Tainted Crimson (2 page)

Time passed, days, months, years. Neither of us talked about the park incident after that day. Dad easily could’ve lied about Daymon and said that he’d made it home safely that day but he didn’t because he knew that I could handle the truth. He knew it would make me
stronger
. That’s what my father was and is all about. 

He’s always raised me to be strong, right from day one, the day I was born. Not just mentally, but physically. Shortly after my mother passed away he began teaching me self-defense skills which later turned into an array of different martial arts training. I loved it at first. I loved that if there was ever another time that I or someone I loved was in danger, I might actually be able to do something other than hide in an outhouse and pray for my life. But as the years passed, I became bored of it. The memories of why I needed these lessons began fading. I mean, I still remember that day in the park but it eventually began to seem more and more like a dream than a memory. The memory is blurry, seen through a child’s eyes. The time finally came years ago when I couldn’t remember what my mother’s face even looked like and for some reason my father got rid of all of our pictures of her, I couldn’t find even one anywhere. It’s like she never existed. We literally haven’t talked about her once since she died. Part of me even wonders if I dreamt up that day in the park. Did it even really happen? The only thing that tells me it did is the scar on my left knee cap where the old man pushed me down onto the gravel and I had to get stitches.

I also never mentioned the boy again, although growing up, I always wondered what happened to him. Is he still alive somewhere? And what about that old man? What did he do to my mom? How did he do it? Who was he? The older I get and look back, the more questions I find myself having, but thankfully ever since that day, my life has been normal, or as normal as it possibly could be anyway.

I mean besides not being allowed to cry and having to take fighting lessons from my father since I was four, my life has been almost
too
normal. Boring, really.

You might ask why I’ve never brought up my mother’s death or the boy or the incident in the park to my father since that day, well, I’m not sure actually. Believe me, there have been tons of times while growing up that I wanted so badly to ask my father about it, but when I tried, nothing would come out of my mouth. I’m not sure if it was because I couldn’t ever find the words, or if something else was stopping me from talking about it out loud, but I just can’t bring myself to talk about it.

Tonight is the night of my senior prom and it also just happens to be my eighteenth birthday. Thing is, I hate dresses, makeup, hairspray, heels, and dancing. So you could say I’m a bit of a tomboy, but thankfully I at least have a date. His name is Nathan Walters, he’s just a guy I met last week at a party, no one terribly important like my boyfriend or anything. We hadn’t even really been talking before he asked me. He just came up to me at the party and asked if I had date for prom yet. Here I had been stressing for the weeks leading up to prom thinking I wouldn’t have a date because no one would ask me and then this random guy just asks me out of the blue. Anyways, he’s no football quarterback or hockey captain, but he’s a guy and it beats going alone to my prom.

My friend Mindy stands behind me fiddling with my hair as I sit in front of a full length mirror in my room. She goes to a different school than I do so she isn’t allowed to attend my prom and her’s isn’t for another week so she’s offered to do my hair.

“So is he cute?” she asks me curiously, knocking me out of my daze.

I shrug.

“Come on, give me something,” she insists.

“He’s just a guy, Mindy, I don’t know. I wasn’t about to start being picky a week before prom when all the good guys were already taken. I took what I could get,” I tell her, annoyed.

She laughs at my irritation and we’re interrupted by a knock on my bedroom door.

“Ari?” my dad asks. “Can I come in?”

“Yeah,” I call and Mindy twirls my chair from the mirror to face the doorway.

The door opens and he takes a single step in. His face lights up as soon as he sees me.

“Oh Ari, you look…beautiful. Just like…” he gives a brief pause and my heart begins leaping in my chest, is he going to say what I think he is going to say? He hesitates and then says, “your mother, I can’t believe how fast you’ve grown up. It feels like just yesterday you were eating shit off of the floor and pooping your pants," he jokes with a smirk, but I see the look in his eyes that he’s trying to cover up with humor. It's pain at the mention of my mother, as if just mentioning her has brought forward all kinds of pain. Surprisingly, I don’t feel any pain. I feel a brief flash of sadness but I don’t feel pain. I’m almost shocked by this. Is it because my memory of her is so faded, or is it because I’ve been taught to put mind over emotion my entire life? I’m not sure. Maybe it’s because of the huge wave of shock at the mention of my mother that has me too rattled to feel pain.

Mindy laughs, shattering the moment. Is that her flirty laugh? Is she flirting with my
father
? Oh my god, for the love of all that is holy!

“I just wanted to bring you your birthday present slash prom gift before you left,” he wags his eyebrows at me, all traces of pain now gone from his eyes, and sets a large blue velvet jewelry box into my hands.

I open it curiously, inside is a huge blue sapphire on a chain. I wonder if it’s real but decide that there’s no way that it could be, it would’ve cost a fortune if it was. We can’t afford anything like that. Not that we’re poor or anything, but I mean we’re not rich. He’s a firefighter for god sakes and they don’t pay those men and women near enough to save lives.

“It’s real,” he admits quietly and then says, “it was your grandmother’s, my mother’s.” I never got to meet her, she passed away before I was born.

“It’s beautiful…” I trail off removing it from its box.

Mindy’s eyes widen. She’s one of those girls who almost faints when they see something shiny and pretty. A girly girl as they call them. I’m amazed by the necklace for sure but I don’t know anything about jewelry and so it’s probably not as amazing to me as it is to Mindy.

“That’ll go perfect with your dress tonight! It’s almost the exact same blue!” she cries excitedly while clapping her hands.

I ignore her and thank my dad, “I love it, thank you.”

He smiles. “I hoped you would. I’ll let you finish getting ready. Remember, I want a picture before you escape,” he warns and leaves the room. I know that 'a picture' is equivalent to a photoshoot but I don't say anything.

As soon as the door shuts, Mindy begins fanning herself with her hand dramatically.

“Oh my god, please tell me that was your secret brother and not your father!” she squeals jokingly. “
What?"
she giggles at my expression of disdain. "Your father looks like he’s 25 not 45!”

And this is why I never bring friends over.

“He’s 34,” I correct her. “He had me when he was 16.” I've had to tell her this a million times over the years we've been friends.

“Oh god, still!” she cries, and pretends to faint.
              It’s no secret that the whole world has the hots for my father. I’ve had to hear about it my entire life. From my kindergarten teachers gushing over him, to my teacher coming on to him last year at the parent-teacher interviews. I only hope that I’ve inherited his awesome aging gene. But even though he always has all of these women gawking at him and flirting with him all the time, he’s never accepted a date with any one of them. In fact, he hasn’t even went out with a single woman since my mother. I partially wonder if it’s because of me, if he thinks it would bother me. It wouldn’t, he can’t be alone forever, and he needs
someone
other than me. He doesn’t have any friends besides his work colleagues.

It seems like ages pass before Mindy is done curling my hair and touching up my makeup. Finally she lets me stand up and pulls my dress from its protective canvas. She helps me into it carefully and does the zipper up in the back.

When I am done, she snaps a couple pictures with her phone, likely for some social media website that I will find myself tagged on later.

“Perfect!” she approves and quickly pushes me down onto my bed and begins shoving my glittery heels onto my feet. “Let’s go show your dad!”

Yeah, you just want to go check him out again
, I think to myself.

I struggle down the stairs, trying not to fall and crack my head open in my dumb heels. This will be the one and only time I will ever wear a dress or heels. I swear that, not even for my own wedding will I wear a dress.

“She’s reeaady!” Mindy calls down the stairs behind me in a sing-song voice.

My dad steps out from the kitchen with a camera and begins snapping photos as if I am a model. I’m not even down the damn stairs yet.

“Smile, Ari! You’re going to your senior prom!” he encourages, and snaps a few more. You’d think that he was a photographer.

Then there is a knock on the door and my heart skips a beat, I’m suddenly super nervous. My date, Nathan Walters, is early.

My dad opens the door and then steps away from it.

“Good evening, you must be Ariella’s brother,” the boy greets him.

My father laughs and Mindy looks at me with ‘I told you so’ eyes. I roll mine back at her.

“I’m her father, actually,” my father corrects and motions for him to come in.

“Oh…sorry, sir,” he quickly replies, staring at him as if trying to put the pieces together.

“Are you ready to go?” I ask him quickly, ready to get the night over with.

“Yes, let’s go,” he answers me thankfully.

Before we leave, my father snaps a few pictures of us together and gives me a hug.

Nathan has a fancy black car, I don’t have a clue what it is exactly because I know next to nothing about cars but it’s definitely something fancier than my piece of crap from 1991.

The ride to the school is long and awkward.

“You look…awesome…I mean…beautiful,” he stammers awkwardly.

I thank him just as awkwardly and then we are silent for the rest of the ride. When we get there I take a swig from the flask I have hiding in the breast section of my dress. Nathan doesn’t seem to notice and if he does, he doesn’t say anything.

We register at the front table, flashing the junior prom workers our student I.D.’s and then we enter the decorated gymnasium. It’s full of balloons and sparkly decorations. I wonder who’s going to have to clean all of it up afterwards. Whoever it is, I feel bad for them. Mostly because of all the glitter and sequins on the floor.

There are people everywhere, apparently no one else thought being fashionably late was cool. Nathan immediately takes my hand and leads me to the dance floor.

Great.
I’m not a dancer.

Thankfully the end of the song approaches and we only have to dance for a few seconds. He is getting ready for the next song when I pull away and motion to the snack table.

Now, the snack table,
that
is the whole reason why I even came to prom. I mean Nanaimo bars, brownies, punch, all for
free
. Just kidding, I only came to this lame party because my father pushed and pushed for me to go. I consider grabbing a bunch of yummy squares and running home with them but sigh and just pour myself a glass of punch. Nonchalantly I take my flask out and pour some alcohol into it. This time Nathan sees me.

He laughs. “I’m that bad a date, am I?”

I smile. “No…I just, I’m not really into the whole prom thing. I uh-I don’t really ever go to stuff like this or wear dresses or…
dance
. The only reason I’m here is to make my dad happy,” I admit sheepishly.

He sighs with relief. “Oh thank god. I hate these things too. I’m only here because my older sister pushed and pushed me to go.”

I hand him my flask and he dumps some into his own punch before handing it back.

“Can we just chill?” he asks me hopefully. “You’re not the only one that can’t dance.” Is it just me or is he shaking? No way is he possible that nervous? I mean I'm not even that nervous and I'm a very nervous person.

I nod. “Definitely, though if I keep working on this flask I might start
thinking
I can dance,” I joke…sort of.

“So…where are you going to school in the fall?” he asks after a moment of awkward silence.

I shrug. “I’m not sure yet. I don’t even know if I’m going to go. I feel bad leaving my dad,” I admit truthfully. What will he do after I leave home?

“Ah…your mom?” he asks then, gaging my reaction and hoping he hasn’t touched a sore spot.

“She died when I was very young,” I explain quickly.

“So did mine. She got sick, what about yours?” he asks suddenly as if this somehow makes me more interesting.

“Murdered.”

“Oh god, I’m so sorry,” he apologizes, quickly spitting some of his punch back into his glass in surprise. I choke back a laugh at this. He then gathers himself and runs a nervous hand through his dark hair.

I fake a laugh. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Here I am, ruining your prom.”

I gaze up at him in shock. “Trust me, Nathan, it was destined to suck before I even met you.” I change the subject. “So why haven’t I seen you around school before? Are you new here?”

“Yes, actually. A few months ago I transferred from private school to get a feel of normalcy.” He seems reluctant to admit it, like going to private school is a bad thing.

“Oh, fancy.”

“Meh. It’s not all it’s made out to be,” he mumbles.

I look up at him and smile reassuringly.  “Neither is public school, I’m afraid.”

This makes him laugh. “Yeah, these prom things seem so much cooler on movies.”

I have to agree with him there.

“So, you have an older sister? How much older?” I prod, not sure what to talk about.

“She’s the smarty pants of the family. She’s 21 and…she goes to Harvard. Her name is Theresa. I, on the other hand, can barely spell my middle name.”

“What’s your middle name?” I ask curiously.

He chuckles. “My middle name is John. Nathan John Walter. I’ll be lucky if I get into community college.”

He grabs a brownie from the square tray and shoves it into his mouth in a single bite before mumbling something through his stuffed mouth.

“What?” I ask, bringing my eyebrows together with confusion.

“Those are really good, you should have one,” he says after swallowing the chocolate treat.

I then grab one from the tray and stick it into my mouth. He’s right, they are absolutely mouth-watering delicious.

"So, what do you like to do for fun, Nathan?" I ask him curiously.

“Well, I crotchet..." he answers with a smirk and it takes me a minute to realize that he's only joking. "Nah. I mean, growing up, my mom made me try a bunch of things but none ever really stuck. Nothing she made me try was ever anything that I liked. After she passed away, I moved in with my father and he really didn’t care about me getting a hobby or anything."

"What did she make you try?"

"Oh she made me try piano, football, tennis, uh badminton, hockey, guitar, swimming. The worst was when she made me try singing. God that was a nightmare." He laughs.

"Singing? You're no good?"

"Can't hold a tune to save my life."

"So what do
you
want to do then? I mean, if you could do
anything
?" I ask him, again curious.