Explosive

06 || I'm Not Okay

"Fall Boy," Theodore says beside me, reaching over to tap at my laptop. His blocks lay abandoned beside him and his focus has returned back to my laptop.

"Fall Boy?" Confused I raise an eyebrow at Mary who is pretending to speak to her dad on her phone.

"Josh's computer," he says and stands up on his feet.

"Baby, I don't know what you are talking about." Mary scrambles up to look at the laptop again.

"Music," she says this time. Pondering her words, it takes me a while to realize that they are talking about Fall Out Boy.

I chuckle as I pull up my playlist and put on Centuries by Fall Out Boy. The twins start jumping up and down and start dancing, their movements are rough and don't match up with the rhythm of the song. I'm not even sure you can actually dance to this song. "Aubrey, dance too!" Theo says as he pulls at my fingers. I look at the stairs, afraid that Josh might come downstairs or worse his Dad might come home. Though that isn't likely because he doesn't show up until after dinner, probably in an attempt to avoid me as much as possible.

Not wanting to disappoint the twins, I shrug my shoulders and stand up on my feet. I get lost in the music and exaggerate playing an air guitar, making Mary laugh. I follow it up by shaking my head violently, not really caring to follow the beat or notice that my leg would be numb soon. "This is definitely going on YouTube," someone says from the top of the stairs. I come to a sudden stop when I see Josh with his phone held up in front of him.

Blushing in embarrassment, I fall onto the couch, pausing the song and quickly clicking on the TV to distract the kids. "Sorry, I got carried away. Can you delete it, please?"

Josh laughs as he wiggles his hips before picking Mary up. He throws her into the air and catches her. "What, you don't want to dance anymore?"

"No," I groan. Wanting to find a distraction, I open up my Outlook and scroll through my emails, something I hadn't done in a long time. There are a few emails from the girls on my soccer team and one from Emily. I click on it.

Hey girl,

I'm sorry I haven't called. Junior year is so stressful. I'm literally writing this in homeroom. Guess who asked me out? Aryan Sanders. Can you believe that?

My heart jumps when I see his name. Aryan had been in all of my classes except for one last year. I had developed a crush on him but never told anyone except Emily. In the email, she goes onto apologize for stealing my man, adding a winky face to show that she is joking.

I frown, ignoring the pang of jealousy I feel and send her a quick reply. I didn't know she had a thing for Aryan too but it doesn't matter now. That life, filled with crushes and late nights watching dumb shows with my mom is gone. Now I have to focus on school and most importantly, moving on. "Hey Audrey, how was your first day of school?" Josh mumbles.

He had been quiet while he watched the show that his younger siblings were watching. "It was good," I answer, deciding to leave out the part about my encounter with Cynthia.

"I'm really sorry about Cynthia. She's actually really nice when you get to know her." Maybe or maybe not, I think. "You should eat lunch with us tomorrow." He seems bored, making me wonder if he is being sincere.

Not wanting to leave Tamara alone tomorrow I say, "It's okay, I don't want to leave Tamara hanging. But it's really sweet of you to ask. Thanks."

"But it's really sweet of you to ask. Thanks," he mocks, rolling his eyes. "Wow, you're so formal." Shrugging my shoulders, I continue to scroll through my emails. "But really, you should sit with us. Tamara is a little -"