Secondhand Purses (3 page)

With that, I turned on my heel and stormed out. The absolute silence in that fast food joint did not escape me, but I was too pissed off to even think about being embarrassed that I’d chewed him out publically. I reached my dad’s car and slipped inside, slamming the door possibly a little too hard. Dad just looked at me quizzically.

“Just drive, Dad.”

I was too wrapped up in the demise of my girlish dreams of a perfect first date to think about the consequences of what I’d done.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not really.”

“You know I’m here for you, no matter what, right?”

“Yeah, Dad, I know.”

“Love you, Vic.”

“Love you, too.”

I kept quiet the rest of the car ride home. When we walked through the front door, mom pulled me into a tight hug. She must have squeezed a little too tight, because I felt tears starting to pool in my eyes and slip down to my cheeks. I wiped at the offending tears with frustration, pulled away from my mom’s arms and ran up to my room. Only once I got to my room did I let them fall freely. I peeled off the perfect first date outfit and hung it back up in my closet. I started to walk away but then stopped. I went back, grabbed the hanger and put it in the very back of the closet. I didn’t want to see the perfect first date outfit for a very long time, if ever again.

***

When Monday rolled around, I really didn’t want to go to school. I had probably screwed up my chance at a quiet existence in that high school. I’d walked out on a date with one of the populars. I tried to convince my mom that I was sick but she didn’t buy it. I dragged my feet the entire duration of the much too short walk to school, and hid around the side of the building until the last possible minute to avoid as many people in the halls as possible.

While this was a great tactic as far as evasion, it meant I had to hurry when attempting my locker combination. Combination locks and I were
not
best friends. I finally got the door open and was stuffing my book bag with the first three period’s worth of textbooks when I heard it. Footsteps. Footsteps that came to a halt directly behind me. I went perfectly still with shock. I thought I’d managed to avoid this.

I slowly zipped my backpack closed, shut the locker door and turned to face a very pissed off looking Matt.

Gulp.

I tried to locate the quickest way around him, and realized that we were not alone. I was surrounded by the Mason Hills High elite. You know that nightmare everyone has at one point or another when they show up for school or work without a stitch of clothing on? I had found a new nightmare that was, like, a hundred times worse. I took a deep breath and stood a little taller. Despite the fact that internally I was shaking like a leaf, I was
not
going to let them have that power over me.

I cocked my hip to one side, resting my fist on it, and gave him the most unaffected, bored-as-hell look I could muster up.

“Yes?”

“What the hell was your problem the other night? I was nice enough to take you out for a nice dinner, and you turn all crazy bitch and go psycho and split? Then you get your daddy to talk about it this morning? He was smart not to use my name, I would have sued him. You ruined any chance you had to get with me. You think you’re going to do better than me? Seriously? Fat freakin chance.”

He stood back, arms crossed, looking smug as hell. I started boiling on the inside. It was all a show for him. This was to save face in front of his little friends.

“What was my problem? What was
my
problem? Oh, I don’t know. Perhaps the fact that I was asked on a date to go out to dinner and you took me to a damned fast food restaurant, and acted as if you expected me to be so impressed by your big spending because you spent a whopping $4.95 on my hamburger value meal. Perhaps it was the fact that you didn’t bother to open my door for me getting into the car, or even bother cleaning your nasty, sweating jock strap from the car. But what was the real problem was the fact that you went all ‘fan girl’ over my freaking dad, all but popping a chub over the fact that you got to meet him. I could possibly arrange a date for you two, but I think you should be warned in advance, he doesn’t swing that way.”

Imagine a collective gasp of about twenty people. Because that’s what it sounded like. Shock amongst the royalty that ruled the hallowed hallways. One of the invisibles had dared to put one of their peers in his place. At this point, a little gathering had formed. Never mind that class was supposed to be in session. Apparently that didn’t matter much to the rest of the students. Or the rest of the teachers, for that matter.

“You were
lucky
I even asked you out. I’m surprised you even fit in my car with how freaking huge you are. Seriously, you should apply for a job as a side show act with the circus. You didn’t actually think I would want to date you, did you? You can’t possibly think that
anyone
would ever date you for who you are?
Icky Vicki
.” His lips curled in a cruel smile, the sing-song way he said that horrible nickname the students called me turned my stomach. I had to get out of there, and fast, before they saw pain and tears in my eyes.

I rolled my eyes, and glared at him in the most unaffected manner I could conjure up. I pushed past Matt, purposefully bumping his shoulder in the process, almost knocking him over.

“Oh, excuse me, my bad.” I walked away, giving him a view of me that had become very common in his life - my retreating backside.

I walked with my head held high until I turned the corner and was out of view. At that point I ran to the bathroom with tears streaming down my face.

Did I forget to mention that I’m a touch on the plus side of the scale? No? Well, now you know. I went in my usual stall and got my cry on. Nothing like being the walking bulls eye for ridicule. Icky Vicki. God, I hated that damned name. After about fifteen minutes I realized I had to leave the bathroom and return to the real world. I checked the mirror, my eyes were a little puffy, but nothing too crazy. It wasn’t like anyone would look close enough at me to figure out that I’d cried. Deep breath, and I walked into the hallway and on my way to class, ready to catch the teacher’s wrath for being late.

***

After that day, a few things happened. One, I had a modicum of respect from the students who were lacking in popularity, such as myself. Two, no guy in his right mind came close to asking me on a date. And, finally, three - despite my new found fame - I was even more of a social outcast than I was going in.

I figured that the good thing was, I probably would be moving and changing schools sooner rather than later. Dad’s career finally had potential in my eyes.

Being the social outcast meant that my options for companionship after school were even more limited. So as I prepared to leave the house, I had to once again come up with something amazing that I would be doing so that Mom had some small amount of hope that her child was not a freak of nature. I imagined myself walking around the neighborhood again for hours, which was why I found myself contemplating a friendship with Nonna. Sigh.

I tried to slip out of the house without Mom seeing me. I managed to get the door open and was halfway out when I heard her voice.

“Vicki, what do you have planned today?”

I ducked my head and cringed a little. I didn’t want to lie to her, but I knew she wasn’t thrilled about me spending time with Nonna.

“Vicki?”

“Yeah, Mom, I heard you. Uh, I was thinking I’d go see if that old lady could use any help around her house or something. Seems like she’s all alone and could use the help.” Well, that wasn’t a complete lie. I realized that I totally made her seem elderly and decrepit, when I thought the truth was that the woman could probably run laps around me. I shook off the little bit of guilt I felt. What mom
wouldn’t
be thrilled that her daughter was trying to help a senior citizen?

Mom raised an eyebrow at me, shook her head and walked back to the kitchen.

My shoulders slumped forward as I turned to walk down the front steps. Once again I’d managed to let my mom down.

cHAPTER tHREE

I got through the school day without too much drama. I walked through the halls as a ghost, no one saw me, no one moved as I walked by. I kind of figured it was like an Amish shunning. I didn’t exist. I was dead to them. I told myself that I was totally okay with that. I wasn’t.

The final bell rang and I was on auto-pilot. My feet took their own path, not directed by anything remotely close to free will. Despite my decision that there was no way in hell I was going to go see that crazy old lady, my feet apparently felt otherwise. With Mom on my ass to make friends, I needed to do something after school that didn’t entail walking aimlessly around the neighborhood.

When I stood in front of the crazy old lady’s house, I half expected to see her outside painting a cat or something. When I got there, all I saw was a very normal looking house. It was funny that I didn’t pay any attention to how
ordinary
her home was. The woman had a strong personality and a presence that was oddly palpable.

I opened the gate and walked towards the house, which was a small cottage style home, so out of place amongst the triple-deckers that were the norm in the neighborhood. I raised my hand to knock on the door, and paused. Did I really want to spend any more time with her special brand of crazy? I thought about her beating the rug, telling me that I had to decide who I wanted to be not what I wanted to be. I thought of her calling me Alex when my name was Vicki. You know what? No. I was not sticking around. I’m sure I had better things to do than be swept up in the whirlwind that was Nonna’s world. I turned to jog back down the stairs, when the door whooshed open and a force barreled through. I whipped around in shock at the intrusion on my world and must have spun too quickly as I felt my arms flailing out, trying to maintain balance as the world tipped.

Then, hands. I felt hands on my waist. I have never felt such warm hands on any part of my body before, let alone my waist. Well, okay, when I was a little girl…a
very
little girl, Dad used to throw me up in the air and he would catch me by the waist as I giggled uncontrollably. But I was not a little girl. This was not my Dad. This was… oh shit.

I opened my eyes, my body in the total damsel in distress having been rescued by the dashing white knight position. My arms were on broad, very muscular shoulders. I found myself staring into deep, dark, sexy as sin eyes. Melt.

I was pretty sure that there was some huge orchestral buildup in the background. Had this been ‘Gone With The Wind’, Providence would have been burning around me and Rhett Butler would be slowly lowering his lips to mine. Mmmmmm. I licked my lips in anticipation. This would be my first kiss. I wanted to kiss this man. I could easily be seduced to drop my panties for him. I was more than willing to happily wave buh-bye to my virginity for him. Oh Lord, what panties did I wear today? Were they cute? Or did they scream ‘overweight girl who has pretty much given up on any attempt at cuteness’?

“Uh, are you okay?” That was not the voice of Rhett Butler, but that was a very deep voice, smoothly washing over my body and making me aware of things that I honestly had never been aware of. Like the fact that just a touch and a deep voice could make me tingly all over. All-freaking-over. But especially…
there
.

I blinked, and those eyes that had held promises of secret meetings and lost virginity just seconds ago now looked as if they were beholding a crazy person who possibly needed a white jacket with extra-long sleeves.

I regained my footing, shuffling to an awkward standing position. I started to step back, to remove myself from his hands, figuring that he wouldn’t want to hold on to me any longer than necessary. But as I pulled back, his hand slightly tightened, gently holding me in place. I looked down at his right hand on my waist, and felt the old embarrassment and shame creep through my body and up into my cheeks as I realized that he could easily feel that little bit of pudge that stubbornly sat atop my waistband.

I whipped my eyes up again to meet his, my eyes questioning as I could feel my subconscious armor being built up to protect me from the attack that I anticipated.

Instead, I met eyes that were looking into mine with such intensity that I felt the stare down to my soul. I felt as if this boy was reading my inner thoughts. I inwardly melted just a little bit more before I decided it was time to bring this moment to an end. I glanced into his eyes just one more time, willing myself to memorize it because I was certain that it would never happen again.

I stepped back, and this time he let me. I turned to leave, not trusting myself to talk because I was certain that I would just say something really stupid and make a fool out of myself.

“Wait, where are you going?”

I stopped in my tracks, slowly turning, my jaw on the ground in surprise that he talked to me.

“Um, I, uh… I guess I was just going to go home.” Wow, smooth, Vicki. He’s going to fall to his knees and beg for your undying love based solely on your eloquent way with words. I inwardly scoffed at myself.

He cocked an eyebrow at me. “But you just got here. You obviously came here for a reason. C’mon, you don’t have to leave.” He took a step towards me, holding his hand out. “My name is Nick, Nick Collici.”

I slowly reached my hand to his, feeling my insides getting warm as the warmth of his hand seeped to the rest of my body.

“Vicki Edwards.”

“Vicki.” He said my name like he was trying it out, tasting it, deciding if it was delicious or if it had a foul aftertaste. A slow grin curved his lips. He could stand in front of me just saying my name for the rest of time and I would be satisfied.
very
satisfied.

“So, watcha doin’ here, Vicki?”

“Oh, uh, the lady who lives here…she told me to call her Nonna…she said to come back today. So I did. I guess.”

I was surprised when he tipped his head back and laughed. I was mesmerized by the sound. Deep, rich, baritone laughter. Not what I expected to hear.

“Of course she did. That’s our Nonna.” He grinned at me, warm eyes twinkling with humor. “She’s actually my aunt, but has everyone call her Nonna. Sometimes I wonder if she even remembers her own name.”

With that, he turned around and took a couple steps towards the front door. I immediately felt the loss as he walked out of my personal bubble. His head turned back towards me and he tilted his chin up as he nodded his head towards the door. “You coming?”

I grinned and moved quickly to follow him through the door and into Nonna’s world.

What met my eyes when I walked through the doorway, totally blew my mind. I leaned back out and double-checked that it was the correct home. Yup, vinyl siding cottage style home. Very traditional. I pulled my head back inside and looked around…anything but traditional. Why was I surprised? This woman, who I’d met just yesterday, defied all logic and ideas of what was traditional.

The first coherent thought that flew through my mind was color. So. Much. Freaking. Color. It was a brilliant assault on my senses. Deep purples, vibrant yellows, cheerful greens; each room a different chromatic theme. It was a shock to my neutral world. My world where you don’t personalize any part of your living space because you would be leaving. This house screamed roots. It screamed permanence. And once my head acclimated to the contrasting colors fighting for my attention, my lips curled into a smile as I realized what else it screamed. It screamed home.

I hadn’t really spent a great deal of time in anyone’s house that wasn’t mine. So, my ‘normal’ was beige or vanilla painted walls with minimal personal effects. I never felt that all-encompassing warmth that was expressed in magazines and on television. A house was just that. A house. A place where your furniture was stored while you lived there. A place where you ate dinner together, did your homework and slept. That was all it was to me. Hell, in one of our moves, the box with our curtains somehow disappeared and we lived for months with towels and sheets nailed up over the windows as curtains. I know, right?

This was the first time that I felt that a structure was a home. I felt myself relax, and that small smile that was lifting the corners of my lips was now a full blown grin.

I found myself wandering from room to room on the first floor, my hand gently gliding across walls, furniture and all the different tchotchke that meant something to her but looked like clutter to anyone else. Tears pooled in the corners of my eyes as I realized how desperately I wanted seemingly meaningless knickknacks lining all surfaces of our home. My eyes drifted to this one figurine of what seemed to be a little boy sitting in a tree. I took in the details of his slouched socks, his rosy cheeks and his little green cap. I had no idea why I was so mesmerized by what my parents would refer to as just ‘stuff’. I found my hand reaching out of its own accord to gently touch the round, rosy cheeks.

“So, what do you think?”

I jumped back about three feet at the abrupt intrusion into my quiet thoughts. I felt my cheeks flame up instantly, nervous about being caught touching her stuff. I turned, my head tilted down, waiting for her admonishment.

“Well?”

I involuntarily arched an eyebrow in confusion. Confusion seemed to be a recurring theme when I spent time with this woman. My eyes slowly drifted up, making contact with a pair of hot pink Chucks, then blue jean overalls that were splattered in every color of paint that was on the walls and then some. Finally a neon yellow tie-dyed t-shirt and a white painter’s cap to complete the eclectic ensemble.

“Um, wow!” I wasn’t kidding. ‘Wow’ was the only way I could possibly describe the vision in front of me. Where yesterday she looked like an elder of an old Sicilian village, today she looked like a throwback to Woodstock, or something.

“I know, stunning, right? Seriously, Alex, what are your exact thoughts?”

“My name is Vicki.” I murmured, unconvincingly. What are my exact thoughts? No one ever wanted to know what really went through my head. Thumper said it best, “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” I found myself reciting something I’d read this morning before leaving the warm sanctuary of my bed.

“You are a vision. A manifestation of all that is right and good in the world. Of all the happiness and hope of a universe. All of that. You are all of that, wrapped up into one, amazing, incredible human.”

She stood there, a shocked stone statue, her jaw slightly agape as she registered the words I had recited. Then, once the shock subsided, laughter.

“Well, it appears we have a reader in our midst.” She looked me up and down with a glint of approval in those eyes.

Now it was my turn to be surprised.

“Uh, well, you know… just a little bit of reading…”

Those eagle eyes I’d observed yesterday honed in on my eyes, and I again had the sense that I was being scanned.

“So you don’t want my nephew here to think you have brains? Looks fade, sweetie, but a sharp mind, well, that is forever.”

I blushed from the roots of my ink black hair to the tips of my blue painted toe nails.

Nick looked at me, with that half smile on his face that I found so irresistible.

“How is it, then, that with all the hope of the universe on your shoulders, you have taken the time to get to know me?” His deep voice was tinged with humor.

My eyes bugged out. He had just recited the next line of the book to me.

“Oh my God, you’ve read The Trilogy?” The Trilogy was this book series, or, well,
trilogy
of books that was crazy popular. It was based in the future where boundaries between countries were blurred and humankind was fighting for their lives in a battle over planetary domination. I know, it sounds crazy, but it was really super awesome.

“Hasn’t everyone? I just don’t know if it was all that realistic when Katja and Johan flew the rescue ship into the wormhole.”

I found myself grinning at him. He didn’t seem to be judging me for reading. When you are in high school, being the overweight kid who does well in school is torture enough. If they find out that you actually
enjoy
reading when you aren’t in school, well, you’re just an anomaly.

“I heard that the movie is coming out in just a few weeks. It would be so cool to see it.” I tried not to sound too excited, but, I was all about The Trilogy. I’d already read the whole series twice.

“Really? I knew they were talking about making one, I didn’t realize it was that close to being released. We should go together.” He winked at me, and then turned to talk to Nonna.

I was frozen to the floor. I couldn’t have moved my legs at this point if you’d asked me to. Did he just ask me out? Did Nick want to go on a date with me? With
me
? He must have meant as friends. Yeah, that had to be it.

I looked up from the floor to see Nonna smiling that knowing smile and Nick looking concerned.

“Well, are you coming, or what?”

Something told me that while I was working out in my head whether it was a date or a friendship thing I missed something. Shit. I hated when that happened.