Big Haired Bitches - 11. Scent of a Woman

Big Haired Bitches: Scent of a Woman

Working for Summer Smithson and her new, big, cherry-red extensions, was a pain in the ass. I’d been fucked by a black 220 lb varsity linebacker with a 10 inch dick, and I could honestly say that she was a bigger pain in the ass than that.

When she said she was bringing in a new regime, what she meant was that she was bringing on several personal assistants for her own hazing pleasure, dangling the hope of social acceptance in front of them and quashing their dreams the second they became defiant.

She had girls fetch her coffee, do her homework, clear the hall for her as she came by, instilling petrifying fear in them along the way. Her return was swift and seamless. I was out. She was in. Everyone knew it.

As her right hand gay, as she liked to call me, I didn’t get the brunt of her sick and twisted games. I simply had to sit there and watch as she humiliated girls that would have given anything to be seen with her in the center quad.

To her credit, the perks were pretty wonderful. Afraid to have their little girl lose it again, her parents gave her literally anything she wanted. On the first Monday of her reign, she, Sydney Yuki, a girl named Angela, and I all sat around her house sipping margaritas and getting Swedish massages. That was followed by a dinner of osso bucco and truffle infused mashed potatoes. On Tuesday, we went shopping. On Wednesday, we skipped school and flew her dad’s jet to North Padre Island to lie out.

Being friends with Summer Smithson was a wonderful thing. If you lived to tell the tale.

“Hey, Loges, it’s Taylor and I’ve been trying to get a hold of you all week. I know you’re probably soaking up some awesome sun in south Texas or eating diamond encrusted chicken with your best friend, but I really need to talk to you. Steven said he hasn’t seen you much either, so call me back.”

I hung up the phone and sighed. It was Thursday and I had been avoiding Taylor for almost a full week, since Summer’s petrifying little threat. I decided to go it cold turkey. No pretense. No games. He didn’t deserve me giving him the lukewarm run around. Steven tried to get me to talk to him, but it was futile. The queen wanted him iced, so Taylor was iced.

“Did he call you again? Jesus, tell that little fairy dust to get a fucking life. What’s his deal?”

“No clue, but I’m over it.” I could have sounded more committed to my faux disdain, but instead, I just shrugged. I’d given up a friend for a field trip to a private beach.

“I’m over it too,” she said, sipping her martini and blowing on her freshly manicured nails. It was late and I should have been home studying, but I wasn’t. I wasn’t allowed to do what I wanted anymore. I belonged to the new Queen.

“You can all go,” she said with a sigh. “I’m tired. Except for you, Logan. You can stay.”

I sat and watched Sydney and Angela gather their things and leave the oval office sized bedroom, leaving me alone with the Ice Queen.

“Loges, I’m sensing you aren’t happy,” she said as cheerfully as could be. “Why aren’t you happy, Logan?”

“I’m plenty happy,” I replied with a sideways shrug.

“Ah, you don’t have to lie to make me feel better, killer. Is it because a week ago, you thought you had this place all to yourself? That you wouldn’t have to fight for the crown anymore?”

She took a deep breath and I contemplated answering.

“Admit it, kiddo. This is a lot more fun than what you all were doing before. Sitting around, going to pool parties, telling each other how fucking fabulous you were. But you weren’t fabulous. This is fabulous. Krystal is fabulous,” she said, shaking her glass in my face. To any normal person, she would have appeared drunk. I had learned over the course of the week that this was her constant BAC level, and I dreaded the thought of what it was when it went up.

“But I know a guy like you likes to be in charge, so… I will let you be in charge. You are now in charge of getting rid of Sydney. She’s dull. She’s served her purpose, now we need someone… prettier to hang out with.”

Her words were loud and bitter. It was that easy for her. Get rid of Sydney. Like I’d already gotten rid of Taylor. My heart hurt a little at the thought, but it didn’t matter much anymore.

As I drove home, in a state that surely would have had me arrested had I been pulled over, I couldn’t help but wonder how I’d gotten to where I was. What wrong turn did I take to end up the gopher of a truly heinous piece of shit? And why was I still there?

The answer of how was a lot simpler than the answer for why. I had underestimated what opening the Pandora’s Box of popularity could do. If I was a middle-tier wall fly, I wouldn’t have been in this mess. But I wasn’t, and that was my choice.

Why? Why was harder. First and foremost, Summer was evil, that much was clear. She was scary because she had no shame about anything. She would do literally anything she needed to bring someone down. At the core of it all, I was more afraid of her than of anything else in my life, including the consequences of being around her.

Then there was the shallow reason. Even if Sydney was dull and Summer was evil and Tori was the most conniving person in the world, they were still popular. And with that came recognition. It brought people doing things for you, complimenting you, being nice to you for no reason other than the fact that you were cool and they wanted to be. The thing that kept me coming back was the simple cycle that was high school: either you were cool, or you wanted to be.

I was cool, and I had to live with it.

When I got home, I called Steven.

“You asleep?”

“No, I’m just reading this report on nuclear physics,” he said in a groggy voice. He yawned and I knew he had been asleep. No one reads about nuclear physics without dozing off even a little.

“Sounds thrilling,” I replied, taking off my shirt and falling backwards onto my bed.

“It is. There’s this new technology that’s supposed to be able to separate a nucleus into something like a thousand parts. Their hoping to prove certain portions of the string theory…”

“Okay, I’m sorry. You lost me on nucleus,” I said, trying my best to be charming. My little nerd. My hot little nerd. “Want to come over? I miss you.”

“I miss you too, babe,” he cooed in his deep voice that contracted the sweet words beautifully. “But I have rowing at six in the morning. If I come over, we won’t be done until then.”

“Really? You think you can go for five hours?”

“I think I could go for five hours.”

“Um, could you please put my boyfriend on the phone?” I teased. I made fun of his stamina just like he made fun of my horniness. His could be worked on. My ailment was irreparable.

“I’m not doing anything tomorrow night. Let’s spend all evening in bed together. We’ll break for dinner and that’s it.”

“That’s perfect,” I said. In fact, it was more than perfect. My dad had a conference in Nashville and would be gone all weekend. I hadn’t told the girls for obvious reasons, but it meant Steven and I could have the house to ourselves if I played my cards right.

The next morning, I got dressed in our Summer-dictated Friday attire of jeans and black tops. I decided on a lightweight cable-knit sweater to go with my Sevens before hustling off to school.

“I hate what you’re wearing,” were Summer’s first words to me when I met her by the arches at the Junior entrance. “We’re going shopping tonight.”

“I can’t,” I said before I had fully thought through a good excuse.

“You can’t what?”

“I can’t go shopping. I, um… I have community service,” I lied. Her eyes pierced through my skin and I swallowed roughly.

“What do you mean you have community service?”

“I um, got a ticket last month. I have to pay my debt to society.”

“On a Friday night?”

“Yes. That strong arm of the law really does suck, doesn’t it?”

She glared at me, seeing right through me.

“Okay,” was all that she said. I swallowed hard, dashed to my locker and went straight to class, my only protection from the Ice Queen.

I managed to keep a pretty low profile for the rest of the day. Aside from one comment at lunch about me being a dreg of society, no one gave me flack about my community service lie. But part of me was on edge about how easily the bitch had taken it.

Okay.

Things were hardly ever okay when Summer was involved. I had learned that much quickly.

I went home straight after school and tidied up my room. Steven didn’t have rowing on Fridays so I assumed he’d go home briefly and then come right over for our afternoon delight. I cleaned up my room, took a preparatory shower and then lay out naked in the backyard, waiting for our skyrockets to fly.

“Hey there, is anyone home?” he asked, creeping through the sliding back door that led to our pool. He approached shielding his eyes and grinning like a small child on Christmas.

“Well look who it is,” I said with a grin to match. My cock twitched just a little at the sight of him. “I’m sorry I was working on my tan.”

“Going for no tan lines, I see.”

“Always,” I said. He slid on top of me, and I wondered if the lawn chair could support us both.

“I tried your cell phone, but it’s off.” I couldn’t tell him I hated turning it on because it kept Summer one phone text message away from me. Plus, I was tired of hitting ignore on Taylor’s calls. Instead of tell him why it was off, I leaned my neck up and kissed him.

That was all the encouragement he needed. Two minutes later, Steven was completely naked, soaking in the excess oil from my skin.

For whatever newly-single reason, my dad had installed privacy fences along the perimeter of our back yard. Steven, surprisingly, had no reservation about sticking it in me right there under the evening sun and pumping away.

His technique had truly improved since I met him. He wasn’t choppy in his grinding, but had found an inner rhythm that really did work for him. I had the feeling he’d consulted several Sean Cody videos, because he’d often say things in my ear that only a porn director would appreciate, but that was a lesson for another day. That afternoon, I simply crouched on all fours, leaned my back to his chest, and kissed him while he fucked me with his newly found rhythm.

Twenty-five minutes later, both of us covered in sticky rapidly drying cum, I laid on our professionally manicured back lawn and let the only thing I’d done right so far that year nibble on my ears.

“Not quite five hours,” I joked.

“Close enough,” he said with a grin I could sense. “So are you not friends with Taylor anymore?”

“You’re still inside of me and you’re asking me about another man?” I deflected.

“It’s not like that, it’s just… ya’ll were getting close I thought.”

“We weren’t that close,” I retorted. “People move on.”

“Well he told me to ask you what was up. He thinks that you hanging out with Summer isn’t the best idea, and seeing how you’re dropping Taylor and barely have time to study, I can’t say I disagree.”

Agitated, I slipped away from him and sat up.

“It’s complicated, Steve.”

“Okay, I get that. But would it be so difficult to balance everything out?”

I looked at him like I’d never seen him before. Unable to get my annoyance in check soon enough, I stood up, grabbed my robe and flung it on.

“Some of us can’t be star athletes, A students, and the best friends in the world, Steve. Sorry to disappoint.”

“I’m not saying…”

“What are you saying? That I should walk away from Summer? You think I haven’t thought about that? You think I haven’t thought about everything she would do to me if I turned my back on her? I can’t, alright? I’m stuck.”

It was like I was describing the gangs of SoHo that I had grown up avoiding. Was I a Crypt or a Blood? Either way, it was ride or die for life.

“I’m sorry, I just… I don’t know what to do,” I said. “This isn’t me. Doing everything Summer wants like I’m some fucked up pledge, it’s just not me.”

He stood up and gave me a hug. I realized when I touched his stable body that I had been shaking.

“It’s alright, Loges,” he whispered deeply right into my ear. “Everything will be alright.”

If only that were true beyond his simple touch.

      **

I heard the phone vibrate a million times before I reached over and answered it. I had passed out shortly after emitting my eighth gallon of semen that night, and I was completely spent from head to toe.

I looked at the screen and realized I had six missed calls from Summer Smithson. I sat up, crept out of bed and tiptoed to the hallway. I flicked the light on and dialed.

“Hey, Summer…”

“Shut up,” she hissed. “Where the fuck have you been?”

“Summer, listen, I can…”

“I have been sitting here all night listening to Sydney Yuki blab on and I could kill myself at this point. Is that what you want? Me to kill myself?”

“No, Summer. What is…”

“I said shut up!”

I stopped talking. How did I end up in this place? I thought. I’m not a punk. I don’t have to take this.

“Actually, I think you should shut up,” I said, my voice even and my tone firm. There was a boulder at the bottom of my belly, but I refused to let it affect me.

“What?”

“You heard me, you heinous mother-fucking bitch. This is over as of now. You can shut your fucking face. You don’t scare me and I don’t answer to you.”

“Like hell you don’t,” she hissed.

“Bring it on, bitch.”

I clicked my phone shut, took a deep breath, and slid down the wall. It had taken everything I had to stand up to her. I was no longer spent… now I was simply scared.

      **

The minute I told her off over the phone, I regretted it. I knew something big was coming, and if I had been wearing boots, I literally would have been shaking in them. I thought about calling her back and apologizing, but how would that apology go? Sorry I just called you a heinous bitch. Didn’t mean that. Love you. Mean it.

“Is everything alright, babe?” Steven asked when I climbed back into bed. It took me a minute to compose myself, but I had to fake it so he wouldn’t panic.

“Yeah,” I replied, kissing him lightly. I wrapped his arm around me and he pulled me tight. I spent the rest of the night in his iron-clad grip, not getting an ounce of sleep.

The smell seeped into my bedroom just after the sun rose. It was putrid, to put it mildly. It smelled like something had died and been buried under rotten eggs for two weeks. I sprang up, rubbed my eye, and coughed.

“What is that?” Steven grogged behind me as I crawled out of bed, sniffing my way across the room.

“Oh my god,” I choked. I clutched my nose with my hand, and braved my way into the hallway. The smell was definitely outside, but it wasn’t quite as bad as it had been in my bedroom. It was almost as if it was following me as I surveyed the entire floor.

“It smells like shit in here,” Steven said. Thank you captain fucking obvious. As if me running around looking for the source of the smell wasn’t indication enough that it smelled like shit.

“It’s not coming from down here,” I said, turning to Steven and releasing my face. It was clear that we’d left the epicenter somewhere upstairs. Somewhere close to my bedroom, but out of sight.

I crawled up the stairs, dreading what I already knew to be true. When we left my room, thinking we would find the source of the nasally offensive smell, we didn’t take one thing into consideration: that the source was actually inside the room.

When I opened the door, my nostrils were assaulted by the scent. In the time we’d run downstairs and investigated, the smell had doubled, if not tripled, in intensity. It was truly unbearable and I thought if I stood in that room for more than a second, I might pass out.

“Holy shit,” Steven whispered behind me. I walked straight to the left of my bed, towards the double doors that separated my sleeping area from my closet.

I plucked the door open gingerly, and if scents had colors, the truly unbearable smell that assaulted my face would have been a bright green. I felt like I was in the middle of a human fart and I couldn’t escape it. The smell was almost hot and sticky, creating a humidity in my room that I could have died from.

“Oh my god,” Steven breathed as I opened the door wider and saw exactly what it was. Not one, not two, but three skunks were perched in the corner of my walk in, looking at me like they were ready to strike again. On the other side of the closet was a small kitten hissing at the black and white animals, spurring the little beasts on. And right there, hanging directly overhead was a hand drawn picture of a skunk and the words ‘You Made a Big Mistake. Huge’ sprawled under the drawing.

I looked at Steven who looked back at me, as confused as ever.

“I’ll call animal control,” he said, darting for his phone.

“You do that.” I closed the door, pulled my robe on, and sat on my bed, literally wallowing in filth and ready to give it all up.

      **

By the time animal control took the strays away with more lectures on properly securing my home from rodents, the smell had seeped into everything I owned. I had to call six cleaning places to find one that had equipment to lift skunk smell from furniture and clothing. The work would take them until Monday morning working around the clock and at a premium. I recited my dad’s credit card number and thought about how I was going to explain the three thousand dollar cleaning charge that faced him when he got home from Nashville.

After the animals were gone, I dumped all of my clothes into the tub, drove to Duane Reed and picked up six gallons of tomato juice. I could have cried as I poured the puree over thousands of dollars worth of designer clothes. My Gucci, Burberry, Ralph Lauren and Marc Jacobs closed were swimming in tomato juice. If I had added squash and eggplant, I would have gotten the world’s most expensive ratatouille.

I asked Steven to leave, and he finally obliged after much hesitation. I got the feeling he was seeing if I needed to be on suicide watch.

Instead of killing myself when he left, I stripped out of my robe, flung it too in the tub, crouched down and for the first time I could remember, I cried actual tears.

      **

I made it to the mall just in time to buy a couple of new outfits. I changed out of my dad’s clothes and stuffed his into a bag. My last errand of the day included seeing someone I knew had no desire to see me. Pushing the thought of my red soaked clothes out of my mind, I drove my car—and what lingered of the smell around me—to Taylor’s house. I was ready to grovel in any way necessary to get my friend back. I had made a huge mistake, and it took the smell of three skunks to show me that.

“What do you want?” His face was stoic and I realized I hadn’t seen it, even in the halls, in ages.

“Taylor, I wanted to apologize,” I said as quickly as possible. I knew he was a step away from slamming the door in my face, and I needed to plead my case before he did.

“Seriously?”

“Listen, she’s crazy. You were right. The bitch is evil. She said she’d hurt me if I didn’t get rid of you. She had a bat and she wears that crazy red wig now. I just… I’m really sorry.”

“She turned on you, didn’t she?” He saw right through me as if I was a piece of torn plastic rap covering a day old potato salad.

“Taylor, I don’t know what to do.”

“And I don’t know what to tell you. You fucked up.”

And that’s when the door slammed, right across my face. I took a deep breath, retreated to my car and sorted out my options.

The way I saw it, I had two possible courses of action. Taylor, who was now so far down the social ladder, he had nothing to worry about, might have been onto something. Bellaire Academy wasn’t far. I could transfer there, start a fresh, not get tangled up in social politics.

But if I did that, I’d be the new kid yet again. I’d have to deal with the stares and the whispers and not in a cool fun way. In as much as that was an option, it wasn’t at all.

My only other option was to stay and fight. As it were, I had no one. I’d dissed Taylor in a big way. Steven was useless for this kind of thing. Sydney Yuki was a total disposable mess. Claire Montgomery was as dumb as a box of hair. Eric Perse was the only other person at Summit I knew from Adam and he turned his head to avoid me every time I saw him in the halls. This was definitely rock bottom.

But I had to fight.

I had to find a way to cut Summer deep. She wasn’t scared of anything, and she’d already suffered the ultimate humiliation. She had no secrets, as they’d all been exposed when she went off the deep end. In fact, as far as I knew, there was only one person in this world who could take her down. And she had done it once before.

That afternoon, sitting in my car, smelling faintly of skunk, and worried that if I didn’t play this right I would have to change schools—and possibly my name—I had the most sobering thought in the entire world.

If I was going to beat Summer Smithson, I had to consult the primo big haired bitch herself.

I had to contact Tori Perse.