"Claire! Slow down!" I grinned; my best friend Sara was having a hard time keeping up, despite my being nearly a foot shorter than her. It could have had something to do with the fact that she was lugging nearly thirty pounds worth of books, though.
"Hurry up, slow poke!" I shouted back at her over my shoulder. "We're going to miss the bus."
"Well maybe if someone would help me," she retorted, her tone laced with sarcasm.
"Who me?" I responded innocently. "You expect a little thing like me to lug around your encyclopedia?"
"You may be little, but you're not weak! Just lazy," she huffed as she tried to pick up the pace. "And besides, it's not an encyclopedia. I'm just doing some research is all."
"Yeah, research for an extra credit project. And for a class that you already have a hund-" I broke off in midsentence when I saw the doors to the bus closing. We really were going to miss it.
"Sara! Come on!" We were only now going through the front doors of the school, and I shifted my weight impatiently while I held the door for her.
"I'm hurrying, I'm hurrying!" she told me exasperatedly. I began to jog down the sidewalk, nearly letting the door swing into her face.
"Wait!" I yelled as I waved my arms above my head, trying to get the bus driver's attention. I had completely left Sara in the dust by now.
"Claire, give it up," Sara called from behind me. "He's never going to see us."
It was true. The buses left in the opposite direction that we were coming from- it was unlikely that the driver would notice us here. I slumped in defeat as our bus began rolling its way out of the parking lot.
"Guess we're going to need a ride," Sara said, having caught up with me.
"Yeah," I sighed. It would be a while before anyone could be here to pick us up. My dad worked during the day, and Sara's mom worked long shifts as a nurse at the local hospital. Last year, we would have been able to bum a ride from Sara's older brother Hunter, but he was in college now.
"Why did they have to change the age limit for driver's licenses?" Both of us would have been driving by now if they hadn't added six months to the age requirement.
Used to my complaining, Sara ignored my comment. "Well my mom won't be off work until 8 tonight. What about your parents?"
"The earliest my dad could get here is 6." I glanced at my phone, which read 3:12. Great.
"Wanna walk?" Sara joked; we both lived over 20 miles away from school.
"Right," I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. "Where is Hunter when you need him?"
She ignored me again. "What about your mom? Could you call her?"
"My mom?" I asked with astonishment. "Are you serious? Since when do we ask her for favors?"
"Since we're desperate. Just call her."
My mother was a sore spot, and Sara knew it. She had left my dad and me when I was six- no warning or anything. One day, everything was all sunshiny and happy, and then it happened, and her suitcases were packed and she drove away without a second glance. I talked to her occasionally- on birthdays and Christmases and stuff- but never did I ever call her for favors. As far as I was concerned, when she left me and Dad, she gave up the right to be part of our family.
"I am not going to call her, Sara."
"Come on, Claire! We're going to be stuck here all night if you don't."
"No, Sara. Drop it," I warned.
"Well, ok, then," she said exasperatedly. "Guess we'll just camp out here."
It was my turn to ignore her. "I'll call my dad to let him know we need to be picked up." Sara set her pile of books down on the sidewalk, shed her book bag, and stretched out on the concrete.
"Hello?" Dad sounded rushed. He managed an electrical company, and always seemed to be swamped.
"Hey, Dad. Can you pick me and Sara up from school when you get off? We missed the bus."
I heard a sigh on the other end of the line. "Sure. It won't be for a while, though." He paused. "Quarter of six at the earliest."
"Yeah, I know. Thanks."
"See you tonight."
"See ya." I hung up. Turning to Sara, I told her, "Quarter of six."
"Sure you don't wanna call your mom? She lives like 10 minutes away."
"Yes, I'm sure."
"Well," she said, "I guess I'll just go ahead and start on that project." She cracked open one of the books.
I sat down next to her, setting my phone down beside me on the sidewalk. Leaning back and closing my eyes, I told her, "Wake me up when he gets here."
Less than ten minutes later, I was up. "Ugh, I've gotta pee. I'll be right back," I told Sara as I darted back inside the building.
When I returned, I found Sara in the exact same position I had left her in- her nose crammed inside some gigantic and undoubtedly boring book. I settled back down and prepared myself for an afternoon of waiting.
My rest was once again interrupted- this time by the blast of a car horn. My eyes flew open for a second, but I promptly shut them, grumbling under my breath about the interruption.
I was confused, then, when I heard Sara stand up from her seat on the sidewalk. "C'mon, Claire," she said. "Time to go."
"What?" I sat up, looking around in confusion. Glancing at my phone, I saw that the screen read 3:50. There was no way that my dad was here already.
"Our ride's here," Sara told me. She began walking towards a car on the other side of the parking lot, and I scrambled to follow her.
"Sara, who-" I stopped short once I got close enough to the car to see who was inside. How had Sara even gotten her number? Too late, I remembered that I had left my cell phone on the sidewalk when I went in to pee. "No," I shook my head. "No. Sara I told you NO!"
"I know, Claire," she said, remaining calm in spite of the deadly glare I was sending her way. "But no way was I going to sit in front of school for three hours." She continued walking towards the car, leaving me standing in the middle of the school parking lot. I glanced around desperately, hoping to find a way out.
When I saw Sara climb into the back seat, though, I knew that I was stuck. I couldn't believe that Sara had done this to me. Slowly, I made my way to the car, silently fuming.
Without a word, I swung open the passenger side rear door, and slid my way into the seat.
"Hello, Claire," my mother greeted me. "I'm so glad that you called."
Refusing to make eye contact, I glared at the back of the passenger seat. "I didn't call," I pointed out.
"Well," she said, "I'm happy to help out."
"Gee, thanks," I said to the seat- in about the least thankful tone possible.
The ride to Sara's house was long and awkward. My mother's attempt at conversation was completely ignored by me, and Sara tried in vain to rectify the mood. Eventually, we pulled into her driveway, and you could practically hear Sara's sigh of relief.
"Thanks, Ms. Young," she said as she climbed out of the car.
"Anytime, Sara. Thank you for calling me."
Once Sara had shut the door, my mother turned to look at me- I glared even harder at the seat. "Do you want to ride up front?" she asked.
"No thanks, I'm good," I told the seat bitterly.
If I wasn't mistaken, I could have sworn that I heard her sigh. Good. I wanted her to feel the pain that she had inflicted on me and Dad.
"Claire," she began as she backed out of the driveway. Why oh why did we have to drop Sara off first? Now my mother was just going to bombard me with words that I did not want to hear. "I know that I'm not around a lot, but I really wish that you would give me a chance."
"Give you a chance? Yeah right," I scowled. "You had your chance ten years ago."
"Claire." She sounded pained- serves her right. "That wasn't easy for me."
"Really? And you think it was easier for Dad and me to go on without both of you?" I couldn't believe how selfish she was being- how selfish she had been. Sure, she may have been suffering, but she wasn't the only one.
"I just couldn't stay," she said quietly. "Not when everything reminded me of her."
"So what you're saying is that I was too painful to look at, is that it? That I reminded you of Kate so much that you had to leave me behind?" God, my mother really did hate me.
"No, Claire," she admonished. "That's not it. I just… I just couldn't. She was my baby." Her voice was breaking, and I idly wondered if I should be worried about my safety with her driving right now.
"I miss her too," I told her. "But I didn't run away from my family."
"No, Claire, you didn't. And it was wrong of me to do so- I know that now. I miss you," she said, "and I wish you would just give me a chance to be part of your life again."
"Why now? Why wait ten years? I'm sixteen, for God's sake!" I couldn't believe her nerve.
"Claire, please." I waited for some brilliant persuasion, but she left it at that.
We rode the rest of the way home in silence, and it wasn't until we pulled up into my driveway that she spoke again. "Claire, I know you're not feeling very generous towards me right now,"- Gee that was the understatement of the century- "but I want you to know that I am going to visit your Aunt Emily this summer for a couple of months, and I'd love if you would come along with me. You haven't seen any of your cousins in a while."
"Yeah," I said. "Not since Kate died. And you, you know, left us." Usually I wasn't so callous about those subjects, but I had a feeling that they would get under my mother's skin.
Judging by the unnaturally long pause, I was right. "Well," she floundered. "Just… let me know."
"Yeah," I retorted. "Sure thing." With that, I swung out of the car and jogged up to the front door without a glance backwards.