BRIE
Iwas lying in bed in my sweats and an oversized t-shirt that I’d owned since I was twelve years old. It had a picture of Calvin and Hobbes on the front, and it made me nostalgic for a time before I knew Seth Dubois. I was brooding over the sad turn my life had taken when I heard a knock on my door.
“I’m fine, Mom,” I called, throwing a pillow over my head. “I don’t want pie.”
“I’m not here to offer you pie,” Jason said, barging into my room without my consent. “In fact, I’m pretty happy you have no appetite at the moment…more pie for me.”
I rolled my eyes and sat up in bed as Jason closed the door behind him. “You were always a glutton for peach pie.”
“No arguments there,” he said, sitting at the edge of my bed.
“When did you get here?” I asked.
“Fifteen minutes ago,” he replied.
“Did you make the trip just for me?”
“I may have.”
I groaned and collapsed back onto my bed. “I knew Mom wouldn’t be able to resist calling you.”
“She was worried.”
“She doesn’t need to be.”
“Oh really?” he said as he lay down next to me. “Because it seems to me like you’re depressed about something.”
“I’m not,” I lied. “I’m just broody.”
“Broody?”
“That’s right,” I nodded. “A period of mourning is customary after you’ve lost your job.”
“Except you didn’t lose your job,” Jason pointed out. “According to Mom, you quit.”
“What has she told you?”
“That’s basically it,” he said. “She told me you arrived yesterday without warning with all your bags. You refused to eat anything and refused to talk about anything except to say that you quit and were home for good.”
I sighed. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Too bad,” he said unsympathetically. “Cause we’re going to talk about it.”
“No thanks.”
“Okay then, I guess I’ll have to call Seth.”
Jason reached for his phone, and I groaned and smacked it out of his hand. “Fine, fine,” I said, in frustration. “I’ll tell you what happened.”
“Excellent,” he said triumphantly.
“But you have to promise me one thing.”
“Which is what?”
“Don’t give me a hard time about this, okay?”
He frowned. “Oh boy…”