Life Unexpected

-5- Revenge is Mine

I watched as Cam ran down the stairs from his room and came up next to me. We walked to the door and I tried not to laugh as we went outside. We walked to the mailbox and I was dying of laughter on the inside. He opened the door to it and grabbed all of the mail.  He saw the fake letter and ripped it open. I watched his face drop and then said “What is it? What’s wrong?”

               “Nothing, it is just a mistake from the school. They sent me a letter saying that I am failing my math class.” He said almost shakily.

               “Really? This is serious Cam they don’t usually make mistakes like this. Wait, isn’t that the class you have an A in?”

               “Yeah, that’s why it must be a mistake. I will call when we get inside the house just to make sure.” He answered almost mad.

               “Cam?”

               “Yes?”

               “It was all a joke by me and the twins. We wanted our revenge and made up the whole thing while you were downstairs.” I said quietly.

               “You did what? I can’t believe you would do this to me. What did I do to deserve this?”

               “Uh, you attacked me while I was taking pictures today, and then left me alone in your house.”

               “Right. I’m sorry; you guys really got me though. We just took a big test and I thought I might have failed it and it killed my grade in the class or something. I honestly thought it was real.”

               “Yeah, we should not have done it; it is really mean now that I think about it.”

               “It’s okay. Let’s just go back inside and play a game or something. How’s Mario Kart sound?”

               “Perfect. That is if you want your butt kicked.” I taunted

               “Oh it is so on .” He said trying to sound cool.

               We walked back inside and played a few rounds of Mario kart before getting kicked off of the TV by the twins. As usual I won every round. After that we went up to Cam’s room and plopped down on his bed. I pulled my phone out and snapped a picture of us while Cam closed his eyes and hummed. When he heard the click he sat up on his elbows and looked at me.

               “You really are talented you know.”

               “What do you mean?” I asked.

               “At photography, at art in general actually. You are the most talented person I know. Possibly in the world, better than Picasso that’s for sure.”

               “Cam, Picasso was a genius, and obviously misunderstood. I’ve heard that if you look at one of his paintings cross-eyed it looks normal and perfect.”

               “I don’t know about that but yours' always look perfect” he said staring at me. I looked away and saw the time.

               “Cam, we need to go now. My mom is expecting us at 6 and its nearly 5 till.” I said panicked. He followed my gaze to the clock, grabbed his keys, and we flew down the stairs. Well almost anyway. On the way down we tripped and landed in a crumpled mess at the bottom.  We got up and ran out the door laughing. I jumped into his car and we were off. Lucky for us my house was only a few blocks away, but we still ended up a bit late. My mom apparently didn’t notice this fact.

               “Mom! We are home. Is dinner almost ready?”

               “Oh, Lizzie. I didn’t hear you come in. It should be ready in a few minutes. Why don’t you make a salad and I’ll be finished with what I am doing then we can all eat. Hello Cameron.” She said from upstairs.

               “Okay mom. Just hurry I am starved.”

               I walked into the kitchen and pulled out everything I needed to make a salad. I ripped up some lettuce and plopped it into the bowl. I then cut up some cucumbers and tomatoes and added those in as well. I put the cold things back into the fridge and grabbed the salad dressing before adding some croutons into the mix. I picked up the bowl and placed it on the dinner table just as mom walked in.

               “Hey sweetie. How was school?” she asked.

               “Great, actually. Except for English. Mr. Roberts got mad that I was drawing during my free time.”

               “From what I have heard, that man has some issues that even tissues can’t fix.” I smiled inwardly at my mom’s favorite slogan. She loved to use it but rarely had the chance anymore. Not since my dad had left us a few years ago. He would always come home complaining about so-and-so and that’s when she snapped at the chance to use her line. Now that he was gone she couldn’t use it much, except of course about him.

               “Actually, I think he is just lonely. He doesn’t wear a ring and always talks about how he cooks this or how he cooks that. Either he is a closet chef or he lives alone.” I said

               “Most people just think he needs to get a girlfriend” Cam said. Until that moment I had almost forgotten he was there, he had been so quiet.

               “Well a dog or some other kind of pet could help his loneliness you know.” I said hoping to move to a new topic soon. It’s not that I didn’t want to argue with Cam, believe me it is fun; I just really didn’t want to talk about Mr. Roberts.

               “True, but it wouldn’t be the same. Actually, now that I think about it, it would be better because it, unlike a girlfriend, may not not leave him. If he is lucky that is”

               I laughed at his joke and went back to eating while listening to Cam and my mother talking about the prank I pulled on him today. As he recounted the story I laughed on the inside. My mother on the other hand laughed hysterically until the end of the story when she gave me a high five. This upset Cam a bit, but he quickly got over it when my mom pulled out her secret weapon. Ice cream.

               Cam and I sat at the bar in my kitchen eating our bowls of ice cream while my mother went to the living room to watch TV. “You know,” he said, “I love your mother.”

               “Cam you love her feeding you, not her. Besides, that would be plain wrong. Believe it or not, I would not like you as a step father.”

               “Nor would I like you for a step daughter.” He said, “that would be just weird.”

               “Weird. I like that word. It means strange and you can use it to describe itself. The word weird is spelled weird.”

               “You’re right, I never thought of that.”

               “I know it’s so weird.” I said not thinking. Cam and I immediately started busting up laughing. We finished our ice cream and then Cam had to go home. When he left I went upstairs and got ready for bed. That was the first night that I dreamt about him.