Dancing Around // peter parker

37

I shook my head but didn't say anything else. I felt a combination of everything I hated. I felt abandoned, nervous, and upset. It was weird seeing Ms. May this morning. It was weird sitting on a crappy sofa with wet heels. It was weird waiting to be on a game show. My father's face kept flashing in my mind. Over and over again. I tried to ignore it, I tried not to think about him. I would distract myself with the rain, or my heels, or the small television screen a few shakes away from falling since it was clearly hooked up to the wall wrong. Yet, my father made his way in here, and suddenly, I felt this guilt. How could I be here without him? How could I do the thing we always said we would do together, without him? How dare I? No, wait, how dare he for not being here. For leaving me.

I always thought he would come to get me one day. He would apologize, tell me he was wrong, that he wasn't right in the head and that we would go on a game show as a way to make it up to me. I always thought he would come to his senses. Well, maybe not thought. More liked hope. Okay, more liked wished.

Sitting there, hearing people on the television setting up, it was like this big slap in the face. I was here, but I wasn't where I wanted to be. I thought that if this ever happened to me - if I had ever actually gotten on a game show, it would be at the perfect time in my life. I would be happy. I would be with my father. I would have friends. I wouldn't feel so damn lonely. Like something easy to leave behind. I was easy to leave behind. It was easy not to care about me. Maybe life was laughing at me. "You thought," it said. It was cruel. It was playing some big joke on me. I got want I always wanted, yet, it was nothing like I wanted it to be. Life was messy and mean. Things worked out, apparently, but did they really?

Ow my head was starting to hurt.

"Marina?" Cindy said. I met her brown eyes. "Can I be honest with you?" Oh, great, another deep conversation about life. "I'm kind of freaking out."

I sat up. "Why?"

She pulled out a piece of paper from her bag, unfolding it to reveal it was much bigger than I had originally thought. It was straight out of a cartoon. She placed it in between us. "I wrote down every question they might ask with the answer. I watched a couple of seasons of game shows yesterday and I planned out exactly how we are going to win this. We just need to follow the plan."

"The plan?"

She nodded her head, pointing to a list of steps on the right side of the page. "Yes, so I think we should stick to topics we're best in. I'll do science and English. You'll do math and history."

"I suck at math."

She looked at me like I was crazy. "No, you don't."

"Yeah, I do."

She stared at me hard for a second, before laughing. "If you're trying to freak me out, stop it, it's not funny."

"I'm not kidding, I'm bad at math," I said.

"You're taking two math classes," she said.

"Yeah, so I can get an off period senior year."

"But you can handle it."

"Just barely."

"Marina," Cindy yelled, "Just stop it okay. Just admit you're good at math so we can move on with it."

"Why would I lie about being bad at math?" I asked.

"I don't know. Why would you lie about being fine?" She asked.

I stayed still. She stayed still. "Okay, so I'll answer the math questions," I said. I looked down at the big sheet of paper on the sofa. She nodded her head, going through all of them with me. "Man, you really like to plan," I told her after a while of going through the question.