When The World Fails You

When The World Fails You Part 4

Madison

The moment I pull up to the drive way Maria comes out and waves. I get out of the car and slam the door so hard it makes her jump.

She crosses her arms and nods to me. “Ray?”

Maria is the only one I told about Ray. She sworn secrecy when she found me crying in my bathroom the first day I realized I loved him.

I wasn’t crying because I realized I loved him, I’m not THAT dramatic. I was crying because he called me a stuck up bitch for the first time to my face. We were in art class together and by then he made it clear he didn’t like me to anyone who would listen. This was around the time I started to notice how amazing he looked when he wore sleeveless shirts.

So I’m painting and trying to figure out how to get an A because our teacher, Mr. Arkan, told me I have no creative talent. Like I needed to hear that from a teacher?

Next thing I knew, Ray bumps into my art stand and it knocks my painting onto the floor, face first. It took me two months to get that picture to look (somewhat) perfect. I decided to do a student painting of Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa but I wanted her to look more like Cher. I found it hilarious.

And he ruined it.

The whole class went silent for a second until I picked up the painting and examined it. Cher’s face was ruined, smushed up and running down the board. I mean, of course it didn’t look like the real thing, but I seriously put so much time and effort into it that it sucked big time.

I looked at Ray who grinned. “Sorry.”

“I find that hard to believe,” I said, putting the painting on the stand.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What? You don’t understand English?”

The class began to ooh us. Ray’s face grew hard and he shrugged. “Your right, I’m not sorry.”

“Why don’t you go do something productive instead of wasting my time,” I sat down and took out my phone.

“Why don’t you quit being a stuck up bitch.” He shot back.

That was the first time someone called me out of my name to my face. It really hurt. By now, I’m used to the insults so much I think I’ve grown immune to them sometimes. But because it first came from him, a guy not afraid to express what he thinks I am to everyone in school…it was just a reckoning day from then on.

I thought you weren’t supposed to treat girls like that.

His dad never did.

He used to be our gardener. Seriously one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met. Maria and I used to make them all lemonade during the summer when the temperature was too hot to handle. I remember bringing the drinks out to him and his workers. Some of them were pigs, staring at me and commenting on me in Spanish, but he’d always tell them to shut up and show some respect. Everyone always obeyed what he told them to do.

Ray looked just like him.

They had the same passionate eyes and no nonsense face. Every once in awhile you’ll see Ray smile and when he did the image of his fathers smile always came into my head.

I had known that he was Rays father for awhile but never said anything to him.

I think that’s when Ray started to show his true emotions towards me. When he realized that his dad was working for my dad…and since my dad was rarely home I was the one who had to tell Maria to tell him what to do with the yard. So I was in charge. I didn’t want to be, but I knew that if I didn’t say something or give them instructions, then Rays dad would be in trouble.