Misty (Wildflowers 1)

"Lloyd has this infuriating smile. He pulls his lips in and you can almost hear the laughter coming from his arrogant eyes, but at the same time there's something sexy about it. He's dangerous and I suppose that makes him exciting. He does what he wants to do when he wants to do it. He's impulsive and has no respect for rules or authority.

"Mr. Calder, the cafeteria monitor, was staring at me with such a look of disgust, like, how could I lower myself to permit Lloyd Kimble to sit next to me and talk to him? Suddenly, I felt as angry and as rebellious as I imagined Lloyd was. What right did Mr. Calder have to decide who my friends should and should not be? He was my English teacher but not my father or my older brother. At that moment I despised all the adults in the world for being bossy and hypocritical.

"'A Beverly like you doesn't usually sit alone unless somethin's wrong, and I'm sure it ain't your breath,' Lloyd commented as he bit into his

hamburger.

"'What's a Beverly?' I asked.

"He stopped chewing a moment, smiled and then chewed on until he swallowed and gestured toward Darlene and my other girlfriends.

"'A Beverly. You know. Girls from Beverly Hills, spoiled bitches.'

"'I live in Beverly Hills, but I'm hardly a spoiled bitch,' I responded with more courage than I thought I had. His laugh made me angrier. 'I'm not!'

" 'Good for you,' he said. `So why ain't you sittin' with them?'

"'They're a bunch of phonies, if you must know,' I said.

"'Oh, I know that,' he told me. 'What they do to ya, cut up your credit cards?'

"'Very funny. They didn't do anything,' I said. 'They just . . . think they're better than me now.'

"'Why now?' he followed and I turned and looked at him, wondering why he was suddenly so interested in me. 'You look like you could use a real friend,' he offered with that infuriating shrug and smile.

"'You're going to lower yourself and be my friend?' I challenged. 'A Beverly?'

"'I do what I want,' he said sternly. 'No one tells me who to be friends with.' "

He smiled softly again. Suddenly he didn't seem as dangerous to me as everyone I knew always said he was, and sitting this closely to him, I realized he was much better looking than I had thought, too. He had great dark eyes, eyes that sparkled wickedly. Maybe I was just in the mood for him We talked some more and I discovered that he had a good sense of humor, especially about some of my friends. I laughed and he laughed and I told him about my parents and how my so-called friends had reacted. He knew more about me than I had expected. He knew I had gone out with Charles Allen and when I told him that was another big mistake of mine, his smile got even warmer.

"I could see that the longer I talked with him and remained sitting with him, the more my friends were chatting about me. I admit that at first I just wanted to shock everyone, but after I spent more time with Lloyd.

I actually really began to like him. He and I had more in common than I would have ever realized or cared to admit. He truly seemed to understand my feelings about my parents and then he said something I thought was very true."

"What?" Star asked. She was really into my story now.

"He said sometimes kids like us have to grow up faster and adults don't realize it or don't want to realize it so they keep treating us like kids, but we're already miles away. And not because we want to be. It's just what's happened.

"He also said you can't worry about whether it's fair or not. You just take it and do what you have to do and if adults don't like it, let them lump it."

"Brilliant," Jade said, puckering her mouth up like a drawstring purse.

"I thought it was," I fired back at her. "It's not fancy, like out of some book you and I might read, but it's still true, especially for me and I bet for you."

She looked thoughtful for a moment and then looked away.

"So what happened with him?" Star asked. Reluctantly, Jade turned back to hear.

"We started spending more and more time together, meeting between classes, at lunch, after school. He didn't have a car; he had a small

motorcycle, which I found out had no insurance on it and had an expired registration. It didn't worry Lloyd.

'Don't sweat the small things,' he told me.

"He made me laugh a lot and I felt better being with him. I felt ... free from everything. When I was with him, the static died.

"Mommy had gone on a few more dates with different men, but none of them were any good in her eyes. She turned bitter because my father was happier. She went to lunch and dinner with women who had similar feelings about men and they became what I call today, the MHA, Men Haters Anonymous. From what I read about AA, Alcoholics Anonymous conducts meetings that are not too different. These women have been at our house for coffee meetings and I've heard them clucking like angry hens. Each of them begins by telling how she was made a fool of by her husband or a recent boyfriend. She admits it was largely her own fault and they all sympathize. They take oaths not to get serious with any man again. They gloat over anyone who has taken advantage of a man or broken a man's heart.