As Issa and I walked slowly to the nearest pizza parlor, I realized that I was crusty from all the sweat and tears, my hair was greasy and tangled, my clothes were dirty, and I was shaking and having fever chills. All that for my first date. The only improvement I could make, when we got there, was washing my face in the restroom.
But somehow it was more wonderful than I ever imagined a date with a boy could be. I wasn’t scared. I knew him, and he knew me. There was nothing to hide. I was more full of hope than even at the Grove. And after that long meeting, the pizza tasted better than anything in a long time.
We didn’t talk about serious things. Sometimes we didn’t even talk. I was glad — I was so tired and shaky I wouldn’t have known what to say.
We got to my house after midnight. I cried in my mom and dad’s arms for a long time. Penny was already there, and had a camping cot made up in my room. My mom ran a hot bath and helped me get out of my smelly clothes.
The last thing I remember was my dad carrying me, dripping wet, and putting me into my bed.
The next week was hell.
It seemed like I was either sweating or shivering all the time. My mom poured fruit juice down me and made me eat good meals, but I was still very weak. I took hot baths and slept a lot, but every time I woke up, Penny was there, doing her schoolwork or playing solitaire or something. When I was
awake was the bad part. I didn’t know it at first, but I slowly realized how hard I was to be with. Yelling. Demanding. Criticizing. Crying. It’s hard to remember it all. It’s hard to want to.
After a few days, Penny started to go home in the afternoon for a couple of hours. While she was gone, Issa was there. We talked about little things, happy things, like flavors of ice cream and the classes he wanted to take at the college next year.
One day my parents made an appointment with a doctor. I didn’t want to go. Penny gave me a dirty look. I went. He said all I could do was sleep and take aspirin and vitamins and all that stuff. When we got home and I looked at the vitamins my mom had bought, I started shaking and crying. They were pills. I couldn’t take them. I just couldn’t.
That evening when my dad got home, he handed me a big bottle of liquid vitamins. Penny got back from her house a few minutes later and gave me a bag of white willow bark from the herb store. Dulcy had bought it, and it would make a tea that would work just like aspirin. I hugged them both and laughed at myself.
After I started to get a little stronger, Penny took a day off and Dulcy stayed with me. We talked about herbs and things when I was awake. It was nice to be with Dulcy, and I didn’t blame her for what I had gotten into, but she still blamed herself. Issa brought over fresh bread and pastries, like he did almost every day now, and I felt good enough to walk out into the backyard. He took my hand, and we strolled around for a few minutes. As we passed the gate to the empty corral, I looked at the grass that was starting to grow there and remembered the box of garden seeds.
I tried to write in my diary about Beltane. It was hard, because so much had happened. I asked each Sprite to help me remember everything that had been said and done. I wasn’t able to get it all into words, but I knew it had been one of the most important days in my life, and I knew I’d never forget it.
After about three weeks, I was feeling a lot better. Issa and Michael would come over in the evening and the four of us would double-date in the living room with a board game and bowls of ice cream. My parents would peek in and smile sometimes. I knew they were proud of me. I was proud of myself, too.
One morning Penny asked me if I had any pills left. At first I couldn’t remember — but eventually I thought of all the places I used to stash them.
We came up with about 20, and had a ceremonial toilet flushing.
School was out now, and Penny and I were eating lunch in the backyard one day when a car drove up. I heard the doorbell ring. A chill came over me and my stomach got tight. I quietly crept inside through the back door.
Penny crept along behind me. I was afraid, but I felt a surge of courage too.
I’m not sure how I knew — the way the car stopped or intuition maybe — but I knew that something bad was here, something dangerous.
Mom and Dad were talking to someone in the living room. A woman. “. . .
and her suspicious associations early this year combined with her absence from school last month . . .” I couldn’t hear it all. Penny and I snuck down the hall to the living room door. “. . . it seems that she has not had adequate supervision by you two, and so it may be necessary for the state . . .”
I was getting mad. I stepped into the living room, and Penny was right beside me.
“Honey, this is Mrs. Walker, a social worker from . . .”
“I know who she is. She followed me all over school for weeks, but wouldn’t even talk to me. And now she’s here to pretend she knows something about me so she can put a label on me and send me to some institution. Well, it won’t work, because you don’t know ANYTHING about me! You don’t know who my REAL friends are, the ones who know me. You don’t know anything AT ALL about my parents, and how much they’ve helped me! You have no idea all the drugs I took, or how easy they were to get at school. It took the people who know me and love me to get me out of it!”
The lady was standing now, holding her clipboard and frowning. I was seething. I walked farther into the room and looked right at her. “I almost DIED, and you knew it was happening, and the school counselor knew, and my teachers knew, but none of you would do ANYTHING. None of you would listen to me and try to understand. Only my friends knew, and they had the courage to help me!”
She was backing toward the front door now, hiding behind her clipboard.
I was almost crying, but I was still angry. “I’ve gone through HELL getting
free of those drugs, and my friends and my parents have been with me every minute of the time. You have NO right to accuse anyone here of being a bad parent! You don’t know how much my parents have helped me, and I’m certainly not going to tell you because I’m SURE you couldn’t understand!”
The front door had been left open, and now she turned and dashed out as quickly as she could, clutching her clipboard to her chest. I was breathing so hard I was gasping for breath. Her car started and screeched away.
My knees started shaking and I felt faint. Penny caught me and settled me onto the floor. I was trying not to cry. I looked up at my mom and dad. Mom looked embarrassed, but Dad said, “I can see that I have a very strong daughter.”