Foolish | ˢᶜʳᵉᵃᵐ

ᴾʰᵒⁿᵉ ᶜᵃˡˡ

Instead of answering it I just press deny, shrugging off any relevance someone who owned and used a landline would be to my life.

I turn back to the stove when the phone began to ring again, I sigh away any frustration that would no doubt brewing within my chest and grab my phone and began to message Sadie again.

Tara
Landline won't stop fucking ringing.

Sades
Should I be jealous? Got your self a secret stalker, carpenter?

The line stopped for one single moment before it rang again, i roll my eyes and lean back grabbing ahold of the phone and placing it to my ear to hear out whatever this person wants.

"Hello?" I ask through the phone, my voice croaked from the lack of speech I had done today considering no one had came over.

"Hello." The other line came through immediately, a deep voice that I can only assume was a man rang through my ear drum. I ran through my brain and tried to pin point were and if I had ever heard that voice, I hadn't.

"Is Cristina there?" The voice then changed to a more normal-ish man's voice. He asked for my mom who wasn't here.

"No, she's not available may I take a message?" I sounded like an automatic machine, but my mom had a lot of business that sometimes would ring but never over the lane line.

I walked down my kitchen, double checking the sauce.

"Urm, yeah. Sorry. I'm a friend of hers from group... oh, shit-" the man cursed but hearing group was a shocker for me, my mom had came into a bad case of alcoholism. I moved around the room and the man talked, grabbing the green stoll and placing it against the book shelf and stood on it to get the keys that layed on the top shelf, I wasn't tall enough to reach with out it.

"From her shit?" I ask, getting on my tiptoes and leaning on the shelf to reach what I needed.

"Look, just tell her I'm from group I'm Charlie she's got my number." The man asked, he seemed like it was important but I didn't really care. Anything to get more information on my very absent mom.

"She goes to group?" I ask him. Getting off the stoll.

"Uh, I shouldn't have-. Just tell her that Charlie called." He asked my, I smirk to myself and took out my phone that I had placed in my back pocket.

"I will do exactly that, Charlie-"

Tara
I think it's my mom's boyfriend

Sades
Does he sound hot? Like daddy dilf hot or middle aged man who works in the 7/11 down the street hot?

Seen

I shook my head reading what my lesbian girlfriend just asked of me. I couldn't deny the voice did sound like it came from a fairly good looking man.

"-once you tell me what kind of group were talking about, is it AA? NA?" My tone came off teasing and sounded like I was trying to mock my mom from seeking help but that wasn't my intentions.

"I cant- just-" the man groaned on the other side and shuffled abit. "You sound exactly like she described you" the man told me which did shock me a little.

"She talks about me in group?" If I knew anything about my mom I knew that he probably thinks I'm a little brat of a daughter.

"I dont think I can really talk about that." I knew that it was some private shit that gets shared within group meetings but I think that I have the rights to know whether or not my mothers been spreading her filthy lies about me.

"What does she say about me?" I ask once again, walking through the doors and back into my kitchen. Instantly I get hit with a strong wave of the pasta sauce I had began to cook mixed with the herbs I had cut up and put in it.

"Urm...uh..- she loves you very much" he struggled to think for a minute so i decided to play with him for a little bit.

"Ooo, what does she love about me?" I had carried on my walk and was by my front door now, placing my shoes in the correct place. I walked back to the living room and pushed the stoll back to its original place against the wall.

"Shes loves that you're creative and you love art, and TV, and movies-" I rolled my eyes at the sad attempt of his to explain what she's shared with him. That's like everyone's top 5 things they like to do.

"Lots of people like movies?" I state to the man who Hmm's in agreement. Sadie is a huge horror fan, sometimes I think that's her only reason to be bestfriends with Mindy.

"Yeah, but she says you love scary movies and that you guys have that in common" I leaned down and pick up the letters that lead on the ground that I had forgotten to pick up.

"Shes proud of making a fan out of you"

"She is?" My voice shook, my mom and I hadn't had a good relationship ever since dad left and my older sister Sam became a bitch.

"Yeah." The voice assured me. I stopped for a minute and found myself smiling at the way he sounded so genuine.

"She told me the other day, she wonders... what's your favourite scary movie?" Something ticked in my brain, like a lightbulb. The wired conversation I was having with this so called Charlie and the way he was asking me questions that weren't meant to be creepy but came off.

"The babadook, its an amazing meditation on motherhood and grief" I told the man what my favourite horror was. I was obsessed with elevated horror, Sadie hated it.

The guy on the other side of the phone chuckled. I began to stirr the sauce again, as he carried on talking.

"Ain't that a little fancy pants?" He teased me, I smiled and carry on with my reasoning to why I love that movie so much.

"Well, it's elevated horror" I told him. The sauce looked like it was nearly done, so I needed to wrap up this conversation.

"Uh-huh. What does that mean, 'Elevated Horror'?" He asked, I thought for a moment, wanting to give it a justifiable reason and maybe even convince Charlie to watch it.

"Its scary but complex enough emotional and thematic underpinnings its not just some schlocky, cheeseball nonsense with wall-to-wall jump scares" I explain to him, proud of my explanation of what elevated horror was.

"Hmm, that sounds boring to me." Charlie hummed, I smiled because that exactly what Sadie says.

"Have you ever seen Stab?" I groan at the mention of the name. Yes, I have seen stab, willingly- no.

"Yeah, my girlfriend is always making me watch it." I lean over the counter, too invested in the conversation to worry about the food.

"I wouldnt have expected anything else, you do live in woodsboro" the man chuckled. I smiled thinking about it too, it would have been weird not watching it.

"Your mother lives that movie she talks about it all the time in group. How well do you know the original?" I played with the knifes infront of me, sucking on my teeth trying to remember if I could remember anything about it.

"I don't know. I mean, it's super '90s. It's really over-lit and everyone had weird hair" I pushed off the counter, opening the cabinet and pulling out another pot, closing it with my feet.

"Uh-huh. Do you remember the beginning?" He asked, I sigh and place the pot in the sink, turning the water on a steady pace.

"Not really, it starts with a kill scene, right? They always start with a kill scene?" I ask walking around my kitchen.

"Yeah, yeah that's right. It's a girl at home, alone." Again, my body goes cold. A sense of danger shoots through my brain at the unsettling tone in this man's voice.

"She answers the wrong number and starts talking with the killer, who makes her play a game." The line went silent for a minute, I turned off the water and turn around in my kitchen. Biting down my tongue.

"Would you like to play a game?-"

"-Tara?"