I don't remember how I first met her or where; she was almost like a strange memory that I can only fuzzily recall. She even dated one of my best friends, Joey...kind of.
It was weird, Joey always had another girl in his life. Every time we'd hang out, there was always a girl that fit into the narrative. This time it was a fiery little Hispanic girl. I don't even remember where HE had met her but I do remember him talking about this pretty girl who worked at Dunkin' Doughnuts and we were all going to hang out. I nodded and followed his lead.
The Dunkin' Doughnuts was out by Interstate 380; in front of the Wal-Mart. It was closing time when we drove up to the little store. We walked in and the girl behind the counter shouted ''Joey!''. She walked over and hugged him and he introduced me to her. She was beautiful, short and curvy, her face radiated youth but with a deep exhaustion set into her eyes. The way she stood made her look a lot older than she was; we were all still in high school.
I was the 3rd wheel who stood there as they talked; looking into each others eyes. Absorbed and laughing. She went back behind the counter and boxed up day old doughnuts she would take home every weekend night.
She finished and we all walked outside. We stood out and talked while she had a cigarette. She was always laughing around him, she'd get into this sarcastic pose where she would cock her head and look straight serious before smiling; almost as if she was getting what she wanted every time.
We followed her back to her house. It was a typical cookie cutter just beyond a hillside ridge of some of the more richer and fancier homes. We followed her in; she always had a tired expression on her face that would change into a big smile as soon as she was going to see someone close to her. I remember her house being quiet for a family of four. There was a little hallway when you walked in, living room to the left, and a kitchen straight ahead. There was an additional hallway that was connected to the kitchen towards the right and it had four rooms; her's, parents, sister, and bathroom.
We were standing in the kitchen while she hugged her mother and showed her the box of doughnuts she had brought home. Her mother was unmemorable, typical, and her father, or whoever he was, seemed like a plastic stand in for someone else.
It seemed all awkward and tense. It was almost like her parents were teenagers that hid in their rooms while she was like the parental figure coming home from work.
Her sister was a younger, and just as beautiful, version of herself. I was awe struck but I knew there wasn't a chance. She was glued to her phone like every other girl at school.
She walked into the hallway and went into her room which was the last one on the end. We didn't follow her, Joey talked up her mother, but I looked and tried to see what her room was like. I saw the assorted make up on a small dresser, shoes on the floor; typical girl room. She had just started to undo her hair as she turned and shut the door to change. When she came out, we waited in the kitchen, then we watched a movie and left.
A few weeks of this exact routine passed, It was the summer and the nights were long, and I was talking with Joey in his basement one night until he got really quiet. I had asked him if they were dating or not. He told me that it was complicated. I laughed and asked what that meant. He got serious and quiet before telling me that she had told him that she was a drug runner for the Mexican Cartel. I laughed hard until I realized that he was serious; then I laughed in bewilderment.
She smuggled drugs through the local airport and the money she had been receiving was paying for her mother's mortgage, her grandmother's mortgage, her car, food; everything. Her whole family was blatantly aware, the ties were in the family, but I never asked her herself about this nor even believed it until one day we all hung out at the mall together.
We were in Hot Topic, I was eyeing a Nirvana shirt that had the logo and text filled in with pink flowers, she stood next to me, noticing me eyeing it, and said ''you like that shirt?''. I said ''yea, but it's thirty bucks and I'm broke''. She didn't blink; ''I can get that shirt for you if you want''. I looked at her, this beautiful girl wanted to buy me a shirt, and I shrugged and said ''yea''.
When she took it up to the counter, the cashier told her that the total was 30 something, she pulled out a wad of money in a little clip. I leaned over her shoulder and saw that they were all hundred dollar bills. She actually apologized to the cashier for only having hundreds. I didn't need to ask any questions after that.
He had also told me that she couldn't date him because a part of the deal was that she could pay her family's entire bills but she couldn't get married to anyone because of the fear of information getting back to the cops. This was all crazy but it got less crazier as we hung out more and I saw how crazy she could get.
One night, he dropped her off and she asked him to walk her to her door. He got out and they stood in the far end of the driveway; talking and kissing in the darkness. I could only watch from the distance of the backseat of his car but I saw them go inside for a very long time. It seemed decades, I guessed what was going on, but he soon rushed out and exhaled as he got in and clutched the stirring wheel. He drove in silence before I asked him what happened. He told me that she had begged him to have sex with her in her room. She even said that her parents would never know. He declined and left. He was sweating and told me that it was one of the most difficult things that he had ever done. After this, their relationship turned into series of passionate arguments and kissing.
I sat there at her grandmother's house, a nice stone house in the fancy hillside, as she argued with her sister about what her sister wanted for Christmas. She'd get pissed and talk quickly in Spanish as she threw her arms around in an elaborate display of an argument. When she did talk in English, she said something along the lines of ''I pay for literally everything''. That shut her sister up.
Her sister was beautiful but so blissfully and ignorantly immature that you felt bad for her. Either she knew about everything and the way she acted was a coping mechanism or she was so literally ignorant that she could enjoy the fallacy of having anything she could want. She had expensive make up, phone, anything that her sister would give her. She sacrificed her entire soul for them because it seemed to be the only way to make them happy.
I realized this when I tried getting her sister to like me. I would patiently listen to all of her conversations; they were so devoid of meaning that I quickly stopped pursuing her. The beauty wasn't worth it. The supposed happiness wasn't worth it.
The last time I saw her was when Joey was dropping her off at her grandmother's house. They got into an argument about staying over at her grandmother's for a sleepover. He kept saying no and she would just keep asking. After a few other times asking, she turned and asked me if I wanted to spend the night. I was so tired at this point that I just said yes. She leaned in to kiss me but I moved and she caught my cheek. I wasn't going to disrespect him like that regardless of if she wanted me or not. I got out and she looked at me and said ''go back into the car, Chris, goodnight''. I watched her go inside the house, the storehouse on the hillside of the fancy Midwest, and we drove away in silence. He told me that she was just trying to make him jealous.
Years passed, I got a phone call from Joey while I was at Inch's house. He calmly told me that she had died. It shook me. He told me that she had went to jail the year before for getting into a fight with a girl in the middle of the street. When she got out, she had apparently gotten involved with human trafficking and she had walked out onto Interstate 380 to kill herself. A car hit her and killed her instantly.
There wasn't a funeral because it was still being investigated by the cops.
