4. Andrea

CHAPTER 4

Andrea

I wake up to find seventeen texts and three voicemail messages from Nick waiting for me. I groan and flop back down onto my bed instead of heading for the bathroom. I ignore the voicemails, but I do scan through the texts. They started just after midnight last night and petered out around two, which means he's probably still sleeping after a round of consolation binge-drinking with his buddies.

I guess I can't judge him too hard. I didn't even drink last night, and I'm only waking up at ten.

The messages are pretty status quo: requests that we talk morphing into pleas for me to come back that eventually become typo-ridden statements about how he's better off without me.

They're not even particularly mean or rude texts. They're just the normal things you'd expect a regular twenty year-old drunk guy to send to his ex-girlfriend a few hours after she dumped him and left the city in one of his friend's cars.

I drop the phone onto the comforter that reeks of rose-scented dryer sheets and blink at the piercing daylight streaming through the room's sheer curtains.

I think that was the worst part of yesterday: when I looked at Nick and realized just how damn regular he is.

When I met him at a party a few weeks after my high school graduation, I thought he was the most exciting thing to ever happen to me. I thought he'd whisk me away in the car his cousin helped him build from scratch—which barely ran well enough to legally be on the roads, but which seemed like the coolest thing in the world to me at the time—and make everything better. So when he asked me to go back to Montreal with him for a week, I said yes.

A week turned into a month, which turned into a whole summer, which turned into a phone call that nearly gave my mother an aneurysm when I told her I wanted to take a gap year before coming back to Toronto to start my internship.

I thought maybe after a year, I'd know why even just the thought of the internship I'd been working towards my whole life was starting to clog my lungs like the smog of Toronto until I couldn't breathe at all. I thought falling in love with Nick would help clear all the confusion out, but when we got into yet another one of our stupid arguments yesterday, I stopped and just looked at him, and somehow, I knew I never loved him at all.

I blow a lock of hair off my face and then push myself up to my feet again. I dragged my suitcase and guitar up here last night but left the garbage bags full of random household crap in the entryway. The suitcase sits at the foot of the double bed like evidence reminding me yesterday did indeed happen.

I really did bum a ride all the way to Ottawa and then nearly got bludgeoned to death by some random girl living in my dad's house.

I can't help grinning at the thought. As hard as I try, I can't imagine Naomi actually doing anything with her makeshift weapons. After we introduced ourselves, she got so flustered she could barely form words. I told her I was crashing at my dad's place after breaking up with my boyfriend in Montreal and then tried to get some more information out of her. All I managed to extract before we said goodnight is that she's the daughter of one of my dad's employees and is staying here all summer to look after the house and the cats.

I can't decide if my body is craving breakfast or a shower more, so I settle on a quick rinse. I wipe the steam from off the full-length mirror once I've stepped out of the glass shower in one of the several guest bathrooms. I drop the thick white towel to the floor and stare at my hair.

The purple dye job I had a friend help me do a couple weeks ago has mostly faded. It was only semi-permanent, but I liked the look enough that I'd do it for real next time. All that's left is a slight burgundy tint.

I throw on some denim cutoff shorts and a plain white v-neck t-shirt before traversing the route to the kitchen. As soon as I walk in, the putrid scent of wet cat food makes my nose wrinkle.

"Oh, hey," I say when I spot the source of the smell.

Naomi is peeling the lid off a can while the cats try to climb up her legs, making desperate mewling noises like they haven't seen food in weeks.

She glances at me with the can still in her hands, and her whole body freezes when our eyes lock. I wait a couple seconds for her to shake off the startled sensation, but if anything, her posture seems to get even tenser when I take a couple steps forward.

"Did I scare you?"

She blinks, and that seems to break her trance. She turns to hunch over the can, her hair falling over her shoulders to hide her face.

"They're really noisy cats, aren't they?" I ask when she still doesn't show any signs of making a sound.

It's possible I'm going to be carrying this entire conversation myself, but considering I did make her fear for her life last night, I probably owe her that.

"My dad's been with Sandy for almost six years, and I still can't get over the fact that she named her cats Bijoux and Aurora Rose." I snort as I head over to the pantry and start scanning for breakfast options. "The first time I met her, she thought we could have some kind of daughter and step-mom bonding session by cleaning the wax out of their ears. Does that seem like a bonding activity to you? I guess maybe trauma bonding, but like seriously, who suggests that as the first thing to do with your new boyfriend's daughter? Oh my god, wait, is she making you clean their earwax while she's gone? Please tell me they hired a professional for that."

I step back from scanning the shelves and look over at Naomi. The cats are now swarming their bowls on the floor, and she's leaning against the island above them, watching me with her chin propped in her hand.

She looks cute like that, kind of like she's waiting for someone to walk over and slide their arms around her from behind.

For a second, I can almost feel it: the warmth of her back pressed to my chest, my nose buried in her hair and my hands gripping the edge of her faded blue t-shirt. She pushes off the island and whirls around like she's embarrassed I caught her staring. I watch her open and close what seems like a random selection of cupboards with her back to me. Then I shake my head to clear it as I turn back to the pantry.

I'm not actually into her. I'm just not sure what the hell I'm doing with my life at the moment, and checking out a random cute girl seems like the perfect way to avoid thinking about that.

Thankfully, she's acting like she's going to burst into flames if she speaks so much as a single syllable around me today, which is going to make it a lot easier to focus on my next move—namely, figuring out where to go from here before either of my parents discover I'm currently living out of trash bags or that I will most likely be unemployed by the end of the day.

It's safe to say I will not be making it in for the lunch rush at my waitressing job in Montreal this afternoon.

It's also probably safe to say I will not be returning to Montreal at all, considering my internship in Toronto starts at the end of August and I don't even have anything left in Montreal to go back to.

A jolt of dread makes my chest tighten, but I grab a bag of bagels off the shelf in front of me and do my best to ignore it as I head for the toaster.

"I do."

The murmur of Naomi's voice pulls me out of my thoughts. She's facing me now, her gaze pinned to the tiles under my feet.

"Uh, clean their ears," she adds before I can ask her what she's talking about. "Their ears aren't actually that bad. The grossest part is cleaning between their toes. There's some scary stuff in there."

I chuckle. "I can only imagine."

"But they're still cute," she goes on. "Once you get used to the whole hairless thing, they start to grow on you. It's sweet that they like to cuddle so much, which I guess is more about my body heat than me, but still, it's cute."

I laugh again, my eyes scanning over her face as she continues to stare at the floor. "Oh no. The Stockholm Syndrome is setting in already."

"Yeah, maybe," she says with a sound that can only be described as a giggle. The noise makes the corners of my mouth lift.

She lifts her head, and I get my first good look at her eyes since last night. They're a lighter blue than I thought and streaked with sea green.

I start to wonder what they'd look like outside, where the sun is already beating down on the yard like it's trying to dry up the whole pool. They look like the kind of eyes that are always shifting between shades, never giving you the full story but always making you want to read another page.

We both jump when the toaster pops.

I grab a plate and fish my bagel out. I can hear blood thundering in my ears, and I don't know when my heart started beating so fast.

"I'm going to go, um, read," Naomi says, already retreating to the other side of the kitchen. "Oh also, sorry if you already did this, but your dad told me to tell you to call your mom, if you haven't yet."

I freeze, the bottom of my stomach dropping as the floor seems to tilt underneath me.

"You told my dad I'm here?"

Naomi blinks. "I…yes? I mean, he texted about twenty minutes ago to ask how things were going, and I said all good since you arrived last night, and he—"

I swear.

Loudly.

If he wants me to call my mom, that's because he's already called her to ask her what the hell I'm doing here.

I glance around the kitchen and then realize I left my phone up in the bedroom. I swear again before abandoning my bagel and gearing up for a sprint through the house.

"Was I—I mean, did I—I mean, I'm sor—"

"It's fine." I hesitate for a moment as I stride past Naomi. Her face has turned pale, and I realize I must look like I'm ready to bite the head off of anyone within a five meter radius.

I screw my mouth up into what's supposed to pass for a reassuring grin, but it must make me look a few shades closer to homicidal instead. Naomi takes a step back and bumps against the wall behind her.

"It's just that he…technically didn't invite me here," I say, "but it's fine. You didn't know."

"O-oh." She opens and closes her mouth a couple times like she wants to say more.

Even though I feel weirdly certain that whenever Naomi Waters does decide to speak, it's worth dropping everything to listen, my feet are itching to bolt for my phone.

"I have to go call her," I shout over my shoulder as I run.

Up in my guest room, my phone is sitting on top of the haphazard pile of clothes heaped in my open suitcase. I swipe to my notifications and find that not only has Nick risen from the dead to start assailing me with texts again, but my mom has also jammed up my voicemail and gotten started on flooding me with texts too.

I don't bother reading the messages. She's just going to yell the same things at me over the phone.

I pull up her number, my thumb hovering over the call button as I stare down at the screen.

She didn't call me when I told her the restaurant finally moved me up from bussing tables to being an actual waitress. She didn't call me when I told her Nick and I reached our six month anniversary—my longest relationship milestone ever. She didn't even call me when I told her I'd almost saved up enough to buy my own car and thought maybe we could check out some secondhand lots together during her next business trip to Montreal.

I squeeze my free hand into a fist, fighting against the stupid burning sensation in the back of my throat, and then I hit the button. I flop onto the bed, reaching for a pillow to keep close by in case I end up needing to smoosh my face into it and scream during this call.

The line clicks halfway through the second ring, and my mom's high, clear voice starts demanding answers without even a ‘hello' to ease into things.

"What exactly do you think you're doing trespassing at your father's house?"

Something in my jaw clicks, but I force my voice to sound breezy.

"Is it trespassing if he's given me all his alarm codes?"

She doesn't miss a beat. "You know very well that sneaking in there when he isn't home without even telling him you're coming is not an acceptable way to behave."

"If he's got a problem with it, why isn't he the one calling?"

That does make her pause, if only for a second.

This is all playing out exactly as I thought it would if the misfortune of my parents finding out I'm here came to pass: my dad turning all responsibility over to my mom with his usual ‘as long as you ask your mother' apathy, my mom getting extra fired up after realizing she'd be handling me without backup, and her taking all the frustrations of their failed marriage out on me.

It's the theme song of my childhood, back for another refrain.

"Because he's in Italy, Andrea."

"Which makes it even less of a problem that I'm staying in his house." I lift a hand to shade my eyes from the beam of mid-morning sun streaming in through the window. "I don't know why you're upset."

"I'm not upset. I'm disappointed."

The disappointment card is a favourite of hers to play. You'd think its effectiveness would wear off with time, but I still feel a sting somewhere deep in my gut, like there's a thread knotted around my insides she can manage to tug on even from a few hundred miles away.

"Did that boy kick you out?"

I chew on my lip to hold back all the swear words just begging to be let out and squeeze the edge of the pillow instead.

"His name is Nick," I say, "and he did not kick me out. I dumped him."

"I see. So now you don't have an apartment. What's the plan here, Andrea?"

I wait for her to ask what happened, or even just ask if I'm okay, but she stays quiet while she waits for my answer.

"I'm figuring it out. I just needed…a break."

She lets out a sharp sigh. "That's what you said when you moved in with him. What exactly are you taking a break from, Andrea? Responsibility? Being an adult? Just because you decided you needed this whole gap year thing does not mean you get to opt out of being a grown-up, and grown-ups do not break into their father's house."

I let out a sigh of my own and throw my free hand up in the air, waving it around for emphasis like she can actually see me. "I can guarantee Dad doesn't care that I'm here. He doesn't really care what I do at all, and we both know it."

I wait for her to protest. I wait for her to tell me that couldn't possibly be true, but even if she did try to convince me he actually cared enough to get involved in my life, we'd both know she was lying. I've seen him joking around with Sandy's sons at holiday dinners enough to know he's found something with his new family that he never had with us.

He let his marriage with my mom slip right through his fingers, and she's spent her whole life since then building a company she'll never have to lose the way she lost him—something I'll never have to lose either. That's why she's had my internship waiting for me for years.

"Well, I do care," she says. "That's why you need to come back to Toronto tomorrow. I'll book you a train ticket. You can spend the rest of the summer getting ready for your internship. We can even look into you starting early, although I suppose it's not really early when you've delayed it for a whole year of doing nothing with that boy."

Tender moment over.

I roll my eyes and press my lips together to hold back a groan.

"I wasn't doing nothing ," I tell her, "and I have money saved up. I'll book my own ticket in a few days. I just need to process things ending with Nick."

"Andrea…" I can imagine her pressing her fingertips to her temple as she trails off for a moment. "You can't keep doing this. I can excuse a gap year. I can excuse all the ridiculous things you got up to in high school, but you're nineteen now. By the time I was nineteen, I already knew exactly where I wanted to be in the next ten years, and every day, I worked hard to make that happen. That's what I raised you to do too, but the past few years, you've been…not yourself, and I just don't get it."

A knot forms in my stomach as I listen to her.

I don't get it either. For years and years when I was a kid, I knew I wanted to be just like her when I grew up. I loved the way she looked at me whenever I said that, like I was the brightest, shiniest thing she'd ever seen. I don't know when the weight of all that shine started to become too much, like a suit of golden armor I was supposed to carry through life, when really all it did was sit so heavy on my shoulders I couldn't breathe.

"Mom, I just—"

"I have a meeting," she says at the same time I start to speak. "I have to go. Send me your train details as soon as you book the ticket."

I swallow down whatever I was about to say. Even if she did give me the chance to speak, I'm not sure I could put it into words.

"Yes, sergeant," I drone instead.

She ignores my sarcasm. "Andrea, one last thing. I'm…I'm glad you're somewhere safe."

A different string, tighter than the last, loops around my insides and pulls so hard I actually press a hand to my stomach.

Then she hangs up.