Page 25 of September Lessons
Now, why was she talking to someone like Carrie?
“Sorry for startling you.” The sleeves of Christina’s sweater covered her hands as she lifted them toward her chest and face. “Didn’t mean to. Saw you coming and thought… well, I should apologize to you. For the other thing.”
Carrie unlocked her door and placed the groceries on the floor of the passenger side. “For what?” she asked, popping her head back up.
“For the party the other night. I was drunk when you flirted with me, and I think I was a bit of a bitch in the way I turned you down. I dunno. Don’t really remember how you reacted, only that it happened.”
Carrie’s fingers slowly wrapped around the open door of her car. Her other hand went onto the roof. Was this how she braced herself for accepting rejection? Again?Speaking of being a bit tipsy…Looking at how pretty Christina was hurt, but she also looked… well, seventeen. Carrie may be a senior in high school and only recently minted nineteen, but she looked at girls like Christina and realized they weren’t worth the drama.I remember being seventeen. Weird to think how much I’ve changed in the past year alone.Then again, making a giant mistake like sleeping with a married woman and getting expelled from her old life, let alone from her old school, would sober a girl’s bad decision making.
“No worries. Trust me when I say I’ve gottenwayworse rejections in my life.” Carrie attempted to smile, but a breeze picked up the moment the corners of her mouth spread apart. She snapped her lips closed again before the cold breeze stung her teeth. “Do you…” She looked at her empty car. “Do you need a ride somewhere? I’m heading back to my aunt and uncle’s.”
“Oh, no! It’s okay! I’m waiting for someone else to pick me up.” Christina looked up and down the walkway outside of the supermarket. Nobody spared a second glance to the new girl in town or the mayor’s daughter. “Don’t tell anyone you saw me hanging out here, though. My mom gets soooo weird when people ask her questions about me. Who knew that having a mayor for a mom could be a pain in the butt, huh? Not as many perks as you might think.”
“Cool. See you at school, then.” Carrie hopped into her seat and shut the door. Christina waved at her as the motor started and gears shifted from Park to Reverse. Carrie thought she caught another familiar car in her sight, but she was too busy concentrating on safely getting out of the parking lot to think about it.
Her aunt didn’t say anything about the price of groceries as she took them and started dinner. Looked like spaghetti. When Carrie asked about the box of mac and cheese, her aunt said, “Dillon’s out for the evening and said he’d be back after dinner. I always make sure he has something to make.”
Was he too good for leftover spaghetti? Hmph.
With Dillon out of the house, though, Carrie didn’t have to worry about hearing anything through the walls. Nor did she have to fight him over what to watch on TV when her aunt and uncle retired to the deck for their evening beer and candy. Yet before Carrie could settle in on the couch and flip to her favorite YouTuber, her aunt popped out of the kitchen and apologized before saying, “I forgot to have you pick up some cheese from the store. Would you mind…?”
Carrie turned off the TV and hopped back in her car. She was offered her aunt’s car so Carrie wouldn’t have to eat the gas, but she had never been comfortable driving any other car.Probably because my mom drove a stick shift and it scared the crap out of me.Carrie knew how to switch between Park and Reverse. That was enough.
With another five dollars in her pocket, she headed back into the store and picked up the cheapest mild cheddar cheese available. The cashier – a young, talkative woman with the name ANEM etched into her tag – had to comment on Carrie’s reappearance in the line. “Forgot something, huh?” Her laughter was a mixture of giggle-snorting and a baby-like cackle. “You’re like… the second person tonight. Must be something in the air!”
Carrie grabbed the cheese, insisting she didn’t need another bag. By the time she made it back out to her car, night had all but already fallen.
“Got the cheese,”she texted her aunt.“Is it cool if I swing by the café for a drink? Assuming you don’t need this right now.”
Her aunt sent a shrugging emoji. How noncommittal of her.
Carrie used it as an excuse to swing by Heaven’s Café and grab a small latte that would hopefully keep her awake long enough to eat dinner, do homework, and hang out for a bit. The barista looked at her like she was as foreign as a tourist getting lost around town. When Carrie once again informed everyone in the room that she was a new student at school, the natural question was,“Oh? Whose house did you buy?”They were always surprised when she told them the names of her aunt and uncle. That’s also when the questions stopped, and people turned back to their rumor mills for half-true answers.
Carrie was in no hurry to get home. She sat in the half-empty parking lot and sipped her latte while surfing through her phone. Her aunt gave her a time for dinner. As long as she was back by then, she wouldn’t be in trouble.
Meanwhile, her good-for-nothing cousin was out doing God knew what. Carrie kept her ears open for word of another fire. She still had her plan to possibly catch Dillon in the act of setting one of the barn fires, but she wouldn’t have the chance to do anything about it until that weekend. Not with school, work, and everyone watching her like a hawk.
The glow of her phone illuminated the dark settling in around her. The light reflected off the taillight of a car parked in an adjacent lot, one only visible from where she parked by an old auto part store.Are you kidding me? Kids park in an auto part lot?Carrie knew that it was a small town with few options for private canoodling, but that was sad.
It also wasn’t what she wanted to see right before dinner. Especially when she realized she knew that car and its driver.
Dillon. The gross butt.
So, Dillon had a girlfriend? That was news. Did his parents know?Will I tell them?She wouldn’t want him talking about her love life, so she’d spare him. This time.
Definitely an impetus to start her car and get the hell out of there, though. Carrie had no desire to watch her cousin make out with some poor girl who didn’t deserve him. Did he brush his teeth? He had a toothbrush in the bathroom, but that thing wasuntouched.
As Carrie was about to pull out of the parking lot, however, she caught a glimpse of the unlucky lady.
Oh. My. God.
If there were a God, he’d be in Heaven, laughing at Carrie. Because what was funnier than catching her cousin making out with a girl she had hit on a few days ago?
Carrie curled her hands around her steering wheel, staring at the unfathomable sight of Christina and Dillon making out in the front seat of his car.I’d recognize that ugly sweater anywhere now.Christina’s hands were no longer hiding in her sleeves, though. They were all over Dillon’s unshaved face.
Puke. Gag.Carrie almost forgot to put her latte in a cup holder before pulling out.Hope he remembers to… never mind!She was going to make herself sick. She was also going to get herself into an accident if she didn’t look where she was going as she pulled out onto Main Street and drove back to her aunt and uncle’s house.
The smell of spaghetti wasn’t enough to revitalize her appetite after she stepped through the door. She threw herself in her room, where she bided her time before her aunt called her in for dinner.
