18. Chapter 19
Chapter 19
CHARLOTTE
I sit cross-legged on my bed as I cram another chunk of chicken into my mouth with some chopsticks and groan. “How is this the best sweet and sour chicken I’ve ever had?”
“And these spicy green beans are amazeballs,” Elizabeth says through a mouthful.
“Speaking of balls . . .” Brynn grins above the rim of her cup.
Samantha snorts. “So subtle.”
“What happened with you and Chris on Sunday?” she finishes.
I feign innocence, dunking another crispy fried chicken bite into the sweet sauce. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Brynn groans and pushes her dish aside. “Come on ! You know I know he paid you a visit Sunday morning. Just like I also know he didn’t come back to the apartment until almost ten o’clock that night, so your little coy act,” she says, drilling me with a finger, “isn’t gonna fly with me.”
“It’s girls’ night. There’s no room for boy talk on girls’ night,” I say.
Samantha almost spits her Coke out. “Um, half of girls’ nights consists of either talking about boys or complaining about them.”
“Exactly.” I point my chopstick at her. “Don’t you think it’s time we break the mold? Can we really not have a night just for us girls?”
“So, I take it things didn’t go well.” Brynn deflates a little, her shoulders rounding at the thought. As we speak, her frown is so deep it’ll probably leave permanent wrinkles.
I hum a noncommittal sound, and her pained expression deepens as I reach for my water at the same time Samantha mumbles, “Oh, it went well alright.”
Brynn gasps, pointing. “What do you know?”
I laugh when Samantha feigns zipping her lips and throwing away the key when my phone chimes with a text.
Setting my glass back down, I snatch it off my nightstand and swipe open the screen, smiling when I read the text.
CHRIS : Still dreaming about your lips.
“What are you . . . Oh my gosh, it’s him, isn’t it?” Brynn lunges for my phone, but I quickly dodge her, holding it out of reach. “You dirty little rat!” she yells. “You’re totally holding out on us.”
Giving up, she crosses her arms over her chest and pouts while I try and catch my breath.
“Pretty sure she’s been texting him all week,” Samantha says, and I spear her with a look. “What?” She shrugs with a grin. “You’ve been suspiciously glued to your phone since, ahem, Sunday.”
“Start talking,” Brynn says, wiggling her fingers.
I bite my lip and push the remaining chicken around on my plate. The truth is the time I spent with Chris last Sunday was the most carefree I’ve felt in a long time. Not only did I tell him about my mother?something I never do?but I didn’t think about her once after we left the shop, and the suffocating grip of my anxiety has somehow lessened since we returned. She no longer occupies all my waking thoughts between classes and hanging out with my friends. Instead of walking around wondering what she’s doing and if she’s functioning or going to work, I’m thinking about a goofy blue-eyed blond-haired boy who seems to have suddenly infiltrated my thoughts.
Truth be told, it’s not a bad way to be.
“Well, like you know, he caught me off guard and showed up Sunday with breakfast.”
“After the stunt he pulled at the party Saturday night, you didn’t gouge his eyes out?” Liz asks wide-eyed.
“No.” I snicker. “However, I was still wearing Danger’s hoodie, and he immediately noticed.”
Brynn’s eyes glitter with excitement. “Oh shit. I bet he loved that,” she croons.
“Yeah, he wasn’t a fan. He basically started gagging like the drama queen he is and demanded I take it off because he couldn’t eat with me in it. When I refused, he threatened to take it off for me.”
“Oh, god, that’s hot,” Elizabeth says. “Please tell me you let him make good on his threat.”
“Sadly, no. I was still in my you-repulse-me-and-if-you-so-much as-look-at-me-I’ll-poke-your-eyes-out mindset, and so I swiftly removed it myself.”
“Bummer.” Liz deflates.
“Speaking of, I really should return that jersey.” I gnaw on the inside of my cheek as I glance around my room. I swear I laid it over my desk chair and haven’t seen it since. Weird.
“Forget about the jersey,” Brynn says, waving a hand. “What happened next?”
“We ate and he insisted on fixing my car for me since he knew I needed a way to get back home to check in on my mother. I guess his father was a mechanic and Chris used to help him when he was young. Then in high school he worked for another local mechanic so he could learn the trade. He basically restored his own car, which is vintage and admittedly pretty cool, so he knows a lot and plans on reopening his father’s shop after college.”
“Damn. Why are mechanics so hot?” Samantha asks.
“I think any man who knows how to get his hands dirty is hot,” Liz says with a wistful sigh.
“Definitely. Any guy that good with his hands is bound to be good at other things, too.” A wicked grin spreads Brynn’s mouth. “Plus, those calloused palms sliding over your body . . .” She shudders.
“Okay, hornballs,” I say, chucking a fortune cookie at them. “Focus.”
“Right.” Samantha shakes her head. “Sorry about that.”
“So, of course, I couldn’t let him do something for nothing because it’s not in my nature. The last thing I want is to be indebted to him, so I told him I’d only go along with it if we made a deal. A favor for a favor.”
Brynn gasps. “You gave him a blowie!”
“What?” I scrunch up my face. “No! Get your head out of the gutter.”
“Sorry, sorry!” She throws her hands up. “But in my defense, when you said ‘a favor for a favor,’ I thought that’s where you were headed.”
“You’re in time-out,” I say, pointing at her.
“Noted.” She rolls her lips together while I shake my head.
“ Anyway, I told him to name the stakes, and he wanted me to agree on a date, so I did.”
“Wait. You can’t stand him, but in order for him to fix your car and not be indebted to him, you agreed on a date?” Liz nearly chokes.
“Yes.” I wince. “Maybe it sounds crazy, but I need transportation. And, okay, if I’m being honest, I still had that kiss from the party on my mind, and so I think a part of me wanted to agree just to see, you know? Kind of like scratching an itch? And if it’s disastrous, then maybe he’ll leave me alone once and for all. But then . . .”
“But then . . .?” Brynn asks, watching me closely, practically vibrating from her spot on the bed.
“I had a lot of fun on Sunday. Like, a crazy weird amount of fun. I even spent some time with his family, and he surprised me.”
“In a good way?” Liz asks.
In the best of ways.
“Yeah, in a good way,” I say.
“Does that mean you’ve changed your mind about his mother and your father?” Brynn asks, her expression bordering on hopeful.
I shake my head as guilt winds its way around my heart. “No. I mean, his mom is great. But I meant what I said. This isn’t about her. It’s about my dad, and I won’t support something I know is bound to be a disaster and will also hurt my mother in the process.”
“So, when’s the date?” Samantha asks, wiggling her brows, and bringing the conversation back around to me and Chris.
“This weekend is a wash because the team is traveling, so we settled on next Friday.”
“Ahhh!” Brynn squeals, covering her face with her hands before she shouts. “I can’t believe you two are actually going out on a date.”
“Me neither.” I laugh.
“Do you think you’ll get a replay of the kiss heard around the world?” Liz grins.
I snort. “‘The kiss heard round the world’? And what did it sound like, exactly?”
She flaps a hand at me and groans. “You know what I mean.”
I really do because I’m still thinking about it. And all the kisses on Sunday, too, which only proved the first one wasn’t a fluke.
“Look! She’s blushing.” Brynn points while Samantha grins knowingly. “Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh!” Brynn gasps. “You kissed again already, didn’t you?”
“Maybe?” I scrunch my nose, and the girls all squeal.
“You dirty little bitch. Why didn’t you lead with that!” Brynn play-smacks me in the arm, and I laugh.
“So was the first a fluke?” Liz asks, reading my thoughts. Leaning forward, she rests her chin on her clasped hands, waiting as I groan.
“It definitely was not a fluke.”
Brynn jumps up from her spot on the bed, nearly toppling our food as she points and yells, “I knew it!”
I laugh and tug on her arm. “Would you get back down here and stop doing a victory dance before you spill everything, and my bed permanently smells like a Chinese restaurant?”
“It’s so satisfying, yet so weird to me that Chris is such a good kisser,” Brynn says, sinking back onto my mattress. “I mean, he’s basically become like a brother to me since Jace and I started dating, so to see him kissing you like he wanted to burn the room down was kinda cray cray, but I’m so here for it.” She beams.
“I would agree with you if I hadn’t experienced his mouth firsthand.”
“Who knew?” Elizabeth mutters with a dopey grin before she flops back on Samantha’s bed. “Ugh. I need a boyfriend. I hate being the only one without a man. Watching all of you with your super sexy men is so unfair.”
“You’ll find one soon enough.” Samantha reaches out and squeezes her hand.
“And Chris is not my boyfriend,” I remind her.
“Yet,” she says with a wink.
I say nothing, mind wandering to what it would be like to have a boyfriend. I haven’t dated anyone exclusively since high school, and even then, I’m not sure I’d call those real relationships. I’d been so busy navigating life after my parents’ divorce I didn’t have much time to devote to any one person. It was more a label and a front for my peers than anything.
I hum under my breath, aware of all three sets of eyes on me, waiting for my reaction to the idea of me and Chris being together for real. I can’t say it’s an unpleasant notion. In fact, the butterflies in the pit of my stomach say quite the opposite.
“Let’s see what Mother Fortune says.” Liz wiggles a brow as she snatches a fortune cookie up and hands it to me.
“What? You know, this means nothing, right?”
“I don’t know,” Samantha drawls. “My older sister once got a fortune that said A fresh start awaits you in matters of the heart, and a week later she met her fiancé.”
I eye Samantha with a healthy dose of skepticism while I bite my tongue and tear through the wrapper, removing the hard cookie. The sugary vanilla scent hits my nose as I snap it in half, then pluck out the little rectangle of paper and read: Expect the unexpected.
“Oooh,” Liz croons. “Chris was certainly unexpected.”
“While that’s true, and everything Chris has done has been unexpected, this could mean anything,” I say, waving it around.
“No way. It’s totally about you and Chris. This fortune is spot on. The last thing any of us saw coming were the two of you hooking up.” Brynn grins.
I snort. “We’ll see,” I say, tucking it into my pocket, entirely unconvinced.
“Look! She’s keeping it!” Elizabeth declares, pointing to my jeans. “She liiiiikes him.”
“Shut up,” I say with a laugh while I swat at her hand, and when my phone starts ringing. Brynn lunges for it this time, scooping it up, and immediately her face falls.
“Oh. It’s not Chris,” she says with a frown.
I scoff. “Not every call or text I get is from Chris,” I say, snatching it back out of her hands.
“It’s your mom,” she says at the same time I see Mom flash across the screen, and my stomach sinks.
“Um, I should probably take this,” I say, standing. “I’m just gonna . . .” I motion toward the door as I get off the bed and hurry out of my room, pressing the accept button as I head toward the lobby. “Mom?”
“Charlotte, I screwed up,” she says on a sob, and my already sinking heart plummets to the floor.
I wander out into the lobby and sink down in one of the ugly purple chairs. “What happened?”
“I lost my job.”
I close my eyes, trying to remain calm. “When?”
“Last week.”
My mind veers in a million different directions, settling on the one thought I can’t shake. I knew I should’ve stopped by her place on Sunday, but a part of me just wanted to have fun, to live in the moment instead of worrying about her for a change.
“You never went back to work after I left, did you?” I ask.
Silence.
“Mom?”
I open my eyes, staring at the clock above the wall and wondering how it is that I’m the responsible one out of the two of us when I’m only twenty, and she’s the forty-four-year-old parent. I’m supposed to be the one out partying and sowing my oats and calling her with my problems.
“No,” she answers. “I tried, I really did,” she says, her voice cracking over the words. “I got up and got dressed, but I just couldn’t bring myself to go. I even got in the car, but then my chest started hurting and I couldn’t breathe. I thought I might pass out. Everything was spinning and I was lightheaded. I couldn’t drive, Charlotte. My heart was pounding so hard. I thought I might die.”
My chest tightens as the weight of the world settles behind my ribcage, every breath coming in sharp bursts.
“It’s called a panic attack, Mom. Dr. Sherri gave you the tools to fight those. Worst-case scenario, you take some meds and wait an hour to leave. You know how they work. They almost always pass and you’re fine.”
“You don’t understand,” she wails, breaking out into full-on sobbing while I grit my teeth and try to keep from snapping at her.
“So, what have you been doing for the last week?” I ask, even though I know exactly what she’s been doing. It’s what she does any time she falls into a severe depressive episode. She lies on the couch in her robe and stares aimlessly at the TV, alternating between crying and sleeping. If it’s really bad, she never even gets out of bed.
“Never mind,” I say, shaking my head. “That’s irrelevant, but what are you going to do now? You need a job. You need to be productive. Have you been back to see Dr. Sherri like I told you to? I think you should go every day until you start to feel better.”
“I can’t.”
“Why?” I ask, my frustration growing.
“Because I have no money. With no job and no alimony, I have nothing,” she says, her voice thick.
I bring a hand to my forehead, a tension headache blooming and pounding at the front of my skull. Interesting how the timing of Dad’s alimony ending and his new engagement are so closely related.
“So, you have zero income,” I repeat, racking my brain for a solution. “What about unemployment pay? Why were you fired exactly?”
“They cited their reasoning as poor job performance and”?Mom sniffles?“repeated no-call, no-show.”
“Damnit. You won’t be eligible then,” I say, feeling the remnants of my patience snap. “What the hell, Mom?”
“I’m sorry,” she croaks, her voice hitching over the words.
I inhale through my nose, keeping my mouth clamped shut for fear of what might come out. All I want to do is yell at her. To reach through the phone, grab her, and shake some sense into her. To shout that sorry isn’t enough. That she needs money to pay for food, the mortgage, and her therapist. That her problems shouldn’t become my problems. That she’s on her own now. But I can’t. I can’t do any of those things. Just like I can’t leave her to figure this out on her own because I know how that ends, and it’s not a scenario I want to entertain.
“I know you’re sorry, but being sorry won’t help,” I say, hating that I sound like a pissed-off parent.
“I’ll start applying for jobs,” Mom says.
“That’s good, Mom,” I say, trying to keep my voice steady and my tone platonic, though I don’t hold out much hope. She’s already been out of work for a week, and it took her this long just to call me when she should’ve been applying to jobs already.
“You need to find something. Start applying, and in the meantime . . .” I tip my head back, leaning it against the back of the chair, knowing what I must do. “I’ll figure something out, but you need to go back to see Dr. Sherri and take your meds.”
Silence falls over the line.
“Mom, do you hear me? You have to see Dr. Sherri. Call her as soon as we hang up and book an appointment.”
Without her meds and therapy sessions, there’s no way she’ll ever dig herself out of this hole.
“But the money?”
“I’ll figure it out, but that’s the deal. You go, and I help, okay?”
“Okay,” she says, sounding resigned.
“I need to go.”
Before I explode and flip the fuck out.
Once she says goodbye, I hang up, and proceed to stare at my phone, my mind a swirl of conflicting thoughts. I absolutely hate that my mother’s struggling. Hearing her cry is like a dagger to the chest, but it’s also the most frustrating thing on the face of the planet because her depressive cycles are nothing if not predictable, and they’re getting old. I’m so damn tired of trying to lift her out of them when all I want to do is live my life. All I want is a mother I can turn to with my problems, not the other way around.
I press my fingers to my temples as I consider my options. I can’t physically make my mother get a new job. Even if I applied for her, I can’t force her to get in a car and go to the interviews. Just like I couldn’t force her to show up for work after I left her place after my birthday.
There’s only one thing I can think of that will help solve the immediate issue at hand and the lack of money. And the only person I can think of who might give us a loan so she can go to therapy and continue her meds while she gets back on her feet is my father. The one person who also happens to be holding things over my head as collateral.
I have no doubt that if I ask him for this favor, he’ll ask for one in return, but giving him what he wants?my blessing and participation in their impending nuptials?will only worsen my mother’s depression. The whole situation is one giant catch-22. Asking him for a favor is necessary to help her but it will turn around and hurt her more. I just have to hope the good outweighs the bad.
I squeeze the phone in my hand until my knuckles ache.
In the grand scheme of things, it’s not my problem. I should go back to my room and finish dinner with the girls. I should forget this phone call and leave her to figure out her own shit.
I should . . . But I can’t.
With a muttered curse, I swipe open my phone and dial my father as I grumble, “Expect the unexpected, alright.”