Sleepover

CHAPTER I

I sat in my room with the light out, in the corner with my knees covering my face. It was pouring outside, so the midday seemed like an early evening. I had already cried all night and I got no sleep, so I had a pounding headache that had been bothering me relentlessly all morning. I wanted to just hide under the rug and sob, but I had already used all my tears.

“Honey? Are you okay up there?” my mom called from downstairs. “I’m fi-!” is all I got out in response before I had one of those half-sobs that only happen after you cried too much. I was a mess and the worst part was I didn’t even care. Julie was dead.

Julie had been my best friend since the eighth grade, and as silly as it is I had even started to really like her. We ended up having sleepovers at my house, and we would watch cheesy movies and share these little salted chocolates and whoever got the last one would have good luck.

I wanted to ask Julie on a date or something, but I couldn’t do it. I just didn’t want her to think I was some damn pervert or something, for asking out another girl. That was the thing about Julie- she was judgemental about everything. I hated her. But I loved her so much too, and now that she had been in that horrible auto accident, it felt like there was nothing more to live for.

I heard about her death yesterday evening. It was hot as hell the day before and Julie and I had been fooling around at the pond, the one with the little silver fish swimming about in it. And the next day, boom, she bleeds out after her leg got severed off after a drunk truck driver T-bones the car she was in. I never saw her again. After I heard of her death I took my hockey stick and put a hole in the ceiling, and then the light in the powder room stopped working. I would have punched a hole in the wall too, but I have always had a deathly fear of breaking a bone. It was awful.

***

Eventually I managed to get up, and I went into the power room to look at myself in the mirror. The light was still out so I only got a partial look at myself, but it was fine. I was all flushed and my eyes were all pink, and the whites of my eyes were a little bloodshot too. My previously winged eyeliner was also smeared everywhere, all the way down to my chin. You probably would’ve thought I looked like Frankenstein’s girlfriend if you had seen me then. I put some warm water on a washcloth and cleaned myself up a little. I was upset and angry at the whole entire universe then, but I didn’t want to broadcast that to the whole entire universe.

CHAPTER II

The next day I had nothing better to do so I sat on the steps of the front porch and stared across the street at this grassy overgrown dirt lot that’s been there for as long as I can remember. There were some dead wildflowers here and there too, scorched brown in the summer heat. I decided to cross the street and lie in the weeds and stare up at the cloudless summer turquoise and think. I had done that before, but never have I stayed there as long as I did that day. It felt like an eternity, and I was just floating in a blue void, free of all responsibility, and for a brief moment, it felt as though all was right in the world. I was about to fall asleep when all of a sudden someone very close by screamed at the top of their lungs and flew over me and landed perfectly onto my left arm.

“JEEZUS!!”

As soon as this person realised I was there she sat up. “Oh no I’m so sorry!” she said as I clutched my arm. “I didn’t see you in here, I’m so sorry are you ok?!”
“I’m fine”, I replied. And that’s when I got a good look at her.

It was a girl who looked about my age, just a little shorter. She had fair and freckled but tan skin and this orange bandanna thing on her head, her hair tied back in a bun. She wore a plain white tank top and blue polyester shorts that were so big they went down to her shins, and the soles of her sneakers were caked with mud. And I instantly loved her. When we made eye contact, I thought I was going to throw up, in a good way I guess.

“I’m Gidget”, she said. “Who’re you?”
“Paige”, I replied. “Cassidy”. We shook hands, and suddenly I regretted it because of how sweaty my palms had gotten.

“Hey when I saw you”, Gidget said, “you looked kind of sad. Before I landed on your arm, I mean. Are you okay?”

And that was the first time I broke down in front of someone my age. I told Gidget all about Julie and the crash and everything, and it all just kept flowing out of me. I didn’t realise how much I had bottled everything up. And by the time I was done telling Gidget everything, I was in her embrace, crying into her shoulder. Usually when someone your age hugs you, their hug is really weak and half-assed. Not Gidget’s though. She gave a good hug, and I hugged her back, and for a little while we were one.

***

“This is so dumb!” exclaimed Gidget later that night while we watched some old 60s movie about a couple who were secretly lizard alien people. “He’s obviously a lizard but as soon as he wears that hat he suddenly looks just like a normal person!”
“I know, right?” I said as I passed her the chocolate box.

I love her.