I realized I had been off in my head, boring holes in her Zac Efron poster with my

eyes.
I wasn't sure how much time had passed but my knuckles were blue from gripping my
phone.
I wasn't OK. Not in the slightest. I needed to either pass out and push the world
go away, or
embrace it and put on the angriest music I had. Since almost all of my music was
angry rock
and heavy metal, that wouldn't be a problem. NIN might do the trick. Then I would
systematically trash my bedroom and maybe put a hole in my wall. I 'd done it
before.
"You know what," she said getting up. "I'm going to go make you some tea. Then
we'll think
of what to do next and stuff." I nodded bleakly and laid my head down on her
pillow.
CHAPTER THREE The sound of the doorbell's jarring ring entered my dreams and
eased me awake. Something about water, darkness, a baby crying. Then the fragments
of the
dream were gone. Where was I ? My eyes focused lazily on the silky ribbon tails
that were
sticking out of Ada's desk drawer. She had won those years ago when she was a
promosing
ballerina. She must be ashamed of them now, I thought absently. I raised my head up
higher
and looked at her alarm clock. It was 8 p.m. There was a full cup of tea on the
bedside.
I must have fallen asleep while she made it for me. I heard a sharp giggle and
flipped over to
see her sitting on her window seat, on the phone with someone. She was listening
intently and
smiling broadly, her cheeks pink, I immediately knew it was a boy. My phone was
lying
beside me in bed and everything came flooding back to me. The fight with my
parents, what
Dex had said. As disappointed as I was to realize that it wasn't a dream, I was too
exhausted,
emotionally and physically, to care as much as I did earlier. My heart and head
were heavy
and even when I tried to think about everything that had changed, I was numb.
There was also a tiny bit of relief washing over me. That was the one bright side
to all of this:
I didn't have to lie anymore. That weight was no longer on my shoulders. I eased
myself up
on my elbows and rubbed my temples. Naps always made me feel more tired than before
I
went to sleep, and this was definitely no exception. "Yeah, it's OK," Ada said into
the phone,
her voice a few actaves higher than normal. "I should stay home. I don't think my
parents
would let me out anyway. They're stupid." She burst into a flurry of girlish
giggles before saying,
"OK hottie, see you tomorrow. Bye." She hung up her cell, staring at it for a few
moments
with a goofy grin on her face before placing it down beside her. Hottie? who was
that?" I asked
groggily, not meaning to intrude but insanely curious just the same. I knew Ada
liked guys, but
I didn't recall her ever calling any of them "hottie" before. I fully expected her
to tell me to mind
my own business but instead she rushed over to me and held out her pinky finger.
"Pinky swear
you won't tell Mom and Dad?" I took her pinky in my own and promised. For once Ada
looked
and sounded like someone I could relate to. "Okaaay," she grinned and went over to
her designer
bag and started rifling through it. She pulled out a high school yearbook photo,
you know the
terrible ones you got to hand out to your friends and sign the back of. Not that
many
people ever wanted mine with my double chin and blue hair and all. I took it and
looked it over. The cute, albeit older, face of a buzz-cut boy stared back at me.
He looked like a jock with nary a spark of intelligence behind his dull eyes.
"That's Layton. He's my boyfriend." She pronounced 'boyfriend' like it was joke.
I could see from her eyes she wasn't joking though. She was head over heels and
trying
to play it cool. "How long have you guys been dating?" I asked, feeling just a tad
protective. I remembered last month I had found a box of safteys in her drawer
(I wasn't snooping if that's what you think) and prayed she wasn't using it with
guy.
He looked too old for her. "Oh, since the beginning of the school year," she said
in a tone
that was both casual and proud. "And he's a good kid?"" Yes," she sighed and
snatched
the photo out of my hands. "Are you Mom now?""I'm just wondering.""You don't trust
my judgement." "I..." I put my hands up in the air and ended up shrugging. "He
looks cute.
I'm glad he makes you happy." "He does," she squealed."He's more than cute, he's