A High School Story

I pulled mom’s Vanquish into the driveway before nearly ripping the keys out of the ignition and letting my forehead fall against the steering wheel. I hated to leave like that but dad seemed to understand when I texted him and explained that Nick and I were in the middle of a rather large, complicated fight. He’d enjoy a night alone with mom anyway. It had been nearly half a year, maybe even more, since they’ve had a date night.
“Mollie?” a gentle voice asked from outside of the car and I looked over to the passenger side to see Kyle standing on the other side of the window, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah bud, I’m fine,” I lied and smiled assuringly, or tried to at least, at him before unbuckling my seat belt and opening the door to the car.
“You don’t look like you’re fine,” he protested and I looked over at him through my hair as I closed the door again.
“It’s nothing Kyle, I promise,” I lied again and he stood rooted to the spot as he stared at me, “I promise you that I’m fine, okay?”
“Mollie-”
“Kyle,” I interrupted him and I gave him my best pleading look, “Please, not now.”
“I’ll see you later then?” he whispered and I nodded before heading towards the house.
I hated treating him like that but how could I get a thirteen-year-old boy to understand that I was crushed because the guy I involuntarily fallen for hadn’t believe me when I told him an ex-boyfriend had tried to take advantage of me? How do you explain that to anyone yet alone a thirteen-year-old boy who had a crush on you? You don’t. You just don’t.
“You don’t do anything,” I murmered to myself helplessly before closing my bedroom door behind me and then bending over in pain.
This all made me feel sick.
“Mollie?” an angelic voice whispered as I looked over to see Nick slipping in through my balcony doors.
“Get out,” I sighed and he stared at me pleadingly, “Get out of my house and get out my life.”
“You…you don’t want to…” he stammered while trying to find the right way to word what he wanted to say, “Please don’t cut me out.”
“Why shouldn’t I?” I scoffed and glared at him profusely as I stood up straight up.
“Because I care about you,” he answered and I rolled my eyes, “I do!”
“Well you have a hell of a way of showing it!” I yelled harshly and he grimaced slightly at the anger in my voice, “I don’t know what you expected me to do but unless you expected this then you’re going to leave here very disappointed.”
“Mollie…I didn’t…I didn’t know that he was capable-”
“I told you, Nick!” I interrupted him hotly, “I told you what he did to me and how much of a sick person he is! I tried to warn you, I tried to save[i/] you but you didn’t believe me!”
“I’m sorry, I should have trusted you,” he apologized deeply.
“But you didn’t!” I retorted, “You trusted that perverted sex addict more than me and you chose him!”
“Is that what this is all about?” he chuckled coolly, “I chose him over you?”
“You’re seriously going to pull the spoiled rich girl crap on me again?”
“I’m not pulling anything on you,” he flat out laughed and I clasped my hands at me side to try and resist the urge to push him out the door and over the railing of the balcony, “I just find it sort of amusing that this is all about-”
“You don’t even know a bit of what this is about,” I hissed and he stopped laughing before looking at my stiff figure, “You can’t even begin to comprehend what this is about.”
“Then help me to understand,” he replied and looked at me desperately.
“No one can help you,” I scoffed before walking into my closet and closed the door.
“Mollie!”
I whipped a stray tear off of my cheek before placing my wallet on the dresser that was next to the door and then slipping my feet out of my high heels. I kicked them to the side lazily.
“Come on Mollie, please don’t be like this,” he pleased from the other side of the door and I bit my lip while trying to keep from lashing out. I had to keep calm if I wanted to handle this the right why.
“Just leave,” I mumbled so low that I doubted that he could even hear me, “Please, just leave.”
There was a short span of silence before, “I can’t do that Mollie.”
“You had no problem doing it early,” I looked over my shoulder as I spoke as if expecting him to be right behind me.
“I’ve been a screw up for the past few weeks, I know that. I regret that,” he was practically begging by this point and it killed me to have to listen to this through a door just because I was too scared of the hold he had on me, “Just please, let me fix this.”
I bit my lip and tried to keep from yelling at him that there was no possible way to fix everything he had done. I slipped my hand behind myself and felt around the upper part of my back for the zipper to my dress. My hand was shaking beyond the point where I could even try to unzip myself so I gave up before grabbing onto the bottom of dress and tugging it over my head. It was a tough process but it was my only option if I didn’t want my boobs to be permanently squished upwards. I threw it to the side, on top of my shoes, and then grabbed the pair of sweat pants and old, worn out, T-shirt of my dad’s that I had slept in last night. They slipped on much easily then the dress had two hours ago and I was grateful for the immense free space my chest had in the T-shirt.
“I’m not going to leave until you tell me too,” he whispered from the other side of the door and I let my head rest against the cool wood of the door frame as I grasp the knob in my hand. I didn’t want it to end like this but I didn’t see how else it could end.
“I don’t have anything else to say to you,” I replied and cracked the door opened so I could look out at him.
“Then don’t talk, just listen,” he pleaded and stopped me from closing the door on him again, “You have been the only thing that I have wanted this much in my entire life. And even though I know that I’ve given you no reason to believe you, I’m asking you, hell, I’m begging you to believe me when I tell you that I want to fix this. I want to go back to the day I moved here and stop myself from caring so much about what people thought of me. I want to go back to the moment I met Mike and take back everything that I did to make him accept me. I want to go back to every time he ever thought that he had the right to lay a finger on you and I want to tell him to leave you alone.”
“You had plenty of chances to do that last one,” I butted in and he took in a sharp intake of breath.
“I know,” he sighed.
“Nick, I think you should leave, okay?” I suggested and he pushed open the door to my closet while looking at me pleading.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated before slowly embracing me in a hug.
That was the final blow. That’s all it took to make me erupt into a round of heavy sobs as I wrapped my arms around his waist. I wanted so bad just to stay in that moment with him for the rest of my life. To pretend like there was never any Mike or any parents on my back about everything because they wanted me to have everything that they had to work for handed to me.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated and it was the sound of his voice that brought me back to reality and caused me to push him away before rushing out of my closet with heavy tears still running down my face, “Mollie? What did I do?”
There were so many ways I could respond to that question.
“What did I do now, I mean,” he corrected himself, “What’s wrong?”
“You didn’t do anything,” I cried out and struggled to get the balcony doors open.
“Then what’s going on?” he whispered in my ear and flipped the lock up on the doors before opening one for me.
“This is all too much, it’s always been too much,” I sobbed and leaned against the railing while trying to breathe in as much fresh air as I could, “It’s too much pressure and you’ve just been adding to it since you got here.”
“I don’t understand,” he appeared out of the corner of my eye as he stood next to me and I tried to calm down.
“No one does,” I half laughed and let my head fall into the palm of hands.
“This is about all the pressure your parents put on you?” he questioned and I nodded silently, “Why don’t you just tell them that it’s too much?”
“Because that’d be letting them down,” I confided in him and he waited for me to continue, “My parents have given me everything not because they want to spoil me but because they both came from nothing and don’t want me to feel what that feels like.”
“What do you mean?”
“My parents grew up in the worst possible area of Southern Los Angeles,” I explained and collapsed onto the wicker couch that was stacked with fluffed pillows, “It took every ounce of determination they had to get out of there and build everything they have now.”
“I still don’t completely understand.”
I sighed deeply before standing back up and standing in front of him.
“My dad’s father is in jail for drug possession and his mom barely even contacts him because she’s so ashamed of herself. His brother works a McDonalds downtown to try and support his girlfriend and three old daughter because he just barely graduated high school. His sister disappeared when I was ten years old and no one even knows if she’s alive. My mom’s family got by with the earnings of her mother who worked at night as a prostitute because her dad booked it when it when she was five. Her mom’s still on the streets doing God knows what as far as we know and last that my mom heard, two of her sisters have joined her. As for her brother, he lives in a jail cell and will for the rest of his live due to a double charge of drug trafficking and cold blooded murder. Her older sister managed to put herself through college like mom and is a nurse at a local hospital in Seattle.”
“So your parents?”
“They met in high school, worked all through college to make it and then got hired at the same company. They made of this out of near to nothing,” I motioned around me and he stared at me in disbelieve, “That’s the only reason they push me so hard, because they don’t want me to back track on everything they’ve managed to get. They want me to do better, to outshine them.”
“Mollie…”
“That’s why when I started acting odd after Mike and I broke up mom only cared about the A minus it was producing. She didn’t want me to screw up my future because I was dealing with ‘heartbreak’,” I put air quotes around the last word and he hesitated before embracing me into another tight hug.
The front door slammed downstairs and I heard my mom laugh.
“You need to leave,” I whispered into his chest and he sighed before letting me go and slipping over the railing and down the tree he had come up.
“Are you here honey?” mom’s voice echoed down the hallway and I closed the balcony door behind me before shouting back.
“I’m in my room!”
“Alright sweetie, we’ll see you in the morning!” dad informed before he closed their door and mom giggled like the horny teenagers they acted like every time they got a night to themselves. It was about love though, not just the sex. Just being together in that way made them remember why they made it through everything; everlasting teenage love.