Page 37 of Games We Play
“Sure.”
Fifteen minutes later, Leah hadn’t made any progress on her letter, but Karlie had finished the first draft of her personal essay, and now turned her laptop around so her sister could dissect it.
“How I Overcame My Personal Hardship.”Groan. Leah remembered when she had to fill out essays like this to get into college. Not that she went right away. There were other matters to tend to at home after she finally graduated high school a year late. God only knew what Karlie wrote about. Probably something completely made up, like most kids who didn’t have disabilities or broken homes did.
What’s this?The introductory paragraph spoke of the Vaughn family and how good they had been to the youngest child. Even when she always had nightmares as a little kid.I had forgotten about those.More like Leah had blocked it from her memory. Those were some of the scariest nights of her life. How was she supposed to handle a four-year-old waking up at three in the morning, screaming because she claimed Janet wasn’t her real mother?
“What’s wrong with it?” Karlie put down her phone. “You’re making that face, sis.”
“What face?”
“The face you make when you’re swallowing something sour.”
“I had forgotten about the nightmares.”
“Really? I guess they were a long time ago.” Karlie picked up her phone again as soon as it buzzed. “Meanwhile, I need to come with a topic for my English essay that’s due next week. I’m supposed to write a paper about a song I really related to last year.”
Leah chuckled, grateful to have a change in topic.Grateful that she talks to me about this stuff.She knew that her role as “big sister” meant Karlie was more likely to talk to her about growing up, rather than going to their mother. “That should be easy! It’s because of you that I memorized all the lyrics to ‘Cheap Thrills.’”
Karlie looked up again, gobsmacked. “Are you kidding me? I was an underclassman when that song came out! It’s like… so ancient now! They play it on classic streaming stations!”
“You’re kidding.”
“No way.You’vegot to be the one kidding me. That song came out like five years ago.” It wasn’t until Leah gave her an exasperated face that Karlie amended, “Okay, like, 2016. Not five years ago, but it’s 2018 now! Duh!”
Leah still laughed. “Could’ve sworn it was last year. Time goes by too quickly.”
“Don’t say stuff like that, sis. You’re sounding like an old person.”
“Well, Ididrecently turn thirty. That’s ancient, according to you.”
“Don’t do that to me. Don’t remind me how old you are now, okay? It’s bad enough that mom’s almost sixty. I keep having to remind her that Kurt Cobain died, like… thirty years ago.”
Leah rolled her eyes. “Pretty sure it’s more like twenty-five, but whatever.”I can’t believe I remember when that happened.Leah had barely been in elementary school, but she remembered her mother being glued to the TV and screaming that you couldn’t trust someone like Courtney Love if your life depended on it. That’s what happened when one’s mother claimed to have known Courtney when she grew up in Portland.Still calling bullshit.Janet definitely had a friend named Courtney Lovett, butnotCourtney Love.
“When you get older…” Yeah, Leah was starting to show her age. Who knew she would turn into one of “those” adults, sooner rather than alter? “Time doesn’t mean anything anymore. It goes by so quickly, because you no longer have the kinds of references that you did when you were in school.” That’s about when it started, right? The endless days turning into months, then years. Without the structure of a school year to keep her grounded, the only way Leah knew it was summer as opposed to winter was because it was slightly less rainy. “I could’ve sworn that song came out last year.”
Karlie cocked her head, the same curly hair she shared with Leah knocking a napkin off their table. Karlie hadn’t noticed. “Growing older sounds scary. You don’t know what day it is, huh?”
“It’s all about perception. I guess a switch goes off in your head as soon as your brain stops developing. I swear it’s not that scary now.”
“What if time goes by so quickly that you wake up tomorrow, and it’s yourfortiethbirthday?”
Leah recoiled. “Don’t do that to me.”
“Sorry.” Karlie went back to her phone.
“Who are you texting, anyway?”
The fact Karlie wouldn’t look back up told her sister that something was afoot. Bad? Good? All Leah knew was that her hackles were raised. “A guy in my class.”
“Is that so?”
“Don’t give me that tone… and you can’t tell Mom. You know what she said about me dating.”
“Not until you’re sixteen, and only if your grades stay up.” Both had long happened, but Karlie once confessed that their mother was so hard on boys that the thought of dating sounded impossible. “So what’s this boy’s name?”
“Stan.”
