The Girlfriend Games {Book Two}

25- Mounting Tension

Aaron ^
A/N: Song is Unsteady by the incredibly talented X Ambassadors.

Alternative title: Not Today

Waking up the day after the 'Level Up' party was difficult. I had experienced such a vast range of emotions yesterday that I was honestly so drained. It took me three tries—all twenty minutes apart—until I could open my eyes fully and stay awake. Even then, there was such a heavy pressure that wrapped from the inside corners and around the bottoms of my eyes that I was tempted to go back to sleep.

My phone chose that moment to ring loudly. Somehow the volume button must have gotten switched yesterday because I almost always kept it on silent. Whatever the case, I finally caved and checked who the message was from.

I groaned when I saw it was from Aunt Amanda.

Hello everyone! Hope you had a great time last night. Remember that the girl's choice starts today. (Guys, you can't say no. It's for your own good) Enjoy these next two weeks! I will text at the end with information for the next party. Chao for now 😘

I could feel the peppy through the text, and I hated it. Looking at my clock, I realized that it was only around 9:30. That wasn't too late. Maybe I could just rest my eyes for a few moments to recoup from the text Amanda sent. Yeah, that sounded good right about now.

When I woke up again, it was nearing noon. Mom was staring at me from the doorway and I jolted upright. I could feel my pulse in my neck. "Geez, give me a heart attack!" I yelled, the only hint of grogginess in my voice. Everything else about me was tense and alert.

Mom just snorted. "You look fine to me."

I scoffed, waiting for her to tell me what she wanted. When neither of us said anything, she just shrugged her shoulders and left. What had that been about? Groaning, I dragged a hand down my face. I guess since I was awake now I should work on a little homework. I didn't even look at my phone until later, but the only message was the same thing from Amanda.

The rest of the day was as lazy and disorienting as the morning. Several naps and snacks later, and it was time to go to bed for real. How odd.

~•~

Monday morning was immediately nothing as peaceful as the beginning of the previous day.

I woke up and could feel that something was not quite right. It wasn't just the fact that there were voices coming from the kitchen, but how they sounded as well.

Mom and dad were fighting again.

I could tell that they were somewhat trying to be quiet, but the strain caused some slip-ups in volume. There was a mountain of reasons why this incident was already a very bad thing. I snuck into the hallway and towards the kitchen, stopping to listen. If they were going to reek havoc so early I felt that I deserved to know what it was about.

"Oh, no. No, you don't get to pull that," I heard mom say. Dad scoffed.

"As if! It's not me pulling anything if it's the truth."

"That's crap and you know it!"

"How can it be crap? How do you distrust me so much?" It seemed that the argument was accusations being thrown, but I got lost as they kept going back and forth faster each time.