Lark Griffing’s debut young adult

Help yourself to first chapter of The Last Time I Checked, I Was Still Here – by Lark Griffing

1

Amy

The socks were the last straw, the breaking point. Despite all the heartache and abuse, the stupid socks are what did it. The socks made her leave.

Amy wound her way through the trees, taking the long way to the school. The sidewalks were the way to travel, but Amy wasn’t having any of that. The sidewalks led past Ronnie’s house, and you could bet Ronnie and the Ronnettes would be there, waiting for her, ready to pounce. It had been that way since the beginning of the year when Amy started her Senior year at Maplewood High. Just another school in another place after a long line of schools. This one was the worst, however.

Usually Amy could fade into the woodwork. She was an average student, with, what she considered, average looks. Her transient nature made it difficult for her to make real, lasting friendships, except for Betsy. Betsy was three schools ago, and she was special. She was one of those people who could look into your soul and get you. Betsy got Amy. They became friends and that was that. Then, of course, Amy moved. Her dad got another transfer to supervise the building of another superstore, and off they went. Mom would never have let that happen, but mom was gone and dad was lost, running from one job to another, filling his life, drowning the empty spaces that had been his beloved wife.

So, this morning, the morning of the socks, left Amy bushwhacking her way through the park, around the spreading maples that shaded the woods. Once she broke free of the trees, she had to traipse through the meadow until she reached the school. If all worked as planned, she would avoid a meeting of Ronnie and her bevy of friends. Amy sighed. It was pathetic that this group of small town girls wanted so badly to be the up and coming mean girls. They were good at it, and Amy was tired of it.

She slipped into the cool hallways and slid around the stairwell to her locker. That was the best thing about this school. Her locker was hidden in a cramped alcove behind a stairwell. It kept her out of the main flow of traffic. She preferred it that way, not being interested in funneling to class with the in crowd. Amy just wanted to be left alone. She stowed her hoodie on the hook in the locker and grabbed books for her first three classes.

She turned around and bumped smack dab into Ronnie and the Ronnettes.

“Hey, skank.” Ronnie looked Amy up and down, appraising her outfit, her hair, her whatever. Amy ignored her and tried to move around her to head to class. “I’m talking to you skank-girl,” said Ronnie.

“What is it you so desperately need, Ronnie?” Amy asked, her eyes steady on Ronnie’s.

“Nothing, just wanted to wish you a good morning.”

“Oh my God! Check out at her socks,” squealed Fawn. Fawn was the outlier in the Ronnettes. She didn’t look like she fit in with the spray of pimples across her forehead and her slightly jutting, not yet brace adjusted upper front teeth. Her daddy, however, owned the local movie theater, and Fawn could get all her friends in free. Instant popularity for the not so pretty girl. “What’s all over her stupid socks?”

Amy looked down with the rest of them. Her socks were covered in burrs, each clinging to the fabric like tiny porcupines. There were burrs upon burrs stuck to her, bunching the bottoms of her jeans in an unnatural manner. Amy could feel her face burning with heat. The meadow. In order to escape Ronnie and the Ronnettes, Amy had cut through that meadow. She was concentrating so hard on not being seen, she didn’t even notice the hitchhikers that made their home on her socks. The girls surrounding her began to laugh and jeer. Amy, with her face burning even hotter, shoved her way through the group and headed to class. She wouldn’t let them have the satisfaction of knowing they really got to her this time. She would not dissolve into tears.

She dropped her books on her desk in Mrs. Parcher’s class, mumbled a quick, “I need to go to the bathroom,” and then made her escape around the corner into the ladies’ room. There, she shut herself in a stall and began the painful process of removing all the burrs.

It didn’t go well. Each time she tried to pull a burr off, it split in half and left individual barbs embedded in her socks. Not only were they unsightly, but they worked themselves deeper into the fabric and began to rub uncomfortably at her ankle. She was doomed. She kept picking at them, oblivious to the time slipping away. She didn’t want to head back to class with the remaining burrs still clinging to her socks or digging into her flesh.

“Hey, um, Amy, are you okay?” asked a voice Amy didn’t recognize. “Mrs. Parcher thinks you’ve been in here for a long time and is worried that something is wrong. So, God this is embarrassing, are you like, okay?”

“I’m fine, thank you. Please tell her I’ll be out in a minute. I’m sorry you had to come check on me, even though I can’t see who you are.”

“It’s Ginny, and no worries. Actually, it’s better than listening to old Parcher droning on about reconstruction of the South.”

“Good point,” Amy said. She opened the door of the stall and stepped out. Her face was red from bending over so long and there was a handful of burrs and sock fuzz mashed up in her palm.

“What the hell is that?” said Ginny. Amy realized, too late, that she should have flushed the whole mess down the toilet.

“Okay, so I took a shortcut through the meadow trying to avoid Ronnie and the Ronnettes and got burrs stuck in my socks.” Amy realized her gaffe as soon as it left her mouth.

“Ronnie and the Ronnettes? That’s hilarious.” Oh great, thought Amy, by lunch the whole school will know. Ginny was a nice girl, but her tragic flaw was that she could not keep her mouth shut. This day was getting worse by the minute. Amy gave one last tug at the bottom of her jeans and headed out of the bathroom. She could still hear Ginny muttering about the new girl band. Amy’s heart sank when she saw the flash of Ginny’s cell phone and knew it was all over. Ginny couldn’t wait to share all the gory details.

Amy stayed slumped in her chair for the rest of Parcher’s monologue on the South after the war and escaped the minute the bell rang. She had been thinking for the last thirty minutes what she could do to minimize the damage, but there was just no hope. Her life was going to super suck from this moment on.

The bell rang, dismissing the class. Amy gathered her things and began to walk to her next class, but then passed it and went out the side door of the school instead. She hit the meadow with a purposeful gait. This time, she recognized the tearing of the burrs at her socks, but that didn’t stop her. She was done. She was over this town, this place, this life, and things were going to change.

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Copyright © 2017 by Lark Griffing

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