I’ve GOT TO DECIDE HOW TO TREAT LEW, WHAT TO TELL HIM. There are nine jillion ways I could do it. I could just drop him, pretending I’d met someone else in Arizona…or I could tell him the truth…or I could just act like nothing’s happened…or I could just kill myself. No, Catholics don’t do that. Besides, Mom would kill me if she knew I’d even thought about killing myself. How many times have I said that?
Monday, September 17
I saw Lew at school, and it’s like absolutely nothing had happened in between. We sat on the grassy knoll and shared lunch, like the gaggle always does, and it was life as usual.
I had one scary little moment when Lew reached over and took a bite of my sandwich. I know Missy tells me people can’t get it from stuff like that, but…I just wish I could wash away all the nagging little feelings. Do you think I ever will, Self? Please say yes.
Wednesday, September 19
Sorry I didn’t talk with you yesterday, Self, but the gaggle was sooooo busy. We’re starting on a class science project, and, of course, Lew is in charge, so his “little harem” had to go do as he commanded. It’s going to be a most mag project! Right? Right! We’re getting an early start for the School Science Fair in November then on to Region in January.
Friday, September 21
4:10 P.M.
…Confidentially, Self, it seems like I have to run to keep up with all the other kids who are only walking. I guess I’m just not getting enough rest. I’ll sleep in Sunday, but tonight Jamie Leeds is having a party. Our gaggle is not too thrilled about going because most of those kids are into drugs, but…well, a dumb party is better than no party at all, right? Part of me wants to say wrong, but we, the gaggle, are straight and sober. I don’t know about Dorie, though…she’s acting kind of different…and she said she climbed out of her window and went “dusting” up Arch Canyon last Wednesday with Freddy. I really hope she’s being careful…whatever the heck that means.
Saturday, September 22
12:59 P.M.
Jamie’s party was pretty fun, at least for Lew and me. We sat out by the pool in the moonlight, and he told me all about his last few weeks. He lives such an exciting life. His big brothers are really good to him and his mom, and they have a gigantic extended family, cousins by the dozens and lots of uncles who are, to quote him, “fantastic father figures financially, socially, spiritually and family-wise.” Then he hugged me and kissed me. Nice, warm, we-belong-together kisses. We committed that we wouldn’t French-kiss after…you know, and I’m really glad, because “body fluids”…Oh, go away, go away, go away, you miserable spoil-everything thoughts.
Sunday, September 23
What a nice, slow, restful day. Mom and I slept in, then went out to the country club for a really, really mag brunch. Her company has a membership there, and I love it! It’s like being part of the Rich and the Famous. I ate like a starving African and had three desserts. The dessert buffet table was so yummy I wanted one of each, but resisted because of the great discipline Lew and I have. See, the discipline thing is helping me in all areas of my life…I wish!!
Lew had to go to some little town south of here. One of his aunts had another baby, and they were going to name it today and have a big family do. I wish I could go with him sometime; it sounds like so much fun. Maybe when he’s old enough to drive himself, he’ll take me.
Monday, September 24
I can’t believe it. Today Lew and I had lunch alone. It’s the first day in forever when at least one of the gaggle hasn’t been gaggling around. Anyways, he told me all about this new little cousin’s blessing. He said he wishes I’d been there, and my heart almost leaped out of my throat and into his hands. He said he wanted us to be like his aunt Marcie and uncle Ted. Uncle Ted is a doctor, and he’s so kind he even operates on and fixes up injured animals that the kids bring in. While they were there, Cody found a little bird that the cat had caught. Uncle Ted splinted its broken leg with a couple of toothpicks, and they made it a cage out of old wire.
Doesn’t that sound like the nicest, kindest thing ever? I want Lew to be like Uncle Ted too, that kind, that caring, that everything. I tried to get him to tell me more about Aunt Marcie if I’m going to be like her, but the bell rang, and we had to go back to class. Later, I’ll have to learn about my new idol.
Lew walked me home from the bus. It’s one of the few, few afternoons when he doesn’t have some kind of function or practice or job or something. I asked him to come in, but he wouldn’t. I’m glad, because Mom wasn’t home, and we’ve got forever…well, he’s got forever. I just…you know…maybe only YOU know.
Thursday, September 27
5:15 P.M.
It’s Mom’s birthday. She’s got a date with nice Maury Marlow from her office. She and I will celebrate tomorrow.
10:41 P.M.
Tonight we went to an extra-credit concert. It was unexplainable. Lew and I sat and held hands and felt the music maybe even more than our ears heard it. There is something about classical music that’s really different. Ordinarily I like my kind, but this was…sorry, no words.
Lew’s brother Mike took us, and afterwards Lew walked me up to the lobby door, where he usually says good-bye, but tonight he took me all the way up to my apartment. In the hall by the elevator there’s a little bench, and he sat me down and hugged me and kissed me till I felt like a fluttering something; then he reached in his pocket and pulled out the most beautiful, precious ring in the world and put it on my finger. “This is our till-we’re-eighteen ring,” he whispered, and I cried all over his shirt. I don’t know when I have ever been so touched.
Can’t write any more. I gotta go dream.
Sunday, January 6
11:11 A.M.
Dear Self:
It’s been over three whole months you’ve been gone. How could you ever have lost yourself in that stack of old magazines? You almost got thrown away, you know. What would we ever have done then? Thank goodness Mom had me clean out the closet instead of Eleanore, who comes every two weeks. She’d have thrown you away for sure, as though you were totally useless. And that you are not, believe me!
I didn’t get to write in you about Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas or Dad’s birthday, but they aren’t much anymore anyway. I feel sorry for Dad and worry about him when I’m with Mom, and I feel sorry for Mom and worry about her when I’m with Dad. Divorce is hell on everybody. We try to buy our way out of our pain with presents and stuff, but it doesn’t really work and the holiday spirit gets lost somewhere between the loneliness and the good past memories. Actually, I think holidays, when you’re divorced (people never talk about it, but the kids are divorced too), may even be sadder than regular days. They certainly aren’t like the festive, happy, together times they used to be. In fact, to tell the truth, something inside me sort of feels guilty when I get too giddy about the “good old times.” I have to try to live in the today, now, don’t-look-back period to keep from being depressed.
In a way it seems a shame to waste all those little-kid BD (before divorce) good memories, but trying to put up two Christmas trees with two single parents just isn’t the same somehow. I wonder if I’d feel like this if I were still a little child playing with dolls and believing in Santa. I suspect so! But enough of examining my guts. Let’s come out into the sunshine and the present. Or is the present pleasant? Oh, it is! It is! I’m feeling great and good and wonderful! Better, I think, than I’ve ever felt in my whole life. I have the energy to stay up with anybody in the whole world doing anything! Well, that’s an exaggeration, but…you know.
I had to go to Dad’s the day after Christmas. I didn’t really have to, but I knew he wanted me to, and he has feelings. Mom and I clung together and cried when I left. Then I clung to Dad and cried when I had to come back.
I missed Mom like anything when I was at Dad’s but most of all, I missed the gaggle and guess who? Lew gave me a precious little gold heart pin for Christmas. In fact, he had Mom put it in my stocking to open Christ
mas morning because he and his mom went up to their uncle Ted’s for Christmas. I gave him a “friendship ring,” which I hope will be more than that in the future.
Dad tried hard to keep me entertained while I was there, but he kept having to run to the office for “a minute.” I remembered, when I was little, asking him if it was going to be a lonnnnnnnnnnnng minute or a short minute, and at Christmastime I asked him that again. He grabbed me and slumped to the floor with me in his arms and hugged me like he was never going to let me go. I felt his tears on my face, and I’m sure he felt mine on his. I don’t know why we were crying, because it was a most sacred, wonderful time I didn’t want to be separated from him again, ever…ever…ever! Together we relived each moment of my life…well, almost each moment. All the good things anyway. He laughed about my almost having been born in the car before he and Mom could get to the hospital, and about how he was the hysterical, almost-out-of-control person that Mom had to soothe and comfort. In fact, he said she was so concerned about him that she wasn’t even hardly aware of her contractions and kept trying to tell him jokes and stuff to calm him down. Then he told me about how, when I was lying in her arms in the hospital bed, we both looked like angels. I felt an ice chunk form in my belly. How could he ever have left her? I had a moment of wanting to reach over and pound him with my fists. Life is really complicated, isn’t it?
Most of the time it was boring at Dad’s with no friends, no gaggle, no Lew, no Mom. Boring…boring…boring, and I felt rotten…rotten…rotten.
When did I start feeling better? you ask. Well, I guess it came on slowly, I don’t remember, I just realized one day that I wasn’t tired all the time anymore. It’s a very nice feeling, and I’m grateful. Once at Red’s uncle’s house we talked about “the sin of ingratitude,” and after we’d gone to bed, Red and I whispered far into the night about that concept. About how being grateful draws you up and how being ungrateful drags you down. We both made a pact with spit on our fingers and our palms and everything about never, through the rest of our lives, being guilty of “the sin of ingratitude.”
I’m glad I remember that. It was a nice memory. I have so, so, so much to be grateful for! I think I’ll just lie here on the floor by the window and relive some of my blessings. Ummmm…I’ll never forget when Dad and I got up before sunrise New Year’s Eve day. We drove out to Superstition Mountain and watched the sun present itself in all its splendor. First the sky turned from black to gray to pink and gold. Then it was like the Disney movie Fantasia, with all the colors in eternity swirling around each other and us, to the background sounds of birds twittering and tweeting, leaves rustling, frogs croaking and our hearts madly pounding. It seemed like Dad and I were gods ourselves and had part in the panoramic creation of that spectacularly beautiful new day. I’m grateful for that one-of-a-kind experience. It helped me feel better about missing El’s New Year’s bash. I can see the gaggle now, playing crazy games and dancing and eating pizza and…I wish I could wish myself there right now. This very minute.
I’m grateful that I took Dad to the zoo for his birthday too. We used to love to go to the zoo when I was little; especially we loved the monkeys. Dad said they still reminded him of me. After the zoo we went to Okay Jose’s for lunch. I’d called him and told him we were coming, and he had lots of special gooey goodies for us. Jose is such a nice person, and it’s a riot to go there. His one violin player is really funny. He tells silly jokes to music.
There’s something else I would like to talk with you about, Self. Do other people feel like I do about birthdays? No one else’s ever seems to be as nice and exciting as mine. Is it just because they’re mine? Do other people feel the same way about theirs? Do you? Of course you do, ’cause you’re me! Sometimes I almost forget that. So again, thank you, thank you. Thank you for being you!
Tuesday, January 22
I haven’t stopped since I got home from Dad’s. I miss him like everything, but my life is here, having fun, giggling with the gaggle and feeling, good, good, good, good. Except, I have to tell you about Dorie. She’s been messing around with Fred Simmons, and now her period is late, she thinks. I don’t know how she could be so careless, stupid, childish…but I’m a fine one to talk. Anyway, she’s facing some tough decisions, and the gaggle can’t help her. She told us last week when we were having lunch on the knoll, and I think Lew took it probably harder than El or Red or me. We went over options! Tell her parents…not tell her parents. Have an abortion…not have an abortion. Marry Fred…she said that was definitely out for him. Stay in school…not stay in school. Keep the baby…adopt the baby out.
The bell rang then, and I think we were all glad. This is too heavy…but at least she could share it, and it only hurts her, at least mainly. It’s not contagious or life-threatening or…go away, thoughts.
The next day Lew and I took the city bus to the park. He said he needed to talk. I was soooooo scared. I thought maybe he was going to dump me just to be sure that…you know. But he didn’t want to do that; he just wanted us to plan a support system for Dorie no matter what happened or what she decided to do. He’s so mature. It’s going to be a very lucky girl who gets him. I know it’s not going to be me, unless there is a miracle in the medical field. Oh, I do believe in miracles…maybe…maybe…I hope…I hope!
Anyways—oops, anyway. Lew asked me not to say “anyways” anymore, and I’m trying to stop, but it’s really hard. In fact, I didn’t even know I said it. I guess it’s just another one of my gruesome habits I’ve got to replace. Anyways…anyway, I forgot what I was going to say.
Lew says the most important thing in Dorie’s life right now is for El and Red and me to be always there, always caring, especially if she truly is pregnant and she starts showing and kids make fun of her. Kids can be so mean, so heartless, so unempathetic. Is that a word? I guess only Lew would know for sure.
I’ve been so busy worrying about Dorie that I’ve hardly had time to worry about myself. Then today Officer Williams came over with two huge boxes full of yearbooks. Mom had told the police that I definitely would not go down there. Anyway, aren’t you proud of me? That was such a bad habit to break. Anyway, he had yearbooks from every junior high in the nation that was named Abraham Lincoln Junior High. Officer Williams was very patient while I looked through them till my eyes crossed. He told me not to look for the name, because in all probability Throw-Up had used an alias. I couldn’t believe that, but then, I couldn’t believe any of the other stuff either.
At last, when I was about to give up, I found his picture—but he wasn’t just barely eighteen like he’d said, he was twenty-four-years old. Gary Mitchem. He’d been a cute, innocent-looking kid back then in junior high. I wondered how he had ever gotten his life so mixed up and evil. How he could do something like he did to me, to a little kid.
Isn’t it funny I always think of myself as a little kid when I think of Throw-Up, and all the rest of the time I want to feel grown up and able to take care of myself and want to be independent and not have Mom baby me and stuff. Now I want to have her hold me in her arms and rock me and sing lullaby songs to me and tell me all the things that are true aren’t true.
Wednesday, January 23
12:07 A.M.
I’ve gotten so I can’t sleep again. I see that cute blond curly-headed little junior-high-school kid, looking innocent and good and sweet, and I wonder, if I had ever been able to have a little boy, would he have looked like that, and then later grown up to be like…you know. It’s a scary, scary thought that keeps going around and around in my head and won’t go away. I wonder if I’d ever dare have children, even if I ever could and I ever would be here and all that. Maybe I could have that…whatever test, and just have little girls. But then, if what happened to me happened to them, I couldn’t stand that either. Oh, dear Self, do you ever notice how screwed up things seem in the middle of the night, or seem to make perfectly good sense when sometimes they don’t make any sense at all?
3:06 A.M.
/> I remember how flattered I was when yuckety-yuck-yuck told me how pretty I was, and how soft I felt and how he loved to touch my baby skin, and how he called me baby skin. How all the time he told me how precious I was to him and how much he needed me and how he said I made him feel “not alone and lonely” and how I said he made me feel the same way, not alone and lonely too.
I don’t know how I could ever have been so stupid, but I thought he was the most beautiful and brilliant human being who had ever lived and that he filled all the lonely, empty holes in my hole-filled life. Cheese Louise, how could I have been so sucked in, but I guess I’m not alone…but I hope I am.
4:24 A.M.
I’m going to be a lively one at school tomorrow—I mean today. I’ve been thinking about a lecture we had one time in health and science. The guest psychologist was talking about how when you feel good in your head, you feel good in your body, and how we had to get things, and keep things, straight and honest and honorable in our lives. Oh, how I wish I’d done more than listen to her. She said too that too often kids would rather have a BAD FRIEND than no friend at all. That couldn’t be true, because I’ve always had the gaggle since I was in grade school, but what about BOYFRIENDS? I’d never really had a boyfriend before *&=-+. And I should have been suspicious about him. When we were in the showers or had sleepovers, Dorie and El and Red all made fun of me because I looked like a boy when I didn’t let my thick blond hair grow as long as it could. They could cut theirs short during the summers if they wanted to because they’d all shaped up literally. While me, the boys my age joked that you couldn’t tell if I was coming or going because I was as flat in front as I was behind.
One day in the showers after gym, Dorie said my boobs looked like two fried eggs. That made me feel real sexy, right?
Thursday, January 24
6:45 A.M.
My trusty old alarm clock just started the “Good Morning” routine. Man, I hardly slept at all. Maybe a zesty shower will get me moving like the TV commercial.