Katie placed a steady hand on my shoulder. Her reassuring squeeze was the healing touch of a merciful Goddess. My feet were back on solid, red Georgia clay again.
“Thanks,” I mumbled. I was a little embarrassed over this unbidden fainting spell.
“Thank God, Cupcake,” Katie exhaled. “I was ready to call 9-1-1.” She took my hand and pulled me up slowly. “Are you okay? Mostly okay? Do you know which motherfucker sold you bad shit?”
“No, it wasn’t... I only wish…”
“Well, this was no ordinary brain fart, sis. You totally fitched a pit.” (That’s how Katie and I said pitched a fit.) I brushed the dirt off my knees. When I stood up, I saw a gathering of google-eyed rubes staring at me.
“Why is everyone looking at me like I just bit the head off a chicken?” I whispered to Katie. I was embarrassed, and even more embarrassed over my cheeks being flushed with embarrassment.
“Well...? Maybe because you dropped like a bag of wet sand, then screamed like we just whooped Auburn.” Katie laughed now. “I mean, Jesus bobbing on a bungee cord, Keira. You even made all the birds fly away.”
Katie turned on the crowd and began shooing them away. I’ve always loved her for this reason. She was always doing something just the right way, reinforcing the fact that she not only held herself in the highest regard, but she deserved to be held there. Katie’s tight, bouncy, brown curls framed her oval face, and at the same time, they strayed in every direction at once. Still, somehow she pulled it off. Charming one and all with the sparkle in her light green eyes, edged with a ring of gold, she was the kind of girl guys drool over, but other women love to hate. She was always the lead actress in her own movie, with a three-picture deal and points. Katie was the star of the show, and in all honesty, she was the star of my show, too.
Her café au lait skin glowed with life. Tall and willowy, but not overly. Curvier, buff without bulk. She was brash-talking, bawdy, an almost burlesque kind of fun-naughty. But Katie wasn’t just a pretty face. She was also a genius. Beautiful and brilliant, as if that’s not intimidating enough, she was a fucking math genius. I mean, come on.
I saw her running back to me, her green eyes brimming with confusion and worry. I found myself-muttering “...and here I thought I would have a good day...” I wanted to shake it off, like a wet dog, but settled for adjusting the bag on my shoulder.
“Let’s go back to the house, Cupcake,” Katie said, gently. “Then you can pass out in privacy. That sound like a kick-ass plan?”
“Depends why I pass out. Will you be passing out, too?” I teased back, but internally, I was begging for this.
“Girlfriend, that’s what I’m talking about,” she said as I attempted to laugh off the whole damn thing. As we got going Katie seemed to bounce as we walked toward the house, leaving me to exert a little extra effort to keep up with her.
◆◆◆
As we approached our little off campus rental, Katie pointed. “That is a fuck load of crows.” The black birds lined every surface they could roost on.
“Gal, you ain’t lyin’,” I agreed in my best faux Georgia twang. The crows blanketed the little bungalow we called home. What am I, Tippy fucking Hedrin from ‘The Birds?’ I wondered, and glanced around to make sure Alfred Hitchcock wasn’t walking past in a cameo.
“This is creepy weird, Katie.”
“Weird seems to be gum on your shoe today, missy,” Katie shrugged. “Maybe something died.”
“Let’s hope not.” I retorted. Visions of trying to fish a dead possum out from under the house flickered in my head.
“That’s all we need, a good whiff of Eau’ d Varmint.” Katie shuddered.
“Well... Crows are harmless. I think.”
“They better be. I notice they kind of follow you a lot,” she said, her observation followed by a cackling avalanche of caws.
I dug out my house keys quickly, pulling out a chapstick and a five-year-old receipt from Target before I finally found them. “Let’s just get inside so we don’t have to hear them.”
“Or play Dodge the Birdshit.” She always had a way of making everything into a joke. Personally, I thought it was her best quality.
I shut the door behind us with more emphasis than necessary. Nice try – but the Goddamn crows didn’t even flinch when I slammed the door, and I resisted the urge to tell Katie they must be unflappable. We dropped our bags on the living room floor with a good, solid thud - the kind you can only get from dropping something on a hardwood floor.
“I am so glad we’re finally done with school,” I sighed, allowing my body to fall, pelvis first, into the hand-me-down sofa and feeling how truly exhausted I was.
Katie grabbed the remote and flipped the TV on. “You’re telling me. Been a long time coming.”
I placed my cell phone on the table. “Can you picture a cap and gown in this heat?”
“Only if I’m butt ass naked underneath it,” Katie smirked.
“I wouldn’t expect anything less from you.”
“When I was a child, I studied as a child should,” Katie intoned, “but now I am a woman, and I will lay aside childish things. Also lay a couple frat boys while I’m at it.”
“Jesus, Katie, really? Right now I feel more like hibernating through the winter.”
“Only, it’s summer.”
“No shit.”
“I know we’re supposed to be celebrating right now,” Katie said, changing the subject, “but damn, girl. My last exam kicked the shit out of me.”
“Oh, get stuffed,” I shot
