dayoldcupcake

The Spring Formal is Friday and Ellie Marsh is the only girl at school without a date.

It doesn’t make any sense. Sure, she isn’t a beauty queen like Jessica Stevens, but she’s no Lydia Cartman either.  She’s also especially popular with the boys; nearly all of her best friends are guys.  Despite this, nobody has asked her to the Spring Formal.  In fact, nobody has ever asked her to any school dance—ever.

The injustice of this reality builds in her mind as she walks home from the bus stop, and by the time she steps through the door, she has been consumed by a fury that she unleashes upon the first person she sees.

“Dad!” she yells, breathing in angry little huffs.  “Will you please tell me what the hell is wrong with guys!?”

Stan looks up from his seat at the kitchen table, a half-eaten apple in his hand.

“Um, what?” he asks, confused.

Ellie can sense him studying her face and grimaces, knowing he is reading her like a book and hating him for it.  Stan claims he can only do it because she has Kyle’s eyes.  Stan can read Kyle like a book, too.

“Nobody has asked me to the dance!” she explains in a hurry, wanting to deny him the satisfaction of figuring it out himself.  “Not even any of my friends—not even to just go as friends!  So what the hell?  What do I have to do to get a friggin’ date!?”

“Um,” Stan replies, obviously stalling.  Ellie doesn’t need special skills to read Stan’s face; he is clearly uncomfortable and withholding key information.  It’s the same look he had when, after returning from her first health education class, she asked how two men make a baby.

“What?” she presses, stepping closer and narrowing her eyes.  “What is it?  What do you know?”

“Nothing!” he says, but it’s clear that he’s lying.

“Did… did Daddy tell you something?” she asks.  Judging by the grimace on Stan’s face, she is getting warmer.  “Does he know why none of the boys will ask me out?”

Stan looks like he ate several worms that are now fighting their way back up his esophagus. Ellie walks right up to Stan and crosses her arms.  With him sitting and her standing, she is just the right height to glare directly into his eyes.

“Tell me,” she insists, slowly enunciating both words.

“Ellie, is knowing the answer worth becoming a kid from a broken home?” Stan pleads.  This is a common evasive tactic for him, but it usually works because Ellie can’t be sure what Kyle would or wouldn’t divorce Stan over. Kyle can be pretty vindictive at times.

“I won’t tell him you told me,” she promises.

But just then, the door opens and in walks Kyle.  Ellie can hear Stan whispering, begging for her not to say anything, but Stan knows perfectly well that Ellie inherited her short temper directly from Kyle, and nothing stops Kyle’s temper.

“Have you been telling boys not to ask me out?” she demands, turning the full brunt of her fury on Kyle.

“Nice to see you too, Ellie,” Kyle replies.  He sets his briefcase on the table and drops into an empty seat across Stan.  “Welcome home from school.”

“You totally did, didn’t you!!” she screeches.

“I may have insinuated that Uncle Kenny would arrest them if they looked at you or touched you or thought about you in any way that wasn’t entirely pure,” he admits, muttering.

“Well, stop doing it!”

“Okay, I will,” Kyle agrees, and Ellie relaxes, but then he adds, “As soon as you turn twenty-five.”

“Are you insane?  Dad, come on!  Tell him he’s being insane!”  She turns to Stan just in time to see him slipping out of the kitchen and into the living room.  Coward.  She turns back around with a dramatic flail and points a finger at Kyle.  “Didn’t you and Dad start dating when you were twelve!?”

“No, I told you, we were twenty-five.”  

“Uncle Kenny said you were twelve!  And that you were only fourteen the first time you fu—“

“—okay, okay, please stop!” Kyle begs, throwing his hands up.

“The point is, I’m sixteen! You gotta let me have a life!”

“I do!  Just not with boys.”

“Joke’s on you, Daddy!!” Ellie yells, her voice raising with each word.  “Almost all my friends are guys!”

“Gay guys,” Kyle says. “As I only scare off the straight ones.”

“You’re being insane!”

“Tough shit!”

Ellie glowers at Kyle, then spins on her heels and stomps up the stairs to her bedroom.  She slams the door with as much force as possible, throws herself onto her bed, and screams into her pillow. ***

Hours later, Ellie is still in bed, fuming and texting furiously with her friends.  Her door opens and Kyle steps in; without thinking, Ellie grabs the pillow and chucks it at his head.  It misses him by at least three feet.  

“Fuck off, Daddy!!” she screams at him.  “No boys allowed!!”

This is met with silence—not even a reprimand for cursing at him—so she can’t help but look over. Kyle looks somewhat apologetic, although his arms are crossed and she can see one of the veins in his forehead twitching.

“Ellie,” he starts to say, but Ellie cuts him off.

“I’m the only girl in the entire school going to the dance alone!  Again!  And it’s all your fault!  You’re an awful father!!”

Ignoring this outburst, Kyle continues with the same placating tone.

“Dad seems to think I’ve been going a little overboard, so,” he says, taking a long, deep breath, as if readying himself. “You can tell the boys at school that I won’t cut the brake wires in their cars if they ask you out.”

“You’ve— Wait— You said that!?  To who!?”

“—Or put ricin in their food,” Kyle continues, “Or push them off a bridge, or—“ he suddenly stops talking, noticing the disturbed look on his daughter’s face.

“I think you spend too much time with Mr. Cartman,” she suggests coyly, knowing this will hit a nerve. It does, and Kyle’s reaction is both immediate and satisfying; he is utterly horrified.

“The point is, I’ll stop!” Kyle says defensively. “They were only empty threats anyway!! *So, if a boy comes here asking to take me to a movie…?” she presses.

“That’s fine,” Kyle concedes.

“What if they kiss me?”

“That’s—fine, too.”

“What if I spend the night at their house?”

“I’ll end them,” Kyle says, deadly serious.  “But,” he adds, softening once again, “That’s an okay compromise for now, I hope?”

“Sure,” she agrees.

“Okay,” Kyle says, breathing out this word like it’s costing ten years of his life to say it.  He starts walking out of her room, but pauses suddenly right at the doorway.  He turns and says, “Hey, Ellie, I— Am I really an awful father?”