Working Girl (5 page)

“Why shouldn’t you?” she asks, suddenly serious. Chrissy knows all about my demons and hates them just as much as I do. Bottom line, she wants me to be happy, just like I want her to be.

Wrinkles creasing my forehead, I look at her. It doesn’t make sense. Isn’t it obvious? “What do you mean, why shouldn’t I? I shouldn’t be thinking about anything but getting myself straightened out. There’s no time to be thinking about some guy I barely know.”

“Just because you’re in this life, Presley, doesn’t mean that you don’t have the right to think about a boy.”

“Whatever, Chrissy, he’s just some pretty boy with too much money. It’s really not a thing . . . at all.” I hope my voice sounds more convincing out loud because to me it seems like a
thing
. I can try my best to play it off, but I know damn well there’s a reason he keeps popping up in my mind.

“All I know is you never let yourself be you. You’re my best friend, and I don’t even think I really know who you are.”

“You know me better than I know myself.”

“Exactly. That’s the issue. Now stop being such a prude and let someone in. And I mean that literally.” She smiles before winking at me.

Chrissy can take anything serious and make it lighthearted. I reach over and smack her on the shoulder. She smirks at me and shrugs. “Off in an hour?”

“Yeah. Wait with me?”

Chrissy blows me a kiss and smiles. “Of course.” She’s being facetious, but I love her for it. She just lays it all on the line, without so much as a thought to anyone else. She lives, owning her life and all that it is. She is stronger than I will ever be. I’ve always known I shouldn’t have been born into this life. I’m not cut out for it. But Chrissy . . . well, she could have made any life her bitch. It’s probably why we’re such good friends—we compliment each other in the best ways possible.

Once I finish up, we make the routine trek across the road to our home, secretly hoping that it’s a quiet night at the Mansion. As we walk, Chrissy slips her hand into mine and squeezes. It’s a symbol of solidarity, and without missing a beat I glance up at her and force a smile. She knows what I’m thinking, and I’m thankful to have her with me.

Opening the door, my silent prayers are answered as we find Momma sitting on the couch, reading the only book she’s ever touched—her Elvis biography.

“Hey, girls,” she chirps.

“Hey, Momma.”

“Hey, Bridget,” Chrissy says, giving Mom a kiss on the cheek before looking back at me with a smile on her face. Tonight is a victory not only for me, but for both of us, and she knows it just as well as I do.

“Well, night, Presley,” she says, disappearing down the hallway to her room having fulfilled her duty of being my moral support, and ensuring I’m okay. That’s what friends are for; even with my sparse life experiences, I know that much.

“How was work?”

“It was fine, Momma.”

I know she expects me to ask the same, but I don’t. I never have and I never will. I don’t want to know how her day was, how many Joe’s she’s had to tolerate doesn’t matter to me.

“Presley, I’ve got to talk to you.” She gestures for me to sit next to her on the sofa. I don’t really want to sit, because I have a general idea of all that’s taken place on that couch and it makes my stomach sick, but I fight the urge to go bathe in boiling water and perch on the edge of the seat. She puts my hand in hers and takes a deep breath.

“Baby, I’m sick.”

I look to her, confused. “Well, I’ll take you to the doctor, Momma.” Even as the words leave my mouth, I know we can’t afford it. Big Earl doesn’t exactly provide any medical benefits. Short of their standard three-month STD testing, the girls don’t come into contact with doctors. But I’ll figure something out. I’ll work longer shifts. Something. Anything. I’ll figure it out. Somehow.

Her mouth forms a hard line and her eyes glisten. “No, baby. It’s not that easy.”

“What do you mean, Momma?”

“I didn’t past my tests this month.”

I suck in air. The tests finally came back with bad news, but in her profession it’s really only a matter of time. I wonder what sexually transmitted disease she’s been gifted this time. Just a few years back, she’d been out of commission for a few weeks with crabs. Since it was summer vacation, and I didn’t have school, I managed to make up the difference of her not working by working double shifts. “What is it?”

She reaches up and runs her hands through my hair. Love shines clear in her eyes, and I desperately want to feel something back . . . only I don’t. Only concern about the hell she might be unleashing on my already chaotic world. Nothing else. No warm fuzzies. Nada. Not even for my own mother.

“Presley, I have HIV.”

For years I’ve done a really stellar job at hiding my emotions, always the one with the stiff upper lip. It’s been necessary for my survival in a way; a necessity born from my precarious situation as a whore’s daughter.

But now, with the reality of the situation seeping into my being, my strength melts away. My mother is sick. No, that’s a vast understatement. My mother is
dying
.

And I don’t know how I feel about it.

Her words hang in the air between us for a good few seconds before I break down. Tears that I’ve spent years repressing bubble from my eyes. They erupt from me, and Momma consoles me like she did when I was just a child. When I calm down enough to talk, we discuss what she’s going to do. But what options do we have? Once Big Earl finds out we will surely be out on our asses. The thought of what might become of us is a weight I never expected to carry.

I WALK INTO BOOKKEEPING 101
on time, and sit at my usual desk. Calling it a desk is a joke because it’s more like a death trap. It’s so damn small, and day after day I struggle getting situated and fitting my stuff on the top of it. I’m deeply lost within my thoughts of pure hatred for a desk when I feel fingers pushing on my shoulder. My eyes look to the right to find an already smiling, Emerson.

How the fuck can someone be so happy?

Using his pen as though it’s a pointer, he gestures in the direction of the cup in my hand. “Smile. At least you didn’t spill your coffee today.”

He pops the end of his pen in between his teeth and winks at me, his grin still plastered across his face. Adorable as he is, his attempt at small talk frustrates me. “That’s the least of my worries,” I bite back. Slightly shocked by the harshness of my voice, I turn my gaze away from his, fearing he may see through my act. That he may see the tears glistening in my eyes. That he might realize that I’m lost in a black cloud of despair. That I am alone. This scares me because he might say something to help me, and I don’t need help. I need a new life. A do-over.

“Ahh, it can’t be that bad,” he argues. “The sun’s shining and everything.”

With his words, my emotions take control and rear their ugly head. I spin around to face him and the words spill from my mouth. “Maybe in your self-righteous, spoiled, rich kid world, things are just peachy, but here, in the real world, shit isn’t all that great. So if you don’t mind, I have a class to focus on.” I slam my books down and turn my attention to the front of the room, waiting for the professor to start boring me to death.

I expect him to say something back. In a way, I
want
him to engage with me. For some reason I just want him to lash out at me, make me feel like the scum that I am.

But he doesn’t. Instead, he just shuts his mouth and looks away. It bothers me more than it should, and I hate it.

All through the lecture, I curse myself. Emerson’s was just trying to be nice, a friend even, but I went and did what I do best—be a bitch.

Stealing a glance over my right shoulder, I try to gauge his mood. He’s looking pensively to the front of the room. It appears my words haven’t ruined his day. In fact, he probably hasn’t thought about them past the minute they left my mouth. And normalcy is resumed. My feelings unimportant to him; him, and the rest of this shitty world.

Not that it matters anyway, I think to myself, scrubbing my face with my hand as I try to focus on the words of the professor. With the first exam coming up soon, I know I need to pay attention, but it’s hard to concentrate on payroll practices when all you can think about is your mother dying. I breathe a sigh of relief when he finishes early and everyone starts to pack up their things. Not following suit, I just sit, welcoming the moments of stolen silence. I close my eyes, focusing on my breathing as a weak attempt at calming my nerves, all the while becoming bitter about the fact that a normal twenty-one year old doesn’t have to worry about the things I do.

Something captures my attention, and I open my eyes just in time to watch a piece of paper fall in front of me. The jagged edges tell me it’s been torn from a notebook. Confused, I look around briefly before making eye contact with Emerson just as he walks away from me. His eyes burn into mine.

The paper is from him.

He watches me as I gently pick up the paper and glance down at it. The words etched into the page are barely legible, almost what I’d imagine a doctor’s handwriting to look like. From the way they’re laid out I guess it’s some kind of poem, but I can’t be sure and I don’t have the time to decipher it. Not when there’s a chance I can speak with him again. I look back to him, half expecting him to offer up an explanation of sorts, but he doesn’t, choosing instead to lift his mouth in a halfhearted smile before shooting a salute and walking out the door.

My eyes fall back to the paper, my palms sweating and my heart fluttering deep in my chest. A part of me is intrigued; the other half scared. I shouldn’t feel like this, especially about a boy that I don’t even know. I have big enough problems in my life without a stupid, spoiled rich boy with the world at his fingertips mucking it up.

Scrolled along the top of the paper is a title,
To J.W
. I’ve read this before; it
is
poetry. Classic poetry by Ralph Waldo Emerson himself.

I keep reading…

Life is too short to waste

The critic bite or cynic bark

Quarrel or reprimand;

Twill soon be dark;

Up mind thine own aim, and

God speed the mark.

If I wasn’t depressed before I certainly am now, but breaking down in the middle of the lecture hall isn’t an option. The last thing I want to be known as is the crying late girl. Besides, I’m an Adams; and Adams’ never show they’re upset. I crumple the paper and stand. Packing my things with absolute resolve, I clench the paper even tighter in my hand, the weight of the possibilities from this one little note pressing down on me harder than I expect as I walk towards the door. A boy has never given me a nice note before. Anything they’ve ever written me before has always been riddled with derogatory slurs, or requests for sexual favors. Never poetry. Torn between what I feel, and what I know is right, I stop next to the wastebasket and contemplate my next move. My choice, right here, in this moment can absolutely shape my life.

Every moment has the possibility to change your future—for most people anyway. I’m smart enough to know that I’m drowning in my present, so this moment doesn’t really matter. Because there is no moving forward for someone like me. Something will always draw me back into the quicksand. Slowly, I will drown and choke, taking down anything that surrounds me.

Guilt and doubt wash over me as I come to the realization that I’ve been a fool to think I could ever recover from this life. With Momma being sick, I know it’s only a matter of time before I fall into the abyss. There is no hope, and Ralph Waldo Emerson was right,
’Twill soon be dark
. But what Emerson can’t have known is that it is always dark for me. There has never been any light. Never any hope.

Sighing, I toss the paper in the trash and walk out of the building, knowing that things are going to be different after all.

Just not in the way I’d hoped.