On Thursday, Marjorine went with her mom to the store—they agreed, kind of sadly, they didn't spend much time together since she'd started school. She didn't really feel ashamed at all to be a Mama's Girl; in her opinion, her mom was objectively awesome.
So the vague panic she felt at seeing Kenny and Stan at the glass counter that was the bakery, stealing the cookies that were free for kids twelve and under, was really irrational.
Wait…would…would they think anything about seeing her with her mom? That kid who just kind of disappeared one day's mom?
She didn't have time to worry long—a cookie hanging three quarters of the way out of his mouth, Kenny turned suddenly, as if he'd sensed her or something, and broke into a way overly excited grin. Stan looked over curiously, and although he didn't share Kenny's enthusiasm, he did look friendly.
The best she could do was totter over to them (away from her mom,) and initiate awkward conversation, unconsciously mimicking Kenny's weird expression.
"Well—well hey there!" She squeaked.
Her mom looked over, but didn't seem intent on interrupting her when she was with her friends. Thank you, God, for blessing me with such a wonderful mother.
"Marjy!" Kenny cooed. Stan and she shared their cluelessness in his cheer.
"Uh, hey, I can't really talk right now, I gotta…shop…and stuff—"
Out of no where, a pair of toned arms were wrapped around her back, and her entire front was shoved into Kenny's thin-muscle-and-bone, slightly smelly frame—she only noticed the smell now because her face was pushed entirely into his shoulder.
Most noticeably, there was a certain…grinding.
This happened in less than a second, while Kenny said, "Aw, okay. It was nice seeing you!" And just as rough as he'd grabbed her, he threw her off, so that she had to take a few steps to steady herself.
As he and Stan walked away, maybe a little fast, she heard Stan try to be quiet as he asked, "What the hell was that?"
Her mom was at her elbow suddenly, her happy face tense and stretched over her concern over what appeared to be her child's fast and public molestation. "Were those friends from school, sweetie?"
--
She packed pajamas, a toothbrush, basic make up, her face wash, clothes for the next day, underwear, her pillow and a light blanket, her I-pod, and spent a few minutes putting her stuffed bunny in and out of her suitcase before deciding it to bury him in the bottom and assess whether or not to take him out based upon the behavior of the other girls.
Her mom dropped her off a little before five. Wendy's house was huge and gorgeous; it fit her personality perfectly. She watched the roof disappear as she got closer, rang the doorbell, which was loud and melodic through the thick door, and wished she'd packed a little less as she adjusted her overnight bag against her leg.
Wendy was grinning as she opened the door, her hair pulled back, wearing a lilac tank top and black sofies, her miniscule feet bare. Her toes were neither monkeyish nor fat. It was magical.
"Hey, sweetie! C'mon," she stepped back from the door, showing high ceilings and a moppy rug. "It's just Bebe and me so far—down here, in the basement—"
She led her into a basement lit to the point of casting oversized shadows, in which everything was either white or animal print, with an enormous TV taking up a good part of wall. Bebe sat by the glass coffee table, munching from a bowl of M'n'Ms that sat joined by other traditional sleepover food. She turned her head away from Gilmore Girls to gave an emotionless wave. Wendy looked a little skanky compared to Bebe's loose sweatshirt and sweatpants with white stripes down the side; but only comparatively.
"You didn't eat yet, did you?"
Marjorine hadn't realized she'd been so deeply immersed in observation. "What?"
"Did you eat yet?"
"Oh—uh—no—"
"Good, we're ordering pizza in a little bit. Oh, hold on." The bell rang, and Wendy showed a generous amount of thigh as she sprung suddenly to her feet and back up the stairs.
For a horrifying forty seconds, Marjorine and Bebe were completely alone. If you didn't count the people on the TV; which, she considered, you should, because they broke the awkwardness quite well.
Millie and Wendy returned together. So far, Milly was probably Marjorine's favorite girl aside from Wendy—she was possibly lacking in modesty, although none of her ego was unfounded, and it didn't interfere with her opinion of anyone else—in fact, it maybe improved it, because she didn't seem to feel like anything else with a vagina was instant competition.
"Hey Baby! Hey Marjy!"
Marjorine didn't have time to realize that two people had now referred to her as Marjy—she was too busy having her self confidence crushed as Bebe smiled, sleepily but brightly, and gave a genuinely happy-to-see-you "Hey Milly."
She set her bag down against the wall and playfully pointed at Bebe. "I brought my straightener and a bottle of roofies—I'm using the first on you, and it's up to you if I use the second."
"Oh God, do you have to?" She sighed, not completely with contempt, and popped a few more M'n'Ms into her mouth.
Wendy laughed—the word mirth came to mind—and gave Marjorine instructions on how to find pop and a toilet. The other girls knew the house.
Red came after that, her shaggy bangs clipped back in a way she probably never wore at school, Annie and Heidi in the same car (Annie was in a different lunch period, and Marjorine suddenly felt she had never been a real member of the group, but just kind of someone who sat at their table, and that tonight was her opportunity to change that,) Nelly and Esther, who were apparently BFFs, and both swore a lot—Nelly through a chipped tooth, and half an hour late and grumpy, Powder, who was probably wearing her boyfriend's boxers and T-shirt.
Marjorine was one of the only girls who had come dressed like she would in public; she excused herself to the bathroom, and hesitated for a while looking at her pajamas.
Everyone else wore cloth shorts and baggy T-shirt or tank tops (or in Bebe's case, sweats; it was sad, that she kept her guard up so tightly in the private company of her friends.) She'd packed her yellow and pink plaid shorts with a matching button-up top. Turned down collar and everything. They weren't ugly, but they stood out. Would it be worse to sleep in her clothes or in kind of dorky pajamas?
Well, she would at least be comfier in the dorky pajamas.
When she got out, she was greeted instantly by at least two squeals; Wendy was on her like she was robbing her nest, bright eyed and grabbing her elbows. Heather and Bebe were the only girls who didn't at least smile.
"Look at how cute you are!" Wendy giggled. "Where'd you get these?"
"Um! …I don't remember." She was bright pink. Like everyone but her was connected by some sort of psychic connection, Annie and Wendy were on either side of her, posing, and there was a camera in her face. She improvised quickly—threaded her fingers together and rested her chin across her knuckles, smiling.
Girls are weird. In a good way, though.
She was spared the stress of starting a conversation when Nelly and Esther showed off their parlor trick, and the five minutes or so of double entendres that followed—Nelly was good at catching things with her mouth, as proved by Esther standing on one side of the room and throwing pretzels as Nelly stood on the other side. Marjorine thought of the chip in her tooth. At that point, Wendy's mom came down and took pizza orders, and Millie announced that she was going upstairs to get a can of pop, at which point nearly every girl shouted an order to bring down while she was up there.
Like on TV or something. It was fun, and stupid, like as soon there were no boys looking, all these girls turned into these immature, tomboyish people in comfortable clothes who ate a lot of junk food like they didn't even care.
And she was one of them.
--
By nine, they were hopped up on sugar and their close proximity to all the other girls hopped up on sugar. Heidi was the one to suggest they play truth or dare—sitting in a big, dumb circle, except for Millie, who was behind Bebe, straightening her hair.
"Okay, okay—how big is Stan?"
Wendy wrinkled her nose cutely. "You're so gross!"
"You have to answer!"
Wendy twisted her jaw, showing her bottom teeth and little, and quickly extended both hands, holding them a generous amount apart. It lasted less than a second; her face was soon pressed into her knees, probably uncomfortably, as she burst into giggles.
Wendy pointed to Bebe once she recovered. "Truth or Dare?"
Bebe looked scared. She visibly weighed the options, then gave a tentative, "Dare?"
She pulled Red into a huddle—probably only because she was on her side—and pulled away with a grin on her face. "Kiss Marjorine. On the forehead or something."
It was probably just Wendy and Bebe and her, but something tightened. The other girls were still talking a little on their own, Millie did the last piece of Bebe's hair, while they waited with electricity running into them from the floor.
"No."
It loosened and released.
"No?"
"I don't want to."
Now the girls glanced warily, eyes wide, not daring to look at any one face for longer than possible. Conversation faded.
"Aw, come on, Bebe, I dared you." The only reason her voice sounded so fake was because it was so out of place; chiding and sweet in a situation leaden with poison.
"I'm not going to do it."
"What's the big deal?"
Marjorine looked down at her feet, crossed Indian-style.
"I don't…like Marjorine."
There it was.
Out there, for everyone—open and sure and eight thousand pounds.
Marjorine had been disliked before. A lot, actually—she'd been hated. But this was…
Her eyes got hot again.
She rushed to the bathroom before anyone could say anything else.
--
She sat against the door for a while, trying to be quiet but kind of failing—it was a loud, hot kind of crying, and she couldn't change that. She heard people whispering, hissing a little, obviously accusing and threatening. It helped a little, to at least know they cared. Bebe didn't, though.
Eventually, someone gently rapped on the door. "Marjorine?" Wendy's voice lilted.
She didn't really want to talk—she could either lie, which would be no comfort whatsoever, or tell the truth, which she already knew. "Go away." She whimpered.
"Marjy, I just wanna talk."
"I don't want to!"
"At least come out of the bathroom?"
"No!"
"Marjorine, she didn't mean it."
That was a lie.
While she had cried, she'd thought it over—Bebe disliking her cut so deep because no one had ever disliked her before.
No, it'd always been something about her—some trait, something she did, or had done, some flaw in her personality, something she could, by some stretch of the imagination, work at to fix, to change.
Bebe disliked—probably hated—her. Just her. And she couldn't fake her way out of it, or do anything else about it. Bebe hated Marjorine. It was written in the freaking stars or something.
A fresh breach of sobs broke loudly from her lungs.
"Marjy? Honey? Do you wanna call your mom?"
She kept using her name. "Okay."
She stood up opened the door a little. There was some muttering, and a small hand reached in and handed the portable phone. She sat on the closed toilet seat to dial the number.
The blank green-grey low-tech screen stared, open, before her. Maybe a little tired from crying so hard, she didn't want to mess it up with her ugly home number. Her thumbs worked more than her mind did.
His dad answered the phone, before relaying it to his son.
"'Lo?" Clyde's voice, scratchy—the reception was crap down there—filled her ear, and sort of filled all the cracks in her mental state. Her voice barely crackled and bubbled at all.
"Can I stay with you tonight?"
"Are you okay?" He really sounded worried.
"Um…can you just pick me up? I'm…I'm at Wendy's."
"Why—"
"Wendy Testaberger's."
"Oh. Yeah—gimme the address, I'll be right there, okay?"
--
When the doorbell finally rang, Marjorine looked in the mirror critically—her eyes were red and puffy, and the make up had washed away, showing the bags that were always there, but almost always concealed.
Annie knocked on the door, carefully telling her someone was there to pick her up—they were probably a little surprised to see Clyde Donovan instead of a middle-aged woman. She breathed deeply, and emerged.
The energy'd been destroyed—most of them were crowded around the TV, watching some movie, and conspicuously trying to not look at her. Bebe was gone. Annie went over to the other girls, while Wendy grabbed her things for her and walked her upstairs.
"Look," she explained as they mounted the stairs, "Bebe's a really, really sweet girl. She just has a few little issues. It's not her fault. And it's even less your fault. Don't take it personally—I swear, when she gets to know you, she'll love you. Everyone else does—they seriously do, we were all really worried about you." Clyde was standing in the doorway, hands behind his back, staring around the room with the same wonder she had a few hours ago. Wendy smiled at him weakly, handed Marjorine her bag, and hugged her tightly. "Feel better."
"Ready?" Clyde asked.
She nodded, and followed Clyde out the door to his dad's suburban, waving at Wendy as she closed the door.
--
AN: Ahah, in the interest of keeping things movin' on forward at a healthy pace, I'm moving some things up. Things that were kinda meant to happen way…wayyy into the story. Which obviously means they won't be as good, but you can't have your god damned cake and eat it too, you ungrateful whores! –cough- I wrote this in the same sitting as that other chapter, but I dunno why, I was ascared to post it. Really I'm so confused as to why. It's not THAT awful. –shrug- And the next one's partially written. And partially sexy! In…not the way you probably think.
