Black Sheep Come Home

I think I’m losing it.

Okay, so, I was out picking up a few groceries. You know, milk and bread and cigarettes and stuff. So, I was at the local grocery store down the street from our house, the one that sells the specific brand of peanut butter that Harper insists I buy, and Clyde the Shelf Boy was following me around the store.

See, Clyde is the shelve-stocking boy who was a year below us in high school. He barely graduated though, and is a bit of an idiot, so it was no surprise he’d be working as a shelving-boy for the rest of his life. I heard from someone (probably Harper) that he is part of some virgin-blood-drinking cult and he’s taken so many drugs he has telekinetic powers.

Although I doubt the last part, because Harper loves spreading ri-fucking-diculous gossip while he is not eating his special-brand peanut butter, the little whore. (And, not that I actually believed it, but I tested Clyde the Shelf Boy’s alleged mind-reading powers by thinking of myself naked while he harassed me once. His reaction didn’t align with the one he displayed when he “accidentally” walked in to the grocery store’s restroom while I was in the process of using it).

He’s nice enough, I guess, albeit kind of a loser (and a possible Satanist and pervert) and anyway he was trailing me around the store like some little lost puppy, as usual, babbling about some party he went to that was so totally kick-ass last night, man, you should’ve been there. Hey, Romy, are you free tonight? ‘Cause I was thinking, if you were free, you know, we could go and get a bite to eat, or something, and maybe see a movie, ‘cause there’s this new place that opened up across town that serves bull testicles—

“Go away, Clyde,” I snapped at him, and reached up high for a box of cereal. Coco Crispies. Harper’s favorite. I swear to God, he’s like a child. “Don’t you have shelves to stock?”

I dragged myself over to the bread, and then the apples with Clyde the Shelf Boy basically humping my leg.

He was standing so close to me when I turned around, I almost ran into his chest. “But c’mon, Romy, it’d be great, please—”

“No. I have a boyfriend. Now go away.”

I maneuvered past him and headed for the peanut butter.

“Wait, Romy, but I love—”

And at that moment, he tried to kiss me (some ridiculous planting his hands on either side of my head and trying to pull my face towards his), but I jerked out of the way and he tripped forward and his hand landed on my tit and reflexively, I dropped my groceries and my fist collided with his throat.

He sunk down to his knees and I stood over him for a moment, half horrified and half relieved, before I went chasing my groceries that scattered into the aisle.

Okay, if you’ve stuck around long enough to hear my original point, this is it.

This is why I’m going insane.

I went scampering around into another aisle chasing an apple, and then I saw her.

At first, I thought it just looked like her. Thank God they didn’t see me, because I was perched there, half-bent over at the waist, reaching for the apple, my jaw on the floor.

But then she turned, and she was saying something to someone, and sure enough Yuri comes into my vision, all six feet seven inches of him, and his face was all wrinkly, like he was trying real hard to ignore her, and then I knew for sure it was her.

Tabitha Jones.



Romy thinks she has lost her mind.

Well, obviously she has. I mean, she comes home from ‘grocery shopping’, but she has nothing with her. She walks in the door in this daze, and I inquire her where my peanut butter is, and she tells me to get my own goddamn peanut butter, and I ask her what her goddamn problem is, and if Tabitha was here she would’ve gotten me all the peanut butter I wanted (I only said that because I knew this would make her angry) and then she looks at me as if I’m the one who has gone insane and she starts to cry.

So I panic and the next thing I know I’m asking her if it’s that time of month and she starts to cry harder; I mean, have you seen Romy cry? It’s awful. She never cries so it’s that much worse. Her eyes get really big (bigger than usual) and they get all shiny and then her shoulders start to shake and she tries to cover her face with her hands. It makes me want to kiss her.

And then she storms past me and goes into the bedroom and slams the door and doesn’t come out. I go and knock on it to apologize, but she doesn’t open the door. So I lean my head against it, and I start to talk, just ramble, about how sorry I am, what I said was stupid, I didn’t mean to bring up Tabitha. That’s when she opens the door and her face is all red but she’s stopped crying. It makes my heart hurt.

I try to hug her but she pushes my arms away, and she tugs me into the bedroom, and then she gets onto her knees and starts to unbutton my jeans with this determined look on her face, and it kind of scares me, and she jerks my jeans down and then my boxers before she stands up and pulls my shirt over my head, and then she takes her own dress off, and she growls Fuck me, and she has never acted this before so I sort of stand there and stare at her until she shoves me backwards onto the bed and climbs on top of me.

Afterwards Romy tells me she thinks she’s seeing ghosts.

I ask her why, but she gets real quiet.

She looks everywhere but at me and says real low, “I know you don’t love me,” and she turns over, her white hair splayed over the pillow like snow. “But it’s okay, I don’t love me either.”

Suddenly I want to cry, because I do love her, I want to love her; but I don’t say anything because we both know it’s true so I roll over on top of her and kiss her all over her face and hair and I bury my face in her neck, and she starts to laugh, and it is the most glorious thing. I think it’s my favorite sound in the world.