To Be Wild and Precious

“Beth, are you actually going to buy anything or are we just going to stand around doing nothing all day?” Val was already very antsy after spending only twenty minutes in the bookstore. Her impatience was only further emphasized as she shifted her weight from one foot to the other and prominently placed her hand on her hip. She even tossed in an eye roll and a loud sigh for the complete dramatic effect.

Beth didn’t even shift her attention from the books on the shelf in front of her as she replied, “I’m not exactly standing around, and this is definitely not nothing.” Her eyes were still scanning all the titles as she sat Indian-style in the maroon carpet.

“It sure looks like nothing,” Val muttered.

Beth’s expression did not change. Nothing Val said could upset her when she was on the search for the work of fiction that would change her life forever.

As she crept into the realm of the “P’s” – Page. Palahniuk. Patterson. – Beth switched positions and sat back on her legs. Paxton. Pearson. Peck. Her excitement was brewing as the name got closer and closer. Perkins. Percy. Perry. Her fingers danced across the spines of each book, lingering on the names of each author. Peterson. Phelan. Phipson. Wait – she must have missed one. Beth checked the shelf once more – Phelan. Phipson. But no Phillips.

“NO! No. No. No. No. No. This just can’t be happening!” Beth was pulling her hair out from the roots to cause herself physical pain, but to no avail. The fluff on her skull is so large that sensory impulses take forever to reach her brain. Maybe she’ll feel the results of the yanking in a week or two. In the meantime, she only made the mass upon her head into a frizzy, unkempt mess, more so than usual.

The sudden outburst must have frightened Val because she lost her one-legged balance and toppled over, quickly regaining her sense of equilibrium from the support of a nearby shelf. “What? What just happened?”

“It’s not here.” She uttered in complete desperate. The sorrow escaped her being in the form of misty eyes and a crack in her voice.

“You have got to be kidding me.” Val slumped against the shelves until she slid all the way down to the cushiony ground. Her irrefutable irritation was evident with every breath that she took. “So you’re telling me that we’ve just wasted thirty minutes of our precious lives in this useless place? What the heck, Beth? What are you even looking for? Are you sure that it’s not there?”

Beth exhaled slowly. “Yes, I’m sure. I checked twice.”

Val stood up and began to pace the aisle. “Then check again. I am not having this half hour of my life be spent for naught. Something must be bought and it must be bought now because I cannot take the smell of these damn books for one more minute.”

Beth gasped, one hand clutching her heart. “You don’t what? You don’t like the smell of books. Oh, God. I think I’m going to have a heart attack. You did not just say that.”

“Oh, stop being such an ass.” Val slapped the back of Beth’s head gaining an “Ow!” in reply. “Just because this whole reading this is your thing doesn’t mean it has to be mine.” She sat down beside Beth and stared at the shelf mindlessly.

Silence emanated between the two as Beth thought about what her friend had just said. It’s true that she shouldn’t be shoving her own wants down Val’s throat, but it sure would be nice to have someone to share them with sometimes. And, if not that, than at least some tolerance from her friends, which, at the moment, Val seems to lack.

“So,” Val began. “What are you going to buy?” She turned to Beth and looked expectantly at her.

Beth replied, “I don’t know yet. I mean I really wanted that book, and I had it in my mindset that that was the one I’d be getting. I really didn’t plan on a back-up.”

“You should always have a back-up plan.” Beth looked into Val’s eyes to attempt to figure out what she meant by this. “Always.” She finished after a pause.

Before Beth could analyze the meaning of what Val had just said, Val’s cell phone began to vibrate. She dug inside her back pocket to find the source of the vibrations and extricated a small device that looks nothing like a phone, but to each his own. Or her in this case.

She rotated the screen of her phone, which was a tiny square, and pressed a few buttons. “Crap!” She announced, looking back up at Beth after reading what was on the little display screen. “Rose just texted me. She says that she just got out now.” Val glanced at her watch. “It’s 1:30 now. It’s going to take us at least fifteen minutes to get there. She’s going to be pissed.”

“Rose doesn’t get pissed.” Beth replied matter-of-factly. “She only gets even. And she does so very subtlety. Remember that time with Shannon Donnelly. Shannon stole Rose’s boyfriend so Rose stole Shannon’s homecoming queen title.”

“How the hell is that subtle, Beth?” They stood up and were already walking towards the entrance of the bookstore.

“It’s subtle because of the way that she did it. Rose told Becca Harrington in the bathroom that she was worried for Shannon about the results of her syphilis test. That got Becca questioning, and it tore off some old scabs for Becca as she remembered that Shannon slept with Becca’s boyfriend back in the 9th grade. You remember Freddie Talbot? Well, yeah. She was really serious about him and he cheated on her with Shannon, and so she began to spread the hate gossip about Shannon around school. I don’t think anyone voted for her for homecoming queen after that.”

“I voted for her.” Val looked confused.

“Yeah? Well, I guess the train of rumors didn’t make its way down to you. I only knew because Rose told me about the whole situation. But all she did was tell Becca about a made-up syphilis test and the wheels started turning. Then, bye-bye, Shannon Donnelly.”
“Damn. I didn’t know that story.”

“Yeah. I’m really proud of Rose for that. You honestly wouldn’t expect that from her. I mean, she’s really awesome and nice and all, but she could be vicious if you rub her the wrong way. She’s like a cougar. She’ll pounce on you if she gets the chance. Well, not really if she gets the chance, but you get the picture.”

There was a moment of silence as they walked across the parking lot and the story settled into Val’s brain. “Shit. Remind me never to cross Rose.”

“Will do. Now let’s hurry because I don’t want this situation to be a situation that calls for such extreme measures. “

They reached the car and both began to open their doors. As Val buckled herself into her seat, she responded, “Definitely. I’ll step on it. I don’t want to Rose to give me syphilis.” Beth laughed at the incongruousness of that statement. “You know what I mean.”

“Sure I do.” She stifled a giggle.

Valerie turned on the ignition. “Just buckle up, smart ass. I don’t want you to smash into my windshield and get it all dirty if I happen to speed to make it there on time.”

“We’re not going to make it there on time.” Beth replied as she fastened her seatbelt and opened the glove compartment.

“Way to be optimistic.” Valerie began to adjust her mirrors. “Wha – what the heck are you rifling through my glove compartment for?” Val started to back out of the space, but was getting distracted by all the movement coming from her passenger.

Searching wildly for some mystery object, Beth was madly pulling things out of the glove compartment – normal things that a girl would commonly leave in her car and random things that no one would ever think of even owning: A hair brush, a bottle of body spray, a slinky, a few tubes of chapstick, pens, nail polish, her car registration, a bajillion CDs, a roll of duct tape, a small notebook, bandaids, deodorant, a pack of crayons, and, of course, gloves. What would a glove compartment be without a pair of gloves?

Her head buried halfway into this mess, Beth replied, “I just so happen to be looking for…wait. I think I got it.” Her hand was reaching all the way to the bottom and she kept feeling around for something which she apparently just discovered. “AHA!” Beth extracted her arm to reveal a doll. “Oh my gosh! You still have my troll doll from 7th grade.” A smile was plastered to Beth’s face.

Val glanced away from the road. “That’s what you were looking for? Your stupid troll doll. That’s what you had to make this whole mess in my car for?” She was pissed, clearly.
“Um, actually, I just got really excited that you still had my troll doll.” She pet the huge tuft of pink hair that sat on the middle of its otherwise bald head. Beth looked back up at Val. “I actually had been looking for this,” She holds up a wrapped CD case in the hand not occupied by the little troll. “But I guess you don’t really care what’s inside it, huh? I guess I’ll just stuff it back into Pandora’s Glove Box. Let’s see when the next time you’ll find it will be.”
Beth makes as if to throw it back into the endless mess of a glove compartment, but Val catches her hand while still keeping the other on the wheel. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to see what’s underneath.”

“I suppose not.”

They drive in silence for five seconds.

“So are you going to open it for me or not?” Val asks.

“Oh,” Beth says, slightly confused. “I thought you wanted to do it.”

“Well, my little brilliant Bethany, I happen to be driving right now. I can’t open that. Could you just do me the honors, please?”

“Gladly.” Beth pulls back the silver gift paper to reveal a CD from one of Valerie’s favorite artists, Maroon 5.

“OH NO YOU DIDN’T!!” Val exclaims.

“OH YES I DID!” Beth replies equally excited because of her friend’s excitement. This merited a lengthy screech of joy from Val sounding a bit like Count Dracula giving birth to a pregnant whale. It pretty much was just painful to the ears. Very, very painful. Beth just couldn’t understand sometimes why girls have to express their excitement through shrieks of delight.
Then, again, Bethany enjoys herself in the occasional jumping-up-and-down-holding-hands-with-the-person-involved-in-the-excitement-while-wailing-tears-of-joy type of happiness. But the key word there was occasionally, and the persons involved in the excitement and almost always (correction: always is) only Val and Rose. No one else. She would never, ever do that in front of any other people. That’s just too embarrassing.

“Put it in. Put it in.” She shouted once she exhausted the howling. She pressed the button to eject the CD that was already in the player and I had to restrain myself from saying “That’s What She Said” as I popped the disc in. I mean, it doesn’t feel like the right time or place for it. She just seems too excited and I don’t really want to ruin the mood.

So the music started and it filled the car immediately. Val was swaying with the rhythms and bobbing her head when appropriate. She hummed to the songs that she didn’t really know yet and belted the ones that she already did. It was incredibly off-key, but they say love is deaf, right? Or maybe it’s blind. Whatever.

“Hey, wait.” Val lowered the music. Beth lifted her eyebrows in attention. “Why’d you get me this? I mean, I really appreciate it. Actually, I worship at your feet right now because of it, but my birthday’s not for a month and a half. Why now?”

Beth shrugged. “Why not start celebrating now? I think it’s nicer to catch people by surprise; it impacts them more. I mean, I bet if I gave you that on your actually birthday, you’d just through it in the pile with all the other CDs you got that day and it wouldn’t mean the same as it does now, when you didn’t expect it at all.”

“I like that.” She nodded in approval.

“Yeah. Me, too.” Beth looked out the window at the passing houses. She tried to figure out which ones had the real chimneys and which ones were just pretending to have them.
She didn’t get very far in deciphering when Val interrupted, “Does this mean I’m going to be getting more presents like this, all random? Or is this supposed to be the birthday present?” She sounded slightly upset.

Beth had to smile at Val’s reaction. “Don’t worry, Val. I’ll get you some more every once in a while. It’ll just be when you least expect it.”

“Awesome!” She started to slow down so Beth turned to look out the window and realized that they had already made it to the camp. With all their talking it seems that the drive was much shorter than expected.

They drove under the entrance gate of tiki poles and surf boards across the top of which hung a large sign that read “Welcome to Camp Kirikituku.” It was times like these that Beth actually felt bad for Rose. While she envied everything else about her, this is the one thing that made her satisfied with her own boring life.

As they pulled into the parking lot, they caught a glimpse of a lone girl in a bright purple shirt and jean shorts. Standing there. Just waiting. Her hands were crossed in front of her chest, but there were no other indications of her anger. They pulled up into the empty spot in front of her and she rushed into the back seat and buckled up. She said nothing. Val and Beth exchanged worried glances over Rose’s silence, but Val took this as a signal to just drive. So she did.

After five minutes, Rose piped up, “Those little munchkins are so adorable, but they can be such pains. Gosh.” She runs a hand through her hair inspecting her split ends, or lack thereof. “Sometimes I wonder why I even bother showing up every day to work.”

“Why do you? I mean, if you hate it so much?” Beth asked.

Rose dropped her golden locks from her grasp. “Not show up to camp? Are you kidding me? Those kids love me!” She went to fiddling with her hair again, and added quietly, “And I love them.”

Val shook her head. “You’re too soft, Rose. If those brats made me finger paint with them every single damn day of my summer vacation, I would punch them. Every single fucking one of them.”

“Val!” Beth scolded her.

“What? It’s the truth.” To Rose, she continued, “It just doesn’t make sense, Rose. I know you like community service and all that, but this is really pushing it.”

“It’s not community service, Val. I’m getting paid for it. I just really like kids.” She perked up as a huge smile danced across her face. “Bryce says I have a real way with them.” She started twirling her hair and staring out the car window at the trees passing by.

“Wait. What?” Val swerved the car at the reception of this information.

“Val! Watch out!” Beth instinctively grabbed the wheel from Val and righted the car into its appropriate lane. “Damn it, Val. Watch it! You’ve got our lives on the line here, too.”

“I know. I’m sorry. But did Rose just say Bryce? Bryce, as in Bryce Sherwood, Bryce?”

“Bryce Sherwood? The rugby star?” Beth asked.

“Yes. Very good.” Val commended her, considering that Beth knows absolutely nothing about sports and hasn’t ever even attended a sporting event in her life. “Yeah..So?” Valerie glared at Rose as best as she could through the rear-view mirror without keeping her eyes off the road for too long and getting us into another almost-accident.

Rose ignored the death-stare. She shifted her focus from the trees to the strands of hair looped around her fingers, the tips of which were stained with a colorful array of finger paints. “Um, yeah. That Bryce. Why do you ask?”

“Well, my dear little Rose,” Valerie said. “Because Bryce Sherwood is throwing the party of the century tonight. “ Cue the solo excitement shriek. Between her smile, Val asked, “So Bryce works with you? Here at the Camp?”

“Um,” Rose pursed her lips as she continued to inspect her fingertips and made like she was thinking about the question. “Yup. He’s kind of been working here all summer.” She blushed.

V al glanced in the rear-view. “Oh my gosh! OH MY GOSH! You like him don’t you? Why didn’t you tell us?”

“I don’t – I mean – um…” Rose stammered.

Beth turned around in her seat to face Rose dead-on. Rose looked up to meet her stare. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell us. Why are you acting so shy? You’ve always told us in the past when you have a crush on a guy? What’s the difference now?”

“The difference, Beth, is that this isn’t a crush. This isn’t just some simple school-girl, note-passing, butterflies-in-the-stomach feelings. This is head-over-heels, gut-wrenching, spine-tingling love.”

Val gasped. “You love Bryce? Already? Hasn’t it only been, like, two and a half months or something since you guys really met? I mean, when did you guys officially start dating?”
Rose was turning bright red. “We’ve hasn’t been officially anything. But we’ve been together since the beginning of July.”

“Are you saying it’s not exclusive?” Beth asked.

“Well,” Rose answered. “For me it is. I don’t really know about what’s going on with his side of the relationship, though. I mean, we didn’t really define the relationship yet. So I guess it’s fine, right?

“I think that you should –“

“No.” Val interrupted. “No, you can’t take that type of shit from anyone, Rose. What happened to the Rose that we know and love, that strong and independent girl who knows what she wants and takes it? You can’t just sit back pining after this jerk while he goes off and sleeps with any other girl who’s far less incredible than you. Trust me. You have to show that asshole what he’s missing. You have to go to that party tonight and make him want you so badly that he’ll be exclusive in a heartbeat.” They were getting close to Val’s house now.
“Really? You think so?” The corners of rose’s mouth began to turn up into a smile.
“Of course. It’ll definitely work.”

“And you should also let him know exactly how you feel.” Beth added. “If you just pour it all out, he’ll probably let you know that he wants the same thing.”

Val glanced in her direction. “How about we just work on making her envy-material, which considering the amounts of paint you got on those pretty, little fingers of yours,” she looks into the rear-view at Rose’s hands, “yeah – we’re going to need to do a lot of scrubbing.”
Rose lifted both hands and inspected both sides with a frown. “Is it really that bad?”

Beth turned in her seat to get a good look and immediately made a pinched-up face as if she just smelled something disgusting. She answered, “Rose, it is that bad.”

Val quickly interjected, “But don’t worry, my little Rosebud.” She starts turning down her street. “We’re going to prim and polish you so well that you will be a beautifully blossomed flower by the time we’re done with you.”