Back To You (25 page)

By summer’s end, I had just about given up on him tota
lly.  One night I was sitting on the couch in my pajamas, fresh out of the shower with my hair wrapped in a towel when he knocked on my door.  I peeked out and saw his car before I answered the door and groaned.  Fabulous, I thought.  I looked gorgeous.

Josh didn’t
mind how I looked that night.  Mom was out and it was just the two of us.  He sat on the couch next to me and giggled at the tangled mess of hair as I pulled the towel out.

“Hey,” I said.  “You are the one who came una
nnounced.  No laughing at my hair.”

He smiled.  “I’m not laughing.  Well, maybe a little, it is pretty wild.  I was just thinking that you look pretty even in your p
ajamas.  Not too many girls can say that.”

“You are just a sweet talker,” I punched his arm lightly.  “So what’s up?  Anything wrong?”

“Yes and no.”

“
This sounds serious.”  I smiled.

“You are leaving soon.”

“In a couple of weeks.”

“I will miss you.”

“Josh, you hardly know I exist half the time.”  I was only partly teasing as I said it.

He turned to me and took my hand.  “I
’m sorry for that.  I should have spent more time with you.  I’m confused.  I feel so different around you.  Something about you makes me feel like I can accomplish so much.  But then I realize I’m not like you.  Honestly, Suzy, you kinda scare me.”

“What a nice compliment,” I was trying to keep the conve
rsation light.

“I didn’t mean it that way!”

“I know.  I’m just giving you a hard time.”

“Would you be willing to write to me?”

“Really?” I must have looked surprised.

“Really.  I am probably not very good at writing...”

“Well, I think it would be fun to try.”

He smiled.  “Good.”

We sat on the couch for a long time, talking and listening to music.  I liked it when Josh was like this.  He was so at ease and wasn’t afraid to show a side of himself that he rarely showed others.  When he was getting ready to leave, he leaned in and kissed me.  I kissed him back.  Nice.  Wobbly knees and everything.

“Mmmmm.  I have wanted to do that for a long time.”  Josh said when he pulled away.

“What took you so long?”

“I told you.  You scare me.”  I started to say something but he put his fingers on my mouth to stop me.  “It’s not a bad
thing.  You just make me feel so, oh I don’t know, like you are just out of my reach.  Too good for a bad boy like me.”

“You aren’t so bad.”

“I can be.”

“Maybe someday I will find out how bad.”  I fluttered my eyelashes and grinned.

He kissed me again.  And again.  I swear I would have taken him to my room and let him do much more kissing all over my body parts, but we restrained ourselves.

“Just don’t tell Dan, okay?”  He asked.  Dan was
the friend that liked me too.

“Mum’s the word.”

One last kiss and he was gone.  I went to bed that night listening to my stereo thinking about Josh’s kisses.  Maybe good girls really did like bad boys.  Maybe most bad boys aren’t really as bad as they say they are.

*****

“It’s a surprise.  So do you think you’ll go?”  Randy asked.

“Sure.  Sounds like fun.”  Jack replied.

Randy was planning a surprise party for Suzy before she left for college.  It was only going to be a few of her closest friends hanging out and acting goofy.  The best part was that it was going to be at her house and she didn’t even know it.  Her mom was in on it and was taking her to dinner that evening so they had plenty of time to set up and get everything ready.

When Jack got there, he was surprised to see Josh and Dan there.  He sent a quizzical look to Randy, who just smiled and shrugged.  Megan made a banner that said “We
’ll Miss You!” and “Good Luck!” for everyone to sign.  Everyone brought a little something to munch on or drink.  Lindsey and Paulette were there bearing farewell gifts.  Randy brought a fun game called The Purity Test.  And Jack brought music.  He also brought his guitar, just in case.  They had all spent so much time at Suzy’s house in the past that they knew where everything was and helped themselves to the kitchen and living room. 

Jack pulled Randy aside and asked, “Is there something g
oing on between Suzy and Josh?”

“Sort of.  No one really knows actually.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, he acts funny when she is around, and she gets all happy and stuff.  Josh doesn’t get serious about anyone so I
don’t think it is anything major.  Besides Dan is head over heels in love with her, and I know Josh wouldn’t want to hurt him.”

Dan?  Well
, it was easy to see that.  He was a shy guy, not all that good looking and he wasn’t the type of guy who would be bold enough to say anything to her.  Obviously Suzy was beautiful and strong and nice and all of the things that guys want in a girl.  But Josh?  All of the times that Suzy came to see Jack at the yogurt shop, and she never mentioned anything with Josh.  Josh was his friend too.  Why wouldn’t she say anything?

*****

I was surprised when Mom and I walked into the house after our dinner out.  I wasn’t expecting a party!  I had been trying really hard to get as much time in with my friends as I could before I left for Georgia.  We had a blast.  The Purity Test that Randy brought was really wild and funny.  Someone called out the questions and we  kept a tally of yes’s and no’s without giving away our answers.  Then at the end we compared the percentage of yes questions to determine the level of our “purity”.  We all laughed at some of the craziest questions. 

The rest of the night was just us acting like us.  We laughed and talked and gossiped and everything else that friends do when they all get together.  Josh never let on to Dan what had happened between us.  Jack looked at us both like he suspected something, but neither of us acted like anything was going on between us.  When people started to head home, the hugs were long and tight and the tears pooled in our eyes a bit.

Megan stayed the night and helped clean up.  It really was a great way to say goodbye to what we all had known for so long, knowing that even though we would see each other again, our lives would have changed so much.

My future was right ahead of me and I was facing fo
rward.  I was ready to move on and move out.  But after a night like that one, it was hard to resist peeking back over my shoulder.

C
hapter 21

August 1989

The drive to Macon was relatively uneventful.  Mom and I spent the entire eight hours switching music back and forth from rock to country and occasionally agreeing to a pop station that we could get tuned in.

The car was jammed with my stuff.  I couldn’t wait to open up the new things like my comforter set and sheets.  They sent out a list of items I would need to bring with me and a list of things that we COULDN’T bring.  It was like summer camp, only it was for a year instead of a week.

I was looking forward to meeting my roommate.  We had exchanged a couple of letters over the summer.  She sounded pretty cool and a little weird.  I was curious how it was going to go sharing a room with someone.  It had been years since I had to share a room with anyone. 
Even while Kim lived with us, I had my own space. 

It was total chaos when we got there. 
My room was on the third floor, so we used the rickety old elevator and the stairs to haul everything.  The building was so ancient it didn’t have air conditioning.  August heat in Macon wasn’t much better than Hammond.  After we moved our things into the rooms, we had meetings for students, meetings for parents and the chance to meet our peer counselors (upperclassmen assigned to freshmen to show them around and make them comfortable) and “big sisters” (juniors that took on the freshmen to help them adjust).

Mom stayed long enough to help get things set up, but they had a full schedule for the students so I didn’t see her much that night.  She was leaving the next day.  I wasn’t sure if I was ready for that or not.  She promised not to cry when she left, but she did when she hugged me right before she left.  Made me cry
too.  There are moments in life that stay with you forever.  The moments when you know something big was happening in your life.  Moments when you felt yourself ripping apart, or coming together, or the earth shattering awareness that nothing will ever be the same from that moment on.  That was one of those moments.  When she hugged me and held on to me, I felt it to my core.  I understood the pain and loneliness she would feel as she drove home alone.  That was what was ripping inside of me.  She and I had been together for so long.  She relied on me to hold things together when she couldn’t.  I worried how well she was going to hold it together without me there.

As the semester began,
it didn’t take long to figure out that my roommate was insane.  Certifiably.  She was the nightmare you pray doesn’t happen to you.  She borrowed clothes without asking.  She brought guys to the room and locked me out while she was “busy”.  She became possessive and suspicious of anything and everything I did.  And one day, she threw a real temper tantrum.  I am talking on the floor kicking and screaming kind of tantrum.  That was the last straw for me.  I went to the main office and begged to be moved.

I met another girl there who was
the complete opposite of my roommate, and we became fast friends.  Carrie was tall with dark hair and dark eyes.  She was shaped more like a boy than a girl.  She wasn’t skinny or fat.  She was just Carrie.

Carrie grew up on a farm.  An honest to goodness farm.  I had never been to a real farm before.  They raised cows.  Her mom had a huge garden and grew things I had never known a
ctually grew in the dirt.  The first time I went to her house, the cows were roaming close by, but they were still a good bit from the house.  I was greeted by an extremely friendly HUGE boxer named Samson, who didn’t seem to want me to get out of the car because he kept jumping on my door as I opened it.  When we got inside the house, it was just an old farmhouse full of memories of a family who had been together forever, people who loved each other and were proud of everything the kids ever had done.  It smelled like homemade food, fresh laundry hung out to dry and well, animals.  I had never been anywhere like it and I immediately loved every single thing about it.

The house was still and quiet, sitting in the middle of nowhere about an hour from Wesleyan.  The silence was deafe
ning when Carrie left me alone in the house alone to go check on something.  I wandered a little, looking at all of the memories on the walls and headed to the living room to sit on the couch.  As I walked into the living room, I passed a large picture window that looked out on one of the fields that the cows grazed in.  However, I couldn’t see the field because there was a HUGE brown cow staring at me!  I screamed bloody murder.  There was a cow about a foot away from my face.  It took me a few minutes to recover from that one and when I told Carrie what happened, she laughed that really deep belly laugh she had.  I couldn’t help but giggle myself.

Her family was awesome.  Her dad was tall and bald with the deepest voice I had ever heard in my life.  Her mom was petite
and totally didn’t fit the typical description of a farmhouse mom, if there was such a thing.  Carrie had gotten her mom’s turned up nose and her dad’s height.  Her sister was a junior in high school and had a job at the same local Dairy Queen where Carrie worked when she was in high school.  She was blonde and inherited the more feminine aspects of her parents.  She reminded me of a farm girl anxious to break out in the big city, where Carrie was simply a smart and talented country farm girl and always would be.

To judge Carrie based on her looks and upbringing would be a big mistake however.  She was a huge fan of live theatre, som
ething that would surprise anyone.  She was a deep thinker and practical at the same time.  She loved to joke around laughing and smiling.  But she also liked to get into deep conversations about religion or politics.  There was nothing about her that reminded me of Megan, except that she was someone I was drawn to.  Carrie was the kind of friend you could say anything to and know that she would never, ever betray your trust or make you feel stupid.  One day I it occurred to me that my best friends were so completely different from the way I was.  I wondered if that meant anything profound.  Did I like them because I was a diverse young woman who saw beyond the superficial things?  Or was it because at times I wanted to be anything BUT who I was so I surrounded myself with people who were different.  Did I want to be like them?  Or did I just enjoy the fact that these people forced me to think beyond what I knew?  I wasn’t sure I would ever know the answer.

My first semester was like a roller coaster ride.  I had my classes early in the morning, but for some reason I couldn’t get my head in the game so my grades were closer to C’s than the A’s and B’s I was used to.  Eventually I got a part time job in Admissions, got involved with an a capella group called the Washboard Band.  And of course Carrie would drag me to the theatre on campus whe
never possible.  She got me involved with backstage stuff after I admitted that I had secretly wanted to be a performer on stage but was frozen with stage fright.  I was moved away from my crazy roomie and eventually was moved again to share a room with Carrie.  She was more like a sister and a friend rolled into one.  She had her little idiosyncrasies but I loved every single thing about her, except maybe that she was chronically late to EVERYTHING.  Her family adopted me like one of their own and soon I felt like I was a part of a family unit unlike anything I had ever known.

As for my academics, once I started working and using my time better, my grades got better.  I was eternally grateful for the English teacher I had my senior year in high school for being so d
emanding. Because of her, I was able to survive the equally demanding and amazing English professor, who thought I was an interesting and engaging writer, encouraging me to make English my major (I had already decided to do that anyway).  My Communications 101 professor pulled me to the side after the second of five speeches I was assigned to give.  She told me I had a gift of “connecting” to groups of people and needed to consider Communications as a major.  The beauty of Wesleyan college was that I could have two majors and still graduate in four years.  It wouldn’t be easy, not by a long shot, but when did I EVER go the easy route?

A lot of people wondered why I would go to an all women’s college.  My answer was simple.  I wanted to get an excellent educ
ation at a well respected, world renowned college.  I knew that I was easily distracted by cute guys in the classroom, so I eliminated that problem.  Of course a lot of people figured that there were a lot of lesbians and goody two shoes there, packed away from guys.  Although there were a few lesbians and plenty of goody two shoes, most of the students reminded me of, well, me.  Smart women who deserved to be more than a number in a large university.  To think that we didn’t have a social life was laughable.  Mercer College used to be all male until a few years before.  It was also in Macon and had the traditional “mixers” with Wesleyan.  But Mercer was still predominately male, so where do you think the guys went when they wanted to pick up girls?  Fight over the few at their college or come to a place that had over 500 women and no competition?  Yeah, no real problem in the men department.  We had the best of both worlds.  We could go to class with our hair rumpled and in our pajamas and still have a date later that night.  That was just one of the things that made Wesleyan the magical place that I was in love with.

Although I was adjusting to life at Wesleyan, it was so vastly different from anything I had ever known that depression and anxiety got their hooks into me for a while.  I didn’t know what was going on with me, just that I didn’t want to eat, I always felt like I was on edge and sometimes it took all of my e
nergy to do anything at all.  Everyone worried as my weight dwindled down and my behavior was at times a bit strange.  Carrie was there for me.  Sometimes it was just that she was sitting on her bed, waiting until the last minute to get her homework done, while I was going to sleep.  She would talk and make me listen to her tapes of Phantom of the Opera and Les Miserables.  And sometimes she would just let me crawl into a ball in her lap and let me cry for whatever reason.  She was the kindest person I knew.  I am not so sure I could have survived without her friendship those first few months.  Before I knew it, it was time to head home for Christmas.

*****

He felt lost.  He hated college and decided not to go back.  To Jack, college was just an extension of high school.  Something he didn’t want to deal with.  All of his friends had moved away or had found new paths to follow in their lives.  But he was stuck.  He worked with his parents, he played guitar whenever he could, and he went out to his favorite place by the lake and drank too much.  Even that was boring sometimes.  There weren’t even any girls he was interested in dating.  He tried, but nothing and no one seemed to interest him.

He wondered if Suzy was coming home for Christmas break.  He was curious
if she liked school, if she had met a guy that was worthy of her, if she had changed or if she was just the same old Suzy.

Randy was leaving for college in March.  He was mo
ving to Phoenix and going to a technical school that was not a typical college environment.  Everyone seemed to be moving on.  Everyone except Jack.

*****

I hitched a ride to Louisiana with a girl who also lived near Hammond.  When I got home, Mom was waiting for me with my favorite meal and the tree set up but not decorated.  She knew I would want to decorate it because the tree was my favorite part of Christmas.  Well, that and listening to my sappy Christmas music.

Josh had written to me a few times.  He sent me some bea
utiful pictures he had drawn for me.  He had even driven out with Kim for my first homecoming.  The three of us stayed in a hotel, Kim in one bed and Josh and I in the other.  It is amazing the amount of touching and kissing you can do in the same room with someone who snores.  No sex, we agreed, but man that weekend was so HOT!  Since he wasn’t going to college, I think he felt a little intimidated by the fraternity guys.  I knew that we would never be a real couple, but it sure was fun to have a fling with him.

I was so excited to see my friends when I got back.  I was to meet Megan at a local bar called Augustine’s.  It was a bar for locals with dart boards and pool tables, hard rock playing on the jukebox and a never-ending supply of alcohol.  Louisiana was one of the last states to make the legal drinking age twenty-one instead of eighteen.  Fortunately most of my friends and I were grandfathered in on the last year.  We could drink if we wanted to, but it was Louisiana, where drinking was the favorite past time, next only to eating.  As long as you looked like you were over the age of twelve, you could
drink, especially if you knew the right people.

I was anxious to meet Megan’s boyfriend.  She had gi
ven up her virginity to him, so I wanted to make sure he was worthy.  Josh, Randy and Dan were going to be there too.  And Jack. 

I
had lost some weight and looked better than I ever had in high school.  My hair was down to my waist, I was in a size five jeans that I didn’t have to hold my breath to button, and I carried myself with a bit more confidence than before.  Of course that night I made sure I looked as good as I possibly could.  Make-up just right, hair long and curled, high heels and jeans that showed off my assets.

Mom was still with Richard, and they were
going out that night too.  I said a quick goodbye and dashed out the door to Megan’s car.  Hugging and squealing and all that girl stuff happened before we could even pull out of the driveway.  We chatted non-stop all of the way to Augustine’s.