Lucinda – Chapter Twelve

The end of August came, like we all knew it would have to. I was broken-hearted that it was nearing a close.  It meant that Cleo would depart for college in California. Knowing Cleo, she would do extremely well out there. She would fit in the way she never had at home. I wanted to beg her to stay, but her happiness depended on leaving this town and her family behind. It seemed as though a lot of people felt that way. I kind of liked this little place no matter how cruel it had been in the beginning. I was finally accepted, and it felt like home to me.

We got together the night before she left and stayed out on the beach all night staring at the stars and talking about everything. As morning approached, the conversations became deeper and the inevitable sorrow set in, for the knowledge that our friendship, no matter how strong, would be altered forever.

“I hate that you have to go Cleo. I feel like all the important people I have in my life just leave me one by one.”

“Aww you know that’s not true. You still have Grammy and Stevie.”

“That’s just because Stevie is too young to leave yet, and Grammy… well you’re right there. She loves us all too much to leave.”

“It must be nice to have a Grammy like that.”

“You know she thinks of you as one of us. You’re as much a part of our family as I am.”

“Yeah but it must be nice to really belong to a family. My family is so screwed up. I know you understand where I am coming from.”

“You don’t talk about them much Cleo. What are they like?”

“Well, I can tell you about my brother easy enough. I adore Ryan and he adores me, though when it comes to my parents, we just don’t see eye to eye. A long time ago we agreed to disagree about them, and we haven’t looked back since. Ryan is really smart and cute. He’s the kind of guy that has all the girls chasing him. Not too much different then your Jessie. And Momma, well Momma is a little slight of a thing. Sometimes I think she’s not very bright at all. I can’t for the life of me see why she is still with daddy after all these years. He treats her horribly, always yelling at her for the littlest thing. I don’t think he hits her, but I could never be sure about that. She takes it though, seems to think that maybe she deserves it for a mistake that she made a long time ago. He’s never let her forget it. Daddy he’s just a son of a gun. He’s got a horrible temper. Like I said he is always yelling at momma and sometimes he comes down way too hard on Ryan.”

“What about you Cleo? Does he yell at you a lot too?”

“Me? No. He can’t be bothered to yell at me. We see each other in passing, but I’m just too different for him to care about.”

She told me all of this and I could hear the crack in her voice. She was on the verge of tears.

For me, her revelations lifted a cloud that had been hanging over her since I met her. I understood now why she was so distant; why it took her so long to talk to me; why she stared at me to judge my potential before she spoke to me. She was afraid I would hurt her, the way her daddy did. I wanted to hurt him, for even though he wasn’t abusing her physically; emotionally he was cutting her down in little pieces and leaving them to fall where they may, never caring if they got picked up again. Her momma must have felt the same way.

“Ryan can’t see what he does to you?”

“Yeah, Ryan sees it. But he’s daddy’s golden child. He can’t do wrong well hardly ever anyway, though dad does expect perfection from him, and sometimes that is hard to live up to, even for Ryan. I don’t know exactly why Ryan defends him. Ryan will tell me that dad is just hurt is all; that he can’t help the way he acts. I just think that Ryan defends him for fear of losing the only ounce of love the man has felt for anybody. But mark my words, some day that man is gonna do something that will make Ryan angry too. I don’t know what it’ll take but he will lose all respect for daddy too. I can’t wait for that day to come. But oh well…last one into the water is a rotten egg!”

Cleo pulled off her long top and underneath was a hot pink bikini. You could have knocked me over with a feather; I was so shocked.

“Well, come on Lucy, what are you staring at? This is the first day of the rest of my life and it’s time I started dressing the part.”

We swam out a little to the cave on the south side of the shore. We had left a lunch there earlier that day and we picnicked like it was old times. Cleo left that afternoon and she swung by my house one more time before she left, and we hugged goodbye.

“I’m gonna miss you so much. You take care of yourself and call me when you get out there. Set California on its ass!,” I cried for the friend that I was losing but also with excitement for the new life that she was starting.

“I promise you I will call you all the time and I will come home for holidays and all. You’ll see, it won’t be so bad. And remember, no matter what you discover this year, I’ll always be there for you. Call me anytime, day or night… I love you kid.”

I smiled at the nickname, “I love you too.” And with that she was gone, driving down the road and out of my life, the way that so many others had done before.

That about wraps up the summer. Oh… but Donny went to California too that September. He said he wanted to be a movie star, something like James Dean, only in his case it was something like rebel without a clue. And you know what else? I think I had the gift of prophecy that year, maybe, just maybe…if all else failed when I got out of high school, I could go off to the circus and be a palm reader, cause he left that little girl pregnant with his child, just like I thought he would. He told her he couldn’t care less; that there was no proof that it was his. She was heartbroken.