My Lost and Found Life by Melodie Bowsher Page B

something out,” I said hastily. No way did I want to live in her dirty house or deal with her mother.
    “I wish you were still going to Boston with me.” Nicole sounded worried. “Are you sure you can’t get a student loan or something?”
    “It’s too late. I checked online. Right now, they’re taking financial aid applications for next fall, a year from now.” I shook my head in dismay. “The only thing I can do is find a job and an apartment here.”
    “But you should be going to college,” Nicole argued. “You’re really, really smart. You had a four-point-oh. And look at the way you read all the time.”
    “I’ll get there. I just need to get things under control first. Hopefully, my mom will show up. Maybe I’ll be able to join you at BU for spring semester.”
    Tattie snorted, no doubt at the absurdity of anyone wanting to go to school, and took a long drag off her joint.
    “What are you going to do this fall, Miss Tatiana?” I said.
    “As little as possible.” She rolled over on her back and stared at the ceiling. “My lawyer and my mother are pressuring me to go to rehab. That sounds really dreary. What I’d like to do is take off and go to Europe. I hear you can get really good shit in Amsterdam.”
    “That’s not a very long-term goal. Don’t you ever think about the future?” Nicole asked with genuine curiosity.
    “Nope,” said Tattie. “Life is short, so live it up while you can. It’s all shit anyway.”
    We both were silent at that, Nicole because she didn’t believe that, and me because I hoped it wasn’t true.
    • • •
    I foolishly allowed Nic to persuade me to spend that night at her house. Nicole’s brothers were sprawled on the living room floor in front of the TV, but there was no sign of Cindy.
    Upstairs, Nicole flopped down on her bed and gave an exaggerated sigh. “I’m so tired, I don’t even feel like undressing.”
    I grabbed one of her pillows, tossed it on the carpet, and parked my butt on top of it, elevating my legs on the edge of a chair. “Ah, this feels good,” I said, inhaling and exhaling a few times to release the tension in my body.
    I looked over at Nicole as she lay stretched out on the bed, her eyes closed. For the first time in a long time, I really looked at her.
    “How do you do it?” I asked. “How do you manage to never have any mean or evil thoughts about anyone?”
    Her eyes popped open. “Who says I never have any evil thoughts? I have plenty—especially when my mother is nagging me. I’m such a big disappointment to her. I can’t be the Miss Popular center of attention she wants me to be. She wants me to be like you, and I can’t do it. Sometimes when she’s going on and on at me, I tune out what she’s saying and stare at a particular part of her body, like her neck. I concentrate, willing her to feel pain there, a pinch or twinge, anything. But it never works. So much for the power of the mind. The only way I’ll ever be able to have my own life is by getting away from here.” She reached up and began nervously twirling and tugging on a lock of hair.
    “Relax, it’s only a few weeks away,” I said. “And stop pulling your hair! You’ll go bald.”
    Nicole instantly dropped her right hand. “I don’t know. I’m not so sure that I should go to Boston now that you can’t. I don’t want to leave you here by yourself. I think I should stay and go to San Francisco State.”
    “What are you thinking? Just because my life is totally screwed up, you want to ruin your life too? That’s really dumb.”
    Tears welled up in her eyes.
    “Listen, I have a shitload ofproblems right now, and there’s nothing you can do about them. You can’t bring my mother back, you can’t give me a job or a place to live. How does it help me if we’re both miserable? For years you’ve been dreaming ofgoing to school on the East Coast and getting away from Cindy. You’d have to be crazy to throw that away now.”
    She sniffed and I