Sinister: oh dear

[Kirsten Kenyon]

  Tonight I was drunk and out for a cup of coffee, and not five 
minutes after had I settled down with my sketchbook, a little high-
school girl rushed over to my table.  
  "Hi, my name is Katie," she said and smiled.  I looked up from my 
book and eyed the girl, a skinny blonde with hollow cheeks and red-
rimmed green eyes.  She leaned forward expectantly.
  "Hello, Katie."  I looked back to my book.  I had lots of work to 
do...
  "Well?"
  "Well, what?"
  "Well, aren't you going to tell me your name?"
 I held back a sigh and closed my book.  It was obvious I had no hope 
of escaping quietly.  "It's Kirsten," I said.  She kept looking at me 
intently, and I didn't know what to do so I looked back.  The girl 
was beginning to make me nervous, so I took a long, deliberate sip of 
my coffee and looked with longing at my sketchbook, which was sitting 
seductively in front of me on the table.  Katie said nothing, so I 
thought maybe she had only wanted to introduce herself...but then I 
wouldn't have minded if she'd left me alone.  I slowly reached for my 
book and started to open it again.
  "Kirsten?"
  Shut the book.  "Yes?"
  "I have always wanted to be like you."
  My head snapped up, despite my best efforts.  It's not often, after 
all, that a pretty teenage girl wants to "be like" a sad-looking 
drunken twenty-year-old person sitting alone at Webb's in the middle 
of the night.  I stared at her.
  "I saw you coming in from the lot, and watched you walk in the door 
with your little book and go quietly to this table where we're 
sitting now...you don't mind if I sit?"  I shook my head, and Katie 
sat.  "Thank you.  Now I've only been observing you for five, maybe 
seven minutes, but I can already tell...may I look at your 
sketchbook?"
  Nobody gets to look at my sketchbook.  I nodded slowly and pushed 
the book across the table with one finger.  Katie lit a cigarette.  I 
did the same, and we both sat silently and smoked while she carefully 
studied each of my drawings, even the terrible contour-line bits I 
had to do for a class once.  I finished my coffee and was trying to 
devise a polite way to leave when Katie, without looking up from my 
book, quickly waved her hand over her shoulder and said "Jim."  Jim 
hurried over and refilled our mugs before I could stop him.  I didn't 
want any more, but I couldn't just let it sit there.  After a few 
more minutes, Katie nodded with what looked like satisfaction, loudly 
closed my book and settled back in her chair.  She lit another 
cigarette and puffed on it for a bit.
  "They're quite good, you know."  She tapped the book and a bit of 
ash fell onto the cover.  I stared at the ash, wanting desperately to 
brush it off but somehow unable to move.
  "Thank you," I nearly whispered.  I couldn't take my eyes from the 
piece of ash.
  "The ones of naked people are especially good.  Accurate.  You must 
have seen a lot of naked people over the years."  Her eyes twinkled 
obnoxiously.
  "I...I suppose," I stammered.  "I mean, in...in movies and stuff."
  Katie giggled.  "In movies, yes."
  And what to say now?  I didn't know why I'd said that about movies, 
as it was a big fat lie.  The only sorts of movies I usually watch 
show the occasional asscheek, or maybe a breast here and there.  I 
dearly hoped Katie was through discussing naked people.
  "So Kirsten, I really would love to be like you."  Suddenly I 
wanted nothing more than to talk to Katie about naked people.  But I 
didn't say anything.  Jim refilled the mugs again.
  "You go to the university, then?"
  "No, not anymore."  I bit my lip.
  "It was boring?"
  "Yes, you could say that."
  "Lovely."  Katie grinned.  "That is perfect."  She blew a smoke 
ring.  "Perfect," she said again.
  "If you say so..."
  Katie was looking down now, scribbling on a napkin.  
  "Here," she said, handing me her phone number.  "You really should 
call sometime. I have quite a few questions for you...but now I've 
got to go...school starts tomorrow."  
  She winked and rushed off, leaving her cup of coffee steaming on 
the table.  All I could do was sit wondering if she'd just been 
fucking with me, and marvelling at the fact that i had just been 
intimidated by a girl who looked like an Olsen twin.


Care2 make the world greener!
http://www.care2.com - Get your Free e-mail account that helps save Wildlife!
+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+
        +---+  Brought to you by the Sinister mailing list  +---+
     To send to the list mail sinister at missprint.org. To unsubscribe
     send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to
     majordomo at missprint.org.  WWW: http://www.missprint.org/sinister
 +-+       "sinsietr is a bit freaky" - stuart david, looper           +-+
 +-+  "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "peculiarly deranged fanbase" +-+
 +-+    "pasty-faced vegan geeks... and we LOST!" - NME April 2000     +-+
 +-+  "frighteningly named Sinister List organisation" - NME May 2000  +-+
 +-+  "sick posse of f**ked in the head psycho-fans" - NME June 2001   +-+
 +-+               Nee, nee mun pish, chan pai dee kwa                 +-+
+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+