Take Me On

“She wants him, and Mom and Dad aren’t in the arguing mood.” Ethan sags against the wall. “Isaiah can convince her to sleep and she’ll force herself to stay awake if he’s not there.”


Ethan resembles Dad with dark hair and eyes, which means we appear nothing alike except for our height. If I ever wondered what hell on earth looked like, Ethan would be the prime example. Days without sleep can turn anyone into a zombie. At least he’s not sobbing like he was the other night. Hell I can deal with; crying I can’t.

I can’t hug him again and tell him it’s going to be okay. That would require me to be stable, and stable isn’t my strong suit. There’s a disconnection of emotion inside me as I step back...step away. It’s a dream. All of this is a bad dream.

Feet shuffle behind me, footsteps of people walking into Rachel’s room. I can’t go in there. I can’t. Gravity draws me and it’s not in the direction my family prefers. I move toward the pull and Ethan slams a hand onto my shoulder. “She wants to see you.”

I yank my shoulder out of Ethan’s grasp. “No, she doesn’t.” It’s safe to say no one here wants me.

My brother says nothing more as I head for the elevator. As I said before, Rachel deserves better...including better than me.





Haley

“Haley Williams chooses, once again, another form. Could this be the one, ladies and gentlemen?” Jax mock whispers beside me. “A hush rolls over the crowd as Miss Williams glances over the wording. Her eyebrows furrow. Is this it? Will this be the one?”

My cousin spiked his whitish-blond hair into a Mohawk this morning, meaning he’s feeling ornery. If he keeps up the running commentary, he’ll discover how ornery I can be.

From over the open bottom drawer of the filing cabinet, I glare at Jax. “Don’t you have something better to do?”

Jax and I sit on the floor, tucked away in the corner of the main office. We’ve been here for an hour and the receptionists forgot we exist, so they gossip freely. The stench of cafeteria coffee transforms into a film over my clothing. I shudder with the knowledge that I’ll smell like this for the rest of the day.

He cracks a wide grin. “Yeah. If you tell me what’s doing then I can go do my thing.”

The ghetto to English translation of “what’s doing”: what am I hiding about Friday night. I didn’t spill this weekend and I don’t plan on spilling now.

It’s Monday morning and I woke early and took the city bus to school so I can, once again, peruse the filing cabinet full of scholarship applications. I use the internet at the library, but trying to find applicable scholarships on there is like trying to search for a lost ring in a sand dune.

“Nothing’s doing, so go do your thang.” I waggle my eyebrows and give him a sly smile. “There’s got to be a girl around here who hasn’t been done wrong by you.”

“You’d think, but evidently girls talk to each other. Damn shame.”

“Damn shame,” I echo. I cram another useless application back into a folder and yank yet another out. “Do you think I could pass for Alaska Native?”

“Sure.” He bites into an apple he five-finger discounted from the cafeteria and dangles a piece of paper in the air. “Bet you could pass for a guy who’s ranked in tennis, too.”

I snatch the application from his hands and shove it back into the cabinet. “Funny. Just wait until next year and you’ll be doing the desperate dance.”

“No, I won’t. High school is as far as I’m going.” Jax is a year younger than me, seventeen, and a junior. When we were younger, we were inseparable, but then he grew up, I grew breasts, he became interested in girls and I became interested in anything other than what I liked at ten.

“I’m getting a job,” he says. “And as far from Dad as possible.”

Amen to that. Guess we’re more alike than I originally thought.

A knock on the window that overlooks the main hallway grabs our attention. Kaden flips us off and mouths, “You suck!”

Jax laughs and flips the finger back. I giggle when Kaden shakes his head and stalks off. “You didn’t tell Kaden you were becoming my shadow today?”

“Nah, he knows, but I didn’t wake him when I heard you getting ready upstairs. He trained hard yesterday and needed the sleep. Kaden’s pissed he had to ride the bus by himself and I wasn’t there to act as shield with that freshman puppy dogging him.”

Kaden’s a year older than me, but he was held back in first grade. Because of that, we’re both seniors at Eastwick High. It’s hard on Kaden with the whole world knowing he’s in the same grade as his younger sister. At least I know it is. Back at a time when we were close, he confided in me. Repeating a grade, it’s why he fights hard in the gym, why he’s quiet in public.

“There’s still some time left before class,” I say. “Why don’t you go pester him?”

“Because I’m pestering you.” Another crunch of the apple.