“You blew it,” I say. It’s harsh. I know it. She needs baby steps back to a normal life, but I’ve been doing this for as long as I can remember and at nineteen, it’s years past too late to contain all my frustration.
“But I didn’t!” She blows a mouthful of her reeking breath in my face. “See?”
I scoff and sit her down on a ratty old sofa chair. I stand in front of her, arms crossed.
“Tell me why, Mum.”
“It’s Mary, excuse me. And stop being so whiney. It h … hurts my head.” She shows this by cradling her head in her hands, chin dropped to her chest.
“Why can’t I call you ‘Mum’? Why can’t you act like a mum?” I have at least a hundred other questions, but these’ll do for now.
“Darling Kalli, baby dear.” She’s off on a tangent, so I let that run its course. But when she actually replies, I’m so knocked from shock, my next planned questions disappears.
“Because,” she finally says, “that’s a story that will remain untold.”
She’s probably lying, spinning a story.
Remember the feeling of trying to have a serious conversation with a clown? That’s me now. If I fall for her poignant words, she’ll catch me unawares and make a fool of me, and I am not the fuck-up here. Plus, she’s told me she’d give me details about my dad on many of occasions and went on to tell me the story of the Lord Jesus Incarnate.
“Sleep it off down here, will ya?”
I decide to give her a chance. I specified not to come back high and she came home drunk. Not the solution I’d intended, but better than nothing.
The spot where I’d slept before was still warm when I get back. I turn and twist until I’m back in the warm spot and reach for my phone, scrolling aimlessly through apps. I’m bored when I start and uninterested when I plop my phone on my chest and stare at the ceiling in the dark and see no features.
After a time, my mobile beeps. I check who messaged me and it’s Nate. Can’t say I’m surprised. All day my phone burned a hole in my pocket. I checked it mid-practise. I checked it while trying to start a novel that probably wasn’t all too boring, but I haven’t read in a while and my head wasn’t in the right zone, what with me checking my phone more than I turned pages.
Nate’s all sorts of amazing. He texts his dates the same night they go out. He’s that kind of guy. He’ll skip a day of calling or texting, but he’ll be there and his girlfriends never come to me or Scout to try to find out if or why he lost interest. He just never played hard-to-get.
Now I’m the one on his radar, and I hope to God he doesn’t put me on the spot with what I’m thinking.
Nate: Eyy Kall Bell. How was ur day? ;)
Kalli: Some hot photographer got me off on his shoot.
Nate: Sounds like a lucky guy.
Kalli: Technically, I got lucky ;)
Nate: Trust me, he finally got lucky.
I hold my mobile out, re-reading those words with a gaping jaw. I didn’t just understand what I thought I did, surely? My fault for flirting, but I was just mucking around. I decide on calling him. He’ll reject the call if it’s too late to talk.
“Hey.” A muffled whisper comes through the line.
Crap. It’s too late for him to answer yet he did it anyway, for me.
“Hey.”
I gulp and so does he, just as loud. I never realised how direct I was about things that have happened between us until now. I’m stuck, and as awkward as him because I can’t ask if he feels that way since it’s quite possible that he does.
I settle for, “So.”
“So, I think you know I like you, Kall.”
“I know.” I shift the phone under my ear and flip to my side, bringing the sheets under my chin and tucking them in. “I know, I can tell.”
You’re a bitch. I can’t help but think it, since he just laid his feelings out there and this isn’t a throwaway relationship. This is life-changing since my fuck up will end up costing us so much more. I should have been responsible, but in my drunken state I was hot for him and in that crazy place where I need to get what I want: control.
“I’m just a little on the spot right now. Don’t know what to say,” I reply.
That’s my first lie. I do know what I think and what to say, it’s just definitely not the right thing. I have a huge heart for Nate and I’ll protect him at all costs, but what I feel for him has always been friendship. He can’t expect me just to fall in love with him, something I haven’t felt for any other guy, ever, including him.
“It’s all good. I just wanted to tell you. I’m not confessing crazy stupid love for you, Kall. But you’re something else, and you’re this magnetic force. I just …”