locker had the stuff. I looked at the boys helplessly, as if to say, What? I’m as bad as y’all.
Before I had a chance to answer, a stout woman approached us, her ratted hair clinging to her scalp like a frightened cat. “I found this,” she said, handing Officer Morrow the pipe. “He threw it.” She pointed at Andy. “I saw it all from my bus.”
We were going to be suspended. Officer Morrow gave me one night to tell my parents on my own. “Tomorrow”, he said, gnashing his gum, the school will notify them about the details, i.e. the pot and paraphernalia. “You’d better ‘fess up tonight, Abby.”
That night, I’d sat at the kitchen table playing with my food, feeling terribly ill. Quietly, I put my fork down, let out a deep apprehensive sigh, and told my parents that I’d been caught ditching school and was probably going to be suspended. My mother cried. My dad sat quietly, seemingly deep in thought until he announced that I was grounded: No more soccer conditioning after school, no television for a month. I omitted the part about the weed. They found that out, like Morrow promised, a day later, when the school made them sign documents as my legal guardians stating I’d been caught with illicit substances on school grounds. Then it was no Driver’s Ed. for a year; I would have to wait until I was seventeen to crash my first car. I was good at neglecting details when I had to spill the
beans. A year after the ditching/weed/Blues Traveler incident, I was caught dealing acid in school. Over a bowl of chicken and rice, I confessed that I was in trouble with Officer Morrow again but left out telling them I might be expelled for good from Richmond High. Over macaroni casserole, I admitted to “borrowing” the 1985 Mustang I was supposed to be learning to drive one afternoon. What I failed to mention at the table was that I’d made mud circles with it around Dad’s alfalfa field; that it was stuck there, and if they’d just turn around to look out the back window, they could see its front rosy-red fender poking through the crabgrass. Every dinner table confession was a half-assed attempt to lessen the blow to my parents by neglecting specific, but major, details that were going to be revealed soon enough. After admitting to stealing the Mustang, it took my dad five minutes to realize it was still missing. When he finally asked where it was, I blushed and waved my fork in the direction of his largest crop field. No, the faux-pregnancy schtick wasn’t going to work. I just sighed and put my fork down.
Sure enough, this move was equivalent to a couple of hushing gavel taps in a courtroom. The kitchen grew quiet. Mom and Dad looked at me. They waited and blinked, blinked, blinked. I knew I ought to do this the right way. Just be honest, and, for once, not omit any major details because the major details
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