School counseling, diaries, and girl crushes
Heathen woke up at 5:50. She had expected her dad to be up by now, but she didn't smell coffee being brewed or hear the news. Instead, it was silent and smelled like nothing, and Lassie was whining at the door, probably so she could pee. Heathen didn't bother looking at her alarm clock, which had been broken since 3rd grade. She pulled herself out of bed and decided to just make coffee for herself, get ready for school, let the dog outside and go. So she did.
She made her coffee the same way her dad did, just with a different coffee creamer. She drank as much as she could without giving herself a stomach ache, ate her cereal, took a shower that was shorter than it could have been, brushed her teeth, got dressed, grabbed her backpack, and her Walkman, and walked herself out the door and to the busstop.
One of her neighbors, Micheal, walked over. "Hey! How are you?" Heathen stared at him. She had her headphones over her ears. You could even vaguely hear her music. She finally took her headphones off and stared at him blankly. "Hi, Micheal." Micheal suddenly looked nervous, kind of like he was cringing at himself. Despite that, he continued. "So, wanna hang out after school? I figured since we're neighbors, we should get to know each other—" Before he could get another word out, Heathen spoke, her tone making her sound startled. "I was grounded." Micheal, who had been looking at the street in front of them, looked at Heathen as he contemplated something else. "Well, what if I sat with you at lunch?" Realizing she probably couldn't get away with avoiding him without making him upset, Heathen nodded. "Great! I'll see you there." Heathen looked at him with more malice she meant to convey as she slipped her headphones back over her ears and angrily rewound her cassette tape.
The start of the bus ride to school was irritating since her best friend, Laci Whitlock, never rode the bus. Well, Heathen thought of her as a best friend. Truthfully, a small part of her thought Laci tolerated her. They wouldn't have been friends in any other circumstance other than when they met in 2nd grade, when Laci was new in town, after she had moved from Wisconsin to Iowa, for a reason she couldn't remember. All she knew was Laci was gorgeous, had no reason to be friends with her, and was the only person she hadn't "caught feelings for" so she could have some sort of advantage. Like how she had dated Waukee Middle School's star basketball player because he constantly picked on her.
Heathen was pulled out of her reminiscing frenzy by Micheal, nudging her. Again, she pulled off her headphones, yet again forgetting to pause her cassette in her Walkman. "Yes, Micheal?" Micheal smiled at her as he plopped down. "I was sitting in the back of the bus, but realized that I should probably sit next to you so we could, you know, talk." Heathen nodded, looking out the window of the bus. "So, I'll go first. Why are you named 'Heathen'? Of all things?" Heathen thought of how she could answer that question. She could say, "My parents wanted to be original." Which was only partly true. Ignoring the fact her dad hadn't actually settled on a name for her until John, Lenny, and Arthur had gotten drunk off their asses. After a few seconds, she turned to look at Micheal. "My uncle John named me. My mom wanted to name me something nice. My dad wasn't sure. They settled on Heathen." Micheal snorted, a stupid smile on his face. He had the hair on the sides of his head shaved off, the rest of what was there was spiked, he had a couple piercings, and he smelled like her uncle John. Micheal started to speak, still laughing as he did. "Sounds like your dad flipped a coin." Heathen shrugged, and despite herself, was smiling. Maybe it was just because she was being awkward. "More like rolled a dice." The rest of the bus ride was... unremarkable, it was mostly Micheal talking, a lot of Heathen pretending to listen, but to be fair, she didn't assume they were going to get along past the bus rides to and from school.
Heathen spent maybe half of her algebra class staring at Laci's empty seat. She hadn't seen Laci recently, but she hadn't really been looking. Which was probably for the best. After all, she caught herself staring at Laci or thinking of making her a mixtape. It took a few nights of her laying alone in her bed, thinking of Laci the way she heard girls in her class talk about the boys they liked. Which would have been less... gross to people if she hadn't had this realization in the middle of the AIDs crisis. Even then, she was sure most people in her life wouldn't care. Even Dutch would keep his remarks limited, hopefully. But what would Laci think of her? Would she be grossed out? I mean, it's weird to stare at someone for as long as Heathen found herself spaced out staring at her, but it makes it worse if it's a weird dyke thing. One of the bigger reasons she refused to acknowledge her own self was the fact that her and most of the school watched a recently openly gay kid jump off the school roof after being bullied.
She remembered hearing stories from her uncle John and Grandpa Hosea about Dutch and his.. odd behaviors, like the story John told her about Dutch threatening to leave Arthur in the cold, snowy Iowa winter for "talking back", and the threats Dutch made about leaving both of them at the spots he found them if they ever argued with him about anything at all ever. Hosea mentioned how he once caught Dutch about to punch Arthur, which sparked an argument that he claims kept Arthur safe for a bit, which Heathen doubts.
Her morbid thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the school secretary's voice over the PA system. "Can Heathen Morgan head down to Mr. Daniels office?" She sat in her uncomfortable chair for about 5 seconds before actually getting up and leaving the classroom. She could have sworn she felt eyes on her as she left, but she chose to ignore it for now. The walk to the guidance counselor's office felt longer than it probably was. She opened the door to the office that had a few posters about hope and everything else that felt sarcastic after a while, but otherwise looked exactly like the principal's office, which she thought was weird.
"Heathen! Welcome. Take a seat." Mr. Daniels always sounded too cheerful for what usually followed in their sessions. "I'm glad you decided to show up this time. Since you, you know, refused to see me for quite a minute." Despite his cheery tone, Heathen could feel the slight disappointment in his words. She didn't say anything and sat down in the chair across from him, Mr. Daniels took it upon himself to fill the silence. "You.. started more fights recently. It's not a good look, Ms. Morgan. I can understand where you're coming from. People your age tend to have some... feelings, and I think I have an idea where yours are coming from." Heathen looked at Mr. Daniels, glancing around the small room to avoid eye contact. She didn't like their sessions, but she didn't hate them either. "What's that?" She finally asked. Biting at the inside of her cheek when she was done asking her question. "Well," Mr. Daniels started, his tone condescending as he fished around his desk drawer for something. "I think, personally, it's the lack of a mother figure. Among a few other things, of course. Maybe being surrounded by.. mainly, adults throughout your formative years might have hurt your social life." Heathen narrowed her eyes at him. Who did he think he was? He was just a wannabe therapist stuck working in a school. When she finally started to speak, her words were deadpan. "You think.. I'm affected by the death of a woman, that I can barely remember, Mr. Daniels?" She spoke slowly, really making sure he knew how ridiculous that idea was— "Well, maybe not that. But the effect it's had on your father could be what's upsetting your subconscious. Sometimes, what the parents go through can trickle down to their children, whether intentionally or not." Heathen stared at him, she looked uncomfortable, like the guidance counselor she'd usually call a douche, had just stuck his hand in her skull, and fished around for something she didn't even know was a problem. "....Oh." was all she could manage. Mr. Daniels finally seemed to find the right time to hand her a medium-sized journal. It was blue and.. pretty plain, actually. She put it on her lap and did nothing else. "Plus, writing down your moods is a good outlet, Ms. Morgan."
By the time it was lunch, Heathen had forgotten about her promise to talk more with Micheal at lunch and was more than irritated when he sat down across from her. "Hey!" He had that same stupid fucking smile on his face. And she started to wonder if he had ever spoken to someone else before. "Hi, Micheal." She stared at him in confusion before starting to eat the sandwich she made for herself the night before. "You can call me Mike, Heathen." Heathen nodded, looking around for Laci. "Who're you looking for?" She couldn't help but frown as she side-eyed Micheal before turning her head fully to look at him. "Laci Whitlock. By the way, are you new in town or something?" Micheal laughed and shook his head, starting to eat the food the cafeteria had made. "No, I'm not. I just never had the courage to talk to anyone. Especially not you." She hummed, refusing to acknowledge him further.
"So, is it just you and your dad?"
"Yeah."
"What happened to your mom?"
again, heathen weighed out the options of answering Micheal, she could say, "My mom shot herself in the attic when I was 2. What about you?" Or she could answer like a civilized human being. She chose to answer like a civilized human being. "She died when I was really young. Don't remember much about her. What about you?" Micheal's smile dropped in an instant, and he quickly offered his apologies, and his "I'm sorry for your loss"es which Heathen nodded to. There were a few seconds of silence before Micheal answered her question. "I feel like a dick for asking now, but I have two living parents." Heathen shrugged. "You didn't know. You aren't a dick." Micheal was put at ease by that and quickly moved onto his next ice breaking question. "What's your dad like?" Heathen took another bite of her sandwich. "He's busy. He works a lot. He's a detective." Micheal's smile was back. He had a dimple on the left side of his face. It was all around a nice smile that fit a perfectly fine face. "My dad works a lot too. He works in construction."
"What about your mom?"
"She doesn't work. She stays home all day and takes care of my sister." Heathen nodded, awkwardly sitting in silence the rest of lunch while Micheal talked about new movies he saw and other trivial things she couldn't bring herself to focus on.
The rest of the day was as unremarkable as the morning was. She got home and opened her newly acquired journal, and immediately closed it. "This is stupid." She mumbled as she threw the book down on the table that should have been used for family dinners and threw her backpack down in one of the chairs. She didn't bother to take off her shoes since no one really cared about tracking mud or anything in the house. She let Lassie in from the pathetically small backyard and plopped down on the couch. She spent a lot of her late afternoon thinking about how she should start her homework and still not doing anything but blankly staring at the tv.
She looked at the clock on the wall and realized that it was close to dinner. She'd made it a habit at this point to get up and call the agency and check in when her father might be home. So, that's what she did. She got up from the couch, walked to the kitchen, and dialed the secretary's number. "Hello? This is Matthews Detective Agency. How may I help you?" The heavy Irish accent was always somehow jarring to Heathen. Like she never expected the same secretary for a reason she couldn't explain. "Hi, Molly, it's Heathen. I was wondering when my dad might be off work?" Molly's tone changed from the usual, almost robotic way of speaking she had when she normally picked up the phone, to a much kinder, albeit slightly irritated one. "Well, sweetie, Mr. Morgan's working a case with Mr. Smith, he might not be home until 12 in the morning." Heathen sighed and nodded, although Ms. O'Shea couldn't see it. "Thank you, Molly. Can you let him know I called?" There was a pause, and Muffled talking that sounded vaguely like Molly was arguing with one of the other girls that worked there before she actually answered her. "Of course, Heathen." And then the line went dead.
Heathen slammed the phone back on its receiver and looked around her house, as if looking for what to do next. She eventually decided on ordering dinner rather than making something herself and waiting for her dad to get home.