Chapter 7
I groaned and tried my best to force myself back to sleep, but the morning light invading my eyelids told me that just wasn't going to happen. Sighing, I opened my eyes expecting my own, cold, boring room with its blue walls and broken furniture that I don't have the time or energy to bother fixing. Instead, I was greeted by a TV set, (not mine considering I don't have one) a Christmas tree (also not mine for the same reason) and a shiny glass coffee table in the middle of myself and a dark red couch on the other side of the room. The entire place smelled like a family gathering and the blanket surrounding me was soft and smelled the way Leah's brother did.
Austin's house.
I looked around again, studying the Christmas tree like an old friend, and I noticed the moving boxes that I hadn't seen in the dark last night. About to get up from the couch, I stopped when I noticed the warm arm draped around me. Turning to see Austin asleep on the other side of me, I laughed quietly at his mouth hanging half open, limply. My laughter was cut short when I realized we had been asleep on the couch together and one of his parents could come down any minute now. Naturally wanting to avoid that situation, I picked up his arm and rested it on the couch as I sat up.
Walking sluggishly towards my bag that was rested against the wall, I pulled it open and saw that there wasn't much inside. My keys, a small stack of emergency money, and a prepaid cell phone. For whatever reason, one of my 3 copies of Moby Dick was in there too, and I picked it out of the bag to look it over before deciding that I needed to read a different book every once in a while.
I stuffed everything back in the bag before getting up and heading towards the door. Reaching for the doorknob, I heard a small mumbling noise from behind me and turned my head to see Austin rubbing his eyes and sitting up. Just run out of the house and go home, I told myself.
"Elodie?" He asked, scratching his head and yawning. Sighing, I dropped my hand off the doorknob and turned completely around before nodding. His eyes widened and I looked at him weird.
"Uh... Yeah?" I said, playing with the strap on my bag.
"Are you okay?" He asked, seeming really worried as he studied my face. Feeling around, I poked under my eye and winced from pain. "You have a black eye," he stated, getting up from his seat on the couch and walking over to me.
"It's fine, I just fell over." I lied, trying my best not to meet his stare.
"Fell over onto your eye? I don't think so." He argued, and I couldn't think of what to say. "Somebody gave that to you."
"It doesn't matter." I said, dismissing it. "I'll just go home, my mom is probably worried." I explained, trying to excuse myself without being rude. He gave me a look and held my chin up to look at my eye, which was throbbing so hard I could nearly hear it.
"If your mom's going to get so worried, why did she lock you out in the cold in the first place?" He asked, "She probably knows you have the black eye, maybe even knows who hit you." He was right, and I was speechless. I looked to the floor to think of an answer, but I came up with none, so I simply shrugged and headed for the door again.
"Elodie," he said, and I froze again with one hand on the door. "Something's up. Why are you so quick to get home if your mom is just going to kick you out?"
"She isn't going to kick me out again," I snapped, knowing it wasn't true. "It's just a thing, I'll be fine." 'A thing'? What kind of excuse is that?
"Is it an all the time kind of... thing?" He asked, sounding sort of concerned and, obviously, catching my thin lie. I wanted so badly to just tell him that it was more than just a small problem, that it was an all the time kind of situation. Maybe if I just blurted everything now it would be easier to deal with.
No, I can't just tell everything to this guy I've known less than a week. Just because he acts like he cares doesn't mean he isn't going to run off and tell everyone-- Mr. Walden proved that to me. I looked at Austin and in return he looked at me expectantly, I'd been silently thinking for too long and he definitely knew something was wrong. His question had already been answered, but I decided to tell him something just to get him off of my back.
"No, I'm fine. Don't worry." I requested, pulling the door opening and walking out, seeing the image of Austin coming after me out of the corner of my eye. I could hear him say something right before I left the house, something sounding extremely similar to 'Don't leave', and my stomach flipped just at the thought of him wanting me to stay. I gave myself a slap on the wrist, telling myself not to start crushing on the stranger boy who cares all of a sudden. You have bigger problems-- don't get off course.
☼☼☼☼☼☼
I crept into my house and down the stairs, not bothering to check what room my mother was in. Opening the door to my room, I saw a small dent in the wall by my door, probably from where the side of my head hit when I fell last night. Dropping my bag against my bed, I flopped on my bed and shoved my face into the old pillow that's aways in the same place, and the self pity settled in again.
Why me? What did I do to deserve this? How am I ever going to get out of this now? What do I do and where do I turn when everything goes from bad to worse? The same old questions swam through my head over and over again until a new one found its way in. What am I going to tell Austin?
Nothing, I decided. He can ask as many questions as he wants, he won't get anything out of me. The only reason Leah knows is because she's been my best friend since the 2nd grade, stood by my side and helped me out no matter what. Mr. Walden only knows because he figured it out, and he told pretty much every faculty member with a pair of ears.
Neither of them really know the half of it, though.
Holding my breath, I shoved my face deeper into my pillow and let out a long shrieking scream, muffled by the stuffing of the pillow. I rolled over and sighed before staring at the ceiling for a while, studying the cracks and cobwebs in every corner.
"You're crazy," I whispered, to myself and nobody else.
"You're crazy for staying here," I closed my eyes and with every exhale let out another insult.
"You're crazy for hurting her like this, crazy for putting her through this when it could all be over with a single phone call." I admitted, my vision blurring over the sight of dangling spiders. I bet they don't feel guilty every second of the day for sucking the life out of innocent insects. Hell, that's practically the equivalent of me torturing my mother day after day until she's resorted to hiding in the corners of the house. Now that I think of it, I must have that number somewhere...
Sitting upright in bed, I stood up and headed over to my dresser before shuffling through a stack of opened envelopes, each with the same return address. I pulled out a note, one much like the others tucked behind checks when the time came around. The notes were in fact, so similar I'd starting to think he'd simply gotten a stamp made to save time. The notes always read something along the lines of:
Olivia,
The money I owe you is all right here, if anything is out of the ordinary, call me and I can fix it immediately.
--Walter
Of course, nothing had ever been out of the ordinary before, but the numbers were listed below just like they always were, his work phone, personal phone, house phone, etc. Just looking at my mother's name in print always struck a nerve, and the spaces behind my eyes started to ache, but I held it in. Obviously, my father didn't know of the situation at hand, and every time he sent a check, he thought he was sending it to my mother. I read off the number before going over to my bag and getting the cell phone out of the bottom of it.
I quickly dialed the number and nerously held the phone to my ear. This could save her, save me, save everything and put it back together. Maybe he could do something to help, do something that would make her remember. On the other hand, I thought as the insisntent ringing filled only one of my ears, he might not be anymore helpful in getting her to remember than I was, she might not even recognize him simply because as far as I knew, they hadn't seen eachother in 16 years. The ringing continued and I tapped one foot incessantly.
Maybe he couldn't do much of anything but put her in a home and pay off the leftover bills. I doubted he would understand when I flat out told him that his ex-wife had gone mad with paranoia at the thought of her daughter's duplicate coming to get her. Maybe I could hang up now and avoid making any mistakes--
"Hello?" The deep, burly voice of a man I didn't know answered the phone.
"Uh.. I- Um," I stuttered nervously, both hands shaking no matter how hard I tried to contain myself.
"Hello?" He asked again, sounding clearly more confused this time. Struggling to gain control over my hands, I quickly pressed the end call button and sighed in relief when the dial tone came through.
So maybe that didn't go as planned, but it was for the best.