Peaches (The Izzy Quinn Series Book 1)

by C. Penticoff

  "It's true, Izzy." Grayson said.

  "Yup," Tyson added.

  I held back an epic glare. What I wanted to say was, Maybe if you guys stepped the fuck up, I wouldn't have all this responsibility. Instead, I forced myself not to feel resentment against them. It wasn't their fault our mom was a loser. I didn't have to choose this life. I could be carefree idiots like them if I wanted to. Okay, maybe there was a tad bit of resentment against them. But I reserved most of that for my mother.

  "Well, I have a best friend named, Bailey who I spend a lot of time with. Grayson's besties with her too. We were a pretty good group before Grayson and her got into drugs."

  "Bailey's sober now, right?" Tim asked.

  Clearly Grayson had told him a lot. "Yes. She's sober. She really only got bad into meth for a year or so. She's sober now and doing really well."

  "What about you though, Izzy? What do you like to do?"

  "Well, uh. Other than hanging out with friends, I like to work. It makes me feel good and accomplished."

  "Do you have a job?"

  "Yes. I start a new nanny gig tomorrow."

  "That's great." He turned his attention to Tyson. Finally. "How about you, Tyson?"

  "What about me?"

  "Who are you? What are your interests? What do you like?"

  "I like to chill with friends and play video games."

  That about sums it up.

  Tim asked him about what sort of video games he played and it turned out, he was a gamer himself. It kind of surprised me because you didn't see many people his age into them.

  "Grayson tells me he's going to your house to live after he leaves here."

  "Yes, that's the plan."

  "You seem uneasy about that."

  "No, I'm not uneasy about it."

  "Yes she is." Tyson said. I kicked his leg.

  "She thinks I'm going to relapse and go back to my old ways." Grayson looked at the ground while he said that. I know it hurt his feelings.

  "You know, it's a valid concern, Grayson." Tim patted his shoulder. "Especially if she's experienced a relapse with you in the past. It's only natural for her to be weary. Most would say it's smart not to go into it being naive. I think it's hard to find the balance of protecting yourself and being supportive of your loved one."

  "Yes, that's exactly it," I said.

  "I get it." Grayson looked at me.

  "I truly believe we can get to a place where that happy medium is met. And to ease your mind, Izzy. For the first time, Grayson's going to have some professionals backing him up, along with his family. I think that will make a huge difference for you all." Tim cleared his throat. "One thing Grayson really wanted to talk about today is the relationship between you two." He pointed to me and Gray. "From what I've gathered, his relationship comes easy between him and Tyson, but you two have struggled more."

  "It's only easy between them because Grayson can do no wrong in Tyson's eyes. I actually expect Grayson to be a decent human."

  "Yeah, but you make me feel like I'm worthless, Izzy," Grayson blurted.

  I crossed my arms and leaned back. "Why? Because I call you out for doing drugs and for stealing?"

  "No. I want you to call me out for that. But you criticize everything I do. I can't ever do anything right in your eyes. I feel like you view me as a lowlife piece of trash." He said this slowly and concisely, like it was rehearsed.

  "You know I don't think that."

  "No, I obviously don't know because those are my real feelings."

  "What have I done to make you feel that way? Name one thing." I was trying not to be combative, but I couldn't help it.

  "Well, look at the way you treated me when we had our falling out."

  I knew this was coming. "Grayson, you had sex with my damn boyfriend."

  "Listen, I know I was wrong. Like...really fucking wrong. I hope you know I would've never done that sober. The horrible things you said to me...the way you cut me off for a year….you did that sober. That cut me so fucking deep, Izzy."

  A huge part of me was feeling extreme guilt because I could not only see the hurt on his face, but I could feel it. We were twins. We had this weird, alien-like connection that way. But in that moment, my own hurt from our past situation was overriding my guilt I felt for him. "What about the way it made me feel, Grayson?"

  "Izzy, I know it was wrong and horrible, but you told me you wished I was dead."

  I could feel the blood rush through my veins, suddenly. I could feel my anger rising. I could feel the real reason I was mad reaching the surface.

  "Grayson, you fucked my boyfriend. I was just mad." I didn't care that I was cursing in front of the therapist guy.

  "Izzy, I know it was wrong and horrible, but you were only casually dating him for like a month or something."

  "Really, Gray?" My voice was getting louder.

  "Really. Yes, I know what I did was wrong but it isn't like you guys were serious and the things you said and did to me after were so much worse."

  "Grayson. I was fucking pregnant. I aborted the damn baby because I couldn't have a baby with a guy my brother fucked!"

  There it was.

  My secret is out.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The room fell silent.

  Tim shifted his head back and forth between Grayson and I. Tyson's jaw was practically touching his chest, while Grayson shook his head and tucked it into his palm. He seemed completely speechless.

  The awkward silence was broken when the door busted open. "Sorry I'm late." It was my mother storming into the room like the whirlwind she was. Her gaudy jewelry made an obnoxious noise as she flailed around.

  We are so not talking about this with my mother here.

  I stood up. "Well, that's my cue to leave."

  "Izzy, please don't go." Grayson grabbed my arm gently, his face long as a fiddle.

  "Why does everyone look like they're at a funeral?" My mother grabbed Grayson's cheeks, kissed him, then grabbed Tyson and did the same thing. She walked up to me and put her arms out. I turned my face away from her and she took that as an invitation to plant one on my cheek. She hugged me and reluctantly I put one awkward arm around her, resisting the urge to squeeze the life out of her when I remembered the last thing she said to me.

  Tim stuck his hand out as he stood to his feet. "I'm Tim. I've heard a lot about you--Cynthia, right?"

  "Bobcat, actually."

  "No one's going to call you Bobcat," I huffed.

  "Bobbie is fine." She took a seat next to Tyson and squeezed his hand. "That's what my friends call me." By friends, she meant her acid dropping buddies. She claims to have gone through some enlightening spiritual journey where she had to rename herself with a name that fit her supposed new self--her higher self--or some bullshit like that. Not to knock that custom because I know it was a real thing, it's just that there was no way my mom had any sort of spiritual awakening. If she did, the spirits would beckon down from the heavens and whisper in her ear, take care of your fucking kids. Just because she drops acid every day doesn't mean she's enlightened in any way.

  "Okay, Bobbie it is," Tim smiled at her, but it was fake in that social worker kind of way that they all did, like they were trying to put people at ease but just doing a really bad job of it.

  I still hadn't taken a seat. "Are you going to stay, Izzy?" Tim asked.

  "As long as we change the subject entirely and don't mutter a word in front of her."

  "Deal." Tim gave me a thumbs up.

  I sat down in my spot and my mother grinned, waved, and mouthed hi to me. She was always so God damned clueless of my disdain for her. Disdain might be a strong word. I loved her, I suppose, but I also hated her--if that makes sense.

  Tim went through the same spiel with my mom, who had plenty to say about herself. She talked about her years as a wife of a baseball player, his death, our plummet into poverty, and basically every minor detail of her life up until that point. I was surprised she didn't give him
the measurements of her bikini line.

  Tim's eyes were glazing over as she went on and on, and I wondered when the hell someone was going to remind her, we were here to talk about Grayson, not her. But you see, my mother was the most important thing in her own life. She always made everything about her and it's one of the things that made my blood boil with her. "And that's pretty much it," she said.

  "Well, okay." Tim yawned.

  For the next thirty minutes we discussed Grayson's progress thus far and his plan moving forward. As I suspected, Grayson and Tyson didn't stand up to my mom's bullshit perspective about her parenting, but I chose to keep calm and not speak up too much about that, in fear of making it about the way I feel instead of Grayson.

  Tim had my mom sign some papers that stated Gray would be released to the apartment. It had to be her since it was her name on the lease.

  Before leaving, we all gave Grayson hugs and kisses.

  Outside, my mom and Tyson chatted for a few minutes while I waited at a safe distance for him to be done. My mom blew me a kiss and told me she loved me before heading out.

  When we arrived home, I came home to a practically sparkling house. This was the difference between when Prissy babysat and when Tyson did. Prissy took fantastic care of Coyote, while also cooking and cleaning. I hated to admit it, but she was better at that then I was. Her time management skills were on point. When Tyson babysat, he simply sat his lazy ass on his game and made sure Coyote didn't kill herself. That was the extent of his caretaking. I'd prefer Prissy to always be the one watching her, but I didn't want to put that sort of pressure on her at her age. She still did really well in school and never got into trouble and I didn't want anything messing that up.

  "The house looks great, Priscilla." I went straight to Coyote who was sitting on the couch with her tablet. "Hi, baby girl."

  "Hi sissy." She yawned.

  "You tired, sweetie?"

  "No." She yawned again and I giggled.

  "I think you're tired, silly girl. Let's get off the tablet and make di-"

  The lights went out. Everything was dark.

  "What happened?" Prissy asked, while drying her dish.

  "Fuck. The damn electricity got turned off."

  "Uh oh. How long until we can pay it?"

  "Not sure. I'll figure it out tomorrow when I start watching Linus."

  Tyson moaned and groaned. He knew this meant no video games for a while.

  I gathered all the candles in the house, while Prissy and Tyson dug through our storage closet for the propane burner, that way we could still have a cooked meal. Luckily, we still had almost a full bottle of propane from the last time our electricity went out.

  Thank God it's not winter. Last time this happened, it was six months prior and right in the beginning of winter, and I thought we were going to die of frostbite. Luckily, it was turned back on after only a few days when I got paid.

  I looked at my phone and sighed when I noticed it was at twelve percent battery. I opened my texts to find one from Kent that asked what I was doing. I responded, and I also told him that I lost my charger and might not respond until tomorrow when I could use Desmond's. Yes, it was a lie, but if I told him our electricity went out then there's no doubt he would pay to have it turned on and he'd refuse to let me pay him back. No way I could allow that to happen. Not after everything he'd already bailed me out of. I was an independent woman and my siblings were tough. We'd done this a bunch of times before and it only made us more resilient. I didn't need anyone taking care of me.

  That night I laid in my bed with my phone and watched it power off. Dead. I wondered what I could do until I fell asleep. I could write. I'd had a dream of becoming an author my entire life, and I had a million stories in my head. Maybe now is a perfect time to start writing. I decided I would smoke a cigarette first.

  I stepped into my front porch with my cigarette and lit up. While I inhaled the smoke, I instantly felt a rush. Probably because I hadn't smoked since the morning as I was trying to preserve them.

  It's really going to suck to not have electricity, I thought. I knew the bill had to have been super high by that point, and with that bill plus rent and other bills we had, I knew it was going to swallow my first few paychecks whole just to play catch-up. Not that I'd have much extra once I was caught up. Actually, now that I think about it, I don't even know how much Desmond's parents will be paying me. I didn't really care though. Money was money.

  Money, money, money. That's all I ever seemed to think about. It was hard not to when we barely had any. All I want is to not have to worry about money. I don't even want to be rich. I just want to always have money for rent and bills. That's all. And maybe some shopping trips and vacations would be nice. I smiled as I imagined myself walking through a mall with an endless amount of money, being able to buy whatever I wanted. I'd get Coyote a ton of toys. Tyson would get all the video games he wanted, and Prissy would get a Kitchen-Aide and whatever other fancy kitchen gadgets she wanted. I'd heard her talking about a food dehydrator before. But what about me? I realized I hadn't even considered what to get myself. Maybe this is what Tim was talking about. I supposed I'd probably get clothes. That's really the only thing I ever desired, other than these nasty cigarettes. That's what I'd do, I'd buy some high-tech way to get me to stop smoking.

  What else would I do with a ton of money? Vacation. I smiled as I pictured myself lounging on the sandy, warm beaches of the Caribbean; then the smile washed off my face when I realized that vacation was never going to happen.

  Those shopping sprees would never happen.

  The reality of what my life was always going to rip me out of my daydreaming.

  I flicked the cherry off my cigarette and stuck the remainder of my cigarette on the ground next to the wall so I could have it for later. While I was bent over, I noticed a peach laying on the ground with a note attached to it.

  Smell the roses. Taste the peaches, the note read.

  Was this lady going to be sending me peach stuff for the rest of her life? It was probably a good thing because I really needed the reminder as I walked into my dark, cold apartment.

  The following morning, Prissy and I ventured into the bathroom to get a load of laundry finished. Doing laundry in the tub sucked, but I had it down to a science. You fill the tub up with soap and just enough scalding hot water to cover the clothes. I'd found that getting the soap out of clothes manually is pretty tough, so we used half the normal amount. We'd let the clothes soak in the tub for twenty minutes. After soaking, it's time to get the clothes clean. You take each individual item and swish it around the water, squeezing it and running it under water to make sure all the dirt and grime is gone. Then we rang it out as much as possible and placed it into a laundry basket.

  Once the cleaning portion was over, we gathered the clean laundry from the basket and hung it in various places around the house to dry. Tyson even helped us, which was a testament to how utterly bored he was. He'd be going to his friend's house later to avoid the boredom, I was sure.

  We did some cleaning and other tedious things around the house to keep our brains occupied until it was time to head to Desmond's for my first day of work. Prissy wanted to come, which I assumed she would, which would help keep her busy since there was an in-service day at school.

  "Make sure you grab your tablet and phone to charge them up while we're there," I told Coyote and Priscilla.

  We gathered our things and headed down to Desmond's.

  Knock knock.

  "Come on in," Desmond told us.

  I got Coyote and Priscilla situated so Desmond and I could sit down and chat about some businessy stuff related to me babysitting.

  "Okay, so I spoke to my mom and she plans on paying you every Friday. Is that okay?"

  "Sure. As long as I'm getting paid, I don't care. Will she be paying me this Friday to begin?"

  "Yes."

  Yes! That meant we'd only be without electricity for a few days.

>   "To start, she'll be paying you eighteen dollars per hour."

  "What? Really?"

  "Yep. Then we'll talk pay raises after a year if you're still around."

  Still around? Who was he kidding? If they were going to pay me eighteen dollars per hour, I wasn't going anywhere. I held onto my phone just dying to bust out the calculator app so I could see how much money that would bring me in per month.

  He went over taxes, bedtime routines, feeding schedule, and everything else I needed to know about caring for Linus.

  Once he was done, I pulled my phone out and calculated my income. At forty-five hours per week, I was looking at three thousand, two hundred, forty dollars per four weeks. Damn! That maybe didn't seem like much to some people, but it was a game changer for me and my family.

  It meant no more food banks.

  It meant no more hang-drying clothes or cooking on old, shitty propane burners because the electricity was out.

  Maybe I could even save up some money.

  I began feeling a huge amount of relief and I hoped nothing would get in the way.

  My first day on the job went fairly well, other than my ten-minute panic fest when I thought the formula ran out. I had Bailey on the phone to have her go to the store to get formula for me, but then Prissy reminded me that Desmond said the new canister of formula was in his diaper bag. I couldn't believe I had forgotten, but I was fed so much information all at once. I was so relieved when Prissy finally pointed that out.

  Desmond sauntered into the living room and saw me rocking the baby in the recliner.

  "How's it going?" With his shoulders drooped and his excessive yawning, I could tell he was exhausted.

  "Good," I whispered. "He was having a bit of a rough time staying asleep, so I decided just to rock him." I was downplaying it. The baby was screaming like a wild banshee any time I tried putting him down. I figured it was because he wasn't used to anyone else having him besides his dad. He would just need time to adjust. It was no big deal, though. As long as he was calm when I was holding him, it was all good. Besides, if I was getting paid well, I'd hold a screaming baby all day and night.