The Face

A Story about a lost girl.

• Fiction
• Diaries

								
Table of Contests
1 to 18 The Face
The Face
by Stepha Kjaerbaek
The fact that I focused on was strategic. I had envisioned this face. It was a perfect image for the times. She moved the way a person should move and looked the way a person should look. It was hard not to notice her.
	I was looking for a friend to introduce me to new people. My crowd did the same old thing, which was of importance as a seventeen-year-old. I wanted to be up on the latest scene, not that I was looking for trouble. 
	Mitch was the thing. She knew what she wanted and got into all the parties. Some of my friends had confirmed my suspicions. They told me about her adventures and suggested I hang with her. 
	I was in my last year of high school and was about to graduate. I would graduate in name only, as the high school system required me to return for six months and retake my trigonometry course. It was the one class I did not pass. Mitch was in the same year, and could not read.
	Otherwise, I was a good student. Most of my grades were As. Fifty percent of my classes were honors level. I have made the honor roll since I was a child. Mitch was not exactly bright, but she was street-smart and crafty.
	Mitch took Grade 12 three times. When she was nineteen, the Province of British Columbia had asked her to leave the school system. Students at the time were not allowed in the regular public school system past nineteen and had to finish adult basic education at college afterward. Mitch barely graduated. It was almost in name only. 
	She never learned how to read properly. Sometimes, I wondered if she was dyslexic. Her symptoms were obvious. She wrote backward and misplaced letters at times, in her right-handed bent scrawl that she tried to straighten while writing notes and letters. 
	I could tell by the way she wrote her name in a garbled fashion and struggled with basic mathematics. I had heard about her over the last six weeks. She was a student at Mount Boucherie and spent most of her time in the art department as an assistant. The school failed to interest her; she had other goals in mind.
	It was the first time I saw her directly in front of me. Usually, I watched her on Sundays from the sidelines. I was picking up a drink and noticed how she stared at the trays she wiped down repeatedly. Managers were in the back, complaining about this and fixing that. She seemed slightly annoyed by her position. 
	"Hi, how are you? I have seen you at the mall," I asked her.
	"Oh, probably. I am looking for a crushed velvet outfit and will probably have to order it. I can't find it there," she commented.
	"The mall is cotton ginny looks," I commented.
	Something about her interested me as a friend. It was not surprising for me to learn that she was seeking a career as a model. She was the look. Thin, lithe, and gamine-like, Mitch moved with a cat-like compulsion. Mitch's skin was tan and smooth. She looked up at me and smiled. 
	I sipped on my soda and wondered if she was well-connected to the party scene. Mitch talked casually about her wardrobe and the boys she knew. She wore her uniform and adjusted her tie. The cap fell over her eyes, lined with auburn and permed bangs that she was growing out. The look was tacky, but even Mitch could make an ugly uniform look attractive. 
	My other friends, Gord and Terry, were thrilled that she had noticed me. Mitch seemed up to something, thinking and rethinking her plans constantly. We all wanted to know. She had an active, crafty mindset.  Her cobalt blue eyes flashed at me. I noticed how she told customers what to order and spent most of her time pouring drinks and cleaning trays. It was a fast food establishment, and it was usually busy. This Sunday afternoon, it was slow.
	"I work here three nights a week. I am hoping for thirty hours a week. Here is my business card with my phone number. I use it for modeling. I went to a makeup class and took a runway workshop. I have been scouting out jobs," Mitch told me.
	"Have you had any luck?" I asked her. 
	"I booked some private showings and a regular runway gig at the mall twice a month. So far, I haven't had luck with commercial work," she commented.  
	"That is interesting. How do you find this work?" I asked her.
	"I check out opportunities through the work center and in the newspaper. You should come along with me," Mitch suggested. 
	"I don't know about that," I answered. 
	I wondered if she could make it as a model, as it was a tough and disciplined business. She had problems with her work. Mitch worked three six-hour shifts a week. She smiled slightly and knew I was going to suggest we hang out. I saw her after hymn singing on Sunday afternoon the next week, and she expressed an interest.
	"I would love to join," she told me.
	"Well, you have to audition, and you have to show up every week on Sunday mornings," I told her. 
	"Are you a full member? Can you get me in?" she asked.
	"Yes, I have been singing for a long time. I auditioned for them," I said, leaving out the part about promising to get her in.
	I was uninterested in bringing in an undisciplined recruit without experience. She was most interested in joining. However, the church required underwear to be worn under her short skirts, which she refused to do.
	"Now you like to sing? Can you get me into the choir?" Mitch asked. 
	I rolled my eyes behind my head and said she should go to Bed for assistance. I had nixed her request to join the choir. Ben, our friend and choirmaster, had put in her name for recruitment. An audition was not required. I had a musical education. Mitch did not. I was always a singing gatekeeper. Who should music accommodate bad singers without underwear?
	Mitch was an unpredictable girl. I think she summarized that. my group was not going to provide the hard drugs she craved and utilized us more for sympathy and attention than access. She was about to turn to street drugs and pharmacopeia.
	I had heard the rumors about her sneaking into bars after the town curfew. She had drunk at several establishments back in her hometown of Saskatoon. Between the ages of fifteen and seventeen, she had left unpaid bills for underage drinking past the 10 o'clock curfew all over town.
	I thought of her as a figure captured in a Gauguin painting during his Tahiti period. I observed her as if my mind were a camera obscura, a person who was dualistically angelic and devilish. She was a natural. An audition was not required. 
	As far as singing went, I had a musical education. Mitch did not. I was always a singing gatekeeper. Who should music accommodate bad singers without underwear? Mitch was a party girl. I had heard the rumors about her sneaking into bars after the town curfew. She had drunk at several establishments back in her hometown of Saskatoon. Between the ages of fifteen and seventeen, she had left unpaid bills for underage drinking past the ten o'clock curfew all over town.
	Mitch told me these details in no particular order. Her conversation was all over the place. She had a mindset of twelve channels on all at the same time, and she focused on one more than the other, then switched back. It was like dealing with high-end Attention-Deficit Disorder. I was a much calmer person who focused on a topic for ten minutes at a time. My attention limit was about twelve minutes per topic unless it was really interesting. I have to be drawn in for a long conversation about one topic. 

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