“Dania, I’ve got to go. You need to head home,” I said a lot more nicely than I had been with Reggie and Stu. With Dania you had to tiptoe carefully. While I was known for my quick temper, Dania was known for ripping your guts out with her bare hands if you looked at her funny. She was volatile and completely mental. Add a dose of pregnancy hormones on top of her already scary personality and you had someone closely akin to a psychopath.
Dania opened her eyes slowly and brought her hands up to her eyes, covering them. “Turn off the light, Ells,” she moaned.
I shook her foot lightly. “I’ve got somewhere to go. You need to head back to your place. I can give you a ride if you need me to,” I said gently.
“I feel horrible,” Dania whined, trying to sit up. She glared down at her belly as if it were the unborn baby’s fault she felt like shit.
She gingerly combed through her long, black hair with her fingers. Even hung over and with dried saliva on the side of her mouth, Dania was beautiful. She always had been. With black, shiny hair and light blue eyes framed with thick lashes, she looked like a movie star.
When we were in foster care together, Dania talked about running away to New York. She said she’d be discovered and begin her amazing career as a world famous model. Back then, she both loved and hated the way she looked. She thought her face would be her ticket out of Wellsburg. That it would give her a better life. But she hated it because of the attention it brought her. Particularly from our foster dad.
But since leaving the system at eighteen, her dreams of leaving Wellsburg had dwindled away. Pummeled by real life. She stopped dreaming. She stopped thinking big. She accepted. Like we all eventually did.
They say misery loves company. And we were the best company each other had.
“Where are you going?” Dania asked, slowly swinging her legs over the side of my bed, making sure to avoid the vomit on the carpet.
“I promised Jeb I’d help Melanie with the inventory this morning,” I lied effortlessly. What a load of shit. And if Dania were feeling half way human she would have called me on it. I hated Melanie Stanton, the other female clerk at JAC’s. To be fair I hated most people. But I made it a point to never willingly be in her presence. Jeb had learned early on that it was not a good idea for Melanie and I to share shifts.
Melanie was a forty-year-old woman who, up until her husband was laid off work, had been a stay at home mom. And she was everything I disliked in a person. She was perky. She was always put together. She talked endlessly about her perfect fucking family. And worst of all, she smiled all of the goddamned time. She made me want to slide down into a warm bath and slit my wrists.
“Oh okay. Is Reggie still here?” she asked, pushing her feet into her three inch spiked heeled boots.
“She should be. She and Stu were half naked in my living room when I went out there a little while ago,” I commented dryly. Dania’s eyes narrowed and I wished I had made more of an effort to filter my comments.
“Did they hook up?” she growled. Why had I said anything? I had no doubt Reggie and Stu had screwed on my lumpy couch after I had passed out last night. Our group of friends was incestuous. It was disgusting really.
We should have been way passed declaring ownership on one another. We hung out. Some of us screwed on occasion. No biggie.
But Dania was extremely territorial of Stu. They had dated for almost a year when we were fifteen. And even though I was pretty sure Stu didn’t possess the ability to develop feelings for anyone, Dania had been crazy, head over heels in love with him. When they had stopped dating (which had everything to do with her jealousy and possibly due to his sexual orientation), she had lost it. In true Dania style, she had gone raging psycho bitch and had egged his car and smashed his bedroom window with a rock.
Stu had taken it all in stride, not seemingly bothered by his ex-girlfriend’s nuclear meltdown. Though he had, on one occasion, called her a whore in front of half the school.
But over time, Dania had calmed down and moved on. It’s what she did. But that hadn’t stopped her from harboring a deep seeded burn for Mr. Lack of Personality.
I shrugged, already done with the conversation. I checked my watch and saw that if I didn’t leave now, I’d be late for my financial aid meeting. “I doubt it. I think they just fell asleep.” I was a really good liar.
Dania shoved passed me and stomped out to the living room. Sighing, I followed her. Reggie was reclining on the couch.
“Where’s Stu?” Dania demanded. Reggie blinked up at her in surprise. Reggie wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. Honestly she was as dumb as rocks.
But even she could tell that she was in some deadly waters.
“Uh, he already left. You need a ride home?” Reggie asked, looking at me in a near panic. Everyone knew Dania went mental over Stu. Particularly when Stu was screwing someone else. Like I said, Reggie was an idiot.
“Did you fuck him?” Dania screeched. Sheesh. I’d never get out of here at this rate. I reached down, took ahold of Reggie’s arm and pulled her to her feet. I then began herding both of them out of my apartment, grabbing my bag and keys on our way out.
“It’s not like that, D,” Reggie pleaded. Dania had already clenched her fists and I knew a fight was brewing. My friends were a classy bunch.
“Look you two. If you’re going to do this, don’t do it here. My landlord is already breathing down my neck about my late rent payment. You two having a chick fight in front of the building would not look good. So please, take your shit somewhere else,” I said tiredly.
I gave Reggie a push toward her car. “Take her home. Deal with her there,” I told her. Reggie looked scared. I didn’t blame her. Dania was pissed. And when she was pissed, she was irrational. Good luck with that.
“Take me home,” Dania demanded, glaring at Reggie who looked ready to pee in her slutty pants.
I made sure the two of them left before I got into my own car. I turned the key and the engine made a clicking noise before it finally turned over. I heard a distinctive clanging as I pulled out onto the road and knew that couldn’t be good. But as long as the old clunker got me to where I needed to be, I internally promised to have it looked at as soon as I had the cash.
Black River Community College was only fifteen minutes from where I lived but it might as well be on another planet. This was a side of Wellsburg that still looked semi-decent. Well-manicured lawns and pretty brick buildings were everywhere.
I stuck out in my jean shorts and second hand button up shirt like a sore thumb. I had made an effort to look nice today but my wardrobe was severely limited. As I looked around at the other kids in their pretty clothes and nicely trimmed hair, for the first time I was embarrassed by how little I had.
Enough of the feeling sorry for myself shit. That didn’t get me anywhere. I threw my shoulders back and squared my jaw before heading in the direction of the financial aid office.
An hour later I left the building in a bit of a daze. I had gone into the meeting expecting to have the door kicked shut in my face.
What I hadn’t anticipated was to have…options.
That wasn’t something I was accustomed to.
But they were there, shining like new pennies. For the first time in my life, something I wanted might actually happen.
Mrs. Randolph, the head of financial aid at the school, had looked over my GED paperwork. I had done surprisingly well on the test for having barely paid attention during the prep course.
Apparently, given my history in the system as well as my low-income status, I qualified for several grants that would pay for me to take classes. As in I wouldn’t have to pay for it out of pocket. As in, I no longer had an excuse for not doing this.
I had taken the folder of paperwork from Mrs. Randolph with a promise I’d fill it out and return it to her before the fall semester’s July 30th deadline. She had said she could expedite the financial aid process so that I would be able to start at the end of August when classes started.