As I closed the armoire again, I decided, that I needed to clean up after myself. I took the clothes I had been wearing to the bathroom and pushed them all down the laundry chute despite the fact that I’d only had them on for a couple hours.
I also found the best way to get into that man-eating bed. With care, I climbed up and stood on the wooden cross piece at the foot of the bed like a bird on balancing on a telephone wire. Then pretending to be a cliff diver, I dove in, spun myself as I fell and landed on my back with a soft ‘FLUMP’. I might add that on my first dive the difficulty level was greater than the nights to come on account of my bulging tummy; thanks to Micah.
Maybe only ten minutes had passed, before I heard a soft knock on my bedroom door. Of course, there was no way I could get out of that bed easily, so I just called out, “Come in!”
The door opened and in walked Mom, wearing her robe and looking like she had been crying. Without saying a word, she crossed over to the bed, found me down inside all those covers and kissed my forehead.
“Sorry I was so mean before. I didn’t mean it. I was having a butt-brain moment.” I said and she kissed me again.
Right after the kiss I caught her glancing down to make sure I was wearing one of the GoodNites. I was waiting for her to say something but she didn’t.
“I know and I love you too.” She said, “Now you better get some sleep. You have school in the morning.”
“SCHOOL IN THE MORNING!” I kept telling myself over and over until sleep finally overtook me.
Sure enough, the day after we arrived in this God forsaken city, I had to go to school and my first day at my new school was just as bad, as you might guess it would be.
Things started going wrong, right after I got out of the shower that morning. However, I didn’t really know that it was going to be a bad day until I was standing at the bus stop, waiting for the school bus and this girl whom I thought might be flirting with me, bursts out laughing. She proceeded to point out to everyone at the bus stop, that I was wearing two different socks. I mean, not just different colors, but different kinds; one white tube-sock and one brown and gray argyle sock.
“It’s not my fault!” I wanted to say, but I didn’t.
Back in California, I knew were everything was in my bedroom. Heck, I could tell you where just about every single item was in our entire home. However, here in Maine I had felt lucky, that I was able to find two socks to wear that morning. I had rummaged through that whole dang armoire, looking for socks. What I was wearing, was what I was able to find and the only reason I found them was, because they had been wadded up and stuffed into the pocket of two different pairs of pants. Don’t ask me why or how, just believe me when I say, that is where I found them.
The socks weren’t the worst of it. At least, no one at the bus stop knew that I wasn’t wearing any underwear, because all of my underwear also seemed to be suspiciously absent from the armoire. My, you-know-what, was so cold that it would have taken the Hubble Telescope to find it; that’s how cold I was without underwear.
Later that same day, after returning from school, I had the chance to ask about my socks and underwear. Come to find out, my socks, underwear and t-shirts had all been put into the drawers in the bathroom vanity under the sink. Now it seems logical, that I should have looked there. I mean, when you get out of the shower or tub, besides a towel, what is the first thing you go looking for? See what I mean? Totally logical! However, at the time, I didn’t have a clue where all those ‘under clothes’ had managed to get lost to.
