Chapter 2

 Coming into myself

That summer the lifeguard and I flirted consistently . The whole time I worked at that camp everyone thought I was already seeing someone because I didn’t give way to conversations. Even still, most of the girls got jealous.. Imagine that… I never really had anyone be jealous of me up to this point. I was always the one feeling like an outcast. I was usually the one being nit picked on because of braces and glasses and my reserved manor. Mostly they were jealous of me and one of the older counselors that they all swooned after. I knew he was way outta my range in age but intellectually we got along. He was very good looking but he was at least 9 years older than me and had a girlfriend. Him and I would talk all the time though. Mainly because he said I wasn’t like all the other girls at the camp, he noticed my intellect. He knew for my age I had an older soul and so we would talk about life and he knew I knew my role and wasn’t going to be one of the other girls trying to constantly flirt. When he was having problems trying to figure out how to do nice things for his girlfriend I would always help and give him some ideas, but other than that we were just friends. Between him and a few of the other guys in the camp that I would hang out with, they were more welcoming. Most of the girls were always judging,plus they liked to talk. They were always wrong though and that was the funny part. I would never give any clues to who I really was because they always would jump to conclusions and then try to talk shit. The funniest part  was when the guys would come to me and tell me everything these girls said about me. I loved that they would tell me only so that I could avoid the ones that were the worst offenders.

I continued to work out and every day after camp I would hit the gym on campus. Almost every day the lifeguard I had my eyes on would join.. There was always flirting and random comments until finally one day, he made his move. It was that moment that I gained a sliver of confidence in my sexuality and body.

Mid workout, while it was just us, I was pulling the weight bar when he came up and just planted a kiss on me. He started to unzip the front of my bodysuit while my hands were still busy on the pulley bar.. Yep this was my chance. My whole body had a heat flash and I went flush. I replaced the bar and he moved me up against the wall and continued to kiss me. The whole time I was thinking that at any moment someone could walk in on us and this could get bad. I slowed him down enough to catch my breath.

I convinced him I didn’t want to be in the workout room, just in case anyone came in and so instantly he grabbed my hand and we were off… He had a set of keys to almost every room on campus since his mother was a teacher at the school.  He took me to the typing room, we both knew that room wouldn’t have any traffic until school started months later. Once in the room he made sure the blinds were closed and he pounced again. And there on the typing room floor I lost my virginity to that lifeguard.

Afterward we lay panting on the floor smiling and laughing. We both agreed that we would tell no one, that way neither one of us would get fired. It was the perfect plan. We both redressed and then made sure the coast was clear as we left separately to make sure no one would see us together. I didn’t care if he was doing half the camp counselors as long as none of them knew about me.  I didn’t need the gossip to have any amo.

That was one of the few times we hooked up .. he became a friend with benefits.. I didn’t care if I never saw him again, in all honesty that’s exactly that I wanted.. something with no strings. But he was a fun fling of flirting from time to time.

Not even 2 weeks later J started to really advance more on his comments about me becoming a woman..I don’t know if it was my new found confidence or if I just really started to realize that no matter what, everyone was gonna look at me in their own way so I should just run with it and stop being so invisible and just be me. I would just keep it private and to myself. No one could hurt my life if they didn’t know what was going on in it.

My mother was constantly telling me how I needed to be pretty and thin to get a good guy. That I needed to marry a man with money to take care of me. I would argue with her that I didn’t want all that, I wanted someone who just wanted me.. in all my entirety. I’d make my own money. I knew I’d never live up to the Playboy Bunny physique, I was taller than my mom now and filling out with boobs and ass. I had a little fluff on me.. toned but fluffy. I couldn’t even fit in my mothers clothes when I  was 10 so I definately didnt expect to fit or walk in her shoes being the size I was now.I knew I would never again be that silent quiet brain dead girl that just smiled and looked pretty, so fuck it.. I was gonna run with what life gave me and this was the whole package whether they liked it or not. I was gonna just speak my truth and rock this body. Don’t get me wrong, I was still shy to talk most of the time, but at this point I was more reserved… I guess I was just calculating outcomes at that point.. I would look at what was going on and either decide to engage or ignore it. Most of the time I ignored it.

It wasn’t long before I found myself in a compromised position with J while at my grandmother’s one weekend. And this is where without me even trying, he calculated on the chance to hook up.  I had gone to sleep in my bedroom, in the middle of the night I awoke to being on the couch with him at my feet rubbing my legs. He talked to me while I became more aware of the situation that was unfolding.  Eventually we ended up having sex there in the living room of my grandmothers. After we were done I remember walking back to my room and finding it all disheveled like he had come and gotten me and brought me to the couch. I could only assume he did so that it wouldn’t leave evidence on the sheets since my grandmother had a leather couch that was easily cleaned. I paid no more mind to that other than realizing he had thought it through. Here I was finally getting a guy that for years looked at me like a little girl. The quarterback for the high school that all the girls crushed after. I wouldn’t look the gift horse in the mouth. Not only did I get the hot lifeguard, but now the quarterback.. all in a short span… I didn’t dilute myself with dreams though.. as much as I crushed on J, he still wasn’t D… It felt different in the energies between us. With J and the lifeguard it was lust, pure sex and that was it.. No connections where I still felt truly seen, only seen as a shell of a pretty body and I could tell the difference.

I knew in the moment that this was just another interaction that would be a good once in a while romp.

It’s weird really looking back. Even then as I look back I see how much I was always the adult stuck living the younger experience.

Life kept going.. Now I had 2 secret hook ups to balance.  Now it was all about finding things that would bring joy despite the fog that was always looming.

I kept quiet and barely looked to hook up with anyone else like all the girls my age at school. I knew none of them held anything more than basic disappointment. I would watch as they bounced from boyfriend to boyfriend in school. The girls would talk about loving these guys and the guys would talk about the girls as if they were trophies to conquer. I was always watching everyone else with a view like watching a movie. I just couldn’t deal with the guys in my school. No matter how much they all tried to act like they were the “it” guy, all I could see was little boys playing capture the flag while giggling about their tactics. 

So I continued to watch from the sidelines and take in the scenery of the game. I just continued with school and my extra activities after school  as usual. If I was going to date they would have to pass the tests and most of the guys around me couldn’t even pretend to pass the first trial.

I would take to watching people everywhere I went, even making a game of it with friends. We would guess their lives then try to see if we could talk to them and get the answers to confirm our predictions.

That Halloween I went with my cousin to a late night Rocky Horror picture show. As we were driving there I looked over to the car next to me. There driving ,along the side of us, there he was…D.

The spark hit instantly when I realized it was him… But I couldn’t expect him to have the same spark. Let’s be real, many things happened up to this point, his life could’ve changed just as much as mine to this point since we last saw each other. For all I knew he could have met someone else and forgotten all about me. I was hopeful internally but at the same point I was preparing myself for the worst.

When I got to the theater he pulled up with his friends and they got in line not far in front of us. I was lagging with my cousin trying to assess the situation. I was so unsure though.. I wasn’t sure if I should say anything because for all I know, he ghosted me and just didn’t want to be with me. There in line my cousin was trying to chat my ear off and she noticed me staring at him, all while he’s staring back… He kept staring. It was unnerving. Was he staring because he thought I was someone else or did he recognize me? My cousin persisted and I told her who I was staring at. I had to tell her the whole situation, about how I secretly would meet up with him and how I truly felt a connection but was nervous.. She finally convinced me to shoot my shot. I decided to walk towards the bathroom and use that as my excuse. As I walked by, our eyes locked and I meekly asked if his name was D (trying to seem like if he wanted to avoid me then he could lie). Immediately he smiled at me and said “Hello, I knew it was you, I was just wondering if you were going to want to talk to me.” He proceeded to get a pen and paper from a friend and asked me to write down every number to get in touch with me because he didn’t want to ever lose touch again. It was at that moment, the world got brighter again.

We picked up talking that night and no matter what, I felt seen again. When I finally decided to give him the ultimate test of meeting my mother just a few weeks later, I was so nervous. The night he came over I barely remember what led up to it, but I remember his reaction to her like it was yesterday. After they meet and talked my mom left the room to go upstairs and he turned to me and said ” Your mom’s pretty and all but there’s just something that’s off about her that I can’t put my finger on”

In that exact moment.. I knew finally someone could see through the outside facade and I wasn’t going to be invisible and alone forever.

I finally had another person that would help me know I wasn’t crazy and just a forethought to the world.

The world could’ve crumbled around me and I wouldn’t have known. The time with him was the brightest point in my day. While I was at school I was on cloud nine and anyone who tried to rain on my parade got a rude awakening that they didn’t matter in my life. We talked almost daily and I started hanging with him and his friends. When I finally got to meet his parents I realized why he was so unfazed by my life. We were warriors on the same path… His parents were outlaw bikers. His bio dad beat him and his mother until his mom left and met her outlaw new husband. We were birds of the same feather. Both misunderstood by the world around us and both just wanting a release to be ourselves.

Patti was barely around at this point, usually off with her boyfriends, so I had more freedom to roam.

This was all in the beginning of my high school freshman year. And it only got more interesting.

His friends became my friends. We would hang out and play cards, go to his warehouse for band practice and go out for late night diner excursions. Most of my friends didn’t really pay attention or come from any of that so they didn’t linger in my life very long. They came and went.. some moving, some finding their own boyfriends, some just fading into their own hobbies. I had a few close friends. By day I would go to school and skip to go surfing with and at night I would hang with D’s friends at their warehouse for the band or work. I avoided being home as much as possible but would do everything I had to quickly, and then be off.

It was about a year into dating that we had our first break up. I remember him just wanting a break, and it nearly took me out.. I felt like my heart had been ripped from my chest. A girlfriend of mine said that the break up was the equivalent of Bella and Edward’s breakup in Twilight for me, and looking back.. she wasn’t wrong…

No screaming, but tons of crying. Not eating, and just blah. The darkness had come in and swallowed all the sunlight. I barely wanted to deal with anyone and that happy go lucky now was just meh. I didn’t want to hang out with anyone. I couldn’t stomach the thought of eating. I was just nauseated daily and lost weight. 

At one point a girl that I barely knew ( Jessica )in my Spanish class who was a super cute cheerleader broke down and asked me what was up. No one actually asked until her. Once I told her I was just going through a break up,she gave me a chain and told me to cheer up and anytime I was feeling low to remember the chain around my neck as a link to the other people around me in the world.  She was a glimmer.. and after that she made it a point to come say hello to me everyday. Here a random cheerleader in my class cared more than  most of my friends. She took the time to talk to me about it all. We spent Spanish class, most days just talking while doing our assignments.

The rest of the year I focused on just being.. I worked on the weekends at one of the bars my mom worked at as a door girl collecting money. I know a lot of it was so she could keep an eye on me and honestly I didn’t care. I got to know a lot of the night time social elite and was getting known around the older crowd.

I had older men hitting on me constantly. Many were claiming to be photographers, modeling agents or just wanting to take me out. The rest of the bar staff would keep an eye out for me and warn me or save me from certain people they felt I shouldn’t be around. The club life was a great distraction and Patti would use me as her eyes and ears so I could help her at work.

While working at the clubs I started collecting secrets… I started to realize the lies everyone lived in. The teachers and staff that had girlfriends and wives, the ones who did drugs, the dark secrets of how these adults lived their secondary lives. Secrets were everywhere and so many would unfold at my feet.

I started collecting the secrets, and oh how I found I could use them.

Mom didn’t care, as long as I went to school and kept up the look of being a good kid. The teachers would keep their mouths closed cause they usually had to worry about their own problems coming out if they told how they saw me.

There were so many secrets. Teachers moonlighting as strippers, guidance counselors that had younger girls from other high schools that they were partying with. The dirt I collected was endless. All of it gave me any hall pass I needed. Late to class, here’s a pass. Want to leave early, here’s a pass. Not coming back from lunch, who’s with you? Ok, you’re all excused. Even the security guard was in the list.. oh going to skip? While you’re out grab me a sandwich. The world now opened up to the corrupt truth of favors.

During the week I would work at the local Pizza place, I would deliver menus and do flyers for them. Anything I could to keep busy.

Mom started dating a guy that lived in Sweden so we ended up going for the summer that year.

Sweden was cold but beautiful and I spent most of my time alone hopping the train to any of the closer cities to explore while my mom was busy with her boyfriend. His son was a little closer to my age so I made friends with some of the girls that hung around his friends. It was an amazing adventure while learning about all the local things. The whole month we were there I can honestly say I looked forward to everyday even being alone. People didn’t know me here and so everyone was friendly and willing to show their favorite spots or go on adventures with me. I learned to speak and read the language just by being there and it surprised my mother that I would read the paper and tell her about any of the local news. It was a whole new fountain of knowledge of people.  I didn’t look forward to going home. The trip was total food for my soul. I wanted to travel more, learn more, see more.

I would soak in every experience and just enjoy every view. I loved meeting new people with so many different lives. But eventually the time ended and my mother got sick of said boyfriend, so we went home. Back to my cloud of gray. It was my first day back that I learned about Jessica.

Jessica died in a drunk driving accident that summer while I was in Sweden, she was a passenger and the kid driving jumped a curb and hit a tree. She died on impact.

I NEVER forgot what she meant to me and I wore her necklace everyday.

I spent the next 2 years in a daze honestly. I was bouncing between theater, swim team, marketing class, my dance classes, work and trying to play with friends. D came in and out of the picture but I kept it light emotionally so that I never felt the pain like the first break up. All the while I tried to still stay out of the crossfire of my mother. I got my license the day I turned 16. That gave a whole new problem in my life. Because of my last name I was instantly pegged by any cop in my crossfire. I was pulled over almost weekly just because I wanted to drive the family car. It got to the point where I started to know the cops by shifts and first names. There was no escaping the family name with the cops. Some would be nice and let me go, but others would pull the power move while trying to intimidate me and anyone in my car. It was so redundant that finally the regular cops started just waving me by while pulling up next to make sure it was me. It was only once in a while when a rookie would pull me over and actually go the full gamut of handcuffing me while searching the car. I hated the tedious mundane harassment. It was around October when I started seeing a guy nicknamed Twist. He was a few years older than me and highly tattooed. He worked construction and attended the hard core shows in his off time. I had kept him separate from my family and background. He was my secret safe space. He wasn’t super hot it super intelligent but he was very catering to just wanting to be around me. After swim meets or surfing I would go relax at his place. Christmas was coming up and my grandmother had found out that I was seeing someone. The family pressed me to invite him to family dinner but I knew he would not go over well. He was highly tattooed at 22 and looked like a skinhead. Between his physique and his choice of clothes I knew that they wouldn’t approve. My family assured me that if he was good to me that he must be a good guy and they wanted to meet him and would look past the ink. Christmas night I went to get him after he had worked a long shift and knew instantly it would not be good but figured I’d give my family the chance to prove me wrong. Unfortunately Twist had gotten a tattoo only days before on the back of his head that read “Demon spawn”.I already knew this was not going to go over well. Walking into dinner with the entire family almost felt surreal. My grandmother welcomed him in with a large smile. My Jewish grandfather actually welcomed him in easily and started to ask him about his ink and the meaning. My mother came in and took one look at him and I could see the daggers. She proclaimed in the kitchen “Over my dead body”. At that point she made the scene larger than life and screamed at us the whole way of talking him home. Twist stayed quiet, trying to be the bigger person and I truly felt horrible exposing him to her venom. I can only imagine how he must have felt. I hated that we both thought they might be accepting at least enough or respectable enough to go through with dinner. By the time we got to his doorstep I was in tears. She threatened him to never contact me again unless he wanted to go to jail. I never wanted him to pay for her discrimination. He grabbed my face one last time and kissed me as we said goodbye that night whispering that he didn’t care about her and that he would do whatever it took to see me. That night I got the beating of a lifetime. The minute I got into the car she slammed her fist so hard into my chest it almost knocked the wind out of me. The next morning my grandmother called me to thank me while giggling. She thanked me for giving her the best view of karma with my mother. It was like salt to the wound. I spent the next week trying to find excuses to go to the store so I could call Twist from the payphone. He tried to stay true to his word for not carrying but in the end I broke it off with him for his own safety. He was my secret safe space and I knew my mother wouldn’t give me that satisfaction or peace.

I went back to keeping to myself and focusing on school and work. I worked to pay for any food or school supplies to keep my distance further from my mother since everytime I needed money she would get more intense in her arguments. I was paying my way for anything I wanted or needed including my concerts and clothes at this point and so I would take in any small side jobs like cleaning houses or detailing cars. I started house sitting and even doing the basic errand running for people just to make extra. I took any job to just stay away from home when my mother was home.

After working for so many with the odd jobs I had met many different types of well connected people in the city. Any friend that knew someone hiring, I applied for. None of the work was constant but it kept the money coming in while I was in school. When a business owner went out of town and needed someone to check on their house or make it look like someone was still there, I was handed the keys and given a couple hundred dollars. I was getting known in the community as a dependable person. 

I was now super connected beyond what any teenager probably should be. I always kept it humble. I only used the cards when I needed to. I never wanted to know all the information I got but it came to me nonetheless. Pretty soon I started seeing which ones were the snakes in the grass. It was also about the time I got a real vision of my family when my grandfather suddenly went into a coma after 8 years of fighting prostate cancer and almost succeeding. That was until the doctors convinced him to do chemo. He had gotten all his cancer down to only 10% left in One bone. They convinced him to do a round of chemo , explaining that he could kill the last bit and be cancer free. Instead, he slipped into a coma that night and then for the three days following. Until he took his last breath. I watched as my family matriarch tried to convince my uncles to suffocate him just to stop the death rattle. Losing him hit me, but watching the family attack each other after, that was the kicker. Anyone that was up to no good came out pretty quickly from every corner in my world.  I was partying to distract myself when I wasn’t working at night. Mom was usually off at work and when she wasn’t working she was traveling with whatever boyfriend was around. During the day I would  sleep through most of my classes while still doing just enough to float in my classes. I started getting into surfing more whenever the waves were good, which in Florida is not often but it was enough to keep me happy. Whenever possible I would drive up north to Cocoa beach to surf just to escape. I took up extra things in high school to keep me busy. Between a schedule mix up putting me in dance and being on flag team, and drama I kept busy. Then I dropped the dance team only to have the marketing team and the swim team recruit me. This was also the time I got my first tattoo. I had my fake ID for working in the clubs so of course it worked in the tattoo shop.I got it in honor of my grandfather without my family knowing. I kept it hidden well since most of them never really paid attention. We were like passing roommates, barely having to really encounter each other enough to see or say anything.

I didn’t want to sleep, I didn’t want any down time. The less the better. I would take acid, smoke pot or take no doz just to keep going without focusing on anything major. “Just keep going” was how I looked at it. Drinking never did much for me and getting drunk seemed almost impossible physically, so I gravitated more to the other devices.

My mother had taken in a roomate Greg that year. Greg was in the circuit with the drug dealers in town. He was not able to drive so in my off time he paid me to take him around town to do errands. It was during our errands that he usually had me take him to a bar to do a meet up with one of his friends. Since I was underage and Greg knew it I would play the kids card. I would sit in the parking lot and wait.I never wanted to push the fake ID much unless I really needed to for work. After a few times of going there the bartender Steve Trotter came out and invited me in for water and a bathroom break. He started doing it almost every time I drove Greg . After a month of doing that the door guy didn’t even bat an eyelash at me going into the bar.  Even when the night time shift would come in they never thought I was anything other than another patron. After a few months of seeing me constantly Steve approached me about a job at the club. Steve was an amazing energy person. He had long sandy blonde almost strawberry blonde hair down to the middle of his back with a raspy voice that he earned from smoking menthols everyday. He was in his early thirties and was always smiling. He loved to blow fireballs behind the bar and do tricks. It was fascinating to watch him in action most days. I loved his amazing energy.

I started working as a cocktail waitress because Steve Trotter vouched for me and he became my ally in the night world. Patti didn’t even know for about 3 months and once she found out, she helped sell the lie. Why would she do that you might ask, well she didn’t pay for anything outside of the normal house bills. I paid for everything else. My gas, insurance, food, pager,clothes and anything school related was all on me. At one point she tried to pull a power move threatening to expose me and once I brought up what she would have to pay and how it would affect her, she immediately backed down.

At this time I would hang out with Steve, the bartender that got me the job. Steve was 16 years older than me but he was the life of the party and a daredevil. Everyone thought I was older and I had the fake ID to back myself just to be able to work in the clubs without fear. Steve knew my age but always helped me navigate the snakes. Once in a while when I was close to burning out, he’d offer me a quiet bed to sleep in at his place and he was always up for fun conversation and great times. We matched energy. He understood I was not the average kid and knew I understood when to adapt. I ended up subletting his apartment for the weekends so I could crash close to work and the beach. My mother was traveling a lot at this point so she barely noticed that I wasn’t home as much. Only a few months later she realized I was basically moved out and threatened to call the cops and deem me a runaway if I didn’t move back in. She was always worried about what people would think and didn’t care that I was already living as an adult in their eyes.. She just didn’t want to look like a bad mother. I learned later she needed to keep me as a bargaining chip to keep the money coming in since my grandmother would send money constantly for the mortgage and most of the time she would use at least half of the money towards shopping for herself. She would always try to take me shopping when it was to look good for the recent boyfriend or friends at work. I never liked accepting much at that point because I knew it came with the attachment.  Everything came at a price. Play the part.

Everyone’s eyes were always on me.. guess that’s why it doesn’t bother me when people stare so much.. That took me a long time to do that..

Not be bothered.

Between some of the socialites I hung out with and the constant working in the night scene my high school friends were always taken care of. If I was connected, so were they. I kept my circle small but after a while quite a few of the other kids started to use my name to get into places, always giving the excuse that I had their ID. I still wonder how many people really used that excuse and got away with it. 

I was just into the end of the year and that’s when I was dating a new guy Mike that I had met. For my birthday that year my mother got a hotel room for my friends and I, and had them plan a surprise party for me. To my surprise Mike brought a friend to the party and it was D. We both froze when we realized the situation and it became awkward. 

Like two planets colliding. One of my best friends at the time was with me and saw it go down.. she had never really known him before all that, only heard the story.. she said it was like watching me instantly calm.  Mike figured out that I was the girl his friend D had talked about and he peacefully bowed out, even when I tried to tell him no.  He explained he never wanted to be the one in between that kinda connection. Mike and I stayed friends for years after that. It spoke volumes to me about his character. Even then there was a small few that I really trusted with certain things around me and he was one that I could relax around.

I hate that D was my calm… Because he knew EXACTLY what I was doing in our time apart. He was doing the same thing. And just like that we were back together all over again.. only this time I left a wall up… No more full access.

This time he wouldn’t be my teather.. because I had Jessica’s chain… That was all the teather I needed anymore. Now he was just the calm in the storm that I occasionally docked up to.

It was like a silent agreement we came to without ever saying.. We just kept on. He went his way, I went mine and if we collided it was enjoyed for the moment. We kept like that almost all year… Just doing life.

I played the field and so did he.  It was before the end of the summer when I hooked back up with the old lifeguard from years before. He was a firefighter now and we still talked occasionally. 

It was a fling and only a fling, so when I ended up pregnant, I knew this was no time to become a mom.

Since he was a firefighter and knew medical I asked for his advice on where to go. I explained how I didn’t want anything else but his help finding a safe place to go. He never answered me back after that. 

I was left to find a place for myself and my best friend at the time helped me to gather the money. I wasn’t going to tell Patti, but the day before she was on one of her rants and blurted out, “what are you pregnant!” When I answered her, it was the first time she was stunned into silence. She panicked. I told her about my already having plans to deal with everything since it was still in the first month of conception. She was more angry with me that I didn’t come to her about it than about the fact that I was dealing with it all. She immediately side swiped everything I had planned for the next day for recovery and decided to attack my best friend that was helping me so that I was set to be miserable and alone in that experience. I instantly regretted telling her. Why I thought my mother might actually show a humane caring moment, I still will never know. I guess I was hoping she was still somewhat honest with me about caring. Instead she called my one girlfriend that I didn’t want to know about it, since she couldn’t keep a secret to save my life, and told her to come take care of me after the procedure. That was a nightmare. Not only did she show up , but she brought the new foreign exchange student with her to hang out while I was sleeping in my house. I was livid. Patti avoided me more after that. She would go to her boyfriends more. I ended up running in D again 2 weeks after everything and I ended up telling him all about the experience. He was genuinely caring about the situation and now was set that he wanted to be by my side more. I came clean to him about the lifeguard and how we knew each other and then told him about anyone else that I was occasionally with. He knew most of the people I messed around with were just flings so he didn’t care because he had his own set of girls that he would see. It was only when he found out about Steve being in my life he got angry. He didn’t like the idea of competition I guess. Though Steve and I were never a thing really, only friends that kissed from time to time and had a shared energy for fun and adrenaline.

Steve ended up in the limelight when he went over the Niagara falls in the first ever Co-ed barrel. An experience I was supposed to be the Co-ed part of but because I was underage we both agreed in case anything went wrong, it would not be a smart move. Turns out we were right since his barrel got stuck on the side of the falls and he ended up in jail.

That didn’t stop Steve though. Him and I would laugh later about how that became a crazy show in itself. His journey getting over the border and then the one girl on the team backing out at the last second only to have the other girl go and puke on him on the way down. He always said he knew I would have never done that but he’s glad I didn’t go because of the jail thing.

It wasn’t long into my senior year before D wanted to make it official that we were exclusive. He moved in with me and my mother at that point.

We were back together and I was back hanging with the old crew like I never left. It was back to band practices and small shows. A perfect place to unwind and jam. There was a sense of belonging with all the guys. There I was, just part of the crew, no pressure, no judgment. I was D’s girl and the rest of the guys became like brothers to me. We would laugh and joke and have card night at the house where I would cook and host the girlfriends over while it was like one big family again.

I switched schools that year to a private school because I was missing too many credits to be a senior. Not like I cared about credits since I was already adulting in so many ways that no one else ever knew.  I didn’t have to pay for the school since the owner of the school was dating my aunt on the side of his marriage for years at that point. Only thing I had to pay for was my uniform and books along with any extra things. I hated the mentality of  most of the students there. They were rich spoiled brats. My first week there, even the English teacher showed me how I didn’t’ and wouldn’t fit in her class when she chastised me for not being able to afford the workbook that week for the class. The few kids that were the outcasts quickly accepted me to their fold and I loved learning about all these new secrets of the school. I was so bold and in their face with the defiance of patriarchy that the teachers who were just doing the job and dreading the audacity of some of the students even would help me navigate the loopholes. Those with humanity stood out quickly. Those with power issues were the bane of my existence.