Something to happen
1539 Words
She placed her hands on her hips. “Look,” she said.
“I need to know if I‟m going to be wearing the cap and gown, so I think you‟d better tell me.”
She‟d passed, but barely. That evening, she paraded with her class and with Camelia and got her high school diploma. Camelia‟s crowd, who was sitting in the bleachers, cheered them on.
Afterwards, she got high. As predicted, she got into a good four-year school just minutes away. Before she left, she asked her friend Gary if she could buy twenty doses of LSD to take with her.
He got it for her, but it took a month and eighty dollars. She slipped them into the jacket of one of her favorite cd‟s, packed her stuff, and headed for the dorms.
Her roommate was quiet and studious. She didn‟t mind. She was just as quiet and wasn‟t looking for a friendship, anyway.
One day, she found herself in a strange dorm room with people she had never met before. A boy with long, shoulder-length blond hair turned to her and said, “If you know anywhere I can get acid, let me know.”
Leah perked up. “I have some,” she said quietly.
That was the beginning of her relationship with Cameron.
He asked her to come to his dorm room, where he bought four of the little squares of acid.
Soon, she was visiting him on a regular basis.
One day, offhand, she complained about not having enough money for w**d. Cameron asked, “Did you make a
profit from the acid?”
“No,” she admitted.
“You should start. That‟s one way to get money.”
Leah found herself staring at him dreamily during their pot-smoking sessions, wishing that she could run her
fingers through that long, wavy hair.
Cameron was an experienced guy. He had slept with many girls.
One night, the two of them were alone in his room.
Somehow, they started talking about s*x.
Soon, they were arguing. “I don‟t see how you can treat s*x so casually,” Leah was saying. “It‟s supposed to be a big deal.
You‟re supposed to really care about the person you sleep with, and I doubt you really cared about all the girls you fucked.”
Cameron, who was holding and attempting to clean a
glass bong, set it down heavily on the floor and rushed to her. He grabbed her and shook her arms. “You don‟t know how hard it is,” he growled.
Leah was shaken; but her opinion on the matter was not changed. She had even cut class one day and walked to the store with Camelia to buy a pregnancy test.
In high school, she considered her sexuality one of the most private and sacred things about her, and she didn‟t think anyone else had a right to know where she‟d been or what she‟d been doing.
But now, she no longer clung so tightly to her secret. Almost all of the kids she
hung out with knew that she was inexperienced.
Leah and Cameron started having long, personal conversations. They told each other about parts of their lives that they had not shared with anyone else, but Leah
still refused to tell him about Brendan.
She would not tell anyone.
One night, Cameron revealed to Leah that he had strong feelings for Justice, a mutual friend of theirs. Leah was torn. She liked Cameron, but she wasn‟t yet sure if it was just physical or if it was something more.
But over the next several days, she plunged into a deep depression. She didn‟t eat. She smoked two packs of
cigarettes a day, and didn‟t go to class.
Physically, she looked and felt like a walking corpse. Flyers went up on the bulletin boards. There was going to be a gigantic party in one of the dorm buildings.
Technically, only over-twenty-ones were allowed to go, but admittance was not strictly enforced. Leah painted her
face more thickly than usually, put on a dress and some boots, and proceeded to crash the party.
She didn‟t see anyone she knew. Instead, she headed for the alcohol. She had two huge Solo cups of some drink
she had never heard of, and soon she was dizzy and lighthearted.
Just as she was about to light a cigarette, she spotted Cameron and Justice. She merrily hopped over to
them, waving profusely.
She hugged them both, lingering on Cameron. “I love you,” she told them, obviously drunk.
Even though she was heavily intoxicated, it bothered her to see the two of them together.
They looked so perfect as a couple. Leah stumbled away into the blackness of the night, the sound of Bob Marley fading in the distance.
She found her way into a boys‟ dorm. She didn‟t know
where she was headed, just somewhere where she could rest her head without having to walk all the way across campus again.
She found it. It was an abandoned suite with a sofa in the lounge. She fell onto it, exhausted and dizzy. She
looked up and saw Bob Marley‟s face painted on the wall.
“Can‟t I ever get away from you?” she slurred, as she turned over and passed out. Some time later she woke up with an overwhelming bout of nausea. She knew she wasn‟t going to be able to make it
to a trash can, much less a bathroom. So right there, into the sofa, she threw up.
She woke up in a puddle of her own vomit. It smelled horrible and it was all in her hair and in her clothes.
Oh, no! Her dorm was all the way across campus.
How was she going to walk there in broad daylight? Everyone would see her with vomit in her hair!
But thankfully, it was early enough. She made it back
undetected, then took a long, hot shower in the bathroom.
Amazingly, she didn‟t feel sick. She didn‟t even have a headache.
Halloween came and went. She was sitting in Cameron‟s
room, finishing off the last remnants of a joint, when all
of a sudden he broke down and started crying.
Leah looked up at him. “Cameron? What‟s wrong?”
She had never seen him cry before; she had thought of him mostly as a “tough guy.”
He raised his head slightly, his hand covering his eyes, and said, “It‟s Justice. She turned me down.”
Leah felt bad for him, but he knew he didn‟t love her.
He knew very well that he didn‟t know the pain of a life-
consuming love that rips you apart, thread by thread.
“I‟m sorry,” she said quietly. “I didn‟t know.”
He lowered his hand. “It‟s just that, when I finally start to care about someone, it has to end like this.”
Leah nodded knowingly. “I‟m sure you‟ll find someone,” she said.
A week later, Leah was approaching his door just as he
was leaving. “Where are you going?” she asked.
“To the bar,” he said.
“Why?” she said. “You have plenty of liquor in your room.”
He smiled slightly. “There‟s a girl there that I want to meet. Something might happen.”
Something slammed into Leah in full force. Panic.
With Justice, she had known that nothing was going to happen. But this was different; this was a real threat.
The mere thought that he was about to have another one of his meaningless affairs made her feel sick to the stomach.
Desperate, she searched for words.
“Well, are you sure she‟s interested? You have to remember what happened
with Justice. That was only a week ago.”
He patted her on the shoulder. “Oh, dear, sweet,
innocent Leah,” he said. “It‟s just sex.”
Before she knew it, she was crying. Cameron was
standing there, stunned. “What did I say?” he implored.
He made a move to open the door. “Come inside,” he said.
He motioned for her to come and sit on the bed. The feelings had come so suddenly, and as such a surprise, that
even Leah wasn‟t sure where they‟d come from.
“Tell me what this is all about,” he said gently. He placed a heavy arm over her shoulder as her crying quieted.
She wiped at a tear. “Cameron, I have feelings for
you,” she blurted. “I tried not to let them show at the beginning, but it looks like I was unsuccessful.” She
looked up hopefully into his eyes.
- Writer
