Girls of a Feather: The Misadventures of Four College Girls

By A. Miller

A coming-of-age story: Quirky, fun, and memorable. Four college roommates have quite a freshman year! Share the roller coaster ride they have at a Boston university. Meet Kate, who traveled from California to Boston to get away from her parents; Cybil, an aspiring ballerina from New York; Debbie, a leggy cheerleader; and Aria, who longs to be a punk rocker.

This new adult novel was originally published with the title "Trashy Novel."

• Language: English
• Publisher: bigwords101
• Release date: May 5, 2018
• ISBN: 9780998416519

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bigwords101

PETALUMA, CALIFORNIA

This book was formerly titled

Trashy Novel: Four College Girls on a Path by JoJo Baker (pseudonym)

GIRLS OF A FEATHER: The Misadventures of Four College Girls

Copyright © 2018 by A. Miller

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

Book Layout ©2013 BookDesignTemplates.com

Cover Art and Design by Matt Hinrichs

Miller A. Girls of a Feather: The Misadventures of Four College Girls 2017

ISBN 978-0-9984165-0-2

Published by bigwords101, P.O. Box 4483, Petaluma, CA 94955

To all the readers!

Sometime in the 1980s . . .

INTRODUCTION

My life reads like a trashy novel.

I’m Kate—not exactly a name befitting the heroine of a trashy novel. Just a plain name. I grew up with money in the rolling hills and valleys of Northern California’s wine country. That is probably where the normalcy ends and the trashy novel begins.

My family is nuts. I know, I know . . . you’re thinking, All families are dysfunctional. There is no such thing as a normal family. While that may be true, I am telling you, my family is nuts, as in Nuts with a capital N. Of course you would never know it from the outside. We always had the nice house, the manicured lawn, the nice cars. But inside those walls nothing was even close to normal.

My father makes his money as an ambulance chaser, otherwise known as a personal injury attorney. Ben Bendy Daniels. If the name is not silly enough, the man is. He is a black mark on the legal profession. He has fed and clothed his family well, so it is difficult to believe that I spent many nights cowering in a corner as various household items flew across the house, launched with the steady aim of Bendy Daniels. Quite a temper the guy has.

He also has a few other bad habits. He spends way too much time in Las Vegas, leaving us blessedly alone and in peace on many weekends. And we have quite a well-stocked liquor cabinet, so Bendy can calm down after chasing ambulances all day. But enough about him.

Mom is your typical meek woman who grew up right at the cusp of the feminist movement, and she never quite got it. She left college to marry Ben, the personal injury attorney with the great future. Mostly, she has raised us three kids—more about us later. She is not a particularly good cook or housekeeper . . . and we do have the money to hire cleaning help, so she really doesn’t have too much to do now that the kids are grown up. Since we aren’t quite in the stratosphere of charity events and debutante balls, she isn’t a society lady like some of her acquaintances. And she doesn’t seem to have any hobbies except watching over you kids, as she says.

My story begins at the beginning . . .

Chapter 1

I am packing my bags, and this time I am leaving!

But where are you going to go, Kate? You just graduated college; you have no job; you have no furniture; you have no plans.

I have friends! I scream just as a wine bottle (empty, I hope) hits the wall outside my room. I’ll go stay with them and find a job. It can’t be hard to find a job with a major in Romance Languages.

My plan is to go down to San Francisco and crowd myself into an already overpriced, crammed, almost-two-bedroom apartment with my two best friends from the neighborhood, Betsy and Elizabeth.

Betsy, Elizabeth, and I have been a solid friendship unit since grade school, and nothing or no one has ever come between us. Unlike my family, their families seemed normal to me.

Betsy, really Elizabeth, had to go by Betsy, so we could tell them apart. Elizabeth would never use a nickname, so Elizabeth-Betsy did. Betsy was a quirky, beautiful-without-trying girl with black hair that curved in all the right places with a body to match. She had her own mind, didn’t care what anyone thought, and had the brains to make that attitude okay. Her father, a similarly quirky soul, was a big deal in the tech industry in the days when tech was more of a mystery to us all. We don’t know what he did, but he made scads of money doing it. He was a funny guy, always nice and helpful—and I figured he probably didn’t throw household items into the walls at his house.

Elizabeth was the polar opposite. Tall and reed thin, she had the classic features of someone named Elizabeth. She looked as if she had money—you know the type. Her light brown hair lay perfectly straight without being coaxed, and she wore a little bit of lip gloss and clothes that looked as if they were from Talbots. It’s hard to believe we got along so well with such a conservative girl, but we did.

Elizabeth’s family had old money. I never knew what that was when I was a kid, but I figured old money must be more valuable than tech money or ambulance-chasing money.

Anyhow, there we were, the three of us. Best of friends. I had gone far away to college—to Boston— to escape all thoughts of my crazy home life. It wasn’t in my plans to ever go back, but I actually ended up moving back to San Francisco a year later to join Betsy and Elizabeth at college. I lived with them in the city until I finished school, but then I figured a month or so at home with my parents, while I made my life plans, couldn't hurt.

Betsy and Elizabeth moved to a smaller place when I moved out, in a much nicer neighborhood, not so near the college; they no longer needed to be close to the school. Well, now I have been living with my parents for three months, my friends are an hour’s drive away, and the plates are still flying across the room. Oh, and my life plans are still incomplete.

You know, it wouldn’t be so bad if my mother would say something—or leave (well, she tried once)—but she tolerates it as if it were normal. Where did I get this mother? And why aren’t I like her? (I hope I’m not, anyway.)

I had made the call last night. Hey, Betsy, do you think I could come crash with you guys for a while? This is no place for a human to live! And I need to live in the City. No jobs here. No life here. I will pay my share of the rent.

You know you are always welcome here, Betsy replied. It will be a little crowded, but we will make do. I know you could get a job here . . . some kind of a job, anyway. Elizabeth isn’t here right now, but I know it’ll be OK with her.

I am packing as we speak! Is tomorrow too soon?

Tomorrow is great! You can help us get ready for Elizabeth’s birthday party. Remember? It’s Saturday night. I know you will love our city friends!

I really missed these two girls. While they had both decided to stay close to home and go to San Francisco State, I had decided to try an escape to the opposite coast. It didn’t really work out, as you will see.

When I moved home after graduation and saw the reality of my life, I began to wish I had stayed in the apartment with my friends—or had even stayed in school on the East Coast and built my life there. Well, that probably wasn’t possible, as things turned out.

Since I moved back to my parents’ house after graduation, I hadn’t gone to the City to see Bets and Elizabeth (no shortening on this name—ever) as often as I thought I would, although I had the car to get there. I don’t know why. I didn’t seem to have the will to do much of anything those three months I was home. Maybe I was depressed. Post-graduation, no job, home-with-the-parents kind of depressed. But I am coming out of it now! San Francisco here I come!

Part I

High School

Chapter 2

You are such a complete asshole! My brother is screaming at Dad as he, my younger sister, and I stand there with assorted weapons in our hands, me a frying pan, my sister a plant, and my brother a brass candlestick. If I didn’t live this life myself, I wouldn’t believe it. I wish I had a picture of the scene. Mom—the catatonic one—remained on the sofa, telling us—not him, but us—to calm down and leave your father alone. The absurdity of it all was a snapshot of my life at home.

My father had by now grabbed a sizable kitchen knife, but we stood unafraid. He generally aimed at the wall, not at people. As far as I know, he hadn’t ever struck anyone with his hands. And if he happened to strike someone with an object, it was an accident. He thought of himself as a peaceful guy—not the violent type.

Put the damn knife down! You aren’t scaring anyone, my brother added. As the oldest, he was usually our spokesperson and the bravest one of us. Yes, this had happened before, but generally not with all of us facing him with weapons. You might ask what had happened to cause my father to get so angry? Who even remembers? Usually it was something trivial like the trash not being put out. And this time, before he threw anything, we decided we would face him down, all three of us, with dangerous items. He retaliated by picking up the knife from our Thanksgiving table. It was just the five of us for Thanksgiving; we were usually too embarrassed to invite anyone due to Dad’s volatility. On the occasions that he was traveling on Thanksgiving, we invited friends and relatives and had a great time.

Dad aimed at the floor. Damn you all! Can’t we ever have a peaceful meal around here? Can’t I have three normal kids? Hel, talk some sense into them. My mother’s name is Helen. He calls her Hel. We spell it Hell.

Go take a walk, Bendy, Mom said. That was her solution to his insanity. So, Bendy left us in peace holding our weapons. Although his name is Ben, she has called him Bendy since forever. Between Hell and Bendy, we generally just call them Hell Bent to ruin our lives.

I so am getting as far away as possible from this loony bin next year! shouted my brother. I am choosing the college as far away as possible—out of this county, if I can. Good thing Ben Jr. was so smart. He had actually applied to Oxford, so he could get very far away from the family. We would miss him, but my sister and I wished him luck—and admission into Oxford!

Tall, slim, and black haired, Ben Jr. is everything you would want in a boyfriend—and a brother. We are lucky to have him. Calm and as different looking from Dad (Bendy) as can be, he is cute and smart and nice. He is 17, two years older than I am. I am two years older than Frannie, the baby. Frannie has the same sandy hair and wide-set brown eyes as Dad. My brother and I look more like Mom. But we are all calm. Perhaps we are a lucky combination of the nutso Dad and the catatonic mom. Somewhere in the middle. It bodes well for us.

Ben Jr. didn’t end up going to Oxford, but he did end up going 3000 miles away—to Yale.

Chapter 3

We didn’t know she had drugs in there! shrieked Betsy. We were at the police station. It was about two months after Ben Jr. had left for college.

My father will more than kill me, whispered Elizabeth. I am ruining the family name. I can hear him now.

Your parents are all on the way. Thank goodness Rachel had admitted she was the one with the pot and cocaine stashed under the driver’s seat. We knew she was kind of a pothead, but we didn’t know she had stuff in the car. We were on the way to a party, dressed to the nines, we thought—kind of looking like prostitutes—when we were caught for speeding. I guess we looked suspicious because they searched the car for drugs. Luckily, at least we had an honest friend. Rachel was from the other part of town, not our upper middle class neighborhood. She was not driving a Volvo or a Mercedes or a Beemer like we might. We had all gotten our licenses recently, but none of us had cars yet. Rachel had already been driving a year, and her parents had given her older sister’s junker to her, an old beat up Camry. No wonder we got stopped.

Elizabeth had cried most of her black eye makeup off. Good thing. It was unusual for her to be so whored up.... I guess it was our influence. Or, she was just getting tired of being a good girl. Betsy pretty much got to wear whatever she wanted—she had the liberated parents—her skirt was so short, it really wasn't a skirt at all. She had purple false eyelashes and bright red hair tonight.

What the hell is going on? What did they do? My daughter doesn’t do drugs! Will this be in the news? Elizabeth’s dad was sputtering as he pulled his mousy, gray-haired wife through the police station doors. Following them were Betsy’s sensible parents, not looking terribly surprised—and then my parents.

Goddammit it! What the hell! What’s going on? Where is she? Where are they? That’s Bendy, hair standing straight on end. Well, it is 1 a.m. by now.

Calm yourself, Bendy. I am sure they did nothing wrong. Good old Mom.

You don’t end up in jail when you don’t do anything wrong. Goddammit! I noticed that at least his hands were empty.

The three sets of parents were not close friends as we were, but they had become well acquainted over the years while taking us three girls places.

Rachel’s parents, it turns out, were out of town. The police did manage to get in touch with them, and they were on their way home. But Rachel was spending the night in jail, anyway. At least one night. We were let go.

Let me clarify. Keep her for the night; let her learn a lesson, scowled my dad. He grabbed Mom and ran out the door, leaving me to learn my lesson. Nice parents, huh? I wasn’t even guilty of anything. Fortunately, I didn’t learn too many lessons that night in jail because I was put in a cell with Rachel. We became much better