Dear Dead Dad:
It's Paul, again. It's the middle of the day, and
I'm in the middle of some deep trouble.
I started this day looking to find Vickie and to avoid Johanna. Knowing that Johanna wanted me somehow made me more convinced that I wanted Vickie. I decided this morning that I would take matters into my own hands regarding Vickie. (Well, as you and I know, I'd taken something else into my own hands thinking about Vickie many times.)
I waited for her outside her first-period class. Other kids shuffled by, but I just looked through them, staring at the clock in the hall. It seemed like everything—everything in my life—hinged on the next few minutes. If Johanna wanted to kiss me, then maybe I wasn't such an ogre and loser after all. I knew, too, that I was finally over Carla. Hell, she never really mattered that much, anyway. Carla was just a distraction; Vickie remained my destiny. It was time to make my stand with her once and for all.
"Vickie, hey, wait a minute." I pushed the words out but stared down at my Chucks. I wasn't ready for eye contact yet.
She barely broke stride as she looked up at the clock, saying, "Paul, I'm late for class."
"This is important, Vick. Gimme just a minute, please."
"Paul, I just don't have time right now."
I wanted to just shake her. Get in her face and shout: YOU NEVER HAVE TIME FOR ME, DAMN IT! But I held back that urge and instead gave my shoulders a slight shrug, trying to look sheepish and a little hurt, playing for sympathy. I finally looked up from my shoes and flashed my eyes right at her. "Vick, c'mon, just a minute."
Behind us I heard the door to her classroom slam shut.
"See, it doesn't matter now," I told her. "You're already late, so what is a few more minutes going to hurt? What are they gonna do, sic the tardy police on us? Maybe throw us a tardy party? If you are late again, does that mean you are a re-tardy? Besides, I'll write you a note. Your dad is a doctor, so I can fake his handwriting. Just gotta break a couple of fingers to make it that illegible."
"Paul, you're too much," she said with a laugh.
"Let's take a walk," I told her. Actually, if we got caught, I was sure I could talk my way out of it. I usually could.
"Where are we going?" she asked nervously. I was losing her.
"I would suggest we stop by the cafeteria to have something to eat; but as you know, food is not served in our cafeteria. That is, unless grease is recognized as one of the five basic food groups. If our cooks worked in a prison, a guy going to the chair would turn down his last meal."
We kept walking as I was letting go with the jokes. Finally, we reached a nice deserted hallway by the theater wing. It was about the only quiet place in the entire school. The school library was supposed to be quiet, but I usually had something to do with changing that.
"Really, Paul, I have to get to class," Vickie said with a sigh.
"All work and no play makes Vickie a tired little girl," I said, pulling one of the books out of the stack pressed up against that beautiful body. It was a guide to colleges. "Is Stanford in here?"
"I suppose. I just got that book," she said as I quickly flipped through the pages.
"There it is!" I said, opening the page to show her the description of Stanford.
"Is that where you're going?"
"Me and my bro Brad; the dynamic duo are California bound."
She glanced over and looked at the book. "Wow, that's expensive."
"I know, I know, I know," I said, shaking my head. "That's what I wanted to ask you. Could your dad loan me half a mil for the next four years?"
"What?" she asked quickly, and then she laughed. "Joking, right?"
"Listen, Vickie, this is a town full of losers, and I am pulling out of here to win." After I quoted the Boss, I got real agitated. I couldn't stop thinking how unfair everything was: She had so much, and I wanted just a little.
"Paul, you can be so melodramatic!"
"Look, I'm sorry." I touched her hands. "Let me make it up by having you come with me to Jackie's party tonight. Maybe we could go to Sand's for pizza before."
"What?" I think she actually looked stunned.
I kicked my ankles together, hard. "I gotta work, but I can be at your house—"
"Paul." Her tone said more than her words. "I can't go with you, you know that."
I stood there hearing my heart break for a moment. "Can't or won't?" I asked.
"Don't put it like that. I'm sorry, but why can't you be happy with us being friends? I really like you, but, you know, just not in that way," she said. "All I was saying—"
"Was the same damn thing you have been saying for three years!" Like a string that had been pulled too tight for too long, I felt something inside of me snap. It was as if all of my fears and frustrations were pulling in one direction, while what little self-control and discipline I possess were pulling in the other. It was no contest. "The same damn thing for three years."
I gave the wall a hard kick as Vickie backed away from me. She stood pressed against the yellow concrete. "Paul, don't go all postal on me. I like you, I like you a lot; but I just—"
"You just want to be friends." I kicked the wall again, missing Vickie's leg by inches.
"I don't want to go with you, okay?" When she said it, she sounded sorry; but it wasn't her pity that I wanted.
I leaned into her. I put my hands flat against the wall: my arms were like bars on a cage; she couldn't escape this time. "I don't want an apology. I just want you to like me, that's all."
"I DO like you, Paul. I can't explain why I don't like you that way."
"Sure you can; you're smart. Just look at all the books you carry," I said, then I grabbed the books pressing up against that body I would never get to touch and knocked them to the floor. They sounded like a bomb as they smacked hard against the floor.
"Paul, please, don't be this way." She looked down at her books. "I'm sorry, okay?"
The echo of the books swallowed up her words, and the big silence returned. I grabbed her chin and pushed it up, making her look at me, then slapped my hands hard against the wall. "So am I, so am I."
"Paul, come on, please don't do that." She started to bend over to pick up her books. "Look, I know you're upset. Don't hurt yourself."
"But I am hurting. You are hurting me, Vickie." I starting kicking her books down the hall: world history, math, science, Latin, and the rest went sailing one by one across the cold floor, stopping with a thud against the concrete wall.
"Paul, this is too much." She started to walk away, turning her back to me.
"Too bad for you," I mumbled. I grabbed her hands and pulled her back toward me. "Look, Vickie, we're holding hands, just like you were my girlfriend. Don't you think that's funny?"
"Let go, let go!" I let go of her hands but pushed her hard against the wall.
"I guess it isn't that funny, but how about this?" I said as I raised my right hand above my head, forming a fist. Then with all the force in my body I brought it down hard against the wall, missing Vickie's face by inches. The red started running down my hand as Vickie ran down the hall.
I stood there for just a minute, the sound of her footsteps pushing the air out of my lungs into the emptiness of the hallway. I broke the silence and probably a couple of fingers as I began to swing at the wall until I couldn't stand the pain anymore. I kicked open the door at the end of the hall and ran toward the Firebird.
I jumped in the car, rolled down the windows, pushed the gas, squealed the tires, and threw in my Born To Run CD. I got it programmed to the title song (. . . tramps like usy baby we were born to run), and by the time I hit the interstate, I was ready to run away forever.
But then Dad, I looked in front of me and saw nothing but road. I looked in the rearview mirror and thought about the vacant stores and closed factories of my hometown, and then I drove a little faster. When I passed the city limits sign, it was like the wind got knocked out of me. I had everything to run from, but nothing and no one to run to, except maybe that Johanna girl. But first, I drove here for some quality father and son time. I drove here because I knew you would understand. I had nothing and no one to run to, except to you, Dad, a man who knew everything about running away.