Page 19 of Kiss Collector
I snort. So random. “Thanks.”
He closes both eyes again, so I leave, shaking my head. I should’ve asked him if there were any Capri Sun poems today. Though he’d probably been sleeping.
When I get home, I find Zebby on the couch where I left him. I plop down beside him, and we zone out mindlessly in front of the television until Mom gets home. She sets down her huge purse.
“Zeb, you didn’t answer any of my calls today. I’ve been worried sick!” She walks in and crosses her arms, her eyebrows scrunched up at my brother, and he looks at me.
Oh, yeah—crap. “I forgot to leave my phone with him,” I admit.
We don’t have a landline. For a second I feel bad, knowing she worried and he didn’t have a way to call anyone, but in the end I only shrug at her gaping face, because he’s fine. Everyone’s fine. Her mouth gets tight.
“What?” I ask, annoyed that she’s freaking out. “Nothing happened. Maybe it’s time to get him a phone.” I know I’m being disrespectful, and I brace myself against her verbal comeback, or even a slap, but she looks almost scared of me.
“Maybe you should watch your mouth before you lose your phone again.” The threat is as weak as her voice, and for a second I feel power over her—a power I never wanted to have, and yet, all the anger living inside me is eating it up like candy.
Still, I don’t want to lose my phone over spring break, even for a day, so I snarl “Sorry,” in a way that shows I’m not sorry at all. She shakes her head and lets out a sigh as she turns away. God, I feel gross about what I can get away with lately, butanother part of me screams that I deserve to have an attitude against the people who are turning my life upside down.
I feel dirty right then, inside and out. I stand up and stomp toward the bathroom to shower. As I pass the kitchen, I see Mom pulling out all the ingredients for taco soup, my favorite, and my stomach sours with guilt.
Our last night in the house is the saddest night of my life. All the beds have been taken apart, and they lean against the walls in the front hall. Zebby and I share an air mattress in my empty room with our sleeping bags on top. We eat popcorn and play with flashlights. He wants to hear a spooky story, so I look one up on my phone, and it’s so cheesy that we end up laughing hysterically. It’s the kind of laughter that stems from stress, when it’s not really funny but you can’t help yourself. You can’t stop. It’s either laugh or cry, and we’re so tired of crying.
But after Zeb falls to sleep, in the quiet of my empty room with its barren walls, I do cry.
Spring Break
Chapter Nine
Brutal, seething anger. It’s all I feel as I stand in the cramped apartment on my first day of spring break, wondering how it got to be this bad. We had a yard sale this morning and took the leftover stuff to Goodwill since we can’t afford a storage unit. Now we’re down to the bare minimum in every sense of the word.
I keep my earbuds in, music blaring, as I unpack stuff in my and Zebby’s room, ripping open boxes with aggression. Mom said we could sell my full-size bed from the old house and get a bunk bed instead, but Zeb offered to sleep on the couch at night to let me have the bedroom to myself, which is really solid of him. The bedroom will be where his clothes and few belongings are stored. There isn’t room for both our dressers, so we’re using storage bins that slide under the bed.
This whole thing blows.
My heart leaps when my phone buzzes against my thigh.
Kenzie.U sure u can’t come 2nite?
Jack Rinehart’s party. I’m not in the mood to be sociable.
I text her back.I’m sure. Sorry, sweets. Have fun.
She sends a crying face.
When I take my earbuds out to go to the bathroom, I hear Mom and Zebby talking in her room.
“Why can’t I help him move, too?” Zeb asks.
“He’s got it under control, honey.”
“Okay, fine. But when can I see him?”
“Maybe next weekend?”
“A whole week?”
“He needs to get settled in, baby.” There’s a plea in Mom’s voice, like she wishes this whole thing would go away. She’s always been a strong yet sensitive woman. I know she has to be hurting, but I still can’t help but be angry with her. She let this happen.
Zeb stomps out of the room with a scowl and I duck in to the bathroom doorway before he has a chance to bowl me over.
