May 8th
Sunday, in my mind, has always been a day for relaxing. Friday nights are going for going out. Saturdays are for doing all the things you don't have time to do during the week, shopping trips, movies, extra chores, baby-sitting. Sundays, you sleep late, read the newspaper, you don't leave the house if you don't want to.
Today was not one of those Sundays.
Saturday night, Justin's dad and family came down to see Bye Bye Birdie. They drove here from freaking Oakland. I KNOW that was a huge boost for Justin, even though he didn't let on too much. They saw the show, Justin skipped the closing night cast party (he made an appearance, but only stayed for maybe five minutes) to go out to eat with them. They stayed the night in a hotel, and this morning, before they left, went out to breakfast with Justin. Justin invited me along.
I woke up at seven-thirty to get a shower and be ready for Justin to come pick me up at 8:15. No one else is awake, and why would they be? It's Sunday morning.
I felt a lot better after my shower, much less zombie-like. I couldn't run the hair dryer because I'd wake everyone up, so I just towel dried my hair as best I could. I stared at my reflection in the mirror and thought about how much easier my life would be if I cut my hair.
I toyed with the idea for a few minutes, just cutting it all there in the bathroom. I even had the scissors in my hand. But I stopped. I decided to get input first. I got dressed (jeans and a nice shirt. I really had no idea what Justin's family would be like, so I thought I should dress up, at least a little.) and brushed my still wet, though not dripping hair.
I went outside and promptly at 8:15 (He knows I like to be punctual), Justin pulled up to the curb. I got in the car.
"You look... damp," Justin said.
"It's Sunday morning, everyone's asleep. Turn on the heater, see if I can dry my hair with it. The hair dryer is way too loud. I'd wake up the baby and be late trying to get her to sleep again, or stuck staying home awake with her, since Dad and Carol wouldn't be too happy."
"Yeah. Just stick your head out the window. It's too hot for the heater."
"You are such a guy. That's what you'd do, isn't it? Stick your head out the window. For crying out loud." I ruffled my hair. "I should cut my hair. Then I wouldn't have to worry about this so much. I mean, it takes me twenty minutes to blow dry all of this."
"Cut how much?" Justin asked.
"I don't know. A few inches. Layer it, so it's faster to dry and take care of."
"I have to be there. I have to make sure it's not horrible. I have to stop it if it's bad."
I laughed. "So how did it go last night?"
Justin told me all about it, going out to eat. He totally seemed to light up. I didn't know why, but I started to feel a little resentful. Like, I wanted to go meet his family, but I also sort of had this feeling of not liking them even though Justin was gushing.
We arrived as the restaurant, and went inside, where any thoughts of disliking them went away. Mr. Randall (I mean Stuart. He asked me to call him by his first name. It's so weird when adults do that) is the typical dad-type, though for being middle-aged (he's maybe forty-six) and a little grey around the temples, he was really good looking. It's obvious where Justin got his looks, and if he's going to grow up to look like his dad, he's got nothing to worry about.
Mrs. Randall (Wendy) is younger, thirty-nine or so at the oldest. She's really pretty, brown hair, big friendly eyes. She's really nice too, soft spoken and patient. But she has major authority over the girls.
Erin and Annie are ADORABLE. They both have the same big brown eyes. Annie's older, and a little taller. They really are the cutest little girls. They seem really well behaved, but anytime they got a little rowdy, they listened to Wendy right away.
"It's nice to meet Justin's girlfriend," Stuart said.
"Oh, I-" I started.
"Dawn's not my girlfriend," Justin said. "We're just friends."
"I thought I... never mind." Stuart smiled.
We ordered food. I was good and didn't say a word about anyone ordering bacon (including not mentioning what bacon can do to your arteries), and not just because Justin was kicking my shin.
We talked about the play, we talked about Justin going to college, we talked about how Justin and I became friends. It was a really pleasant meal. Even with wet hair and getting up at the crack of dawn, it was totally worth it.
I said good-bye to them and waited in the car while Justin said good-bye. I didn't want to impose on their family moment.
Justin slid into the driver's side. "You didn't have to go," he said.
"I didn't want to, you know, impose."
"Would I have invited you over for breakfast if I thought you were imposing?"
"I guess not," I said.
"So now what? We're up and out. We might as well do something."
"You're right. What do you want to do?"
"I don't know."
"We should go get my haircut. It's almost ten, that's when salons open, right?"
He nodded. "I think so. Maybe not on Sundays."
We ended up going to the mall, which opened up at ten. We were like the only people, besides employees, that were there. It was kind of cool having the mall to ourselves.
While we waited for the Super Snips (or whatever it's called) to set up, we sat in one of the mall seating areas. Justin was playing with my hair, pulling it back into a ponytail, or braiding little bits of it.
"Have you ever gotten an overhauling haircut before?" he asked.
"Not since I was little," I replied. "I've just gotten maybe an inch or so taken off here and there."
"I should keep your hair and make a Dawn wig. For, you know, the Dawn shrine I'm building."
I burst out laughing. It echoed in the empty hallways of the mall. "You're building a WHAT?"
"I'm kidding, I'm kidding. But I do want to save a lock. You know, for knowing you when you had the amazingly long hair. Oh god, what is your dad going to say?"
"It's my hair," I said. "I can do what I want with it. And it's not like I'm dyeing it green or something. I'm just getting it cut. And if it ends up being horrible, which it won't because you're here to stop it if it is, it'll always grow back."
"Are you going to get it like, no need for a hairbrush short?" Justin asked. He was still braiding one lock of it. I really DID have long hair.
"Nah, I was thinking, you know how girls have their hair that they pull up into those like mini-ponytails? Where it's a ponytail, but it doesn't fall down, it just goes out?"
He nodded.
"Yeah, like that. It'll be a nice summer look. Even pulling it back is sort of useless when you have this much hair. The only thing good for summer looks, you know, hair off the back of my neck, is French braiding, and that takes forever."
"So I've discovered. My fingers are cramping. Which they shouldn't, since I'm a guitar player and my hands should be used to this kind of grueling punishment."
We went into the salon and the woman practically started dancing when I was telling her what I wanted done.
"Do you want to donate your hair to Locks of Love?" she asked. "You've got more than ten inches here."
I thought about Mrs. Winslow, and even Danielle Roberts. I nodded. "Definitely. Oh, as long as my friend here gets a bit. He wants to remember."
The woman smiled. "No problem."
Justin watched carefully as she put the majority of my hair in a rubber band. Then in a few cuts from a pair of scissors, most of my hair was gone. I actually gasped. Justin did too.
"Does your head feel lighter?" Justin asked after a few seconds.
I laughed. "A little, actually.
The stylist came back and worked on my hair. It's REALLY short. When it's down, it falls to just below my earlobes. It's a little shorter than I wanted, I can't really pull it back or anything, but that's okay. I keep reaching up and touching the back of my neck. It actually looks good. Weird, but good.
Dad freaked out when he saw me. He liked it after the initial shock, though. Carol loves it. She wants to go out and buy gel and hair wax so I can spike it. Sometimes she can still drive me a little crazy.
Anyway, after that, we couldn't think of anything else to do, so we ended up going back to Justin's and doing nothing, like we usually do.
Justin had tied the lock of my hair (my hair that got donated was 28 inches long. That's just unbelievable) around his review mirror.
"Here," Justin said, "three years ago we bought a hammock. It's been sitting out in the garage in a box since then. We should set it up."
"Good idea," I replied.
So we spent about two hours doing that. We probably would have gotten it done faster if we had read the directions. Or if Justin's neighbor's hunky pool boy wasn't setting up their pool (in just swimming trunks). We got a little distracted.
When we finally had it set up in the backyard, the two of us squeezed onto it. If one of us (me in this case) lay on our side, then we could both fit without too much discomfort.
"So when are you leaving?" I asked.
"I don't know, probably sometime in the last week of June. I'm going to be sending most of my stuff up right away after I hire a U-Haul driver. And then I'll go up a little bit slower. I'm going to stop in Hanford and visit Mike and Veronica for a few days. The babies will be born by then, so- Oh! Did I tell you that I got Mike to tell me the sexes of the babies?"
"No! What's she having?"
"Girls. Both girls. They've picked out names for each case, so they'll be Kaitlyn and Samantha."
"That is so cute. I'm glad they're not doing rhyming names or names that start with the same letter or something."
"Yeah, none of the names were like that. Something about their own identities or something. I know they're not planning on dressing the same, except for maybe photo ops."
"It sounds like they really have been thinking about being the parents of twins."
He nodded. "Yep."
"Is your dad going to go visit them?" I asked.
"I think they want to come up for Christmas. At least I'm trying to convince them to."
"How are things going with... you and Mike?"
"Okay, I guess. We don't talk a whole lot, but we actually have things to talk about now. It's not like we're best buddies or something, but... it's not too bad."
"It's better than before."
"Exactly." Justin paused. "I've been thinking-"
"Uh oh."
"Shush. If you're going to be mean, I'm not going to tell you."
"Okay, okay." I adjusted how I was laying. "Go."
"Well, other than doing the play, dabbling in a literary magazine, I haven't done a lot of the senior year things. So I thought I would make a point to go to prom. Especially since I didn't go last year-"
"Why didn't you go last year?"
"I ended up going to a midnight showing of Rocky Horror Picture Show instead with a bunch of the guys from the track team. It seemed like a lot more fun at the time, and then we were all thinking about how we could go next year anyway."
"Weren't you dating what's her name?" I asked.
"Nancy? I was a bad boyfriend struggling with my sexuality. She wanted to go, but it all depended on me, since she's too young. So I avoided the subject until it was too late. You know, she might not have hated me so much when I came out if I'd taken her to prom."
"Probably not." I actually had no idea where he was going with this.
"So, anyway, I thought maybe you'd like to go with me."
I looked up at him. "What?"
"Would you like to go to prom with me?"
It was like my stomach dropped out.
Justin laughed. "Oh man, your face just turned a wicked shade of white. If you're worried about being a freshman there, I'm sure there will be others there. Something about moving the eighth graders into the high school last year gave everyone a big boost on freshmen."
But that wasn't it. It was like his asking me to prom made this little switch go off in my head. I hadn't even CONSIDERED Justin as any kind of romantic interest. And not that his asking me to prom made him consider me in that way, but it made like flashing lights go off in my brain. Me and Justin?
Nope, couldn't be. I had to tell him no.
But instead I fell out of the hammock.
"Ow!" I yelped when I hit the ground.
Justin peered over the edge of the hammock at me. "Did you just fall for me?"
Even though he was weirdly right, I had to be outraged by his horrible pun. I laughed. "No! That was awful." I got up and dusted off my butt. I climbed back into the hammock.
"So what about prom?" Justin asked. He poked me in the arm. "Come on, you want to go, don't you?"
"Well, yeah, but-"
"What?"
"I... I don't know."
He wrinkled his eyebrows and gave me a strange look. "What is it?"
Insert weird thought: What would it be like to kiss him?
No idea, I replied in my head to the weird thought. We're going to overlook that I was talking to myself.
Kiss him and find out.
I almost fell out of the hammock again. I grabbed Justin by the arm to keep my balance. I had that weird thought again. It was overwhelming. But I was just going to make a fool of myself.
"So, what was I? Last resort?" I tried to make a joke.
"Actually, no. First pick. There isn't anyone else I'd rather go with," he replied.
"That's just because you spend all your time with me."
"And I enjoy it. And that's why I think we'd have a good time at prom together. Since we enjoy ourselves all the time anyway. There isn't any reason we shouldn't go. It's my senior prom and I want you to come with me. You don't have to say yes, but I'd be really, really happy if you did."
"I'll go! I want to go!" I said.
"You're humoring me. Why don't you want to go?" He gave me the wrinkled eyebrow look again.
"I want to go. I'm just... confused."
"Confused?"
The way he said it, it was, well, confused. He had no idea what was going on in my head. Obviously this didn't mean anything. What was I thinking? I've only been broken up from Christian for a month (even though it feels like a lot longer), why would I want to even think about getting together with Justin? He's leaving in a couple of months anyway.
"Nothing," I said. "I'd love to go prom."
He gave me a funny look and poked me in the arm again. "Talk to me, Dawn."
"Nothing," I said again. "Oh, god. I'm going to need a dress or something! And my hair. Is this prom hair? Is this acceptable hair for prom?"
Justin laughed. "It's perfect hair for prom." He ran his hand through my hair and I got chills up my spine. "Really, Dawn, it looks great. And you know I wouldn't lie to you. Not about something as important as hair."
"I know."
Suddenly, I couldn't wait to get out of there. I felt foolish. The last thing I needed was a useless crush on Justin. Besides, he's my FRIEND. Why complicate that?
But it's too late. It's already complicated.
May 9th
Oh my god! I have the most beautiful dress in the world! After school today, Carol picked up me and Ducky (for a consult, and he LOVES my haircut. He said that he should get the same cut, ha ha.) and we went to the mall for dress shopping. Long story short?
I own the most beautiful dress ever! It's long, floor length, and black, with glitter in it. It's got one strap that goes over my shoulder and a big slit up the one side.
And I look HOT.
Ducky was fitted for his tux, and reserved it for prom night. He looks mad handsome.
I'm so excited! I don't even care what could possibly happen over prom between me and Justin. Even if nothing happens, I think it's going to be so much fun.
I'm dying without having anyone to talk to about it. I'd normally go to Ducky, but would he really want to hear me wonder about my feelings for his ex? They seem to be getting along well as friends, and Ducky's involved with Kevin now, but there's probably still something awkward about talking to him about it. He knows Justin and I are going to prom together and all, but "feelings" for each other? I don't know.
And talk to Sunny about relationship issues? We're hardly even friends anymore. And not with everything she's got going on. Considering her last relationship.
I'm just going to have to suffer it out.
May 11th
Sometimes I wonder why I try. I was thinking about the snobby remark I made about Sunny in here the other day, and I thought that was pretty mean of me. Sunny, of course, doesn't know I made that comment, but I still felt bad about it.
Sunny and I have grown apart. We've developed different interests, grown closer to different people, but part of me missed her. The old her. The Sunny from the end of the summer. The Sunny from before my parents got divorced. I knew that Sunny had to be in there somewhere. I thought I would try and make amends. Even if it's nothing, even if we can more than look at each other when all of our friends are together. Maybe we still had things to say to each other.
I wasn't ready to give up my best friend.
And maybe it was selfish of me. In not so many words, my "best friend" as of lately has been Justin. And he's leaving. Maybe I wanted to make sure that in the end, I wouldn't be friendless. I would still have someone.
Maybe I should give Jill a call. Sunny is useless.
Not useless. Just... I don't know.
I went over to her house today. Ducky had made some comment about Sunny being under "house arrest," though, when I asked him how she was doing, he told me that he had no idea. Not anymore. He sounded sort of distant about the subject and quickly found a new one. I wonder if they had a fight. Which would be kind of shocking to me.
Either way, I went over to her house. I had the idea that she would be there. I was right. I knocked on the door, feeling weird. It felt weird to be there. I used to run in that house without a thought. It was always so bright, full of light.
Apparently Sunny and Mr. Winslow aren't big on cleaning. It wasn't messy or dirty, just... cluttered and dark. It was sort of like being in a cave.
Before Sunny let me in, she sort of stared at me. "What do you want?"
"I, uh, just wanted to say hi," I replied. We hadn't seen eye-to-eye on a lot of things over the past year or so, but I've never felt this intimidated by her before. it was like she had aged twenty years since December.
"Hi," she said. I could tell she wanted to close the door in my face.
"Can I come in?"
"I guess." She pushed open the screen door and I came inside. I did what I could not to stare at the cave-like house. We went in the kitchen.
"So how's everything going?" I asked.
"As well as it can be," she replied.
I didn't really know what that meant, so I didn't push it. "So, how's, uhh..." I couldn't think of anything to say.
"What are you doing here?" Sunny asked, not letting me finish the string of "uh's" and "um's" that were about to come out of my mouth.
"I just wanted to-"
"Say hi. Right. So what are you really doing here? Come to ask me up front about what happened? Be superior and perfect to my face?"
"Why are you being so defensive?" I asked.
"Why aren't you telling me what the hell you're doing here?" She crossed her arms over her chest. "I didn't realize that we were still "buds," Dawn. I thought that died a long time ago."
"It doesn't mean we can't be friends again."
Her face softened for a second. It lost that aged shell. She looked like a teenage girl again. Her words were just as harsh, though. "I'm trying to clean my life of anything that made me feel like shit. So you might as well leave, Dawn, because ever since Mom died, all you've ever done is made me feel horrible about myself. It's not surprising that pushed friends like you away. Because I didn't need friends like you."
"Sunny, do you think it's possible that you NEED friends right now? Any friends? At all?"
"It won't matter. I've seen the brochures coming in the mail."
"I, uh... what?" That comment didn't compute.
"Boarding schools. Girl's schools. Family counseling. All of it adds up. Dad can't handle me, I can't stay. It's not that bad, Dawn. Not when I've pushed everyone away. You're the only one who's taken the time to come back."
"Then why are you still pushing?" I asked.
"Because. It's that much easier to let go." She walked away, leaving me in her kitchen. Then I left.
I can understand where she's coming from, but it doesn't make it right. Not in my mind. But then again, Sunny and I are very different people. We always have been, but it just seems much more obvious these days. We handle things differently, we see things MUCH differently. I can't make her see things my way. I can accept that.
If she's right, I guess it won't really matter. And maybe I will end up friendless.
I hope things work out for Sunny. I hope she turns out okay.
May 12th
I'm sitting at lunch. I'm by myself today, and that's fine. I wanted to write. I was talking to Maggie today. It was the first time I've actually talked to Maggie in like months. Maybe I'm still trying to work out my possible friendless issue by reconnecting with Maggie.
I ran into her in the halls. "Hey!" I said.
She turned around. She smiled, but it was kind of eerie. It was like the ghost of Maggie smiling at me. She looked like she'd lost weight again. But I hadn't been much of a friend these past few months, so I didn't feel like it was my place to say anything. But then again she was dressed all in black, and that's slimming. She was also wearing black framed glasses, but I didn't think Maggie needed glasses.
"Hey, Dawn," she said. "What's going on? I love your hair, it looks great."
"Thanks! I just thought I'd stop by and say hello."
"Oh. Hi." She picked a book out of her locker. "I heard you're going to prom with Justin."
"Yeah..."
"I'm not surprised. I knew he liked you."
"It's nothing like that," I said. "We're just friends."
Maggie looked surprised. "Really?"
"Yeah, why?"
She blushed. "It was just... oh, something he said to me once. It, you know, gave me the idea that he liked you." She shoved the book in her bag. "I, uh, I've gotta go. See ya, Dawn."
That was weird. I don't know what got her all flustered. And what did Justin say to her that gave her the idea that he liked me? Was that why she was upset? Because he said something? I was pretty sure that Maggie was way over Justin. It's been over a year since she liked him, and has dated someone since then.
I don't know what to think. Is it possible that he likes me? Not that it really matters. Not in the long run. It would just end in disaster since when he leaves, he probably won't ever be back.
Romantic relationship or not, knowing that hurts.
