Now, get this. Never in my life have I taken Max seriously. We always joke like this and I’ve never felt the need to correct him. I always joke back. We have a playful dirty banter and laugh together.
Yeah. Not today.
My face flushes, I jump up from the sofa, turn my wide eyes to Asher and pointing to Max, I yell, “He’s lying!”
I have no idea where the need to defend myself came from, but Max looks at me like I’ve seriously lost my mind while Asher looks pleased and about to burst into laughter. Realizing what I’ve just done, I say quietly, “Sorry. I don’t know where that came from. Something’s wrong with me.”
A light bulb goes off in my head and I say the magic words. “I must be getting my period.”
Max’s face turns uncomfortable and he utters, “TMI, babe. T. M. I.”
I look over to Ash wearing a shit-eating grin. My expression clearly says I win. He rolls his eyes at me then goes over to greet Trick and Tatiana who has more rice pudding on her face than in her mouth. Something tugs my pants leg. I look down at Max. He wears a frown and whispers, “Everything okay?”
A fake smile spreads across my face. I reply, “Just peachy.”
He nods in resignation. “Let’s order the pizza.” He stands, puts his arm around my shoulder and we walk into the kitchen together.
I sneak a peek at Asher and can’t hide my smile.
Tatiana’s sucking on his nose again.
Sigh. Ah, them feels.
***
As we exit his car, Asher walks around to me and puts his arm around my waist, pulling me close. Still shocked at tonight’s events, I’m not sure what I’m feeling exactly, but I am exhausted.
It all started an hour after we all got to Nik and Tina’s. Lola and Trick were obviously not seeing eye-to-eye so Trick left. No goodbyes. No wave. Just up and left. Shortly after that, Lola emerged from the bedroom, red-eyed and announced, “Sorry guys, I think I’ll just go-” The poor girl looked around the room, lowered her head and whispered, “He’s gone, isn’t he?”
My gut twisted for her.
Enough of this bullshit!
Luckily, Mimi, Tina and Tatiana were off playing in Ceecee’s room. I crossed the room to take a sobbing Lola into my arms before turning to Nik, Max and Asher and stating, “Enough is enough. Tell her what’s going on! Trick isn’t going to and…” Shocked to feel my own tears welling, I choked out, “…her heart is breaking.”
When you have friends like I do, even a cold person like me is affected by their hurt. My heart squeezes. Looking right into Ash, I whispered, “I can’t watch this anymore. It hurts my heart.”
Ash turned to his brothers and firmly said, “Deal with this.” This was clearly not a request.
He walked over to Lola, kissed her head then picked up his keys and left. Leaving me confused as hell, I yelled out, “Is someone going to tell us what the fuck is going on?”
Max and Nik turned to each other and with facial expressions and hand gestures, they had a silent conversation. A minute later, Max sighed, “We told Trick to tell you, Lola. The guy’s falling apart.”
Lola lifts her head from my shoulder and replied a watery, “He’s hurting me so bad!”
Nik and Max have three sisters. You’d expect they would be used to tears, but whenever one of us girls cries, they look like they want to put a fist through a wall. Max stepped up and explained, “We promised Trick we wouldn’t say anything. Sorry girls, he trusts us.”
Lola lowered her head to my shoulder and wailed hard. A panicked Nik argued, “Yeah, he trusts us. And we would never say anything. So we can’t say anything,” nodding every time he said say, trying to get a point through to us.
Catching on, I encouraged, “Okay. So don’t tell us. Show us.”
Max’s brow furrowed and he shook his head at Nik disapprovingly. Nik pointed to Lola with a she’s breakin’ my heart expression. Max turned and looked at Lola a short while before sighing and nodding. Nik stood in front of me while I held Lola, put his hands together in a cradle action under his chest and rocked his arms back and forth. I gasped, “Trick’s got a baby?”
Lola lifted her head in shock and shrieked, “What?”
Max and Nik both vigorously shook their heads.
You’re really bad at this shit.
Nik tried again with the same action as before and Lola yelled out random words like she was on a quiz show, “Uh, baby! Crib! Cradle! Children! Sleep! Rock! Rock! It’s rock! He’s in a rock band! Don’t throw rocks at glass houses! Uh, he rocks? Just tell me!”
Both Max and Nik wear mirrored expressions that said where the hell are you coming up with this stuff and shaking their heads. During this time of commotion, we hadn’t heard the front door open.
“My mom. She’s sick.”
We all turn to look at the hall where Ash stood with a hand on Trick’s shoulder in an obvious show of support. Trick looked devastated. So devastated that I hid my quivering lip by biting it. Lola ran over to Trick and threw herself at him saying, “I’m so sorry, baby. You should’ve told me. I could’ve helped somehow.”
And just like that Trick and Lola were once again Trick and Lola. Trick even smiled.
Anyone could see the night was over, and I really wasn’t in the mood for pizza anymore. I went into Ceecee’s room pleading a headache and said goodbye to everyone. Not caring who saw, I walked over to Ash who still had his keys in hand. He put his arm around my shoulder, I put my arm around his waist and we left.
After Tina’s mom and daughter died, I told myself that I would wake up every morning with a good attitude. For months after they passed, I would repeat the mantra ‘I will be grateful for this day’ because the thing is, you think you have time. Living our droll everyday lives, we forget to relax and just live in the moment. We need to count our blessings not our problems. Everyone in life is fighting their own battles. Ones you’ll never see unless they allow it.
Which brings us to now.
Without even asking permission, I follow Ash into his apartment, walk past him toward his room, over to his bed and fall forward, faceplanting. Not ten seconds pass when I felt his bed dip. Both obviously unsure what to say, we lay in the dark in comfortable silence, stuck in our own thoughts.
After a while of thinking about every random thing my brain could possibly present to me, I turn my head to the side and whisper, “Don’t let me fall asleep, okay?”
Through a yawn, Ash replies, “Okay, babe. Talk to me.”
Glad that he wants me here, I do. I tell him all about my childhood. How it was growing up Croatian. About the time Helena put the cat in the fridge. How mom makes me palačinke, Croatian pancakes, every time I come home. That my dad knows how to swear in eight languages. About my first high school crush.
“And he was such an ass. He told everyone he fucked me and that I wasn’t any good. I mean puh-lease, right? If I could, I’d fuck myself because I’m that good.” With every soft and slow word I say, my eyes droop further closed. Somehow we’ve become tangled in each other. Ash cradles me to his chest with his nose buried in my hair, breathing me in. I remind him, “Don’t let me fall asleep, okay?”
He grunts his acknowledgement so I continue weakly, “Then I saw him a while later and he was all, ‘you look so good’ and ‘maybe we could go on a date’…” Through a yawn, I go on, barely able to keep my eyes open and slurring my words, “…and I was like whatever, asshole.”
Everything fades to black.
Lights out.