“Look, I know you’re upset, hon,” Lela said, patting my hand,

“but could you be a little quieter?

Olive is trying to take a nap, you know.”

For a split second, I almost did the exact opposite,

just to spite her,

but somehow I managed to remind myself that none of this was actually her fault,

nor was I even angry at her.

I even managed an only partially hissed, “I’m not upset.”

“Whatever you say,” Lela shrugged,

picking up the knife to resume cutting apples.

“So, what happened after that?”

I took one of the apple slices, snapped it in half.

“Nothing,” I replied, popping one of the halves into my mouth,

nearly throwing the other half at Lela when she pointed a reproachful finger at me,

as I’d seen her do when telling kids not to talk with their mouths full.

“Except he asked me if I could drive him to some party this weekend.”

She gave an involuntary chuckle,

immediately giving me an apologetic look after.

“Seriously?”

“He said it, but I don’t know if he was joking or not.

We were both still sitting on his stupid porch swing in silence, and you know how he hates the quiet.

He did mention yesterday his parents weren’t letting him drive their car anymore, though, so who knows?”

I ate my other bit of apple,

rolling my eyes at Lela’s expression.

“No, I didn’t say I’d do it.”

“But did you say you wouldn’t?”

She raised her eyebrow briefly,

before turning to set the plate,

Olive snack for after she got up, in the fridge.

“Does leaving count?

‘Cause I did that.”

“That might be close enough.” She smiled.

“Now, are you sure you’re all right?”

“I’m fine,” I told her.

“Then we’ll talk tomorrow, okay?

Olive gets really needy after a nap, and I don’t need her telling her parents I spent all day hanging out with my friends.”

I sighed. “What do they care?”

“Well, I’m supposed to be hanging out with her, you know.

Plus, her parents are actually paying me for it.”

“Whatever,” I shrugged, grabbing my purse and heading for the door.

“Like I care.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” she promised.

“Whatever,” I repeated, barely loud enough for her to hear it as I closed the door behind me.

Like I needed her anyway.

Let her play with that annoying little Olive girl

I could certainly live, and quite happily so,

without having to put up with her anymore.

She was in my ballet class,

somewhere in the middle, age-wise, but damn close to the bottom in terms of skill.

She wore these huge glasses, and always looked uncomfortable.

I’d assumed she was just embarrassed because she knew that most of the younger girls were better than her,

and would continue to be so until she miraculously grew new,

less klutzy, legs.

But even at her house,

she looked awkward,

like she just didn’t fit into her surroundings.

And if she was needier after a nap,

I definitely didn’t want to stick around for that!

Every three seconds she’d been interrupting me,

as I told Lela about how Keith had broken up with me for no real reason,

wanting more water,

or to know if it was all right if she ate lunch in her room,

or want to know why the sky was blue.

Well, I don’t remember that question specifically,

but it wouldn’t surprise me if she’d asked it,

since she wanted to know everything else.

The first few times I just told her to go Google it,

but after a few unamused glares from Lela,

who would then proceed to explain whatever to the girl at ridiculously great detail,

I gave up, and, from then on,

just sighed, f

olded my arms,

and got real comfortable on the couch whenever I heard those clumsy little feet approaching.

Stupid kids.

And stupid boys, for that matter.

I guess, if I thought about it,

Keith actually having me come over to his house to break up with me was better than him just doing it over the phone.

But I didn’t want to think about it.

If he wasn’t going to give me any reasons for doing it,

or any chance to apologize or try to make whatever I’d done wrong up to him

not that I probably would have, of course

he might as well have just left me a voice mail.

I realized I had stopped walking,

and started to laugh at myself,

only to find that I couldn’t.

Instead, I just felt my chest heaving, inches from sobbing.

“I don’t need him,”

I growled to myself.

“I’m better off without him.”

I didn’t really have a hard time believing that

But it was still a few minutes before I could get myself to start moving again,

without feeling like I was going to fall apart.

What was so wrong with me that he’d just had to get away?

And why did I even care, i

f this was for the best?

I tried to stop, but as I walked slowly back home,

my mind kept going returning,

unbidden, to the subject.

The house was, of course,

empty,

at least for an hour or two more,

depending on when dad managed to get out of work.

I grabbed the remote and laid down on the couch,

only to find, a few minutes later,

that I’d already flipped through all of the channels,

and there was exactly nothing good,

or even brainlessly entertaining, on.

Though the inner debate leading to my decision was quite intense,

I ended up not hurling the remote through the television screen before grabbing a Diet Coke from the fridge and closing myself into my room.

There was equally nothing interesting to do there

unless I wanted to flip through the books that had been sitting on my shelf probably since I was 8 or 9.

I didn’t, nor did I have any interest in laying in bed, staring at the ceiling

too much chance of thinking about things I’d rather not,

at least if I was just there, in silence.

But perhaps with the right accompaniment

Much as I loved it,

my MP3 player wouldn’t do the trick, either.

I wanted to let it be loud,

without actually blowing my eardrums out.

So I pulled out my CD book,

opened it to a random page,

which turned out to be pretty much the last.

Of course, the first CD I saw while flipping through my collection was one of Keith’s.

I stared at it for a minute or two,

unsure of what to do, or even what to think,

and then nearly put them all away.

First, I took Keith’s CD out and threw it to the other side of my bed, like a Frisbee.

I cracked a little smile; there was no reason to be down, after all.

Why should I let him ruin my afternoon?

The next page held another of his CDs, along with one I decided would work for background music,

while I continued to look through my collection.

It was surprising how many of his CDs I’d ended up with.

I guess I’d borrowed them to rip onto my MP3 player,

then forgot to give them back.

I could be vindictive,

pretend I didn’t know what he was talking about when he inevitably asked for them back,

maybe put a couple through the microwave and toss out the rest, but I was better than that.

I had almost made it to the beginning when I spotted a CD I didn’t recognize,

mostly plain silver,

but with a ring of red.

Curious, I replaced my nearly over the current selection with it,

only to find that the music, while nice, was equally unfamiliar.

I guess Olive was still being

“needy”,

because it took Lela a few rings to answer her cell.

“Are you okay?” s

he asked, all urgent and scared like she thought I was calling her from the edge of a bridge or something.

Just how delicate did she think I was?

“I’m fine, Leels,” I rolled my eyes.

“Look, did you ever lend me a CD with this, like, red ring on it?”

“What?”

“It’s silver, and it has a red circle.”

She paused for a second,

though my assumption that she might actually be thinking about my question was shattered when I heard her whispering,

“Oh, that’s pretty, sweetie.”

“You know, a CD,” I reminded her.

“It’s round, got a hole in the center, makes…”

“I don’t think it’s mine,” she interrupted.

“Is it what you have playing now?”

“Yeah,” I said, holding the phone closer to the stereo for a second.

“Sound familiar?”

“Nope, not mine. It’s probably…”

She cut herself off.

“Hey, did you find the cookies I made you?”

“What? You made me cookies?”

“I snuck them into your purse.

Thought they might cheer you up a little.”

“If they’re shortbread,

I’ll love you forever.”

I dug through my purse, eventually finding a little container.

“Hmm… Well,

I was going to give you more tomorrow if you came to see me,

but if you already love me forever, what’s the point?”

I smiled a little at her giggle.

“Look, I have to go. You sure you’re all right?”

“Would you please stop asking me that?”

I sighed, starting to get annoyed.

After we hung up,

I stared at the CDs for a little longer,

before deciding I’d gotten far enough for one day.

It wasn’t like Keith was breaking down my door to get them back or anything.

I ended up back outside,

not entirely sure how or why I’d made that decision.

My car wasn’t there, of course –

mom’s car was still in the garage,

probably would be for a little while longer.

Had to replace something that seemed pretty important,

since its name had two complicated sounding words.

I picked a direction

any of them other than the one that went by Keith’s house was fine and started to walk,

not really paying any attention to anything I was passing.

So it came as quite a surprise when I nearly ran into somebody only,

when looking up to apologize, to realize it was the reading girl.

She stared at me with a blank,

almost awed,

expression,

mouth hanging ever so slightly open.

I honestly don’t know what came over me.

“Why the hell are you following me, you freak?!” I screamed, right in her face.

“What do you want from me?!”

I shouldn’t have been surprised that she turned and ran after that;

I was more surprised to find myself following her.

Her legs weren’t quite as long as mine,

but she was quite fast anyway and much better at dodging around the other people hanging out on the sidewalks,

like they didn’t have anything better to do.

I nearly knocked a couple of kids down, which slowed me enough that she managed to get up the steps and into the library,

which I doubt I’d have even noticed otherwise.

I forced myself to calm down as much as possible,

not wanting to get thrown out before I reached my prey,

while my heart did its best not to explode in my chest.

The library was, as usual, not particularly busy,

which made it easier to hear where the girl was,

even though she was doing her best to be quiet.

It also made it harder to pursue with any kind of speed,

since I knew if I wasn’t careful I’d just bring the librarians down on me, thus prematurely ending the hunt.

I tiptoed through non-fiction, listening to her footsteps a few shelves over.

Turning slightly,

I could see her, or at least a strip of her chest,

against which she was clutching that book,

through the empty spaces between tops of books and bottoms of shelves.

She was breathing hard, finally giving me a reason to believe I wasn’t horribly out of shape for feeling a little tired.

She was walking in the opposite direction as me, and a little faster.

If it came down to it,

I could probably have caught her if I’d turned around,

met her when she hit the aisle. Instead,

I kept going to the aisle on the opposite end of the shelves, turned the corner, and stopped,

peaking again to make sure she was still there.

Sure enough, she was, and now just right on the other side of the shelves, I was looking through.

She’d stopped moving, was now just standing there, all wide-eyed, shaking.

Part of me felt bad; it wasn’t too difficult to ignore that part until later. After all, she’d been following me for way too long for me to consider it a coincidence. Didn’t I deserve to know what in the world was going on?

I took it even more slowly then,

keeping her in my sight in case she should happen to hear me and dart.

Her gaze kept leaping all over the place,

and a couple of times I was certain she’d seen me,

but it wasn’t until I was almost to her that I saw her eyes widen in fear.

Knowing my luck had run out, I jumped forward,

snaking my arm through the shelf, taking out a few of the taller books on it in the process, and grabbed her arm.

She gave out a strange sound, like a wounded animal, and began to writhe wildly.

I could hear the librarians descending on us,

so, when her arm broke free of my grip and she took off,

I somehow resisted the urge to give chase, pleased enough with her expression of terror.

That is, however,

not to say that I minded the little bonus of noticing that she’d dropped that book of hers.

“Did you see what got into that girl?”

I glanced over with a blink and an innocent shake of my head to the librarian.

“No clue,” I said. “Can I help you pick those books up?”

“Well, sure,” the old woman smiled.

I had knocked over more books than I’d realized, and, somehow, even after seeing her with it so many times,

I couldn’t quite remember what it actually had on the cover.

Just some random thing, against what I thought might have been a blue background.

There were a couple that looked familiar, s

o I left them until last so I could decide between them.

Finally, the title of one caught my eye.

“Oh, this is just what I was looking for!”

I chirped, a little too loudly, earning myself a disapproving glare.

“That’s kind of an odd spelling,” she said,

though, once we were at the circulation desk.

“It’s how my name is spelled, actually,” I told her.

“Oh! How interesting!” And, amazingly enough,

she actually did sound interested.

“It’s just a weird coincidence,” I said, mostly to myself. It would be a neat little curiosity,

perhaps,

if the person who had been reading it last hadn’t been stalking me.

I managed to make it out of the library, just barely,

before cracking open the book.

I was tempted to flip through,

hoping for some pictures,

but decided instead to start with the first page, not sure what I was expecting to find.

Certainly not what I actually found,

anyway, that’s for sure.

“‘Aw, fricklestein,’ the girl grumbled under her breath,

reaching down with one hand to inspect the rip up the leg of her shorts.

It wasn’t that the girl particularly minded showing off her legs –

they were, undoubtedly, the best part of her otherwise large and gangly body –

but she’d just bought the shorts three days ago.”

I stared at the words for a few minutes, unblinking.

I tried to tell myself it was all a coincidence again,

but the words dried up in my throat. What was going on?

I tried to read on, but my head was already swimming,

and the words began to blur and dance until I felt dizzy enough to fall over.

I decided to put it off until I got home, and could devote more time and energy to it.

So, I closed “Skye’s the Limit”, and started the slow walk home, a

lone with my increasingly confused thoughts.