“Wanted: friend for a 16 year old girl. Preferably under eighteen. Gender does not matter. Call or text ‘459-662-8436’ if you are interested.” Cam threw the newspaper down on the kitchen table. “Good grief, does this girl want friends or pedos?”
His girlfriend, Angie, came up behind him wrapping her arms around his shoulders, “I don’t know, but why should we care?”
He rolled his eyes, “Mostly, because she’s another human.”
She grinned. “She must be a pretty desperate human to be putting a wanted ad in the paper for friends.”
Cam shrugged. “Well, we could always call….”
Angie pulled away and crossed her arms. “Say what now?”
“I said, ‘we could always call.’”
“Why would we want to call?” She flung her hands in the air, “She’s obviously desperate. Of course, she could be a pedophile herself.”
“We’ll take a knife!”
“She’ll have a gun!”
“You’re just paranoid.”
“And you’re just a thrill seeker!”
“I’m calling.” Cam pulled his phone from his pocket, winking at his girlfriend as he did so. “It’s ringing!” He whispered after dialing the number.
“Put it on speaker phone.” She whispered back.
“Hello?” Came the slightly electronic sounding voice.
“Hi, my name is Cam and my girlfriend is Angie, we’re calling about your friend ad?”
“Oh! Hi! I’d almost forgotten about that! I’ve been in this town for a while and I’m super lonely, but I don’t go to school here and honestly, the local youth group doesn’t seem like a good place to make friends. I’ve gone a few times, but they all already have their own groups of friends.”
“The Cliff? Yeah, I know what you mean. So, when would you like to meet me and my girlfriend?”
“Well, I guess today is as good a day as any.”
“Ya think?”
“Well, I don’t have anything to do other than read, watch movies and waste my time on the internet.”
“Hey, us either! Wanna meet at the park around three? That gives us about an hour. And we have cookies.”
“Are you the dark side?”
“Absolutely.”
“I heard you guys lied about the cookies.”
“That’s our New York branch.”
“Oh, okay, then I’m cool with joining you! Three, you said?”
“Unless you can come up with a reason why that’s a bad idea, yep. Oh and by the way, what’s your name?”
“Lillian. Thank you so much! I can’t wait!”
“Yeah, sure sounds like fun. Bye!”
“Bye!”
Cam hung up, then turned to his girlfriend who was shaking her head, her dark brown ponytail swinging across her back.
“You are an idiot, Cam. She doesn’t go to school here? Why didn’t you ask where she goes to school?”
He shrugged, “I guess I didn’t think about it. But don’t worry, Angie, we’ll be fine.”
“I’m sure that’s what all kids who are about to be raped say.”
An hour later, Cam and Angie were at the park, sitting on a bench, waiting for Lillian.
“Well, this is boring. Our pedo won’t even show up.” Angie complained.
“Oh come on, Ang! We don’t know she’s a pedo!”
Angie crossed her arms over her chest and huffed. She was worried and it was quite obvious to Cam, who had grown aware to the fact that whenever she was worried, she acted constantly irritated. “But she could be.”
Just as Cam was about ready to defend their unknown new friend, his phone sang out the Star Wars theme. “That’s probably her. Hello? Yeah, we’re on this park bench. Say wha? Um, alright.” He hung up then turned to his girlfriend, “Um, Angie…we got a problem.”
“She is a pedo?”
Cam shot her a look, “No, the problem is that a pedo has her.”
“What?”
“On the other side of the park. She got a phone call shortly after ours and she decided to try to meet us both. She met him about fifteen minutes ago and he’s been trying to convince her to get into his truck and go to a hotel. She’s scared to just walk off.”
Angie’s eyes widened. “We can’t let that happen.”
“Exactly. Which is why you’re going to call the police and I’m going to go rescue her using whatever means possible.”
“My knight in shinning armor, always rescuing maidens in distress, while at the same time remaining faithful to me.”
“My princess in glistening silk. Now I’m off! To slay a dragon.” He kissed his girlfriend on the forehead, then jogged toward the slide on the other side of the tree line that obstructed his view.
“Babe!” He shouted, flinging his arm around the shoulder of a short, slender brunette talking to a short, gotee-d man. “I thought we were meeting on the other side of the park!” He chucked her gently under the chin. “I swear you dye your hair this color.” Then, turning to the man as though seeing him for the first time, “Oh, hi! Have you met my sweet Lillian? Isn’t she beautiful?”
“Oh, Cam, stop it!” She caught on, after first staring at him with a blank look in her eyes.
“I can’t help it! I must proclaim your beauty to the world!” He looked dramatically into the sky.
“Well, you shouldn’t do it so loudly.”
“Fine, if you say so, sweet thang.”
Lillian rolled her blue eyes, shooting him a thankful glance.
“Thank you so much for keeping my beautiful girlfriend company while she was on the wrong side of the park.”
“Wait, so she made plans to meet you?” The man asked in a gravelly voice, hooking a thumb through one of his belt loops, bringing attention to his snarling lion tattoo.
“Of course, she tends to make plans with her boyfriend.”
The man crossed his arms over his chest and licked his teeth. “But she told me the reason she put the ad in the paper was because she had no friends nearby. I would think that a boyfriend would qualify as a friend.”
Lillian looked up at Cam, worry in her eyes.
“Oh, it’s very simple. See, I called her about, what was it, twenty minutes ago? Told her I was coming. She must have forgotten about you until now or something.”
She nodded uneasily.
“Cam?”
The three turned to see Angie coming from behind the trees.
“Angie? Oh my word! I didn’t want you to see this!”
“Why do you have your arm around that girl, Cam?”
Cam dropped his arm from off Lillian’s shoulders. “I can explain.”
“Cam, who is that girl?” Lillian questioned.
“That’s…um…my cousin!”
“Your cousin?” Lillian raised her eyebrow and gave him a rather dubious look. “She’s a rather attractive cousin….”
“Yes, well, attractiveness runs in my family?”
“I’m not your—”
“Only attractive cousin, I know….” Cam winked at Angie, knowing that would get the message across.
“I’m your girlfriend!” Angie shouted.
“But wait….” Lillian looked from Cam to Angie in faux confusion. “I thought I was your girlfriend, Cam?”
Cam lowered his head. “You are. You were. I came to break up with you. I didn’t want to mention Angie. I didn’t want to hurt you. It’s been forever since I’ve seen you, but seeing you now, I just don’t know. Maybe I’m not mature enough for a girlfriend.”
“Evidently not!” Angie crossed her arms and raised her eyebrows. “You can keep her, I refuse to remain your girlfriend. I feel used!”
“So do I! Have you ever heard the song ‘Two Black Cadillacs?’ Well, that’s the new song I’ll be singing when I think about you!”
A police car pulled up and a tall, black, muscular officer got out, walking slowly and cautiously toward the fighting trio, stopping beside the man with the lion tattoo. “They’re really havin’ at it, ain’t they?”
“Sure looks like it. Apparently that boy had two girlfriends and they met.”
“That never goes over well.”
“Sure doesn’t. I learned that the hard way.”
“Oh didja? I learned it because my brother learned it the hard way.” Then he sighed, “Might as well try to break these kids up. Alright! Enough! I was called here because of a disturbance, is this it?”
“Yes officer!” Cam told him, displaying a thumbs up.
Without another word, the officer had the man with the lion tattoo handcuffed. “You really shouldn’t try to convince sixteen year old girls to get in a vehicle with you.” He went through the proper procedure, then situated the man in the back of the cop car. “As for you, young lady,” he waved a finger in Lillian’s face, “you should know better than to put your number in the paper asking for friends. That man is the kind of friend you’re going to attract. Do your parents know what you did?”
Lillian lowered her head, “No officer.”
“I recommend telling them and not answering calls from any would-be friends. Some will be nice, like Cam and Angie, but not everyone in the world is like them. And in the future, don’t you ever do that again.”
She nodded. “Yes officer.” Then she turned to Cam and Angie. “I’m sorry. I guess you probably won’t really want to be friends with me now anyway. I guess that ad actually seemed pretty desperate.”
“Yeah, it did. But we’ll be friends with you anyway.” Cam told her.
Lillian glanced at Angie, who shrugged. “You don’t seem to be a pedophile, so I think I can manage to be your friend. You obviously need someone to protect you from creeps.” She smiled kindly. “But in the future, avoid creeps.”
Lillian laughed. “Alright. Thank you so much.”
Cam shrugged, “Hey, that’s what friends are for. Thank you officer.”
“No problem. Keep an eye on your little friend now.” He nodded his head in a friendly fashion toward the trio.
When the officer had gone, Lillian rolled her eyes, “Great, now I’m the little friend.”
“Well, you are the shortest.”
“And you look hungry. Would you like to have a picnic? There’s a Subway right down the street where we can get some sandwiches.”
“That sounds amazing. I’d love it.” Lillian couldn’t stop smiling. Sure, she’d attracted a creep…and she’d also attracted some friends. She’d also learned a lesson: Never, ever, under any circumstances, put your number in the paper asking for friends for sixteen year olds!
©Katie Holm2015
