Color Blind

Color
Blind

a novel by

DIANA GARDIN

Copyright
 
©
2013
by Diana Gardin

All rights reserved.

Contents

Acknowledgements

Chapter 1-Act Like a What?

Chapter 2-Luka

Chapter 3-Double Date

Chapter 4-Cooper

Chapter 5-First Date

Chapter 6-Jet-Skiing

Chapter 7-Mamma Mia!

Chapter 8-The Bonfire

Chapter 9-Turning Point

Chapter 10-Truth

Chapter 11-Official

Chapter 12-Seashell

Chapter 13-The Spot

Chapter 14-Perfect For Him

Chapter 15-The Spotlights

Chapter 16-Pain

Chapter 17-Lilly Brewer Strikes Again

Chapter 18-Distraction

Chapter 19-Answers

Chapter 20-Safe and Sound

Chapter 21-Ready

Chapter 22-Revelations

Chapter 23-Fear

Chapter 24-Line Of Fire

Chapter 25-Found

Chapter 26-Slow Motion

Chapter 27-Over

Epilogue

About the Author

Acknowledgements

To my mother, Inez, thank you for
instilling early on a great love of books and reading. Maybe I never knew then
that I could do this, but without the love, it never would have been possible.

To my brother, Tommy, thank you for
always believing that I could be better than I myself believed.

To my husband, Tyson, thank you for being
moderately patient with me when I had to run off to find an “office” in which
to write. Thank you for picking up my slack when I needed time away, and for
always supporting my dreams no matter what.
Muah
. I
love you!

To my children Carrington and Raleigh,
thank you for patiently waiting for Mommy to be finished working so I could
play with you. Thank you for being the beautiful muses you are day after day,
and for giving me unconditional love and affection.
 

To my best friend, Melody, thank you for
being my biggest fan and my first reader. You are irreplaceable. I love you like
a fat kid loves cake.

To my beta readers:
Richelle
,
Heather, and Ant. Thank you for wanting to read what I wrote, just because you
love me. Your enthusiasm drove me forward, and made me think that I could do
this.

To the readers who stumble upon this
story, thank you for giving me a chance to entertain and move you with my
writing. I hope you fall in love with Cam, Cooper, and Luka the way I did.

Chapter
1

Act
Like a What?

Camryn

Standing in front of them, fists
clenched, eyes narrowed, my heart begins to beat too fast. My knees shake, and
I am afraid my anger will betray me. That I’ll lose my cool.

Losing my temper in front of these girls isn’t
something I’ve ever done before, and I don’t intend to start now. I steel
myself against their words of hate and ignorance, and prepare to turn around,
to walk away.

Like I always do.

As I stride by them, my head held high
when I really want to duck my chin, I overhear a snippet of conversation.

“---Acts like a white girl.”

My head snaps around toward the group and
I stop short.

The group of gorgeous girls stare
hatefully at me, as if daring me to say something.
 
There is no way I am going to confront
them here, now.
 
So I continue to
walk.
 
Their not-so-hushed whispers
ensue.

And then I change my mind.

I’m not going to slink past these girls like
the vile words they said don’t matter. It matters. And I’m tired of hiding
behind strength and the high ground.

“Why do you care how I act?” The words
fly out of my mouth before I realize I am striding back toward the group.

“We don’t care about
nothin
’
you do,” one girl replies. “Now exit to the left, before you walk your ass
right into trouble.”

I stop, but stand my ground. “You must
get pretty tired of seeing me in your dreams at night. I mean, if you care
enough to talk about me all day at school, you must dream about me, too.”

Another girl steps forward. “Look,
wanna-be-white girl—“

I stop her with my hand, my eyes shooting
sparks in her direction. “I don’t
wanna
be anything but rich and famous one day. And when I am, I’ll be sure to thank
all of my
haters
for the motivation.”

I walk away without looking back.

Hot tears sting my eyes as I walk out of
the school building into the bright sunshine.
 
Crying is the very worst thing that can
happen to me right now.
 
I will not
cry because of those girls. I am so tired of being hated for absolutely
nothing.
 
What the clique of girls said
was nothing new to me. No one had ever says it to my face, but I’ve heard it
since middle school. Middle school is when girls are at their ugliest. Everyone
is just trying to find a place in the first fishbowl of life, stepping on the
backs of others to make it to the top.
 
So the whispers started then.
 
Always from girls, never from boys.
 
And sadly, never from the small amount of multicultural students who
attended my schools, and never from white girls either.

Sharing the same skin color means a world
of competition and bitter comparisons. If you don’t act a certain way,
according to an unwritten rulebook, you are an outcast. You are strange and
weird and different.

How does one go about “acting white”
anyway?
 
I never understood it.
 
Maybe it is because I am
articulate.
 
I have no accent, and I
was raised to speak clearly and enunciate.
 
Maybe it is because I have a lot of white friends.
 
But that’s stupid.
 
I have a lot of Filipino friends
too.
 
No one ever says I act
Filipino.
 

Maybe it’s because I love the beach, and don’t
shun the oceanfront during daylight hours and only frequent The Strip at night,
like my African-American counterparts.
 
This is coastal Virginia, where the ocean is a part of daily life.
 
We cross a bridge or enter a tunnel
every time we leave the house.
 
I
love feeling the hot sun hitting my face, and the sound of the waves crashing
into the soft sparkling sand.
 
If I
denied it because of my skin color, I’d be living a lie. And I don’t lie.

More likely it is because I live an urban
lifestyle in spite of all that. Tiny apartment, mom who worked two jobs. Dad
who is nowhere to be found. I am a cliché in that way. But my mom told me a
long time ago that just because we didn’t have a lot of money, it didn’t mean I
couldn’t have everything I wanted to have in life. I’d just have to work harder
for it.

Whatever the reason, certain girls at my
school (who I’d dubbed the Pretty Black Girl Clique) have an idea about me they
can’t, or won’t, change.
 
And they won’t
forgive me for it, either.

It’s no wonder I feel like a dolphin in
shark-infested waters at school most of the time.

When I arrive at Dara’s car, she’s locked
in an embrace with her boyfriend Brandon. Her black boyfriend. Unlike some of
the other girls in school who look like Dara, she doesn’t date Brandon for a
status upgrade, or to upset her parents, or to “see what it would be like to be
with a black guy.” She just fell for him. I don’t even think she’s noticed his
skin color yet. Or, if she has, it hasn’t registered as an issue at all. That is
one of the reasons I love her so much.

She’s colorblind.

I clear my throat as I approach.

She smiles brightly at me.
 
“Hey, Cam!
 
How did the rest of your day go after
lunch?”
 

I shrug.
 
“It was alright.”

“What’s wrong?”
 
Her shrewd glance tells me she already
knows I was upset.
 
I’m never able
to put anything past her.

I recount my confrontation with the P.B.G.C.’s
for Dara and Brandon.

“Whoa,” says Brandon.
 
“They said all that?”

Dara scowls.
 
“It’s nothing new, Brandon.
 
She’s dealt with those stupid bitches--“

“Hey,” I interrupt.
 
“There’s no need, Dara.
 
They mean less than nothing to me. I
don’t even know why I let what they say behind my back upset me.”

“It upsets me too.
 
You’re my best friend.
 
I’m sick of seeing you hurt about this
stuff.
 
I love you, and so do a lot
of other people.
 
They’re missing
out on a kick-ass friend.”
 
She hugs
me.
 
Thank God for Dara.

“Come on,” she pulls my arm toward her
car and blows Brandon a kiss.
 
“We
have a date with Ling Cho ‘n them.
 
Mani-Pedi time!”
 

I laugh, and let her pull me toward
meaningless, fun girl time.
 
Yeah.
 
Thank God for Dara.

***

Another day, another torturous experience
with the girls who hate me. Trying not to think about them as I dress for
school is nearly impossible. Spending your day on guard, checking over your
shoulder for the people who detest you isn’t my idea of a party. I smooth my black
hair with my flat iron, grab my backpack, and head down the hall.

Breakfast consists of a Pop-Tart, still warm
in the toaster, and a banana.
 
It’s
all Mom has energy to make after working all night at a manufacturing plant. I
grab them both.

When I exit the front door and walk out into
the bright autumn sunshine, I turn my face up and inhale deeply.
 
The fresh, salty air accosts my lungs, causing
a smile to touch my lips.
 
I love
living by the ocean.
 
The prospect
of living anywhere but the coast just confuses me. I cant fathom it.

Beep.
Beep.

I drop a glance down over the railing of the
third-floor landing.

The horn on Dara’s Civic honks
again.
 
I grin and jog down the cement
staircase to the car, opening the passenger side door.
 

“Damn girl, what the hell takes you so
long to get your buns out here every morning?” Dara grumbles as she pulls out
of my driveway. It’s her usual rant, so I give her my usual answer.

“First of all, you don’t drive me to school
every morning.
 
We alternate,
because ‘Lil Red can’t take the heat.” I pat the dashboard on her old Civic
affectionately. Second of all, you know I sleep until the last possible
second.
 
You should just get here
later.”

We’ve been driving each other to school
every day since we got our licenses sophomore year.
 
We took driver’s ed. together, because
our birthdays were only four days apart. I got my car later than Dara did,
though. My mom told me she’d match what I saved from working at the studio, up
to a thousand dollars. I knew she had to work overtime hours to do it at both
of her jobs. I feel a pang of guilt every time I drive my car.

Dara Giovanni looks like a supermodel.
 
She’s tall, and completely all-American
with her long blonde hair and light blue eyes.
 
The dimples that flash in her cheeks
when she smiles just round out her near-perfect look.
 
She is also five foot ten.
 
The girl is just fierce.
 
Her problem is that she doesn’t even
realize it.
 
She’s never had a boyfriend.
 
It’s our senior year, and she finally
decided to accept some of the male attention she’s been ignoring since fifth
grade.
 

When we pull up to our gigantic,
beige-brick school building, we park in the side lot reserved for seniors.
 
There, standing next to his dark blue
Jeep is Brandon Travis.
 
His
handsome face breaks into a wide grin when Dara pulls in next to him.
 

“Hey, girl,” he greets her, and takes her
in his muscled, chocolate-brown arms.
 
“I’m tired today.
 
Someone
kept me up talking on the phone all night.”

Dara flashes those deep dimples and
replies, “Really?
 
That’s
funny.
 
I feel so well rested.”

He squeezes her tighter as I grab my
backpack and step out of the car.

“’Sup, Miss Grimes?” he glances back to
greet me.

“Hey Brandon,” I answer.
 
“I’m going to need you to stop making my
best friend rush me in the mornings.
 
Looking like this takes time.
 
It can’t be hurried.”
 

Laughing loudly, he pushes his fist out for
me to bump, which I do.

We walk into the building as a threesome,
but I suddenly feel like the odd one out. Turning a pair of best friends into a
party of three will do that to you. Where Dara and I usually keep to ourselves,
with the exception of my dance team members and her choir group, we now go
everywhere with Brandon by our side. So even though I like Brandon, and I like
the way he treats my best friend even more, it’s awkward to be a third wheel.

The throes of navigating high school
relationships.

I hang back, walking alone up the
sidewalk leading up to the building.

And then I am attacked by a midget.