The Me You See (18 page)

Staring. Watching.

That’s why I always kept watching Stefia. Princess Stefia.
That annoying puke of small town royalty who got anything she wanted by
twirling her perfect hair around her perfect finger. I’d kept watching her
because I knew she was going to wreck.

“What do you have against her?” Gabriella had asked one
afternoon.  School had ended two hours prior, after which we walked to Beidermann’s
Ice Cream and decided to order double chocolate cones. We’d finished them and
then hiked down to the river that the shop overlooked.

“She’s everywhere. She’s in everything. She’s annoying,” I
said. I sucked on my cigarette and then turned my hand to look at the chipped
nail polish on my thumbnail. I had painted lime green and black stripes on the
nails of my right hand the night before bed and the polish hadn’t even lasted
twenty-four hours.

Cheap polish, I suppose, for a cheap girl.

“She’s such a spoiled brat,” Gabriella continued. “Which is
kind of unfair, since I’m the youngest.”

Gabriella was two years younger than me but cool as hell.
Crazy, since she was also Stefia’s youngest sister. Gabriella and I didn’t talk
to each other much during the school day but usually ended up doing something
together after class let out.

“Everyone likes her,” I said. “Stefia, I mean.”

“Well, that’s not a reason to not like her.”

“What? Now you’re part of the Princess Stefia club? I
thought you couldn’t stand your sister.”

Gabriella laughed and pulled out a cigarette of her own.
She lit it with her neon pink Bic and leaned her back against the giant boulder
we were next to.

“No, I’m not part of her fan club,” she said. “Let’s make
sure we have that clarified.”

“Good.”

“But if you’re going to hate her, hate her because she’s a stuck
up bitch. Don’t just hate her because she’s got everyone else fooled about it.”

I smirked and took one last drag off my cigarette and
flicked the butt into the river.

“I’ve got plenty of reasons not to like your sister,” I
said. “And none of them have to do with what anyone else thinks about her.”

“Oh yeah? Like what?”

 “It all boils down to the fact that she’s not for real.”

And that was the truth. My whole issue with Stefia was that
she seemed too perfect. Her life was too perfect. And perfect is a lie,
everyone knows that.

She was hiding something.

“Are you going to Jimmy’s birthday party this Saturday?” I
asked.

“Yeah. I am. I mean, who isn’t?” Gabriella smirked and lazily
tossed a pebble in front of her. “I’m leaving with Adam afterwards.”

“For the night?”

“No. For good. I’m done with this town.”

“Don’t you think someone will try and stop you?” I asked.

“Who would try to do that?” She picked up another rock,
rolled it between her fingers, and then tossed it as hard as she could at the
water.

I knew who wouldn’t be at Jimmy’s party. Stefia. Stefia
never came to parties. Stefia was too good for high school parties. I didn’t
understand how the same person who didn’t come to high school parties for
whatever reason could still be worshipped by the same people she wouldn’t party
with.

Oh, to lie prostrate at the feet of Saint Stefia. To wrap
oneself in adoration and adulation for the Princess of Perfection.

Well, fuck them.

**

That Saturday night, while marbling my nails blaze orange
and yellow, I thought about Stefia and the homeroom class we shared as freshmen.
I’d just moved to town and she was that goody-two-shoes who took it upon
herself to welcome me.

“Welcome to Granite Ledge!” she had said, arm extended
waiting for me to shake her hand. All I could think was what fourteen-year-old
girl shakes hands? And as I sat there trying to figure out if it was a small
town thing, or just something strictly Stefia (what kind of a name is that
anyway?), she put her hand down and flitted away to grab another group of gals
to introduce to the New Girl.

 I tried as best as I could to peg Stefia down, fit her
into a group. Was she a cheerleader? Was she student council president? Was she
a recovering emo? As hard as I tried, I couldn’t label her as anything. She was
like a ridiculously gorgeous, unidentifiably shaped peg that wouldn’t fit into
any hole I wanted to slam her into.

A couple months after I started at the new school, I was
hiding out and smoking a cigarette behind the bump out the lunch room made into
the parking lot. School had been done for twenty minutes and I marveled at how
quickly the parking lot had emptied. As I scanned the horizon, I realized Perky
Perfect Stefia was getting into an old olive green Cutlass that had pulled up
to the curb. I squinted to get a better look at her, wondering why the hell I
found her so fascinating. She was like a magnet, this girl, and as I looked in
the car I realized it might have had something to do with her daddy driving the
car. Let me tell you, her dad was smoking hot.

A few weeks later, while hanging out with the only group
I’d found to identify with, I said, “So. This Stefia girl.”

The other girls looked at me.

“What about her?” asked Charlene.

“What’s her story?” I asked.

“What do you mean? She ain’t got a story. She’s
just…Stefia.”

“Everyone has a story,” I said. “Everyone has some dirt.”

“Not Stefia,” Charlene said. “She’s just Stefia. She’s
always been Stefia. Parents had a little trouble beginning of this year…I think
her mom walked out and left her dad but no one knows where she went. Hasn’t
seemed to trouble Stefia much. She lets most everything roll right off her
back.”

“She’s an actress,” another gal named Miggy said. “She got
in with that theater on the edge of town and I guess she’s pretty good.”

“Does she act here at school?” I asked, marveling at the
thought that a fourteen-year-old girl would be such an asset in community
theater.

“We don’t do much theater here until high school,” said
Charlene. “Don’t have anyone to run the program. Lots of interest, but no one
to hold it together.”

“Well, regardless of what her story is…all I can say is her
dad is pretty effin’ hot. Bummer that her mom left, she must not have eyes in
her head to see what was in front of her.”

They looked at me like I had ten fingers coming out of my
nose.

“Stefia’s dad?” Miggy said. “Oh my god!”

“Oh, come on,” I said. “He’s hot! Tall? Dark hair cut super
short? Just enough scruff on his face? Looks killer in a pair of sunglasses…”

Miggy snorted from where she sat cross-legged in the grass.

“Stefia’s dad? He’s not tall. Or dark-haired. And he’s
definitely not cute. Sunglasses or not.”

“Are you sure?” I asked.

“I used to hang out with Stefia in third grade,” Miggy
said. “Her dad is about five foot ten on a good day and he’s a ginger.”

“Maybe it was an uncle?” I muttered to myself.

“Who was an uncle?” Miggy said.

“I just saw her getting picked up the other day after
school and the guy who was driving was drop dead gorgeous. Just assumed it was
her dad and figured that’s why she is the way she is. You know, gorgeous and
all? My bad, I guess.”

I finished my cigarette and locked my mind around
discovering who the gorgeous older guy was that Stefia got to ride around with.

As luck would have it, three days later, I was staked out
in my hiding spot and the olive green Cutlass pulled up again. I snuck another
peek at the guy and thought, man. How come freshman guys can’t look like that?
Shit, I didn’t even know many seniors who looked that good.

I took my phone out of my pocket and zoomed in to get a
real good look at this guy. If I took a picture, I could show the girls and
they could tell me who it was. Everyone in small town Minnesota knows everyone
else, right? I needed to know who this guy was.

As I zoomed in more and waited for the focus to sharpen,
the gorgeous guy leaned over to Stefia to say something.

Focusing…focusing…

Then, I kid you not, after he scanned the parking lot to
make sure it was empty, he leaned over further…and kissed Stefia.

On the lips.

I just about dropped my phone. And I forgot all about
taking a picture.

Okay. Not her dad. And not her uncle.

Well, hopefully not.

**

A week or so later, I watched over Stefia’s shoulder as she
concentrated on making a precise incision into the pig fetus our group was
dissecting in Biology for our year end project.

“Stefia,” I said quietly, over her shoulder. “Do you walk
home?”

“Usually,” she said, not looking up.

 “What do you do when it rains?”

“I get a ride.”

“From who?” I asked. “Your dad?”

“God, no,” she said, setting down one scalpel and picking
up another. “My dad works an hour and a half away and doesn’t get home until,
like, 7:30. He’s not around to give me a ride.”

“Who gives you a ride?”

“Why?” she asked. “Do you need a ride after school?”

“Nope.”

She set her knife down and turned over her shoulder to look
at me.

“So why were you asking?”

“Just curious,” I lied. “Thought I saw you yesterday
walking by my house after school, but it must have been someone else.”

“Well, it definitely wasn’t me yesterday,” she said,
turning back to the pig fetus on the table. “Yesterday, I got a ride.”

“That’s weird,” I said, walking around the table to look
directly at her.

“Why?”

“Because it didn’t rain yesterday.”

She stared at the table, scalpel in hand, and slowly
exhaled through her nose with more force than should have been necessary. Then
she looked up at me with an icy glare. Her silence told me I was asking about
things I should have known to leave alone.

It was then, the second week from the end of 9th grade that
I decided Perfect Perky Princess Stefia might have been holing up a whole lot
of stuff.

And it was then, the second week from the end of 9th grade
that Stefia had figured out that I knew.

**

Later that Saturday night, I took my marbled nails, skinny
jeans, and almost see through concert tee to Jimmy’s party, fully prepared to
have an amazing time. Jimmy said he was going to have a case of birthday cake
vodka in honor of turning eighteen and said he’d save a special shot for me.

“Raynee!” everyone howled when I walked in. It was nice to
be liked. It was nice to be the life of the party. It was nice to be the fun
girl. I grabbed a beer and headed out to the balcony where Jimmy was sitting on
the ledge waiting for me.

“Happy Birthday,” I said, winding my arms around his waist.
We were not dating. But he was hot and we were both there which was sometimes
all that mattered.

“I’ve got something for you,” he said, holding up the shot
glass.

“I’ve got something better for you…” I said, locking my
lips on his face and playfully running my fingertips over the front of his
jeans.

“Okay,” he said. I led him into the nearest room and closed
the door.

Five minutes later I walked into the hallway, smoothing my
hair in a pathetic attempt to look innocent as I rejoined the crowd. But the
balcony was empty and quite a commotion had stirred up below in Jimmy’s huge
entry way.

“Jimmy, come out here!” I called, and then we quickly made
our way down the stairs to where a small crowd had gathered.

I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t fucking believe it.

Stefia had come to the party.

No one else could believe it either. Some people were so in
shock they didn’t know what to say, others fell all over themselves trying to
be the first to bring a her a Solo cup of beer.

Like a goddamn celebrity.

I moved over to where a makeshift bar had been set up, with
bottles of just about everything you could think of, and downed two shots of
birthday cake vodka.

“Hey! Stefia!” I yelled, waving her over. “Come here!”

I smiled. I waved.

But she wouldn’t come over.

I strained my ears to hear her conversation as she mingled,
catching pieces of
anyone seen Gabriella
and
planning to skip town
and
I need to talk to her
as she moved through the crowd.

Most people ignored her questions and instead offered her a
beer. She always refused.

Bitch.

She was deep in conversation with some girl when I stumbled
on purpose in between them and spilled a whole Jagbomb all over the front of
Stefia’s shirt.

“Oh, god! I’m sorry!” I said. “I didn’t mean to…”