Why Girls Are Weird by Pamela Ribon Read Free Book Online

running out now that my life with Ian had ended. As I stared at my apartment window, the shadows of the furniture just visible in the light, I imagined saying good-bye to all of this. I tried to picture what would happen to me next.
    I realized Shannon had sat down next to me. She was wearing a shiny mauve dress with thin shoulder straps. Her hair was curled and I could see the hairspray straining against the weight of her pretty brown tendrils. She had glitter on her eyelids.
    â€œWrong kind of party,” she said to me. “I thought there’d be lots of dancing.”
    â€œDale’s work friends aren’t as fabulous as we are,” I told her.
    She lit a cigarette and looked around.
    â€œDid you drive here wearing that?” I asked her.
    â€œNo, I stopped at your apartment and changed.”
    â€œThat’s why my light was on,” I said, turning back toward my place.
    â€œYou’re the only person I know who watches her own house while at a party. Tomorrow we’re having fun. I didn’t drive all the way from Houston for nothing.”
    â€œWe’ll have fun.”
    â€œI’ll stay through the holiday weekend, if that’s okay.”
    â€œSure. That’s cool.”
    â€œI’ll mostly be studying, but I thought it’d be nice to go down to Barton Creek and read in the sun.”
    Dale’s high-pitched panic voice doesn’t normally startle me since he uses it all the time, but it shook me immediately out of my conversation when he screamed through his bedroom window, “Get in here!”
    â€œI think you’re in trouble,” Shannon whispered.
    I ran into the bedroom to find Dale trembling. He was holding a shuffled bundle of pages, letting them fall from the space between his hands and his chest.
    Before I could speak he grabbed me by the arm, pushed me into his bathroom, and shut the door.
    â€œGet in the tub!” he said quickly.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œI said, get in the tub!”
    This certainly wasn’t the reaction I had been expecting. I stood, my mouth opening and closing silently, ridiculously.
    â€œGet in the fucking tub, Anna!”
    I did what he said. My shoes slipped on the porcelain. I steadied myself by holding on to the soap dish. I took Dale’s beer out of his hand and took a sip.
    â€œI don’t believe this,” he started.
    â€œDo you want me to explain?” I asked.
    â€œI want you to shut up.”
    â€œDon’t talk to me like that, Dale.” I could feel a fight starting. I only had to hold back and let him rant and I could avoid it completely, but something in me wanted to fight back instead of letting him run me down with his words.
    â€œI don’t want you to write about Ian.”
    â€œI don’t want you to tell me what to write!”
    â€œThis is unhealthy.”
    I stood up, narrowly missing my head on the curtain rod. The shoes I was wearing made me taller than I was used to, and I was happy for the extra inches. “I did it for your birthday present, Dale. I don’t need a lecture.”
    â€œYou did it to write about Ian.”
    â€œThat’s not true,” I said indignantly.
    â€œNo? Then why do so many stories come back to being about him? You’ve written a webpage worthy of stalker status here.”
    â€œI’ve written a webpage pretending to be some other girl who has a boyfriend that’s based on Ian, but not really Ian.” My foot slipped, so I quickly squatted and grabbed the soap dish to steady myself again, this time slapping my right hand down on a damp and sticky bar of soap.
    â€œThere’s no way you really believe that,” Dale said as I gently turned on the faucet and rinsed my hand in the cool water.
    â€œThis isn’t about Ian,” I said.
    â€œEverything is always about Ian, including when you deliberately do something that’s supposed to not be about Ian. Don’t you see that? You can’t