Blanche

I have one more story involving my friend Zar, from back in the day’s when we roamed the halls of Argo Community High School. He used to date a girl named Debbie, we called her Blanche. Zar’s entire posse, including me hated her. So, one day our friend, Rosier coined the nickname of Blanche onto her and it stuck. We would call her that and she would get beyond pissed. Harassing us to tell her what we meant by it, which of course was nothing. We just knew it pissed her off, so we kept calling her Blanche.

This girl was off her rocker. She was obsessed with Jon. We were playing softball one day up at St. Fabian’s. She went with her Mom up to Kmart. Once her Mom was in the store she stole the keys from her purse and stole the car and drove over to watch Jon play, leaving her Mom in the store wondering where the hell she went.

Most of the summer of 1986 we were subjected to this girl and her lunacy thanks to her dating Zar. I remember Jon, basically begging me and Doyle to go to her birthday party. He assured me there would be beer. So, with the enticement of some hooch, I against my better judgment went to her party. Zar was right, there was beer. Unfortunately it was Coors Light and some old hag was drinking it all and would not let anyone under age even sniff a can. So, instead Doyle and I were treated to a one hour torture session watching Blanche open all of her gifts of which there were many.

She attended Queen of Peace when Zar met her. But not being able to talk to Jon while he was at school, in October she transferred to Argo. Much to my dismay, she would be in my World History class, which also happened to be my last class of the day. It was torture having to go to that class and have to deal with her on a daily basis.

It all came to a boil one afternoon. I got up to take a leak in the middle of class. I came back to find that she had snagged my keys off of my desk. The bell rang she still had my keys and would not give them back for some reason. All the buses left and it was me and her left at Argo. I was naturally pissed. Her solution was to call her Mom. Her Mother came to Argo and I was then stuck in a car with Blanche and her Mom as she gave me a ride home. Blanche only gave me my keys back once I got to my house.

That was the last in many straws for me. I knew this girl Sherri was basically in love with Zar so, my friends and I all banded up and basically talked Zar into dumping Blanche and dating Sherri. (Not that she would be much better, it was basically like trading one psycho for another.) Blanche did not take this well.

At first she tried everything in her power to get Jon back. But Zar smartly wanted nothing to do with her. One night after she barged her way into a party we had to hide Zar in a linen closet. Another night Dell and I incurred her wrath as she tried to muscle her way into Dell’s Impala and force Dell to drive her to Zar’s house.

As the anger grew and grew inside of her she became beside herself. With no other options she decided to hire “hit men” to get me, Dell and Doyle. She paid at least two guys that I know of to kick our asses. The good thing about it was, I knew one of the guys pretty well. He told me of Blanche’s offer. I told him to take her money, which he did and my ass never got kicked.

This made her become even more insane, which made my World History class a nightmare. Dell, had the pleasure of having her in a class as well. One day they got into a verbal sparring match and she followed him all the way into the men’s bathroom. She, tired getting me in trouble with my History teacher, claiming I cheated off her on a test. (Which was baseless as I scored higher on the test then she did.)

Eventually, our senior year ended and Blanche became an after thought. That was until one day, years later I picked up the Southtown Economist and wandered over to the police blotter. I read a story about a bar fight at Cagney’s and wouldn’t you know it seems like Blanche started it. As I read the story, a smile came across my face and I thanked God, Zar had the good sense to dump her when he did. Who knows what that loon might have done if he dated her longer then the four months that he did.