Page 13

Eleven

I never heard him come to bed. I assumed he was sleeping at his parents’ house. I stirred from my slumber the moment Adam kicked the bed by accident.

“Shit. Fuck.”

The mattress bounced as he fell onto the edge of the bed, swearing and whimpering about his stubbed toe.

I was wide awake now, but ever so still in my little blanketed cocoon.

It was safe to say he knew I was here, seeing he was trying so hard to be quiet.

I spied the darkened outline of his silhouette in the room and smiled.

The shadow limped over toward the direction of the dresser; he was trying to feel his way across the room, his palms skimming along the wall, then the dresser itself, based on the sound of crashing objects.

“Fuck. Shit,” he whispered.

I started to giggle, trying to muffle the sound under the blanket, if not rather unsuccessfully.

“Where the hell am I?” Adam complained, lost in his own room.

I scooted up straight, leaning over to click the bedside light on, casting the room in an eerie, yellowy glow. Adam was in the far corner of his room, hands splayed against his cupboard door. He turned around, squinting against the light.

“I would be a crap homing pigeon,” he said sheepishly, looking around at his foreign placement in his room.

“What are you doing?” I said, glancing at the clock and feeling utterly relieved to know that by basic calculation Adam had obviously just dropped Meg off and come straight back. What could have happened as a part of a goodbye though was something I didn’t want to think about right now.

“I am trying to go to bed,” he said, opening his cupboard like it was exactly where he wanted to be. He glanced inside, and then shut the doors, before coughing and making his way across the other side to the tall boy. “As you were.” He nodded with a little smirk.

“I think I’ll wait,” I said, sitting against the bedhead, crossing my arms.

Adam opened up the top drawer, grabbing some boxers out like I knew he would.

I knew pretty much all of Adam’s movements before he did: he would go to the bathroom, have a shower, brush his teeth and then hop into bed, hair all damp, smelling of mint and Lynx deodorant, ready to go to sleep like a good Boy Scout.

It had me suddenly realising how I hadn’t exactly behaved like a Girl Scout.

I probably had raccoon eyes and matted hair; I was still fully clothed having merely been dumped here.

I still felt a little foggy, but I sure as hell wasn’t staying this way.

“Um, hang on, can I use the bathroom first?” I asked, pulling back the blankets and moving toward my bag to grab my nightie and toiletry bag. Too bad, the terms was non-negotiable, I didn’t want Adam seeing me like this, being reminded with how awful I had behaved tonight.

“Ugh, seriously?”

“In and out, I swear.”

“Yeah, well, don’t be three hours,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed already losing patience.

I did what the old Ellie would do, I flipped him the bird while I exited the room. Adam merely caught it and clutched it to his heart as if I had blown him a kiss. He was such an idiot, I thought, walking down the hall with a big goofy grin on my face.

After rubbing, scrubbing, lathering, soaping my skin to pinkness—I mean, I had been sitting on the ladies’ toilet floor, after all—I quickly blow-dried my hair; if it was the one thing I had been taught by my mum, it was not to go to bed with wet hair.

I could just imagine Adam rolling his eyes at the sound of the blow-dryer coming to life.

It gave me a sick kind of pleasure thinking about annoying him a little.

Hair dried, I would usually pull it up into a messy bun, but I left it down instead.

I began my normal nightly ritual of moisturising my legs, brushing my teeth, and then spraying my Tommy Girl perfume in the air before doing a pirouette into the mist; okay, so I didn’t exactly wear perfume to bed, but hey.

Looking at my reflection, satisfied with the result, I turned, then whipped open the bathroom door. A cloud of steam escaping into the hall, I was about to step through it—much like a magician would—but was stilled by Adam leaning on the other side of the doorjamb looking bored.

“You done?” he deadpanned.

“In a sec, I just forgot to …” I went to double back into the bathroom, but Adam quickly grabbed me by the arm and pulled me into the hall.

“Hey,” I said, incredulous of his manhandling, but secretly loving it.

Without a word, Adam saluted me from his brow and closed the door.

It didn’t take long for the shower to be running, and for Adam’s voice to echo against the tiles as he sung ‘Heard it through the Grapevine’ at the top of his lungs.

Again, much like I had only moments before, I found myself walking down the hall with a big ol’ grin spread across my face.

I tried to remember the last time I had ever smiled so much.

It had been a long time. As much as I’d kind of dreaded coming home this weekend, I actually couldn’t think of anywhere else I would rather be; only then did my smile dip a little.

Once again, uncertainty flooded me, allowing myself to feel this way.

Lost in my thoughts I hadn’t even realised I had come to a standstill until the door next to me flew open, causing me to jump at the unexpectedness of it.

There Max stood, hair all dishevelled, wearing only a sheet wrapped around his narrow hips. I think he was giving me a filthy look, although it was hard to tell because his face was all twisted, as his eyes adjusted to the light in the hall.

“What are you doing?” he croaked, rubbing his hair.

“Just heading to bed.” I shrugged.

“Yeah, well, can you and Romeo keep it down, some of us have got to get up early.”

I breathed out a laugh; Max called every couple Romeo and Juliet, it was his thing, scoffing at the loved-up couples from the bar. Even though Adam and I weren’t a loved-up couple we were still not immune to his scorn.

“Oh, and where are you off to then?”

A high-pitched note Adam attempted from his shower concert delayed Max’s answer. We both cringed before he answered.

“I’m headed back to Moira Station in the morning for the weekend.”

I broke into a broad, knowing smile, one that instantly put Max on edge.

“Well, well, well, for someone who doesn’t like going home, you’re sure making a few trips of late.”

“Shut up.”

“Well, say hi to Juliet for me; oh, I mean, Mel-in-da.” I had great pleasure, along with everyone else in Onslow, in giving Max shit about his new girlfriend.

The very man who had made it his life’s mission to escape his dusty hometown and forge a new life elsewhere had gone and done something rather foolish.

He’d fallen in love with a girl from back home: oh, the irony.

“So, just out of interest, how does the long-distance love thing fare?” I asked, crossing my arms.

Max smirked. “Why? Looking at starting one up?”

“No,” I replied, perhaps a bit too quickly. Maybe it was my paranoia but I didn’t want him alluding to Adam and me; any other time anyone ever teased us I could roll my eyes, or come back with a quick “he wishes” comment. Now, I wasn’t so sure I could fake it.

My awkwardness was not lost on Max as he studied my face for a long moment. “I don’t recommend it,” he said, surprisingly candid.

“Not a fan of early mornings?” I joked.

Max shrugged one shoulder. “If you love someone, you never want to leave them behind.”

And in that very brief moment I knew exactly what he was saying.

That feeling that twisted the pit of your stomach anytime you had to say goodbye; that heart-aching moment standing on the edge of the driveway waiting for Adam, only for him not to show, was like driving a dagger into my heart.

These were all foreign emotions for me; admittedly I was the kind of person to fall in love with the newest boy in my vision, but nothing measured those feelings, nothing had ever come close and it scared the shit out of me.

I blinked, trying to shake away the sickening feeling.

“So, wait, you’re not going to the party?”

Max shifted, readjusting his sheet around his waist. “Nah, I can’t. Why the hell are they having a surprise engagement party anyway?” Max asked the same question everyone was.

“You know Sean and Amy, always an overkill on the party scene.”

Max breathed out a laugh; it was enough to know he completely agreed. Our attention snapped to the groaning of the water pipes in the wall; it was always a clear sign that the shower had been turned off.

“Thank fuck for that.” Max sighed.

“The perks of having a room next to the bathroom. At least you can get some sleep now,” I said, edging my way to Adam’s room.

“Ha! That’s just the start of it; you should hear him whistle while he shaves, hum while he brushes his teeth. The boy needs gagging.”

I laughed, knowing every single thing Max had just described was the absolute truth. Sadly, that was Adam in a nutshell and I knew every one of those signature moves. It’s kind of what I loved about him the most; mind you, my room wasn’t near the bathroom.

“Well, sweet dreams, Romeo, ” I called out, darting into the room and closing my door before Max had a chance to respond.