Laura knew that her Aunt Rachel had been drinking by her speech.
This would happen every once in a while, Aunt Rachel would call her sister, or Laura's mother when she was drunk. It was a bit annoying, but through the years Laura could see that not much would change.
Rachel would often just need to call her sister for support, since her sister was the only family who would actually listen.
"Hi Cheryl, this is Rach—I was wondering if I could talk to you about Jeremy?" Jeremy was her husband. Laura wondered what it could be about, but decided it was personal. By the tone of her aunt's voice, she sounded upset.
"Sorry, this isn't Cheryl, it's Laura her daughter, my mom is at the grocery store," Laura said trying to sound upbeat.
The strange thing was Laura had never actually met her aunt in person, and no one in the family wanted to associate with Aunt Rachel. Though Laura was sure her relatives were just as confused as she was about her aunt's life choices.
It was in these short and to the point moments that Laura had any sort of interaction with her aunt.
"Oh? I'll call back again in a few hours. Bye!" Aunt Rachel said abruptly, tension radiated from the phone. She sounded angry with someone. Laura tried to not think about it anymore but was still curious as to what was going on.
"Okay, bye!" Laura said hanging up the phone.
Laura lugged her backpack up to her room to finish some assignments. Somehow even the thought of homework made her even less inclined to do it.
Instead, Laura had to get her aunt out of her head, to do this she would need a distraction, perhaps a research project.
Todd seemed like an interesting character to examine, considering his demeanor that morning.
Mostly, Laura just wanted to see some pictures of him and Elise, perhaps the relationship didn't look as perfect as the people in it.
As soon as she got upstairs Laura laid down on her bed with her laptop, she opened Facebook. What was his last name? Jones! She typed in 'Todd Jones' and no surprise there was a plethora of results; from baseball players, to politicians, to photographers, and musicians. Popular name, unfortunately.
After she scrolled for a bit, on the second page of Todd Joneses, there he was. His face literally popped out of the page at Laura. Unsurprisingly, his conventionally attractive features caught her attention right away.
It was a picture of him and his friends, mostly girls who were just as pretty as Elise, maybe he cheated on Elise? This was the most likely explanation, how many people got into a relationship in high school and still managed to spend the rest of their lives together? Not many.
She clicked onto his page, but to no avail, the only pictures he had shared were memes or pictures of him and his family. He had seemed like a private person; he probably was that hostile with anyone that knew his secrets. Though she wasn't sure why he cared that much about what people thought of his and Elise's relationship.
Some boys would love to have the news around that they were players, perhaps he was worried about it getting around to other girls so he couldn't gain their trust and seduce them.
Todd seemed like the kind of guy to be manipulative with girls, even though he looked like your standard Hollywood actor, you can never really tell a person's personality by their face.
Everyone likes to see the best in pretty people. Wouldn't it be lovely if you could read people's minds just by looking at their face? Most people would look at her and walk away if she didn't have a personality. Her red curly hair always looked frizzy, and her face was laden with zits. She thought she looked like a sad dog most of the time. When others looked at someone like Todd, they saw accomplishments and a prize-winning smile. When people saw her, they only saw her flaws.
No pictures with Elise though.
Laura almost gave up, but after she scrolled a few months back on his timeline, she recognized the blonde next to Todd, Elise.
Laura stared at the post made back in August, the caption read, "I love my girl, she always knows how to lift my spirits" A slew of heart emojis came after that. The picture is of them on a boat wearing swimsuits.
In the photo, the couple looks amazing together. Elise is tan and muscular, as well as well-endowed. Her hair is shiny and straight. Her pink swimsuit is just enough hot and cute, a bit of fancy lace covering her assets as to not be too revealing.
She appears to be so comfortable with the boy next to her. His eyes stare lazily at the camera, he looks effortlessly posed. With a natural tan and the gentle outline of abs. They look like models straight out of Vogue.
Laura was curious, this boy had everything, yet he cared so much what people thought. He had so little compassion and no good reason to be mad at her. Todd didn't make sense.
Laura powered down the laptop once she realized how late it was and how hungry she was. She hadn't eaten since lunch. She got out of bed, her mom still wasn't home, and it was now dark. No empowering light to save her now.
Then she heard the phone ring, it had only been thirty minutes. She let it go to voicemail.
Laura heard a knock at the door. Of course, the second the phone stopped ringing; her mom came home. Laura went down to the kitchen to help her.
Her job was to haul the groceries in from the car. Laura opened the door, and her mom came through with two big brown grocery bags which she handed to Laura, who instantly slumped over from the sheer weight of them.
"Here you go, sorry I was gone so long, I had to get the stuff for that Christmas party on Friday." her mom smiled from the reprieve of handing off the groceries. Laura shrugged, to let her know it wasn't a problem. Laura continued to lug the groceries to the house, as her mom continued to put them away.
This Friday would be the day that her parents hosted the neighborhood Christmas party. Luckily this only happened once every three years or so. To relieve her parents, her other neighbors took over alternating every year.
Identical to the previous years, Laura would end up babysitting for the parents while they drank heavily and prattled the night away. She wouldn't even have any friends at the party either, the only person she hung out with was Casey O'Jenson from down the street. Laura didn't even know her that well, because she was a bit shy.
Laura could, however, invite Ryan, a boy she sat with at lunch. But to her dismay they weren't good friends either, she had just met him this year. He would probably think that Christmas parties were lame, he seemed to think everything was lame. That's what was cool about Ryan, the "I don't care attitude" he had personified. She knew he did care about one thing though, his music.
Laura would never admit it aloud, but she liked Ryan. Even though within the first week of knowing her he said, "Dating in high school is just stupid like if we started dating that'd be stupid, right?" part of Laura agreed, relationships in high school almost never ended well. Even though what he said wasn't meant to be mean, that didn't make it hurt less.
Eventually, Laura gave up looking for signs he liked her, he didn't.
Something Laura did know about Ryan was that he was honest, unlike Todd. Ryan was like her in a way he was tough and ignored the status quo. Laura also sat with a girl named Marie, she was big on not talking. Laura was friendly enough to get her to open up a bit, but boy could that girl avoid conversations. Though Laura felt like she could relate, sometimes she felt like Marie, of course, those days were the quietest.
It really didn't make a difference to Laura who her friends were, she wasn't one to choose her friends, they had all just ended up together all at that table. Classified as "loners" within the hierarchy of high school, together maybe they could be less lonely.
After Laura and her mom had put away all the groceries, the phone rang again. Laura had almost forgotten about Rachel. Her mom answered the phone hastily.
Laura snuck back up to her room as her mom was now distracted, Laura wouldn't be roped into making dinner tonight. Laura heard a sigh from the kitchen. Poor Mom, she was so kind to her sister, who needed professional help.
Laura opened the door to her small blue room. She shut the door gently behind her, not bothering to turn on the lights. She just stood in the dark and looked at the messy disaster ahead of her.
A clump of granola bar wrappers lay on her bookshelf, stray clothes covered the wooden floor, her red floral comforter laid askew on her tiny bed, her desk covered in papers and scraps from last Wednesday's all-night project for geography.
Her head started to hurt. Today was certainly headache worthy, with all the confusing aunts, annoying boys, and self-destructive mind games. Laura just wanted a life that made sense, not a life that felt like trying to solve a ridiculously hard math problem.
She saw a light from her phone on her desk indicating a notification on the screen, it was a text from Ryan.
What's up.
She didn't feel like texting at the moment, but she replied with a lazy.
Not much, how bout' you?
A moment later he sent back.
Not much I'm bored.
A frown emoji followed.
Laura decided if they were really going to be texting, she was going to get comfortable, and practically flung herself unto her bed, getting under the covers as she felt goosebumps pop up. Why did her room need to be so cold? Her stomach growled at her, but she ignored it.
Hey, want to come to a Christmas party this Friday? There's free food.
Laura asked boldly, biting her lip. Laura didn't care if Ryan thought a Christmas party was lame, she was desperate for someone to talk to there. Not that Casey wasn't going to be there, she was always forced to, but she was kind of depressing to talk to.
Casey was a goth for a lack of a better word. She always wore black dresses with lacey tights, and dark eye makeup. Casey only ever talked about music, which was okay, but after a while, the conversations felt flat. To Laura, Casey was like Ryan, but to an extreme, she cared too little.
Ryan was pessimistic for sure, but Casey didn't even have a sense of humor.
Normally I wouldn't go to parties, but if there's free food, I'm in.
LOL.
She texted him, not much of a reply, but Laura wasn't much for texting.
You know, I don't actually think you are laughing out loud right now.
Laura noticed the hint of sarcasm in his text.
You're too sarcastic! I gotta go eat.
She texted him she practically pounded the keys as she heard her stomach gurgle again.
Ok, and I'm not really THAT sarcastic.
Laura deserted her bed to go to the kitchen. Downstairs her mom was absent from the kitchen, probably talking to Rachel in her room, looking for privacy, which usually meant the conversation was taking a turn for the worst.
Laura took a bowl from the cabinet and filled it with grapes. She popped one in her mouth after washing them, she felt a trickle of sweet juice run down her chin.
She set the bowl of grapes on the kitchen table and turned on the television in the corner of the room.
Jennifer Martens, the newscaster talked about a recent attack on a school. A teenage boy had brought a gun onto school grounds and shot at a group of students. None of them had died thankfully, but two people were suffering from gunshot wounds. The news could be so depressing, she turned it off in disgust.
The world could be such a scummy place. The good in society has always been trampled by tragedy, at least the negative side of her thought so.
"Hey, you know I'm not sure if you should be calling us anymore! You're making this up, you're drunk! Didn't you know that? No, I've had enough," her mom shouted, clearly exasperated by her sister. Could Rachel have offended her in some way? Her mom typically was the reasonable one in the conflicts, but this was the first time Laura had heard her snap.
The day ground on Laura's patience. The light and happiness Laura saw at the beginning of the day was just a mirage. Today's true colors were more menacing than she had predicted.