section 15

author's note: little Miss Brigitte is up to no good again.

“I’m not angry,” I faltered even though I really wasn’t very angry, at least not at Lyle, “but can you take me home?” I looked down at the the yogurt cup, it was mostly melted and really didn’t look very appetizing now. “I’m not hungry anymore and I’m kind of tired,” I explained. I sniffled, thinking how unattractive it was. It wasn’t like I could help it though.

“Yeah, sure,” he ssaid curtly. It made me feel like crap. I didn’t want him to be mad at me and I didn’t want him to think I was mad at him. I followed him out of Fro-Yo and back to his car where he simply unlocked the door and got in. Last week he sweetly opened the door for me.

I felt defeated.

After he started driving I turned to him, but only slightly. I wasn’t ready to see exactly what he was thinking yet. “I’m not mad at you, Lyle,” I insisted. “I’m just… I’ve never really been asked that and I guess I felt defensive. I mean, I know the way I feel isn’t right. I wish I could be different, I wish everything could be different but I can’t change it and it sucks.”

“I understand Brigitte,” was all he said for the rest of the ride. He didn’t even say good-bye when I got out of the car. After I shut the front door of the house I heard his car drive off, going well beyond the speed limit.

“How was group?” Mom asked from the living.

Fan-freaking-tastic.

I was cranky at school the next day. I was mopey and Kayla said I was depressed. Cody rubbed my back sympathetically even though he didn’t even know what was wrong. I went through the day on auto-pilot. My math notes were pristine, legible and the most thorough I had taken all year. I followed my chemistry teacher’s directions down to a T and didn’t let Kayla or Megan distract me from the assignment. I couldn’t actually recall the assignment though.

“What’s with the sourface, pretty girl?” Devyn asked. He was the first person to actually ask me what’s wrong even if it was pretty rudely. I slumped on to the desk, arms crossed and chin on top of my hands. I rolled my eyes at him and looked at the boaard moodily. “What your mascara clump up this morning?” he proded again.

“Bite me,” I glared at him. We had been broken up in to groups and the rest of the class was pretty loud so I didn’t have to worry about being over heard.

Of course, this only egged him on more. “What’s wrong, pretty girl?”

“Please don’t call me that,” I begged.

“What someone turn down your invite to the dance?”

And I started crying.

“Oh hell no!” Devyn held up his hands in a form of surrender. I buried my face in my arms, I was pathetic and I was just hoping that no one else was noticing my little breakdown. My breakdown about a boy.

Yes, it was about Lyle. It was about that he was angry at me and that he made me get all emotional the night before and that it hurt. It hurt what I said and I what I realized. I didn’t want to dislike my parents like I did but I also didn’t want to be ignored but I was completely helpless and hopeless because there was nothing I could do about it because they didn’t even realize what they were doing and when they—the times few and far between, though Dad was definitely better than Mom—did realize what they were doing they just thought I should more mature and responsible because Andrew was autistic.

The desk shook as Devyn slammed him hands down. I heard him cuss under his breath. The chair scraped against the tile of the class room floor. “Mrs. Snyder,” he called out over the roar of the class room, “Brigitte needs to go to the nurse’s office,” I peaked out from my arms to see if people were staring. The roar of the classroom had quieted down and I could see people looking back and forth between Devyn, Mrs. Snyder and me. “She has cramps, Mrs. Snyder.” The classroom went dead silent. People were definitely staring. I groaned and tried to curl up further into my seat, hoping that I could just curl myself up in to a ball and dissappear. Maybe people wouldn’t see me, my parents were pretty good at over looking me. I was obviously overlookable.

“Come on,” Devyn grabbed my arm and hoisted me up from the seat. I tripped over my legs but he continued pulling me towards the door. He had picked up my backpack in his other hand and was carrying it like there wasn’t several pounds of books and pens in there.

Once we were outside the classroom he let go of my arm and slowed down his pace.

“What are we doing?” I asked in a whisper. I didn’t want any of the teachers to poke their heads out of the classroom and ask what was going on.

“We’re leaving,” he said briskly.

My mind was having a hard time processing what was going on.

“Are we ditching?”

Devyn looked at me like he was surprised that this was no big deal, then his eyebrows went up. “Oh, don’t tell me you’ve never ditched before. Aren’t you best friends with Kayla Kerns? She isn’t exactly innocent, I’ve seen her at parties.” I had, in fact, never ditched before. I only missed school for the rare doctor’s appointment and when I was sick. I was really good at forging my mom’s signiture so getting the absence excused was never a problem for me.

I didn’t say anything as we walked out of the school parking lot, but I wondered if we were going to walk to whatever our destination was going to be and if it we were if it was very far away. He walked me to the parking lot in front of the grocery store next to the school and to a beat up car. The paint was peeling off the sides and the front bumber was from another car and I couldn’t help but wonder if he had stollen from another car. “Do you enjoy being boring?

“Just because I’m friends with Kayla doesn’t mean I do everything she does,” I said pitifully. I knew that Kayla was more mature than I was. She had smoked and had had beer, she had her first kiss when she was thirteen. When it came to milestones like that Kayla was ahead of me, but I had never thought it was bad thing until Devyn had called me boring.

Devyn turned the key in the ignition and even over the roar of the engine (I thought he needed tuned or whatever it was that you did to noisy engines) I heard him mumble, “Such a pretty girl.”

I rolled my eyes and sniffled. “So, why are we ditching? There’s only like—” I looked at his dashboard clock but it said it was 5:27, definitely off “—ten minutes left of class,” I estimated.

“Because, I didn’t want to be there,” that wasn’t a surprise, “and because it got you to stop crying. I hate when girls cry.”

“That’s surprising, since you used to make so many of them cry on the playground.” Instead of defending himself he smiled. This distraction had stopped me from crying and for that I was grateful. I shook my head and turned to face the window. It looked like we were going to the outskirts of Denver where it turned from city and suburb to wildlife and small clusters of houses.

word count: 1307