| The Ice Cream Shop Note: This story features a character who sleeps around but it is not a major plot point. however, if reading that would make you uncomfortable I suggest you not to read this story. Prologue: Aretha Franklin I woke up the morning after my friend D.T. died feeling twenty pounds lighter than when I had finally fallen asleep the night before. For a second I couldn�t remember why my face was tearstained and I held a crumbled tissue clutched tight in my fist. Then reality hit knocking the wind out of me. It was like a weight towering over me. Suspended, when I had fallen asleep but came crashing down when I awoke. I tried to go to sleep again to get that weight off my chest but sadness weighed me down and I was too cried out to shed one more tear. I sat up and looked at the clock. It was noon and I was late for work, again. A memory flashed into my mind of another morning where I was in pain and late for work. I had been dumped by my first serious boyfriend and I was miserable. I showed up an hour late for work and immediately felt better in my most comfortable atmosphere. Burger Town was a small local restaurant which served not only burgers but just about every kind of die-hard American food. There were two soccer moms eating pancakes in a corner but other than that the place was dead. My friends were in their usual morning places. Al was brewing coffee, flipping through In Style, and watching the soaps, the queen of multi-tasking. Simon was nowhere to be seen, probably making out with some girl in the restroom. D.T. was in the kitchen making salad dressing and blasting Metallica, his favorite. D.T. was our resident Master of the Music. He owned almost every CD in existence. Mostly, he played stuff he liked but when he saw me he nodded briskly and Metallica stopped. A few seconds later Aretha Franklin, my favorite, was playing full blast. I smiled at D.T. my eyes watering. D.T. wasn�t the sentimental type but this was the way he showed he cared. Simon emerged from the bathroom with a girl on his arm his face already twisting into a scowl. �Okay, dude, what happened to Metallica? What�s with this crap music?� he complained. �It�s for Natalie,� Al said quietly. �Oh,� Simon said just as quietly and shot me a guilty look. I smiled at him to let him know I was okay. The girl with him was tall, with a short haircut. She had at one point been wearing lipstick but now it was mostly on Simon leaving nothing but a faint ring around her lips. She strode over to the coat rack, grabbed her purse and turned to Simon who had made a beeline to the coffee pot. When she spoke I could tell she was foreign, she was putting stress on all the wrong syllables. She sounded European but I wasn�t sure. �So, Simon I will see you later.� Actually it sounded more like: �So, See-mone, I vill see you la-ter.� Simon just nodded chewing a bagel. The girl tossed her hair and strutted out the door bumping my arm with a bony elbow. I winced, feeling the spot with my fingers, picturing the bruise that would be there by tomorrow. I moved toward a barstool and sat down. Simon poured himself a cup of steaming coffee, black, and took a huge gulp, closing his eyes to savor his favorite early morning treat. Al lowered her magazine and leveled Simon with a piercing glare. �I thought you didn�t do this anymore.� Simon took a long time before he answered. �Do what?� �Sleep around.� Al said it in a quiet, harsh tone that caused the soccer moms to stop talking and glance over at us. Conscious about sitting and staring, I grabbed the paper from the news rack nearby and pretended to read but nothing registered. Simon flushed. �I didn�t sleep with her.� The soccer moms ducked their heads and began whispering furiously. �Oh so you just made out with her.� Al said loudly. �Like that�s so much better. Don�t you have any pride? How can you be like this?� �You know,� Simon said in that low voice he used before he exploded. �I don�t have to listen to this.� He strode over to the table and grabbed the paper out of my hands. �Simon, Natalie was reading that.� Al said. �No she wasn�t she was just holding it. Right?� Simon asked me. �Yeah, sure.� I said not wanting to start something �God, Natalie you are so spineless. You can�t let people walk over you like that. But that�s not the issue here.� Simon slammed the paper down on the table. �Then what is the issue here? Tell me, Al! It�s me isn�t it? And tomorrow, it�ll be Natalie or D.T. or the president! You know, nobody is ever good enough for you! Natalie�s spineless, D.T. doesn�t apply himself and as for me, what else is there to say? You have your hands full with me and you�re so upset you haven�t been able to tame me, the five years we�ve been friends. I mean, I curse, I�m stupid, and I sleep around! Well, I�m sorry I�m such a failure! The room tingled after Simon finished his tirade. The soccer moms gave up trying to pretend not to listen and were now openly staring their mouths hanging open. Al�s eyes were wet with tears and she blinked, stunned at Simon�s outburst. �I-I�m sorry, Simon. I just worry about you.� The soccer moms made fast business of preparing to leave throwing money on the table and bolting out the door. Al moved to collect it her eyes on Simon the whole time. D.T. and I sat and stared waiting for what happened next. Simon took a gulp of coffee as he gathered his thoughts. Finally, he spoke: �Why? Why do you even bother to worry about me?� �Because she loves you,� D.T. said before Al could open her mouth. He had moved from the kitchen to standing right behind Al. I hadn�t even noticed him move. Now, Al whipped her head around and stared at D.T. her face flushed. Simon blinked, once, twice trying to register what D.T. had just said. He opened his mouth to speak but D.T. cut him off. �The reason why she bothers to critique your every move is because she wants you to be everything you can be. Just like your mother who also loves you. You know, she�s not the only one to tell you that. Me and Natalie tell you that stuff all the time but do you listen? No! The only reason why you take Al�s opinions so personally is because you care for her too. Need I say more?� No, he didn�t. I couldn�t believe D.T. had gathered this much from one five minute conversation. He didn�t plan to but he had given Simon and Al the greatest gift they had ever received: an analysis of their feelings. That was over a year ago and Simon and Al are still together. D.T. did this stuff all the time. Thanks to him, I got a job and three of the best friends a girl could have, Al has a new car and D.T.�s neighbor has a husband. D.T. was so in touch with other people�s moods and feelings. He could always sense when a fight was about to start and knew what exact words would get the reaction he wanted from a certain person. It was one of his many talents. D.T. was, at eighteen, the best chef our restaurant Burger Town could ever wish for. He was also incredibly good at skipping school. Somehow, he managed to get passing grades. Al would always tell him of he only applied himself he could work miracles. Well he did do that just not in the way anyone expected. He did that through Simon and Al. I finished my speech at D.T�s funeral and gazed at the crowd. There was not a dry eye in the building. Later, I stood with my two best friends as D.T.�s casket was lowered into the grave. Simon and I had bawled like babies during the service and were still sniffling but Al remained stoic and strong. It used to bother me that Al never showed any emotion, now I envied her that. I returned home and found a large manila envelope sitting on my bed. �I found it in your book bag,� my mother told me. I opened it carefully and unfolded the piece of notebook paper. Somehow I knew it was from D.T. Natalie- Call 555-7621. Surprise! -D.T. I picked up the phone and dialed wondering what gift awaited me. �Hello, Natalie? A little birdie told me you�d call. I�m Steve but you can call me Dad if you ever feel so inclined.� My jaw dropped. My father, who once denied relations to me, was actually on the phone. I sat back soaking in my father�s every word wondering if D.T. had seen his death coming and had left this as a gift to me. There was something else in the envelope. It was D.T�s Aretha Franklin CD. Chapter 1: Pretzels It was three weeks later and in that short period of time I had learned more about my father than I had found out from my mother in the past eighteen years. My mother had a low tolerance for long distance phone calls, especially ones to my father so she only let me have one 60 minute call per week. I learned that he was a wealthy car dealer who owned a mansion by the sea in South Carolina; he was a Taurus, loved candy and was obsessed with water polo. Oh by the way, he was also remarried and had a fifteen-year-old daughter. He sprung that one on me in my last phone call to him after inviting me to stay with him. I would have said yes and talked my mom into springing for the plane ticket but the daughter thing stopped me. How could he have just replaced me? I voiced this concern out loud to Simon�s mother one Friday night while watching Simon and Al get ready for their date. Actually, Simon was ready but Al had showed up with a huge bag of stuff and holed up in the bathroom for half an hour. Simon�s mother happened to be one of my favorite people alive. She insisted that we call her by her first name, Emily. She had Simon when she was only fifteen so now she was only in her mid-thirties. She worked two jobs as a secretary and shoe salesman and when wasn�t going out on dates she sat on her couch with me watching tapes of the soap operas she missed during the day.�Oh honey,� she said now. �No one could replace a doll-face like you. He loves you and the more he chats with you the more he�ll adore you. I�m positive; it works the same way with me.� Simon snorted in the midst of stuffing his face with pretzels. Simon and his mother both have a lot of quirks but the funniest one is eating pretzels when they�re nervous. There are three different stages of pretzel eating. Small crunchy ones for when they�re anxious, large crunchy ones for when they�re really anxious and large soft ones when they�re terrified. Now, Simon was eating large crunchy ones. ��don�t see what you�re so nervous about,� Emily was saying. �You�re just doing dinner and a movie like you usually do, right? page 2 |