Forget You ( jenlisa ) (gip)

21

L

Dear Jennie,

(This is a truce message)

Your AP Art teacher asked me why you've missed class for the past two weeks. I don't know if you want me to tell him that you've been spending it at the hospital with your mom, so I made up a lie. I also asked him for your homework assignments. (I asked all your other teachers, too.)

I put everything in your mailbox.

Forget You,

Lisa

Dear Jennie,

(This is another truce message)

Your painting, I Hate Her, won first place at the state art fair over the weekend. (I thought you said that you were done painting me with knives in my chest?)

I was already there since I won the essay contest, so I told them I lived next door to you, and they let me accept the blue ribbon and cash prize on your behalf. I don't want to put it in your mailbox, so I'll keep it on my desk.

Let me know when you want me to bring it over.

Forget You,

Lisa

Dear Jennie,

I'm sorry about the passing of your mother.

Sincerely,

Lisa

I crumpled my letter and tossed it through Jennie's window. It landed on her desk, right on top of all the other letters I'd thrown.

When her mom was diagnosed with stage four cancer months ago, Jennie refused to believe it. She stormed out of her house and up to my room whenever her mother started to say things like, "When I'm gone, make sure you..." or "When it's you and your dad, don't forget to..."

She was too convinced that her mom would beat it, and she didn't want to listen.

Even though my parents (and a lot of other people in the neighborhood) wanted to be hopeful, they braced for the worst.

Jennie was the only one who didn't.

Ever since the funeral, she'd sat on her bedroom floor, crying.

Her extended family paraded casseroles and flowers through her front door for the first couple of weeks—waving at me as I looked on, but they eventually stopped coming by.

I tossed tons of letters through her window, telling her how sorry I was, asking her if she needed anything, but she never tossed one back to me.

The few friends she had at school (Well, "classmates" since she didn't have any real friends), never stopped by her house to see if she was okay, and from what I could tell, they never called or sent letters either. When I confronted one of her art club-mates, to see when she was planning to visit, she said, "Why can't Jennie visit me? I mean, she's a pretty tough girl. I'm sure she's not crying about something like this for all this time, right?"

Standing up from my desk, I decided it was time to stop waiting on Jennie to write me back. The sympathy flowers on her porch were dying, and she and her father hadn't left the house in forever.

I made a few calls to places in town and changed clothes. Then I picked up a bouquet of lilies from her mother's favorite floral shop, and parked my car in her driveway.

I rang her doorbell, but there was no answer.

I rang the doorbell again.

Still no answer.