Leslie's Journal - Allan Stratton [9]
At Katie’s parties, we all sit around in the rec room in our nighties. (Except for me. I usually sleep in my underwear, so Mrs. Kincaid makes me wear an old pair of Katie’s pajamas, plastered with kittens or ballerinas. I basically look like a dork, but that’s okay so long as nobody takes pictures.) We eat popcorn and chips and play stupid games and gossip. Then Mrs. Kincaid comes down with more so-called treats, like Rice Krispies squares and Jell-O fruit cups, and also stuff she makes from recipes on the backs of packages, like multicolored mini-marshmallows and canned mandarin orange slices in sour cream. I swear: Eat that crap, you’ll be puking rainbows.
Anyway, Mrs. Kincaid’s got her ear to the air vent the whole night, because the second we bring up the subject of boys she’s down again to interrupt with the nutty idea we might like to dye our hair. She hands out these Krazy Kolors that wash out—Krazy Kolors, crazy if you’re a clown, maybe—and, bingo, we’re all dyeing our hair and giving each other facials and rolling around in hysterics. Ha ha, remind me to laugh. Oh, and did I mention the fashion show? The thrills never stop.
It’s not that I don’t like facials and fashion shows. Katie and me used to have them all the time. But it was just the two of us. It’s different when you do stuff with people who’re just putting up with you.
Hearing the hilarity, Mrs. Kincaid comes back and whispers loud in Katie’s ear, “Your father’s trying to get some work done. How be you girls settle down and watch a movie?” Katie always acts as if this is a great idea and puts on some sucky piece of junk they taped off the Family Channel.
After gagging for five minutes, I suggest we turn down the sound and make up fake dialogue. At which point, Ashley either goes, “Leslie, we’re enjoying this. If you aren’t, why don’t you go home?” or “Come on, Leslie, you’re looking for an excuse to say something gross and spoil everything.” When I turn to Katie for support she just flaps her hands and looks helpless. I know she doesn’t want to choose sides, but her silence sure feels like a choice to me.
I go off in a corner and pretend to read whatever’s on the coffee table. I sigh a lot and moan and generally bug everybody till they start throwing cushions at me. Then finally it’s midnight, and Mrs. Kincaid comes back down and turns the lights out.
“Sleep tight.”
It is always the same and it is always torture!
So when Katie invites me this time I say, “Sure, great,” but I’m seriously thinking up excuses to cancel. Until I get home, that is, and find Mom rummaging around my room in Amazon Warrior mode. It seems Mr. Manley has called about my “continued inappropriate dress,” and Mom’s discovered I’m not wearing what I leave the house in. In fact, I’m wearing clothes she didn’t even know I had.
“You’re quite a piece of work, Leslie,” she fumes, pointing at my secret wardrobe. She’s started to dig clothes out of supposedly empty drawers under my bed, and she’s throwing them onto a big pile in the middle of the room. “What’s the meaning of this?”
How do I answer that? I don’t even try. Instead, I point at the “Leslie’s Room: Keep Out” sign on the door. “Can’t you read?” I yell. “Like, whatever happened to trust?”
Mom shoves the pile into a green garbage bag. “These are going out with the trash.”
“Who the hell do you think you are?”
She ignores me, holding up a black bustier. “Where did you get this filth?”
“For your information, that filth just so happens to be a present from Dad.” This is partly true, because I bought most of this stuff with money he gave me for Christmas and my birthday. Also with money I borrowed from his wallet. (I don’t call it stealing, I call it getting even. He says he gives me money instead of gifts so I can get something I’ll really like. Bullshit. He’d rather spend time with precious Brenda than shop for his daughter.)
Anyway, Mom is apparently deaf. She stuffs the last of the clothes into the bag and heads towards the door. “Get out of my way.”
“You toss my stuff, next time you’re out I’ll