and tell you that I met my birth parents this weekend. It was amazing.
Call me when you get this; I would love to talk to you. I umm, I miss you.”

I hung up and felt like puking. If I could
invent a time machine I would do that over again. Shaking it off, I turned the
corner from the security checkpoint expecting to see Johnny’s freckled face
excitedly looking for me, ready to tell me some story about how amazing Jennika
was. Instead, I saw a tall slender girl and bright purple hair tipped with
black. She was bundled into a defiant stance against the wall. Black lipstick
sharply defined her lips, red eye shadow screamed across her eyelids, and a
purple spike protruded from her pierced nose. Fishnet tights, jean shorts, and
huge, sloppily laced boots completed the look.

“Michelle, what are you doing here?” I
hugged the little freak as I spoke. She hugged me back but pushed at me quickly
and started smacking her gum loudly.

“Look at you, sell out.” Her eyes
automatically rolled at my new appearance. No answer came next; she just
grabbed my carry-on, rolling it behind her as she walked off. 

“I thought Johnny was coming?” 

“Yeah, well Johnny had a date so he put the
job on Isaiah, who then called me telling me that he was starting to feel sick
from all those pain meds, so I was the last choice, but the only one who
actually wanted to get you. That’s life, preppy.” She winked at me, chewing gum
obnoxiously, completely open-mouthed. I laughed and put my arm around her like
I always did. Well, like I did before I met Lucy. 

“Hey now! How’s your girlfriend going to
feel about this?” She poked me in the ribs. But instead of pulling away she put
her arm around my side. 

“You’re a jerk.” 

“I know.” Her grin was wicked.

“So, what are we doing tonight, pretty
boy?” Michelle looked hopefully at me, forgetting to make out with her gum and
give me a mean face. 

“I was just thinking of going home and
making sure my grandma was okay.” I felt tired and depressed after the message
about Grandma. Then getting worked up about calling Lucy and just getting her
voicemail. Emotional mood swings made me grumpy.   

“She’s fine, let her sleep. Let’s do
something. When’s the last time we hung out?”

“When we were fourteen, maybe.” 

“That’s what I’m saying, let’s go knock
over a bank or something.” The devious smile didn’t leave her face as she threw
my suitcase in her car with little consideration .

“Ok, let's do something.” I consented,
buckling in. “Distract me.” 

“Great! I actually already thought of
something that we could do. I know, shocker. Sit back and enjoy!” She revved
the engine and I laughed. I had forgotten how much fun Michelle could be when
no one was looking. Never happy unless you got her alone, she would then light
up a room with her spunk and energy. I looked over at her flat profile, so
different from Lucy’s curvy body. Michelle’s big round cartoon eyes were
magnified by her red makeup and black eyeliner. I remembered how she looked at
Prom; her lips were thin but the curves were all well-defined and her eyes had
more color with less makeup: a pretty golden brown. Her almost-natural face had
looked so pretty that night. I couldn’t help picturing her less done-up, her
attempt at keeping people away. It was the same get up we all wore at some time.
I realized that, over the last year, we were all growing out of this stage.
Michelle was the only one who hadn’t changed at all. In fact, it seemed the
more the rest of us toned down the more she geared up.