Picture Perfect

I walked into my house at a little after eleven. I could see my father lying on the couch in the living room from the door. Unsurprisingly, he was lying there with a bottle of beer on his stomach. How was it staying there? Whatever. My mother was nowhere to be found, probably at work, as usual. I really didn’t blame her for putting herself into her work, as that’s the same thing I’d do, if I had a job. Luckily, I have friends that I can hang out with, when they’re not busy, that is.

As I walked into the living room, my father opened his eyes. This was definitely not something I was used to, as he was a pretty heavy sleeper at times, especially after becoming drunk.

“Emily, where have you been?” my father bellowed at me, I didn’t know why he yelled it, I’m in the same room with him, not three feet away.

“Dad, I was at Melanie’s, remember?”

“Oh, right.” He looked at the empty bottle, and picked up a new one. As he opened it, he asked, “How’d you get home?”

This unfortunately reminded me of how I had gotten home. William drove me home in his car, a red 2005 Acura RSX.

“So, this is your car.”

“Wonderful observation,” William had said.

He opened the passenger door for me, waited until I had gotten in, and then closed the door. Once he had completed that, he went to the driver side and opened his door. Once he was in the car and had his door closed, he touched my hand, very gently.

“Do you want to go to the movies with me tomorrow night?” he had asked me, looking straight into my eyes.

“Um, I d-don’t kn-know,” I stuttered. “A-are you asking m-me ou-out?”

His green eyes looked deeply into my brown eyes, as if they were searching my soul. “Are you nervous?” He finally began to drive; I thought we were going nowhere.

“No,” I answered, suddenly very calm. There was definitely no way that William was asking me out. Or was there?

“Well, okay, you can call it a date if you want. I will.” He turned on the radio. Finally, there was a distraction, due to the music playing.

“I barely know you, William,” I stated. Very sure that he’d finally shut up and leave me alone. Either that or I thought he’d start spewing random information about himself.

“I know, it’s a shame, isn’t it?” a rhetorical question, I assumed, as he didn’t stop to let me answer. “It’s strange though. One would think that since my sister is your best friend, we’d talk to each other all the time, thus knowing one another well. The truth of the matter is, however, that I know nothing about you, and you know only what you hear from others, probably.”

“Yes, that’s true,” I stated, “and the things I do know about you aren’t very flattering.”

“Oh, well, now that’s definitely a shame. More so than us not knowing one another at all, that is.”

“Yes, and why do you think we don’t know each other?” I asked. He shrugged as an answer and I continued. “You were always out, with your friends, or your girl of the week.”

William stopped at a traffic light and turned to look at me. “Oh, I like that. ‘Girl of the Week.’ Yes, that would be a good name for a prize for a lovely female.” William laughed.

I rolled my eyes, “Yes, William, because girls are just prizes.” William looked confused and gave me a “Your-Stupid” look.

“Emily, of course they’re prizes.” To be honest, I couldn’t tell if he was being serious or not. He began this long speech, me interrupting him to tell him the light had turned green. “Damn light,” he muttered.

William never had time to continue his tirade about women being prizes to men, since after the traffic light, the radio news came on and I made him shut up by making him think I was actually listening to it. Obviously he was listening to the radio news, since every once in a while he’d have some comments about a news story, or something. I wasn’t listening so I had no idea what he was talking about. Then again, half the time I didn’t know what he was talking about when I was paying attention.

When we got to my house, a little white house on the corner of a rather busy street, William offered to walk me to the door. I declined. One, we weren’t on a date, and two, I didn’t want to have to spend anymore time with him than need be. I didn’t even want him to accompany me on the way home, let alone to the door or worse, in the door.

Before I could get out of William’s car, he grabbed my hand, instantly making me stop, turn around and slap his face, taking my hand with me as I got out of the car. As I walked up the steps to the door, William yelled my name.

When I turned around, William asked, “So, are you coming to the movies with me tomorrow night?”