It's Not What They Say, It's What They Whisper
Candymouth
I'm hiding out on the back porch at another one of Angeline Granger's parties. I don't know why I fucking bother anymore, but Lucas showed up at my house, sans Cynthia for a change, and insisted that I air myself out. We walked in, everyone gawking, and L immediately headed for the keg in the kitchen. I stood around for a minute, eying my classmates as they eyed me. It never fucking changes, you know? I got the fuck out of there.
Thirty minutes later I'm standing on the back porch when I hear the sliding glass door open.
"I don't know how you fucking stand it," she says, jerking her head toward the house before lighting up a clove cigarette. The back patio is small and wooden, with steps that lead to a much larger, lush green yard. Despite the party raging inside, I'm the only person outside, braving the fine mist of another Forks spring night.
I lean against the railing and she joins me, uninvited.
I look her over, this intrusive stranger. She's short and curvy, with long brown hair and big dark eyes. Little pink mouth wrapped around her smoke as she sucks down the candy-flavored fire. I don't respond. What the fuck am I supposed to say?
Granger's shitty sound system bleeds Blink 182 out into the night. The song ends and in the silence I hear her drawing in the smoke, the soft pop of her lips as she pulls the cigarette away from her wet little candymouth. Keeping with the 'songs of masturbation theme,' strains of Turning Japanese filter through the air.
I watch her out of the corner of my eye. She inhales a couple of times. No, wait. She doesn't inhale. She just…sucks, then blows out the smoke after holding it for a second in her mouth. After every puff she sucks on her bottom lip, like she's enjoying the taste. She flicks the filter tip with her thumb, and ash rains down onto the grass below. I chuckle a little, shake my head.
She turns and stares me down, then quirks and eyebrow at me. "Don't judge me. These things will make your fucking lungs bleed."
"I didn't say a word," I answer. She's wearing a little denim skirt and showing off quite a bit of leg. She's got to be fucking freezing; it's only March. She takes a sip of whatever's in the red plastic cup, which I'm guessing is cheap, too foamy beer, then goes back to puffing on her cigarette.
"You're Damien King," she says. I nod, but don't say anything else. If she knows my name, then she's heard the stories. Not much of a conversation can be had at this point, is my guess.
I pop the cherry from my smoke and watch as it falls into a puddle. I lean down on the ground and make sure that there's no more fire on the butt, then stuff the spent thing into my pocket. She watches me, her mouth open.
"It's fucking rude to litter," I say.
"Why don't you quit?" she asks.
"Why don't you start?"
"Because I have no interest in becoming addicted like some kind of fucking junkie."
The words hang like a gunshot in the stillness and she turns twenty shades of red, her mouth popping open to a perfect little "O."
"Shit," she says. "I'm…so fucking sorry. Jesus, Brooks." She looks down at her feet, muttering to herself. She drops the cigarette, toes it out on the ground and walks away. Ten seconds later she comes back, picks up the butt from the ground and stuffs it into the pocket of her hoodie. Then she's gone again.
The night air is damp, like everything else in Forks. The stereo is set to some emo pop shit and I'm still kind of gaping after the girl.
"What the fuck was that?" I ask myself in the dark.
Lucas laughs from the shadows. Fuck. I didn't even realize he was out here.
"That," he says, walking toward me, his big frame blocking out the porch light, "was Miss Violet Brooks."
I close my eyes and sag against the railing.
Fuck my life.
Thirty minutes later I'm standing on the back porch when I hear the sliding glass door open.
"I don't know how you fucking stand it," she says, jerking her head toward the house before lighting up a clove cigarette. The back patio is small and wooden, with steps that lead to a much larger, lush green yard. Despite the party raging inside, I'm the only person outside, braving the fine mist of another Forks spring night.
I lean against the railing and she joins me, uninvited.
I look her over, this intrusive stranger. She's short and curvy, with long brown hair and big dark eyes. Little pink mouth wrapped around her smoke as she sucks down the candy-flavored fire. I don't respond. What the fuck am I supposed to say?
Granger's shitty sound system bleeds Blink 182 out into the night. The song ends and in the silence I hear her drawing in the smoke, the soft pop of her lips as she pulls the cigarette away from her wet little candymouth. Keeping with the 'songs of masturbation theme,' strains of Turning Japanese filter through the air.
I watch her out of the corner of my eye. She inhales a couple of times. No, wait. She doesn't inhale. She just…sucks, then blows out the smoke after holding it for a second in her mouth. After every puff she sucks on her bottom lip, like she's enjoying the taste. She flicks the filter tip with her thumb, and ash rains down onto the grass below. I chuckle a little, shake my head.
She turns and stares me down, then quirks and eyebrow at me. "Don't judge me. These things will make your fucking lungs bleed."
"I didn't say a word," I answer. She's wearing a little denim skirt and showing off quite a bit of leg. She's got to be fucking freezing; it's only March. She takes a sip of whatever's in the red plastic cup, which I'm guessing is cheap, too foamy beer, then goes back to puffing on her cigarette.
"You're Damien King," she says. I nod, but don't say anything else. If she knows my name, then she's heard the stories. Not much of a conversation can be had at this point, is my guess.
I pop the cherry from my smoke and watch as it falls into a puddle. I lean down on the ground and make sure that there's no more fire on the butt, then stuff the spent thing into my pocket. She watches me, her mouth open.
"It's fucking rude to litter," I say.
"Why don't you quit?" she asks.
"Why don't you start?"
"Because I have no interest in becoming addicted like some kind of fucking junkie."
The words hang like a gunshot in the stillness and she turns twenty shades of red, her mouth popping open to a perfect little "O."
"Shit," she says. "I'm…so fucking sorry. Jesus, Brooks." She looks down at her feet, muttering to herself. She drops the cigarette, toes it out on the ground and walks away. Ten seconds later she comes back, picks up the butt from the ground and stuffs it into the pocket of her hoodie. Then she's gone again.
The night air is damp, like everything else in Forks. The stereo is set to some emo pop shit and I'm still kind of gaping after the girl.
"What the fuck was that?" I ask myself in the dark.
Lucas laughs from the shadows. Fuck. I didn't even realize he was out here.
"That," he says, walking toward me, his big frame blocking out the porch light, "was Miss Violet Brooks."
I close my eyes and sag against the railing.
Fuck my life.
* * * * *[center/]
I get to school early on Monday. I don't know why, it just means I'm going to end up sitting in my truck, iPod cranked up while I wait for the bell to ring. I'm leaning back in my seat, eyes closed, drumming on the steering wheel when Black shows up, pounding on my window.
Lucas's probably big enough to be a lineman but plays quarterback, and he brought home the all-state championship two years running. He also happens to be the only individual in all of Forks High School who can pass for a decent human being.
I roll down my window and hit pause on the music. "S'up, L?"
He cracks a grin. "Gotta go to Port Angeles on Friday, get a new suit for Sadie Hawkins. You down?"
Sadie fucking Hawkins. The only dance of the year that I fear because it's girl ask boy and I never know when one of these Forks bitches is going to try to play rebel without a clue and ask me.
"Fuck no. You know I don't go in for that shit. Besides, thankfully, no one's asked me."
Lucas raises his eyebrows at me. "I don't know, I think you made an impression on that Brooks chick."
I roll my eyes. In town for less than a week and Violet Brooks has probably heard every sordid fucking story there is about me. Whatever.
"C'mon," he says. "You know I fucking hate doing this shit alone. We can hit up the club after. I hear they've got some decent bands playing this week."
I sigh. Might as fucking well. He'll bitch all day until I say yes. "Pick me up at my house at four. And bring me some food."
Lucas laughs, drums his hands on the roof of my truck and walks away.
I look at the clock and see I've still got ten minutes before my first class. I head out to the handball court and rest against the back stop. I have time for one last smoke before I head into the various of levels of hell that are high school.
The morning is quiet out here, the cumulative noise of students talking, car doors slamming and lockers jostling open has dimmed to a faint buzz in the background. I hear footsteps approaching and I stub out my Camel. It's unlikely to be a teacher, but the last thing I need is a lecture on smoking, so out it goes.
"So, uh, what class do you have now?" The scratchy voice of Klarke Christie interrupts the snap and hiss of a match being lit on the other side of the backstop. There's a smooth drag and a long exhale. When the hell did Christie start smoking? He's the fucking poster boy for goody-good.
"Fuck if I know," comes the voice that could only belong to the Brooks girl. I freeze. It seems like even breathing would make too much noise in the quiet out here.
"Let me see you schedule," Christie says. I hear fumbling, a zipper, and Christie's nervous laugh. Why he doesn't just piss on her leg already is beyond me.
The two start talking about schedules and teachers and Christie about comes in his pants when he realizes he has not one but two classes with the girl. I start to tune them out. The banality of high school is going to be the death of me.
"So, uh, you were talking to Damien King the other night?" Klarke's statement comes out as a question and I'm suddenly eager to hear what he has to say.
The Brooks girl coughs a little and mumbles something too low for me to hear.
"Yeah, well, just, uh…you don't want to make friends with him, okay?"
There you go Klarke. Tell her all about it.
"I don't?" she asks. "He seems like an okay guy." I tilt my head to hear better. Her voice is soft, the fierce girl from Saturday gone, which makes me curious. I know she's already heard some of the stories. Why the fuck is she pumping Christie for more gossip?
"Just, uh…he's not, Violet." I hear feet shuffling and can picture Klarke, trying to be a hero when he's still just a little boy. "He's kind of, well, I mean…uh…he's kind of got a drug problem. Like, with needles and stuff. You don't…want to be around that."
"He shoots up?" she asks. "That's a little hard to believe. I mean, if it was that bad, wouldn't he have OD'd or something by now?"
The half grin that spreads over my face is as unstoppable as it is unwelcome. I close my eyes and wait for the next, the best part.
"He did," Christie says. "He like, OD'd one day in class, after lunch. It was right after he moved here. We were all sitting there, in a movie in science class and he just started flopping around, like he was having a seizure or something. They hauled him into the nurse's office and an ambulance came and everything. Grismer Perkins said she saw some needles and other stuff in his backpack when she took it to the office for him. He went to rehab for, like, three months after that. He just came back to school this year."
Violet takes another puff from her clove. I can smell it, sweet and spicy, and it makes my mouth water. There's silence as she evaluates the information.
"Does he still do it?" she asks.
I can practically see Christie shrugging in my head. "Dunno," he says. "He pretty much keeps to himself now. He never had a lot of friends to begin with."
I hear a shuffle and slide and realize that someone, probably Violet, is sitting down on the other side of the backstop. I'm trying to picture her in our school uniform, wondering if she chose the pants or the skirt, when Christie interrupts again.
"Well, uh, we should go, Vee. Bell's going to ring in a minute." 'Vee,' huh?
Candymouth sighs. "Go on without me." There's silence for a moment and she breaks it by saying, "I'll see you at lunch, yeah?"
"Sure Violet. I'll see you." I hear his steps crunch on the blacktop, quick as he heads to class.
The quiet of the morning settles around us again. The bell rings and she doesn't move. I consider leaving, heading for class, but I don't want to reveal myself and embarrass us both. No, that's not true. I really kind of want to embarrass the Brooks girl.
Instead, I sit and wait. After a few minutes I hear a soft humming and then Violet Brooks starts singing. “Well it's in the way he walks, it's in the way he talks, his smile, his anger and his kisses." Her voice is soft and sweet and way too high for that song, which, I'm surprised she knows.
I stand up and come around to her side of the backstop. She's got Lolita, that elegant smut, half-open and resting against her thigh. She looks up at me and turns all kinds of shades of red. I'm wondering if she shouldn't have chosen a school with different colors. The blue and green plaid kind of clashes with her flush, which has spread all the way down her neck and into the collar of her white shirt before it gives way to creamy white skin.
"Misguided Angel," I say. "You're going to be late."
I walk away before she can comment, but I hear her scrambling behind me. Her footsteps slow as she comes near but then speed up as she runs toward the buildings. Her skirt flips up around her thighs and I'm enjoying the view but it's cut short as she trips and goes flying across the blacktop.
Ouch. That's gotta hurt like a motherbitch.
She lays there for a moment but before I can really start to worry she picks herself up and sits on her butt, her knees folded against her chest. She looks around herself and I'm reminded of a toddler after a fall, trying to decide whether or not to cry. Her candymouth trembles and I want nothing more than to kiss her and make it better.
I reach her and squat down to look at her knees. They're both scraped pretty bad, the blood beading up on the surface of her skin, with dark brown and black smudges all around. I pick up her palms and they're bleeding too, though not as bad as her knees. From our positions, I can see that she's wearing blue cotton panties. Very nice.
"Come on, Brooks girl. Let's get you to the nurse's office." I rise and hoist her up under her arms until she's standing. I pull her back pack off her shoulder and sling it over mine, tucking my notebook under my arm.
"You okay to walk?" I ask. She nods, her face still flushed with blood. She takes a hesitant first step and I put my hand at the small of her back, guiding her, ready to catch her if she falls. I swallow down the urge to laugh, because I mean, come on, it's pretty fucking funny. The one person she's trying to run away from ends up being the one person she's trapped with. Plus, I'm really liking the way the small of her back fits against my palm. I'm wondering if her ass will feel just as good. I glance down. Probably better.
We get to the office and Ms. Barrone waves me in. "I've got a live one for Mrs. Henley," I say, pushing Violet through the low wooden doors that separate the waiting area from the office. I lead her through the open space until we come to a small room. Nurse Henley looks up from her paperback, surprised to have a patient so early in the day.
"Hello, Damien. Are you-"
"I've brought you a patient," I say, before she can go any further. "Took a header on the blacktop," I explain. "She's, uh, Chief Brooks's daughter."
"Oh, my. Hello, Violet dear." Nurse Henley turns her attention to the girl and I ease out of the office, waving to Ms. Barrone as I go. I know she'll have no problem giving me a hall pass if my first period teacher asks for one, but I doubt I'll need it. Mostly my teachers let me come and go as I please, and I ever have to do is offer an embarrassed smile as an excuse. As long as I maintain my four-point-oh, no one gives me any hassles.
The next time I see the Brooks girl is at lunch. She's got thick white bandages over both knees and an ACE bandage around one wrist. A couple of band aids on the heels of her palms perfect her look. She sees me from across the quad and offers me a small smile, apologetic and grateful.
I pretend not to see her and skip out for the rest of the day. I don't like pretty girls who think I'm a junkie smiling at me. It's just wrong.
I get to school early on Monday. I don't know why, it just means I'm going to end up sitting in my truck, iPod cranked up while I wait for the bell to ring. I'm leaning back in my seat, eyes closed, drumming on the steering wheel when Black shows up, pounding on my window.
Lucas's probably big enough to be a lineman but plays quarterback, and he brought home the all-state championship two years running. He also happens to be the only individual in all of Forks High School who can pass for a decent human being.
I roll down my window and hit pause on the music. "S'up, L?"
He cracks a grin. "Gotta go to Port Angeles on Friday, get a new suit for Sadie Hawkins. You down?"
Sadie fucking Hawkins. The only dance of the year that I fear because it's girl ask boy and I never know when one of these Forks bitches is going to try to play rebel without a clue and ask me.
"Fuck no. You know I don't go in for that shit. Besides, thankfully, no one's asked me."
Lucas raises his eyebrows at me. "I don't know, I think you made an impression on that Brooks chick."
I roll my eyes. In town for less than a week and Violet Brooks has probably heard every sordid fucking story there is about me. Whatever.
"C'mon," he says. "You know I fucking hate doing this shit alone. We can hit up the club after. I hear they've got some decent bands playing this week."
I sigh. Might as fucking well. He'll bitch all day until I say yes. "Pick me up at my house at four. And bring me some food."
Lucas laughs, drums his hands on the roof of my truck and walks away.
I look at the clock and see I've still got ten minutes before my first class. I head out to the handball court and rest against the back stop. I have time for one last smoke before I head into the various of levels of hell that are high school.
The morning is quiet out here, the cumulative noise of students talking, car doors slamming and lockers jostling open has dimmed to a faint buzz in the background. I hear footsteps approaching and I stub out my Camel. It's unlikely to be a teacher, but the last thing I need is a lecture on smoking, so out it goes.
"So, uh, what class do you have now?" The scratchy voice of Klarke Christie interrupts the snap and hiss of a match being lit on the other side of the backstop. There's a smooth drag and a long exhale. When the hell did Christie start smoking? He's the fucking poster boy for goody-good.
"Fuck if I know," comes the voice that could only belong to the Brooks girl. I freeze. It seems like even breathing would make too much noise in the quiet out here.
"Let me see you schedule," Christie says. I hear fumbling, a zipper, and Christie's nervous laugh. Why he doesn't just piss on her leg already is beyond me.
The two start talking about schedules and teachers and Christie about comes in his pants when he realizes he has not one but two classes with the girl. I start to tune them out. The banality of high school is going to be the death of me.
"So, uh, you were talking to Damien King the other night?" Klarke's statement comes out as a question and I'm suddenly eager to hear what he has to say.
The Brooks girl coughs a little and mumbles something too low for me to hear.
"Yeah, well, just, uh…you don't want to make friends with him, okay?"
There you go Klarke. Tell her all about it.
"I don't?" she asks. "He seems like an okay guy." I tilt my head to hear better. Her voice is soft, the fierce girl from Saturday gone, which makes me curious. I know she's already heard some of the stories. Why the fuck is she pumping Christie for more gossip?
"Just, uh…he's not, Violet." I hear feet shuffling and can picture Klarke, trying to be a hero when he's still just a little boy. "He's kind of, well, I mean…uh…he's kind of got a drug problem. Like, with needles and stuff. You don't…want to be around that."
"He shoots up?" she asks. "That's a little hard to believe. I mean, if it was that bad, wouldn't he have OD'd or something by now?"
The half grin that spreads over my face is as unstoppable as it is unwelcome. I close my eyes and wait for the next, the best part.
"He did," Christie says. "He like, OD'd one day in class, after lunch. It was right after he moved here. We were all sitting there, in a movie in science class and he just started flopping around, like he was having a seizure or something. They hauled him into the nurse's office and an ambulance came and everything. Grismer Perkins said she saw some needles and other stuff in his backpack when she took it to the office for him. He went to rehab for, like, three months after that. He just came back to school this year."
Violet takes another puff from her clove. I can smell it, sweet and spicy, and it makes my mouth water. There's silence as she evaluates the information.
"Does he still do it?" she asks.
I can practically see Christie shrugging in my head. "Dunno," he says. "He pretty much keeps to himself now. He never had a lot of friends to begin with."
I hear a shuffle and slide and realize that someone, probably Violet, is sitting down on the other side of the backstop. I'm trying to picture her in our school uniform, wondering if she chose the pants or the skirt, when Christie interrupts again.
"Well, uh, we should go, Vee. Bell's going to ring in a minute." 'Vee,' huh?
Candymouth sighs. "Go on without me." There's silence for a moment and she breaks it by saying, "I'll see you at lunch, yeah?"
"Sure Violet. I'll see you." I hear his steps crunch on the blacktop, quick as he heads to class.
The quiet of the morning settles around us again. The bell rings and she doesn't move. I consider leaving, heading for class, but I don't want to reveal myself and embarrass us both. No, that's not true. I really kind of want to embarrass the Brooks girl.
Instead, I sit and wait. After a few minutes I hear a soft humming and then Violet Brooks starts singing. “Well it's in the way he walks, it's in the way he talks, his smile, his anger and his kisses." Her voice is soft and sweet and way too high for that song, which, I'm surprised she knows.
I stand up and come around to her side of the backstop. She's got Lolita, that elegant smut, half-open and resting against her thigh. She looks up at me and turns all kinds of shades of red. I'm wondering if she shouldn't have chosen a school with different colors. The blue and green plaid kind of clashes with her flush, which has spread all the way down her neck and into the collar of her white shirt before it gives way to creamy white skin.
"Misguided Angel," I say. "You're going to be late."
I walk away before she can comment, but I hear her scrambling behind me. Her footsteps slow as she comes near but then speed up as she runs toward the buildings. Her skirt flips up around her thighs and I'm enjoying the view but it's cut short as she trips and goes flying across the blacktop.
Ouch. That's gotta hurt like a motherbitch.
She lays there for a moment but before I can really start to worry she picks herself up and sits on her butt, her knees folded against her chest. She looks around herself and I'm reminded of a toddler after a fall, trying to decide whether or not to cry. Her candymouth trembles and I want nothing more than to kiss her and make it better.
I reach her and squat down to look at her knees. They're both scraped pretty bad, the blood beading up on the surface of her skin, with dark brown and black smudges all around. I pick up her palms and they're bleeding too, though not as bad as her knees. From our positions, I can see that she's wearing blue cotton panties. Very nice.
"Come on, Brooks girl. Let's get you to the nurse's office." I rise and hoist her up under her arms until she's standing. I pull her back pack off her shoulder and sling it over mine, tucking my notebook under my arm.
"You okay to walk?" I ask. She nods, her face still flushed with blood. She takes a hesitant first step and I put my hand at the small of her back, guiding her, ready to catch her if she falls. I swallow down the urge to laugh, because I mean, come on, it's pretty fucking funny. The one person she's trying to run away from ends up being the one person she's trapped with. Plus, I'm really liking the way the small of her back fits against my palm. I'm wondering if her ass will feel just as good. I glance down. Probably better.
We get to the office and Ms. Barrone waves me in. "I've got a live one for Mrs. Henley," I say, pushing Violet through the low wooden doors that separate the waiting area from the office. I lead her through the open space until we come to a small room. Nurse Henley looks up from her paperback, surprised to have a patient so early in the day.
"Hello, Damien. Are you-"
"I've brought you a patient," I say, before she can go any further. "Took a header on the blacktop," I explain. "She's, uh, Chief Brooks's daughter."
"Oh, my. Hello, Violet dear." Nurse Henley turns her attention to the girl and I ease out of the office, waving to Ms. Barrone as I go. I know she'll have no problem giving me a hall pass if my first period teacher asks for one, but I doubt I'll need it. Mostly my teachers let me come and go as I please, and I ever have to do is offer an embarrassed smile as an excuse. As long as I maintain my four-point-oh, no one gives me any hassles.
The next time I see the Brooks girl is at lunch. She's got thick white bandages over both knees and an ACE bandage around one wrist. A couple of band aids on the heels of her palms perfect her look. She sees me from across the quad and offers me a small smile, apologetic and grateful.
I pretend not to see her and skip out for the rest of the day. I don't like pretty girls who think I'm a junkie smiling at me. It's just wrong.
♠ ♠ ♠
Whaddya think? Comments would be awesome.This story is going to be quite short. Three, maybe four chapters, max.