“I’m not sure. It’s going to be an adjustment having to dress myself based on how I actually feel that day. I swear, it took me an hour to settle on jeans and a tank top.” I shook my head at the absurdity that something so normal and effortless seemed to be so difficult for me.
“Well, I think it looks great, but I was wondering, now that you don’t have to continually dye your hair anymore, what color do you think you’ll settle-oh… Nate’s coming over here,” David said, cutting himself off mid-sentence. I looked over toward the quad to see Nate striding over. I couldn’t read by his expression if he had already talked to Karen’s mom or not. To be completely honest, I had completely forgotten about the whole situation until that very moment. When he was within earshot, I tried to put on an encouraging smile, hoping he was coming to deliver good news.
“Hey Nate, what’s up?” I asked. A small smile was resting on his lips so I figured the news couldn’t be all bad.
“I talked to Karen’s mom last night. I know I was supposed to wait until today but I couldn’t. I just wanted to sort things out already and… well, I couldn’t help myself.” This report was nice to hear, but completely pointless until he actually told us how it went. Not wanting to deter him from his train of thought, though, I simply nodded encouragingly, willing him to continue. “She was really mad at first. I thought I’d completely messed things up, but after Karen calmed her down, we explained everything. We told her about all of the precautions we’d taken, about how Karen wouldn’t mind going back to being homeschooled if it meant we’d be able to stay together.” He stopped there, which was amazingly frustrating.
“And?” David and I asked in unison.
“And she said that as long as Karen agrees to be homeschooled and we run all dates by her first, she thinks it could be all right.” Nate seemed ecstatic with this news. It had apparently been quite an effort for him to keep the smile from his face while telling us the story so that he didn’t spoil the ending.
“That’s wonderful, Nate,” I said enthusiastically. The situation may still be a bit overbearing for my taste, but at least they were happy.
“I know!” he agreed wholeheartedly. “Thanks so much for helping,” he added sincerely. “I’ll have to remember to repay you someday,” he said as he turned to leave.
“Wait!” I said suddenly, remembering that I hadn’t actually broken them up. I fished my wallet out of my backpack and pulled out the fifty dollars Karen had given me. “Can you give this back to Karen?” I asked, holding the money out to Nate’s retreating form.
“I’ll repay the fifty dollars myself, and you keep that as a thank you from me. Besides, what you did for us is worth more money than that,” he conceded happily. And with that, he was gone, walking with a bounce in his step back to the cafeteria.
“Well, I’d say that was a nice way to end your career,” David said, looking at me.
“It is, isn’t it?” I hadn’t quite expected the end of my career to be such an easy transition. I’d always expected that I would miss something once it was over, that I’d feel empty or sad that the one constant in my life was no more. None of these feelings came, though. I felt completely at terms with my life and the changes it had taken for the better. I had David, I actually might have made friends with Nate and Karen, and everything was just fine. There was the problem of my mother and how she chose to spend her free time, but I suspected that I’d just have to accept that my mother and I would never understand each other. It was a sad reality, but it was one I could learn to live with.
David kissed me good-bye as the bell rang, and then I made my way to math. With only one class today, I actually felt like I might be able to handle the workload. Everything felt completely perfect. Too perfect. This should have been my first warning signal, but because I’d never experienced true happiness, I wasn’t anticipating a change of course. Real life throws you curve balls, and mine was coming fast. I was about to discover that in “normal” life, just when things start to look up and you become comfortable, things fall apart when you least expect it. Of course, being the social virgin that I was, I blissfully went about, enjoying my comfort zone, not knowing that the “falling apart” phase was lurking just around the corner.
Chapter Eighteen
I approached my locker after school, ready to deposit my math book and spend a lovely afternoon with David when I noticed a girl standing there. She wore stylish clothes that just reeked of designer labels. I suspected that she hadn’t spent less than $100 on jeans in her life. Her hair was dyed blonde in the way that actually made you wonder if it was dyed or natural. That color had definitely come from a salon and not from a bottle.
I approached the girl warily, sure she was there to give me a job, or maybe tell me that I’d been switched at birth and her incredibly rich parents had decided to take me back under their wing as their own, pay for my college, buy me a new car, and generally make my life easy. That wasn’t the case.
“Amelia Bedford?” she asked in a way that made her sound like a CSI agent trying to approach a murderer for questioning without scaring them off.
“Yes,” I answered apprehensively.
“I’m Rachel McKlintock,” she said, as if that name should mean a lot to me. It did ring a bell, of course. Everyone in school knew Rachel McKlintock’s parents were something like the fourth wealthiest people in the state. This was quite a feat in California, if you take into account that it’s where all the movie stars live. No one really knew why the McKlintocks had so much money, but that didn’t really matter. If you’re rich, you’re rich.
“Okay,” I said, still wondering why someone like Rachel McKlintock was approaching me.
“I have a job for you. I need to-”
“Oh no… sorry, I don’t do that anymore,” I said definitely. I didn’t even want to let her get any further than that into her speech, or I just might not be able to say no.
“Since when?” she asked, the perfect picture of indignity. After all, she was Rachel McKlintock. Shouldn’t everyone fall at her feet, ready to serve her?
“Since two hours ago,” I said, waving her aside so I could get into my locker. She didn’t budge… not that I had really expected her to.
“Well, what if I told you I was willing to pay a bit more than you normally charge?” she said. I knew she was going to say that, which was exactly why I didn’t want her to go on talking. I groaned and looked around to make sure David wasn’t there to witness this moment of weakness. It wasn’t that I was actually considering listening to her proposal, but if she was going to throw it at me, I didn’t have much of a choice. I could just refuse anyway.
“I’ll give you five hundred dollars,” she said, waiting for my reaction to this. My reaction was just what she likely had expected it to be. My eyes grew wide, and I stared at her in disbelief. “Here’s the thing,” she went on, not waiting for me to speak, “I’ve been dating this boy Alex because he’s rich.” Well, that was extreme honesty-at least she was able to admit it. “I guess he’s cute and everything, but I’m just not that into him anymore. But my mom is so obsessed with me marrying him because if our families were joined by marriage it’ll make her look good at the country club or something bogus like that.” I suddenly felt like I was back in the Victorian period where someone was promised to someone else because his or her parents thought it was a good idea. I didn’t have any pity for Rachel, though. Somehow she just wasn’t exactly a pitiable person.
“So break up with him,” I said, pointing out the obvious, for which I was sure she’d have a great excuse as to why this was impossible.
“My mom won’t let me. I’ve told her a million times that I don’t like Alex anymore, but she just doesn’t get it. Unless he leaves me for someone, there’s just no way I can get out of this. Even Daddy won’t listen to me.” She pouted slightly at this. Oh poor girl, even daddy wouldn’t listen. How horrible her life must be.
“I’m really sorry about your… uh… situation, but I just can’t help you. I’m quitting the business. Sorry.” I tried once again to get into my locker, and she blocked me once more. This ritual was truly becoming old, and I crossed my arms in front of my chest and raised my eyebrows at the girl before me, almost asking for a reason to forcibly remove her from my locker.
“You seriously won’t just take this one job for five hundred dollars?” she asked me, wondering why I was being so unreasonable in the face of so much money. Honestly, I was wondering that exact same thing, but I couldn’t take the job after I swore to David that I wouldn’t. That would make me just like all of the other girls I’d helped in
