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22 - Tuesday Evening

22 - Tuesday Evening

Maya Sumedh

“Layla. Layla. Layla. Layla. Lay. Lay. Lee-Lee.”

 “Oh my God, shut up.”

 Layla fixed me with a reproachful look on the screen – she was surreptitiously Skyping with me at work. Behind her I could see the office bustling with activity.

 “Talk to me,” I moaned. “I’ve been sitting here for ages.”

 Her eyes were fixed on the screen and she was typing furiously.

 “What do you want?”

 “You’re not listening.”

 She glared into her webcam again.

 “Shut up. And tell me.”

 I sighed, getting comfortable on my bed.

 “Okay. Thursday is Luke’s birthday. And I have to get him something. And he’s turning eighteen. And Zayn wants to meet me again. And I don’t know what to do. So help me, oh wise one, please help me.”

 Her expression became frustrated.

 “Ugh, I’m at work and I’m supposed to be proofreading this stupid article on this stupid topic and it’s written so bloody stupidly.”

 I waited. She looked up into the camera again.

 “I’m going to school today to get my Board projects back, are you coming? We can talk then.”

 I stared at her, fumbling with my bedsheets as I sat up.

 “What, what, Board projects? We’re getting them back?”

 “Yes, stupid,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Anyway, I’m going at like three. You’ll come?”

 I nodded frantically. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll come. Guess I can come home with Sam and Luke.”

 She was quiet for a moment and then a smirk appeared on her face.

 “You and Luke. I seriously can’t, I mean, you guys are so perfect.”

 I blushed, twisting the sheets around my finger.

 “Whatever. But yeah – it happened.”

 “Indeed,” she murmured, squinting at the screen through her glasses. “Wow, this word is so badly spelt I don’t even know what it is. What the hell is w-a-s-c-d?”

 I rolled my eyes. “How am I supposed to know? But you should get back to work. I’ll see you at school, yeah? I have to study now anyway.”

 Her eyebrows shot up but she didn’t look away from the offensively spelt word.

 “Study? Really?”

 “Yes. I’m finally preparing properly for the SAT,” I informed her. “So yeah, I have to go.”

 She grinned at me.

 “Okay then. See you at school.”

 “Bye, Lay.”

 *

 I heated up leftover pizza for dinner at two o clock, and after wolfing it down and changing into a shirt and shorts and grabbing my purse I left the house, with Blu watching me morosely from the living room couches. It felt nice to do that once in a while – I realized that I’d been spending way too much time cooped up at home.