MayMetMo 2020 #25: Cynical for Swimming
“…Bring your bathing suit” Her heart sank reading the last time to the coveted invitation to the most popular girl in school’s birthday party. It was to be held at her fabulous and wealthy estate, up in the upper crust hills of the city. Mary Lou Depardieu, the very name almost made Gretchen Wiler turn her nose up in the air and mock the stiff upper lip of her rival and classmate for the better half of 6 years. Ironically she and Mary Lou had been something of friends when they’d started school. But no amount of effort seemed to be able to mend the gulf that had arisen between them in the intervening years. At first, she thought it had been some cruel joke, a way to get the best of her, or maybe she’d just invited all the girls from school. She was sure that Mary Lou just wanted to get a picture of ‘fat’ Gretchen in a bathing suit at her party, or worse, no one else would have brought one, and she’d look just like a beached whale clinging to the sides of the last life raft on the sinking ship “Adolescent Friendships”. She scoffed at her own use of hyperbole and decided to see what the people at school were saying. Surprisingly no one mentioned anything about a party from Monday to Thursday, and with the party Saturday, she was sure it would have been the talk of the school that the prettiest, most popular, gem in a sea of sand crabs girl in school was having a party. But there was simply no mention. Gretchen wanted so badly to ask anyone else about it but thought that there was the off chance it was secret she was spoiling, or being called a freak or making it up herself, she hid and withdrew into her pulled up cloak the flush crimson of embarrassment heating her face and neck until she was sure everyone was making fun of her and her “tomato face”. By Thursday night, Gretchen Wiler was convinced there was some trickery afoot and had designs to go by Mary Lou’s and give her a piece of mind she’d never forget. Got all the way to Mary Lou’s gate at the front of her property before losing her nerve and returning home. ‘There’s just no way…’ Gretchen thought, ‘I’m not going to this…’ and she threw the letter in the trash that Friday before school. Proud of herself for reviewing the facts and making a decision, she headed to class.
It was just after lunch Friday afternoon when Mary Lou found her in the locker area at the front of the school, and walked up cool and nonchalant, “Hi Gretch, ” She whispered, “I wasn’t sure if you got the invitation, but, I’m having a few friends over on Saturday for my birthday, and I’d love for you to come..”
“Listen! Mary Lou,” Gretchen practically shouted, a sum of the divide she’d held between them in her mind’s eye, “I don’t know what game you’re playing, but I’m not going to parade around in a swimsuit for your friends to just laugh at me! I’ve had a rough year, and I didn’t even know we were still friends, with the folks you’ve been running with the last few years, and this is the FIRST time I’ve been asked to do anything in that time, so I don’t know where you get off, but I’m not your personal mockery.” She breathed, finishing her speech as if she’d run a mile.
For Mary Lou’s part, she’d seemed to take it in stride, braced properly from the impact of it, “Gretch, I… just wanted to reconnect again,” she stammered, fresh salt and water welling up her in eyes, “I know it been a long time, but I had just hoped we could start fresh, like when we met, at the Summer Camp we went to in 6th, we’d met by the pool there, and I just.. I didn’t invite anyone else Gretch, I only wanted my friend back..” The last bit was covered in an array of sobs that broke through her speak breaking it as a dish slammed to the ground. Mary Lou seemed to recover, for a moment, and ran from Gretchen then, while Gretchen was left attempting to stammer out an apology, to the air left behind, and found her self unable to breathe, caught in the deep in of a pool, swimming in her one cynicism.