Finally, it's here! It took me ages to post it and in the time I've been missing from fictionpress I have written 2 new books in addition to this one. The other two are more of my classic chick romances. During the time I was writing this one, however, I hit a number of obstacles. The end result is nothing like what I had planned for this novel to be. It sort of took on a life of its own. This first chapter is more of a reflection for the narrator and the actual story doesn't begin until the next one.
ENJOY!
One decision can change your whole life. It doesn't have to be a big decision or an important one. It doesn't even have to be a decision you think about. But each and every decision you make can impact your life and the lives of people around you more than you could fathom.
I am, at this very moment, on a subway in New York headed for the airport to buy a ticket back home. Some creepy guy with pink hair gelled into spikes and a safety pin punched through his right eyebrow keeps looking at me like I'm amusing to him in some way. Like writing in a diary on a subway is unusual. An old woman in the corner is clutching one of the stainless steel handlebars and pressing her pink plastic pocketbook to her bosom as if her life depended on it. She's scared of the pink-haired guy. Of course, so am I.
So, I'm sitting on this hard plastic seat and glancing at this freak and all I can think about is all the decisions I have made and if I would make a different choice if I could do it again. I don't understand why I think so deeply about shit like this because all it really does is mess with my mind. I guess I just like to complicate situations. But now that you understand how serious this situation of decisions can be I'll tell you the decision I am rethinking at this very moment.
I'm thinking about when I was five years old and my mom asked if I wanted to go to Moore Elementary or Jefferson Elementary. I was five so I didn't really think it through. Mom just asked because she believes it's very important for children to think for themselves and make their own decisions about their lives, even at a very young age. I didn't know anything about Jefferson Elementary and I knew that my older sister, Nadine, had gone to Moore so I told Mom that I wanted to go to Moore. So that was the first decision I was rethinking.
But I have to cut myself some slack. I was only five. I didn't know the pros and cons of both. And actually, if Mom asked me that question again I would probably still say Moore. And not just because of Nadine. Moore is a good school, with interesting students and teachers. I probably spent the best years of my life there and wouldn't trade them for Jefferson any day. So that wasn't a mistake. Unless I took someone else's spot at the school and they were forced to go to Jefferson where they didn't make any friends and were bullied, thus pushing them into depression and they got bad grades and became a cutter in middle school and ended up committing suicide in high school… But that's unlikely.
So then my mistake must have been in first grade. The day I was coloring a picture to go along with my story in class and was sitting next to a boy named Bill. Or was it Bob? Anyway, Bill/Bob told me my picture was ugly and I started to cry. Then a new girl that year came up behind us and placed her hands on her hips, exuding a bossy aura.
"Is he bothering you?" She asked, jutting one hip out to the side and tapping her blue gel sandals on the floor.
At this point I could have calmly wiped away my tears and told her, "No, I'm fine." But instead I replied,
"He told me my picture was ugly."
Bill/Bob shrugged and wiped his nose on his sleeve before saying, "At least it isn't as ugly as her face." And he poked his finger toward the new girl.
"Shut up!" She hissed at him.
The boy rolled his eyes. "Bite me."
"Well, if you want me to." And she clamped her teeth down on his finger that was still pointing at her.
After Bill/Bob ran crying to our teacher the new girl sat right down in his now vacant seat.
"So, wanna be friends?" She asked, staring straight into me without blinking.
The whole episode had sort of scared the shit out of me. I stared at her too, tears dried on my cheeks and me sniffling periodically. So this was the next decision. I could have said, "No, you scare me." Which is exactly what I was thinking. But even as a little kid I was too nice for my own good. And when I think about it, I probably said yes because I was scared if I said no that she would bite my finger. Years later when I knew more about her I realized that she would probably have just shrugged, said "Okay" and walked away to find some other girl that would end up being her best friend.
But that isn't what happened.
"Okay." I said and sniffled.
"Good! Do you have a red marker? Mine ran out."
So with the passing over of my favorite scented red marker our friendship began. That could have been where everything went wrong. Maybe if I had said no and then met some other girl that ended up being my best friend I would have had a better life. Maybe I would have befriended some cute blond and I would have been popular and we would go shopping together every Friday and we would share gossip. That way, instead of being in a subway that smelled like piss and being stared down by a druggie, I would be lying on a featherbed, looking through girlie magazines. I would be comfortable listening to the newest music and watching my blond best friend strut in front of me in the new sundress she bought in Paris the weekend before.
Of course maybe I was never popular material anyway and if someone came up to me and gave me the choice of changing my friendship with Miranda to be popular I would laugh and say they were crazy. No, I wouldn't do that different either. I love Miranda and I wouldn't give up all of our adventures just so that I could have a rich blond best friend and be popular. That's sick. So no, that decision is safe too.
So maybe it was the first time I saw Miranda smoke. We were behind her father's restaurant, ultimately pissed off because her boyfriend had just dumped her for that would-be-my-best-friend blond girl. She was crying, her mascara running down her face and we were sitting on the back steps.
"He's a jerk." I cooed.
"No, he wasn't. I wish he were because that would make it so much easier to let go. But he wasn't. He was a good boyfriend."
"Miranda, please don't beat yourself up. He'll regret it one day. I know he will."
"No, she'll probably be some rich housewife that won't look a day over twenty-five and I'll be a washed up musician crying on the back steps of my father's restaurant because even he won't give me a job."
"That's not true." I said.
"It's the worst night of my life, Ari. The worst! And now Dad tells me we're moving to New York." Miranda broke out in new peals of sobbing.
That was the worst, I thought. She would move away from me forever and I would die without her. Actually I am probably in more danger with her than without but I'd miss her. She sobbed into my shoulder again. Then she took a deep shaky breath and looked up at me. Shadows covered her face and her black hair gave her pale face a dark halo. Black streaks of mascara ran down her face but her pale blue eyes pierced me just like they always did. I could hear the chains from her thousands of necklaces clashing together.
"Come with me." She whispered. "Your Mom wants to move doesn't she?"
"Well…" I paused. Sure, Mom had told me she wanted to move. Ever since Dad left us when I was seven she said that she would move anywhere I wanted to. She just wanted to make me happy. I felt Miranda's ice cold hands clasp mine now. I could feel her metal rings cutting into my hands, so cold in the night air they burned.
"Just tell her you want to move to New York. Then we could be together again. Forever."
I could have said yes. I could have gone home and told Mom and she would have rented an apartment in the building right next to Miranda's and we would've moved before school started again the next year. Then we would've stayed closer than ever and we would've grown together, adjusting to the sinister life in New York. We would've gone to parties together and I would've become more and more like her.
But that would just make me more and more like what I was running from now. And the truth is I like who I am, even though it's not who Miranda thinks I should be. I probably wouldn't have changed like Miranda did either. I would have stayed the same, boring old me.
"I can't, Miranda." I whispered back, my breath becoming mist in the air. "I just can't do that. We can still stay close when you move." I told her.
But the moment was broken. I had chosen my hometown over her where she probably wouldn't choose me over the town. Miranda dropped my hands, her necklaces banging again. She stood shakily and I jumped up with her. But she looked away, her long hair falling in front of her white face acting as a curtain, blocking me out.
"Miranda, come on." I said, pulling at her bell-sleeve.
"Forget about it." She said coldly. "It's nothing." And she crossed her arms over her chest and walked out of the alley. I watched her pull her first cigarette out of her pocket, light it, and take a drag. She coughed a little before taking another. After a few times she got it down and smoked it until the fire had eaten the cigarette into ash all the way to the butt. Miranda threw it on the pavement like they do in movies and ground it in, the last of the white smoke circling around her fingers and up above her head.
I could have taken it away from her; maybe even slapped some sense into her like she would've done for me. But I'm not like her. I can't be bold and controlling like that, even if it is for good. I should have helped her through her time of hardship but I didn't. I just stood in the alley, watching her in the moonlight. I thought about how her black hair blended in with the night sky around her and how her silver chains glistened. I thought about how empty her coughing had seemed, how she didn't care, and how she held the cigarette between her middle and index finger like a pro. How she tapped the ashes off with her thumb like she'd been doing it for years. All I could do was watch the white smoke that escaped her thin lips in tiny wisps circle like steam above her head. I thought about how ironic it was that I couldn't tell the difference between the mist her clean breathe made in the cold air and the smoke that also issued from her lips.
That might have been the wrong decision. But I doubted it. I don't think it would've helped. And I am still in love with my town and love living there. And apparently I didn't want to live in New York with Miranda.
So what could it have been? Think, Ari, think! You had to have made some wrong decision! Oh, I know. I know it right down to the second of the minute of the hour of the day. I have made plenty of decisions that contributed to how all the events in the past weeks have gone but the biggest one was a month ago. A month ago after Miranda had come down for her first visit. She had been with us for two weeks before she dropped the bombshell.
We were sitting down at the kitchen table in my house. I had just made a pot of coffee and poured it in the mugs I remembered Miranda and I used to like when we were little. I was explaining to her my newfound love for caffeine and she looked very disinterested. I doubt she even knew what I was talking about because when I paused to take a breath she used the brief silence to interrupt.
"Do you want to come back to New York with me?" She asked.
"What?" I asked, blinking a few times before settling into that staring contest that we tend to get into when we're serious. She always wins because she has that icy stare when mine is totally unthreatening and soft.
"Do you want to come back to New York with me?" She asked again. "I'll drive you and you can stay with Dad and me in the apartment. It's no problem. Come on. I can introduce you to all my new friends."
I didn't see why not. I mean, after all, she had visited me. It would only be polite for me to visit her new home, right? And Mom would be more than happy for me to actually go on a road trip with Miranda. And, hey, I bet it'd be a lot of fun!
"Okay." I said and sipped my coffee as she gave me that smile that always made me feel like I had given her the right answer. She started talking a lot about plans we would have to make and when we would leave.
There was no doubt in my mind even back then that that was a bad decision. None whatsoever. But now I know it was the worst of all my decisions. Because the last month has been the worst month of my life. It has changed me so much that I doubt I will ever be the same again. I might've been better off with the blonde popular girl or maybe I would've been better off going to New York years ago so the problems with Miranda hadn't gotten so big. What the hell, maybe I should've gone to Jefferson or told Miranda to go away when she bit Bob/Bill, or maybe I should have worn a different pair of jeans last Wednesday. Who knows?
The subway just came to a screeching stop and the doors slide open. I can see the sign just outside and this is my stop. I stand and the boy with the pink hair makes a rude gesture with his hands. The old woman with the pocketbook gasps and glances quickly at me.
At this time I could calmly go over to the pink-haired boy and slap him, like Miranda would to teach him a lesson. But I'm not like Miranda and I can't do that. Instead I just hurry off the subway, followed by his mocking laughter. Maybe I should have slapped him or at least said something that would have cut him down and put him in his place. Maybe later I will wish I had said something bold or brave or clever. But that isn't the decision I made. I decided to run. And in life I don't get the chance to change that decision, no matter how shitty the outcome.