“Why are you telling me?” Mom retorted. “You’re both plenty old enough to do your own laundry.”
Luke looked shocked by the mere idea of approaching a washer and dryer, but then the shock seemed to give way to fear at the thought of actually using them. Although, in his defense, I suppose he had a valid reason for his fear. When he tried to start the dishwasher last week, he wound up overflowing the thing. I wasn’t exactly sure how he managed it, but Mom wasn’t too upset.
“At least he was trying to be helpful,” she’d sighed.
Skylar just looked highly affronted at the concept of washing her own clothing, like the task was beneath her. With her arms crossed over her middle, she huffed angrily. When I sighed in exasperation at her ridiculousness, her eyes landed on me. “What about Silly?”
Mom glanced at me, puzzled as I was. “What about her?”
“Why does she still have clean clothes?” Skylar accused.
“I do my own laundry,” I glared.
Apparently, Skylar thought since I could do my own laundry, then she wouldn’t have a problem doing hers, so, eventually—she, evidently, wasn’t completely out of clean clothes, as claimed—she broke down and gave the washer and dryer a try. The result: a complete disaster.
Luke, still fearful of the washing appliances, bravely asked Skylar if she could wash a couple of things for him because he, mistakenly, thought she had things under control.
It was a Wednesday afternoon, and neither Luke nor Skylar had to work and were both, surprisingly, home that evening. She’d already started the wash when I came downstairs to get something to drink.
I was surprised to hear the dryer running as I passed the utility room. As far as I knew Mom wasn’t home yet, but I didn’t think too much of it until the buzzer for the dryer went off and Skylar strode through the kitchen into the utility room.
As soon as I saw her, I realized she was the one doing laundry and suddenly had a very bad feeling. Uneasy, I watched as Skylar threw the contents of the dryer into a laundry basket before moving the clothes in the washer over to the dryer. Then she grabbed the basket and went into the dining room to start folding.
I watched with mild interest as I sipped on a can of Cherry Coke. Luke came into the kitchen just after Skylar had started folding. He grabbed a can of Mountain Dew from the refrigerator and turned to walk toward Skylar, opening his mouth as if to ask her a question, but he stopped dead in his tracks.
Skylar was, of course, listening to her iPod, so I wasn’t even sure she’d seen Luke enter the room, and she didn’t seem to really be paying much attention to what she was folding, but as Luke stared at her for several moments, she seemed to feel his gaze.
She tore the ear buds out, clearly annoyed. “What?”
His eyes zeroed in on the shirt she was holding, and he asked, through gritted teeth, “What is that in your hands?”
Skylar glanced down and shrugged. “The shirt you asked me to wash.”
“What the hell did you do to it?” he demanded as he walked closer to inspect his shirt.
What had once been a white Beatles t-shirt with a picture of John, Paul, Ringo, and George on the front and a list of the songs on their White album on the back was now light pink.
My feeling of foreboding, apparently, hadn’t been unwarranted. I knew immediately that Skylar must have failed to sort the clothes by color. I’d have wagered she hadn’t looked at the tags for any special instructions either.
I felt sorry for Luke. I knew it was his favorite shirt. The expression on his face was somewhere between rage and desolation.
“You fucking turned it pink!”
Skylar was immediately incensed. “I did not!”
“Oh, yeah? So it just turned itself pink somewhere between the time I gave it to you to wash and the time it got in and out of the washer, huh?” Luke spat.
“Okay,” Skylar scoffed, “maybe it turned pink in the wash, but I didn’t do it on purpose.”
Luke didn’t seem to care whether the error was intentional or accidental. “You’re buying me a new one.”
“Why should I?”
“Because you ruined it! I can’t wear a pink White album shirt, you twit,” Luke said. “Why didn’t you tell me you didn’t know how to wash clothes?”
“I know how to wash clothes,” Skylar replied as she sifted through the rest of the clothes in the basket, grabbing another item to fold. “Everything else is fine,” she said, but at that moment, she held up what was formerly her three-quarter-sleeve ivory cashmere top. No longer ivory, it was now the same shade of pink as Luke’s shirt, and instead of looking like it belonged to an eighteen-year-old, it looked better fitted for an eight-year-old.
We all stared at it for a moment in complete silence. I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. It was just too much. Then, finally, after what seemed like an eternity of silence, Luke seemed to regain the ability to speak.
“Wow, I guess you really are the expert on laundry,” he commented. “Or at least the expert on how to make clothes fit a toddler!”
“Shut up!” Skylar’s confidence seemed to finally crack, and anger mixed with embarrassment. “I don’t know what happened, but it’s not my fault.”
I’d managed to stay quiet up until then, but I had to speak up. “Actually,” I said, “it kind of is. I mean, that’s a cashmere top.”
“I’m fully aware of that, Silly.” She spat my name as if it were a curse.
“Well, then you should have been fully aware that you’re only supposed to dry clean it,” I pointed out.
That shut Skylar up immediately, and, if possible, her pale face grew paler, and there was a quick moment of surprise before her face went blank.
“Mom drops all of the clothes that need dry cleaned off at the cleaners at the beginning of each month,” I added. “She keeps them in a pile beside the laundry basket. Just for future references.”
“Wha—how—why didn’t you tell me that before?” Skylar exclaimed as I pushed away from the counter where I’d been leaning.
“I didn’t know you were doing laundry,” I replied with a shrug. “Or I would have.”
“Yeah, right,” Skylar glared. “I bet you think this is really funny, don’t you?”
“Well, yeah,” I replied, honestly. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Luke crack a smile. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one amused by Skylar’s lack of common sense. “Maybe next time you should try sorting the clothes by color and checking the tags before you put them in the washer,” I suggested.
As I walked out of the kitchen and into the hallway, I heard Skylar mutter, “Smart ass.”
Amused, I went upstairs to my room. I knew it would be a while before dinner since Mom hadn’t made it home yet. I’d already finished my homework, so I decided to read.
After finishing The Da Vinci Code, I was looking for something new to read. After mentioning that to Jackson on instant messenger, he suggested The Client by John Grisham.
“I read it a few years back. It was a pretty good mystery or thriller,” he commented.
His recommendations hadn’t led me astray yet, so I picked it up on Monday when I went to the library with Tierney and Tegan.
“You need to start returning the favor,” Jackson teased. “I’m in need of some suggestions myself.”
I promised him I’d think of something, but my mind had been oddly blank every time I considered book titles. It made me oddly nervous. What if he didn’t like my suggestions?
I sunk into my window seat that overlooked the backyard, deciding I’d save book suggestions for later. I took a moment to really look out the window. I could see my reading tree plainly below.
I missed my favorite reading spot, but it was already getting dark, and it was much too cold to sit outside and read now. Even though my room was the smallest of the four bedrooms and my parents and Skylar both had balconies leading out from their rooms, I was the only one with a window seat that could be used all year
round.
I curled up in the winter reading nook and thumbed through the pages to my bookmark. I found the last paragraph I’d read and returned to Mark Sway and Reggie Love’s world of mystery and suspense.
It was so easy to sink into this other world. I’d spent the majority of my childhood with my nose stuck in a book and pretending I was right there, living the adventure, right along with the protagonist.
I’d never really had many friends. As the baby of the family, I’d spent much of my time at home with Mom, so there weren’t many opportunities to play with other kids aside from my siblings. Most of my days were spent playing alone while Mom tended to things around the house or running errands with her. Sometimes we’d go to the park or stop for ice cream.
My favorite times, though, were when we went to the library. She’d let me pick out tons of books, and we’d come home and she’d read to me. Once I started to learn to read on my own, she’d let me curl up on the couch all day and read until my heart was content.
Preschool had been terrifying because I’d never been away from Mom like that before. By then I was so used to being alone that I really wasn’t sure what to do around the other kids and they didn’t seem to know what to make of me, so the two years I went to preschool weren’t easy.
Meeting Tegan in kindergarten had been a godsend. She was the first person who didn’t perceive my independent play and shyness as an oddity. Through most of elementary school Tegan had served as a terrific friend, but also a good buffer between other kids and me. That had made it possible to form other tentative acquaintances with my classmates throughout the years and made me feel like less of a weirdo.
As my focus returned to the book, the rest of the world fell away, and it wasn’t until there was a knock at the door that I pulled my eyes away from the book. “Come in,” I muttered, distracted.
Luke poked his head into the room. “Dinner’s ready.”
“Okay, I’ll be right down,” I answered. Luke left without another word, and I grabbed my bookmark and pressed it between the pages before closing the book.
A quick glanced at the clock showed that it was well after seven, which meant Mom must have got home later than usual. My stomach growled in realization. I hadn’t even heard her car pull into the driveway, so absorbed was I.
When I got downstairs, Luke was telling Mom about Skylar’s laundry gaffe and his resulting ruined shirt.
“Not only did she turn my shirt pink,” Luke commented, and the earlier humor had faded back into scorn, “she also turned her own shirt into something fit for a toddler.”
Mom was only half listening as she put the food out on the table, and Skylar was scowling at Luke as he spoke.
“Luke, we’ll get you a new shirt,” Mom finally said with exasperation. “And, Skylar, what were you thinking putting reds with whites?”
“I didn’t know!” Skylar exclaimed as Dad entered the room.
“What’s with all of the yelling?” he questioned. “Can’t we just have a quiet peaceful dinner? It’s bad enough we’re damn near eating dinner at bedtime.” He glanced at Mom as he said the last part.
“Well, then I guess some other people around here need to learn how to cook then, don’t they?” Mom replied with a pointed look at Dad.
That shut Dad right up, and the rest of dinner was quiet and tense. And, honestly, the food wasn’t too great either. Mom usually managed to fix Hamburger Helper without any problems, but tonight the hamburger seemed overcooked, and she also burned the dinner rolls. All in all it seemed to be turning out to be a not so lovely evening with the Grangers.
I felt bad for Mom because it seemed like no one was cutting her any slack. Dad wasn’t even trying. He was just sitting around complaining about being hungry. At least Skylar and Luke were trying to be helpful, but neither of their attempts had turned out too well. If anything, they’d probably only made matters worse for Mom because she had to come home from work and listen to them bicker about botched laundry on top of getting dinner on the table.
I just wished they’d all quit being so selfish.
After dinner, I decided to help Mom with the dishes. Luke, Skylar, and Dad fled the room almost immediately while I started gathering the dishes from my end of the table. I followed Mom into the kitchen, and we poured the left over food on the plates down the garbage disposal.
“Thank you, Silly,” Mom said tiredly as she reached for the pots and pans on the stove.
“You’re welcome, Mom,” I smiled taking the dishes from her and loading them into the dishwasher, along with the plates from dinner. I closed the door and hit the buttons to turn it on.
I turned to watch her clean off the dirty stove and counter. I felt like I needed to say more. She looked like she was having a stressful day, but I wasn’t sure what I could even say to make her feel better, so I said the first thing I could think of. “I think it’s great that you’re working again, Mom.”
She stopped cleaning the counter to look at me. Eyebrows raised and tone clearly surprised, she asked, “You do?”
“Yeah,” I nodded. “And I think things will get better around here once we all get used to the new routine. I know Dad’s kind of stuck in his ways, and Skylar and Luke are kind self-absorbed, but I really think we’ll be okay.”
Some of the stress seemed to clear from Mom’s elfin features as she cracked a smile. “Thank you, Silly,” she said, dropping the dishrag and stepping over to pull me into a warm embrace.
I squeezed back, and as she pulled away, I offered, “I can clean this up for you if you want.”
“Don’t you have homework to do?”
I shook my head. “I’ve already finished it.”
She looked reluctant to accept the offer, but I could tell she was dying to sit down and relax for a while, so I said, “Go. I can do this.”
“You really are a blessing,” she said, hugging me again before she slipped out of the room.
I picked up the dishrag Mom had been using and finished cleaning the counters. As I was wiping down the dining room table, Luke came downstairs with a pile of clothes in his arms. I didn’t even want to ask what he was planning to do, so I headed for the hallway, but before I could escape to my room, he called my name.
I groaned inwardly, but I turned around and walked into the utility room, where Luke was standing with his clothes in hand.
“What?” I asked, leaning against the doorjamb.
“Do you think you could show me how this thing works?” he asked, gesturing to the washer.
I bit my lip to hide my surprise and nodded quietly. The fact Luke was actually asking for help was a shock, and the fact he was asking me came as an even bigger surprise. Apparently, having his favorite shirt ruined caused him to suck it up and give laundry a try for himself. I couldn’t blame him. I wouldn’t let Skylar near any of my clothes after what she’d done either.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
I’d always considered myself to, generally, be an optimist. Even when something bad happened, I tried to keep a positive outlook. It wasn’t always easy, of course, but people were always saying, “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” Personally, I’d have preferred to make lemon meringue pie because I liked it better than lemonade, but the idea remained the same.
Sometimes, though, it could be really difficult to find the bright side; especially when what was shaping up to be a positively great day turned into an absolutely dreadful one in the span of only a couple of hours.
It was days like those that turned my optimism inside out. I didn’t like to be pessimistic, but there were times when I could see why the other members of my family were often so negative about things. Sometimes, I was sure that pessimism was closer to realism than optimism because of all the bad that happened in the world.
And on those days, when I found myself facing something bad, I wanted to take those metaphoric lemons, make the damn pie and shove it directly in life’s face.
My lemon day started off really well.
When I arrived at school on Friday morning, Tegan found me at my locker.
“Tierney is going bowling with Jesse tomorrow night, and she invited us to come along.”
I stuffed my books, save for the ones I’d need during first block, into my locker along with my messenger bag before glancing at Tegan. “I take it things are going well with Jesse then.”
“Oh yes,” Tegan nodded. She rolled her eyes, but she was still smiling, so I could only assume that Tierney was still in her “goofy in love” stage with Jesse. They’d been seeing each other pretty regularly since Halloween, and the times I’d seen them together they were so sickeningly sweet. I couldn’t be anything other than happy for Tierney for finally getting together with her crush, but there was that small part of me that envied her like crazy.
“Anyway,” Tegan went on, and her excitement seemed to grow. “Tierney said we should invite a couple of friends if we wanted.”
“Oh?” This, of course, piqued my interest.
“Yeah, they’ve invited a few people, but Tierney said it was the more the merrier,” Tegan explained. “We’ll just break up into teams, you know?”
From the sound of things, Tegan had already accepted the invite on behalf of herself and me, which I didn’t mind. I thought it sounded like fun. I hadn’t been bowling in a while, and it wasn’t often I made plans with anyone besides Tegan and Tierney.
Last weekend with Jackson and Tegan felt so much like a fluke. I still couldn’t believe Jackson had shown up like that out of the blue to invite me to the movies. It was exciting to have more plans lined up for this weekend.
Tegan had teased me often since our night at the drive-in. “If I hadn’t been there, you and Jackson totally would have wound up making out,” she claimed.
I didn’t believe it for a second, even though I really wanted to. At the same time, the idea of making out with Jackson kind of left me feeling a little flustered. With lips like his, he was likely to have done his fair share of kissing. I’d never kissed anyone except for on the cheek, and that totally didn’t count as real kissing. Even though I was convinced Jackson had no interest in me beyond friendship, I couldn’t help but fret over the idea of, theoretically, kissing him.
Infinite (Strange and Beautiful, Book 1) Page 17
