Chapter Forty Three:
Late Night Jibber- Jabber:
I put the last of my stuff away in my drawers and then looked around my room. My room looked a lot better than the last time I had been in here. There was no longer a large piece of plywood duct taped to the wall, the last of the broken glass had been cleaned up and everything that had been ruined had been thrown away. Plus there was now a brand new window.
The glass people had just left twenty minutes ago, and Alice was still over at the Connors’, so I had the house to myself. Kyle had helped me (against his will) to move all my stuff over, so I could just hang out and relax now without having to worry about anything.
It felt almost strange to be alone, I was used to being at school, and then at the Connors’ with all the siblings. It felt nice to be alone, but it was still strange.
I tried to come up with something to do, and as I was thinking I ended up sitting on my bed. As weird as it is, as soon as I was seated on it, I realized home much I had missed sleeping in my own bed.
I decided to sleep, might as well; I had nothing better to do anyways.
When I woke up a couple of hours later, I could hear my family moving around downstairs. It felt like I hadn’t properly seen them in days, so I was eager to get down to them.
I got out of bed quickly, grabbed my crutches, fixed my hair, and then made my way down to my family.
“Bridget!” Mom exclaimed. She was the first one to spot me when I entered the kitchen.
She strode towards me quickly and wrapped her arms around me, ignoring the crutches. “Oh it’s so good to have you home sweetie,” she said, rocking me slightly in the embrace.
“Yeah,” I agreed, “it’s nice to be home.”
Mom released me and stepped back so she could look at me clearly. “I’m so sorry you had to deal with all of that,” she said sincerely.
I gave her a smile. “It’s not like it was your fault, none of us could control it.”
“I know,” Mom said with a small frown. “But I still feel bad that you had to move out.”
“I didn’t move far, just across the street,” I said with a shrug.
“I know but-”
“Penny, I think she gets it,” Dad said with a chuckle from across the room. I smiled gratefully at him.
“Oh, okay,” Mom said with a sheepish smile. “Let me go grab Alice and then we can start dinner!”
I nodded and crutched my way to my seat to sit down. Dad did the same.
“So no problem with the window guys?” Dad asked me.
“Nope. They came, put the window in and left.”
“Oh good,” Dad said with a nod.
Mom came back into the room then with Alice under her arm. Alice’s eyes were bloodshot and there was a frown painted on her face. She sat down silently in her seat across from me.
“Cutie, are you okay?” I asked her.
Alice stared down into her empty plate.
“Alice?” I asked again. “Are you okay?”
Still staring down into her plate, Alice shook her head the slightest bit. I looked over at Mom and she sighed.
“Just leave her alone, alright Bridget?” Mom said sadly. “She’ll tell us when she’s ready.” That meant Mom didn’t know why Alice was upset either; it wasn’t just me being left out.
Dinner was quieter than usual. Alice didn’t speak once, and Mom was too worried about her to care about carrying on a conversation.
I had just finished eating when my cell phone rang.
“Hello,” I said cheerily into the phone when I answered it. Dad was looking at me quizzically, trying to figure out who I was talking to. Since dinner hadn’t been the most talkative, I hadn’t been in that great of a mood; so the happiness I was feeling right now was a complete 180*.
“Hey Pigtails,” Garrett greeted. “You miss me yet?” I could hear shouts in the background from his friends.
“Mm,” I said pretending to think about it. “Not yet.” I noticed Dad leaving the room, so I was alone now. Mom was upstairs with Alice.
“What? Not even a little bit?” he complained.
“Well,” I said drawing out the word for suspense. “I do miss you house.”
I heard Garrett snort through the line. “You don’t miss me, but you miss my house? How does that work?”
I shrugged, then remembered he couldn’t see me. “Well when I got home earlier, my house se-”
“Oh yeah! You’re back home now, I forgot about that,” Garrett said.
“Yup I am. Anyways, my house just seems so much quieter.”
“Are you calling me loud?” Garrett asked, faking hurt.
“No. I’m just calling your house loud in general.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“No I like it,” I admitted. “Wait, where are you calling from? Are you guys still in Bellingham or-”
“We’re in Cali now,” Garrett said lightly. I could almost hear the smile he must be wearing right now. “We got in about an hour ago. I would have called you sooner but-”
“Gare,” I said shaking my head, “it’s fine. I don’t have to know what you’re doing at every moment. I’m just glad to hear from you.”
“Okay, good. Do you think my mom will think the same thing?” Garrett asked hopefully.
“Maybe don’t tell her you got in an hour ago,” I advised him. “Just tell her you called her as soon as possible.”
“That part is true though! Since we got in we’ve been getting our luggage and rooms and-”
“Gare, again,” I said, “you don’t have to explain to me.”
“I knew there was a reason I liked you so much!” Garrett said teasingly.
I rolled my eyes at him. “You know she’s not going to be very happy when she finds out you called me before her again.”
“But your my girlfriend, I want to talk to you,” Garrett complained.
“Oh? And you don’t want to talk to your mother?”
“No not particularly,” Garrett said nonchalantly.
“She’ll be mad if she doesn’t hear from you,” I continued.
“I’ll call her later,” Garrett said. “We’re heading out for dinner soon so I’ll call her on the way there; that way she has a time limit,” he reasoned. “But anyways, how was your day?”
I shrugged even though he couldn’t seem me. “Alright I guess.”
“Just alright?” Garrett asked.
“I pretty much just had a lazy day, so nothing exciting.”
“Aw your life is boring without me!” Garrett cooed.
“Well…yeah I guess. But only slightly!” I defended.
“It’s alright to admit it to me, Pigtails.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I grumbled.
I talked to Garrett a while longer, right up until him and his friends left for dinner. Our conversation had kept getting interrupted by his friends screaming at him, but despite all the teasing he was receiving, he still stayed on the phone with me.
Once I had hung up with Garrett, I did all my homework that had been assigned for the extra-long weekend. When I had finished all of that, I realized that Garrett was right; my life was boring without him.
After managing to waste some more time, I decided I might as well go to bed. When I got up to my room, I found Alice curled up, fast asleep, on my bed.
I quietly crutched across my room to get my pyjamas. I didn’t know why Alice was in my room, but I wasn’t going to wake her.
After changing and getting ready for bed in the bathroom, I headed back to my room. I watched Alice sleep for a moment before turning to leave the room. If she was in my bed, I guess I could sleep in hers.
But as I was leaving the room, I accidently banged my crutch against the door. I froze instantly and waited to see if I had woken Alice.
“Bridgey?” she called out sleepily. I turned my head to see her rubbing one of her eyes with the back of her hand.
“Hey Cutie,” I said softly so I didn’t startle her. “Didja get lost on the way to your room?” I teased.
She shook her head. “Can I sleep with you tonight?” she asked.
“Yeah of course,” I said. “But you have to move over alright?”
Alice nodded and did as I had asked. I didn’t question her reasons for wanting to sleep with me tonight, I didn’t want to push her. I figured she would tell me when she was ready.
“Can you turn on that light?” I asked her, pointing to the bedside one. Alice nodded before reaching over to flick it on. Then I turned out the overhead light, closed the door, and crutched over to the bed to join her.
I dropped my crutches next to the bed, and clambered in next to my little sister.
“You comfortable?” I asked her.
“Yes,” Alice whispered. She shifted slightly, and then I felt her head on my shoulder.
“Goodnight Cutie,” I whispered, giving the top of her forehead a kiss.
“Goodnight,” she said so softly I barely heard her.
I closed my eyes and actually tried to fall asleep. But I realized that it would be impossible when I felt something wet land on my shoulder. I turned my head and saw the tear tracks running down Alice’s face, glistening in the moonlight creeping in from under my curtain.
Another tear ran down and landed silently on my shoulder.
Alice didn’t notice that I was watching her, that I had noticed she was crying. Her eyes were closed tightly in attempts to look asleep.
“I’m really sorry,” Alice said quietly after a couple minutes of crying.
“What do you have to be sorry for?” I asked her.
“I made the plane crash,” she said.
“Alice, there is no way you made that plane crash. And it wasn’t even a crash, just an emergency landing. No one was hurt, you don’t need to worry about it,” I assured her.
“I did it,” Alice said. A sob shook her body and she gripped my arm tightly. “It was all my fault. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry,” she said.
“There’s no possible way it could have been your fault Alice! Stop saying it was!” I told her.
Alice whimpered. “I didn’t mean to really,” she sobbed.
I sighed and thought of something to say.
“Alice, I think you should go to sleep, I think you need it,” I told her finally. She must keep apologizing and saying what happened with the plane this morning was her fault because she is over tired. It’s just late night jibber-jabber.
“Sleep?” Alice asked.
“Yeah, we’ll talk in the morning, alright?” I promised her. Maybe after a good night’s sleep she would see the truth. Talking to her more tonight would just be too pointless, she was too tired to understand.
“You promise?” she asked.
I wiped some tears from Alice’s cheek with my thumb and looked in to her watery eyes.
“I promise Cutie.”
That was enough for Alice. She gave me a week smile, and then cuddled up against my arm. Not even moments later she was asleep.
***
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