On a sticky wicket

The insides of my eyelids are lighter than the night before, annoying me out of my sleep. I groan loudly, feeling the effects of a restless sleep. I've got a slight headache threatening to appear, while the sheets I remember being wrapped around me last night now have been kicked to the foot of the bed.
I force my eyes open, looking out of the opened window, a slight breeze cooling my already cold body. As I remember the window not being open when I went to sleep last night, I remember I'm not alone in this room. I lay still, hoping to hear any sounds indicating where Spencer is located. No luck. The room is completely silent, no rustling of sheets, no water running in the bathroom, no eerie feeling of Spencer's presence. I chance a look behind me, finding the bed unmade, unoccupied. No trace of Spencer anywhere.

The walk to Glen's room is silent, no one else walking the corridors. I can't help but wonder where Spencer is, although I'm not frightened for her, she probably just got up earlier than me. It was proved when I saw her suitcase packed and ready to go, and although I should have been relieved to have the room to myself, no awkwardness present, I surprisingly wasn't.
I couldn't help but let my mind wander to the night before, Spencer uttering those words with such pleading emotion in them. Before those small words escaped her lips, I had never witnessed any sense of care coming from Spencer. She always seemed too self-absorbed, too into herself to ever see what happened around her, how much her indifference also hurt her own brother.
It's the only thing I've been thinking about since I trudged into the bathroom, took a longer than necessary shower, blow dried my hair, put classy make up on and stepped into the black dress bought for the funeral.

As I reach Glen's door, I knock on it lightly, not feeling comfortable with any loud sounds on a day of grief. It takes a while before he opens, and as I'm expecting him to open the door and ask me to step in, he doesn't. His hand is pressed against the door sill, the other one clutching the door, keeping him trapped in the middle. It's confusing me, the sudden uninviting nature of his movements, but as I take a quick glance behind him, I see a girl resembling his sister sitting on the bed, hands folded in her lap.

Glen's face is telling me something, begging me to let it go, to not question his sudden retreat of welcomeness. I nod, barely noticeable, as I tell Glen I'm gonna wait in the lobby.

The funeral was to be expected. I've been to several, we had a lot of old ladies helping out at the orphanage, and whenever one of them died, we always showed up, showed our gratitude towards the person giving up their time to spend it with us. It didn't matter that several of them were nagging old hypocrites, only showing up to get their free card into heaven, we still showed them the respect it was expected of us to show.

They're burying her right now, the grandmother I never got to meet. All her children and grandchildren are present, everyone having had a relationship to the woman they're now saying goodbye to. However wrong it is to think these thoughts when I'm currently standing here, showing my respect to a woman I've never met, it's impossible for me to shut out the thought of not relating. I can't relate to the feelings they're all sharing with each other, what unites them here today, their common bond to the person being laid into the ground. I've never had a grandmother, never had that bond to someone, the feeling of being loved unconditionally by a person who does everything in their power to spoil you.

I never knew you could miss something you never had.

But as I'm blocking out the preaching of the priest, these thoughts invade my mind, and I can't help but feel a grief of my own, the grief of never getting to experience what these people have, the love and respect for someone of their own blood.

Arthur's hand is clasped in Paula's, her hand squeezing every now and then, giving him comfort, showing him that she's there, with him. Glen is looking down, I think he's trying to hold in his tears, softly kicking the ground beneath him to distract his tears from doing what they
want to, need to.
My eyes wander over to Spencer who's not showing any emotion, a face stoic, hard, hands pressed into fists, hair blowing in front of her eyes blocking some of her view. She's wearing a black dress, one obviously not bought for a funeral, as it is too nice, too complimentary for such an occasion. I wonder when the last time she wore it was. On a date, out on the town, for a holiday, for Christmas.

They're walking into groups, me standing a few feet away from all of them, not feeling comfortable in this situation with these unknown people surrounding me. I stay in the background until Arthur is shouting my name in a delicate manner, high enough for everyone to hear but not loud enough to shatter their peacefulness. He's waving me over, where he's talking to a tall dark-haired man, obviously related to Arthur himself.

"Ashley, I want you to meet my brother, Ben", he says touching both of our shoulders, leading us into closer encounter with one another.

"Ben, this is our new family member, her name is Ashley."

Ben holds out his hand and I take it, not quite sure how to handle this situation, how to behave when you meet someone important at such a sombre day. His hand is pressing mine a bit harder than I feel necessary and his eyes never match Arthur's welcome ones.

"So you're the girl my brother absolutely had to bring with him here".

He's not saying it in a light, warm manner, there's no lingering smile under the bemused expression on his face. He's not welcoming me, he treats me like an intruder, someone not worthy of witnessing this intimate happening taking place.

"Uhm, yeah", is all I managed to reply, how are you supposed to reply to something like that?

"Well, Arthur, I'm gonna go back to my wife and son, Craig have been so upset over the loss of his grandmother, I don't think he's up to par with meeting anyone not related right now."

Before Arthur gets to reply, he's walking in the opposite direction, clearly not interested in further interaction with neither me or Arthur. I should be mad at the way the man treated both me and his brother, but all I feel is sadness, the meaning behind his words hitting a spot I never knew was so easily accessible.
Before Arthur gets to reassure me that Ben didn't mean anything with it, I give him a quick smile before I stutter out a sentence about sitting down on the bench further down the path. I don't want him to console me on the day of his mother's funeral, he shouldn't be the one doing the consoling, I should. I don't have any relation to this woman, I shouldn't feel the way I do. I should be the one comforting, talking soothingly, helping them, not the one receiving it.

The bench is cold against me, as the dress doesn't isolate much warmth between the fabric and my skin. The view presented to me is of everyone present at the funeral, every member of the extended Carlin family. People that mean something to the family, that holds a special place in their hearts however much they might disagree on matters. However many differences that makes them unsuitable as friends, they still have something uniting them, gravitating them towards each other, keeping them in touch.

I've never had that.

"Glen's busy talking to his cousin."

I felt her presence the minute she walked up to the bench even though she wasn't in my line of sight. I felt her even more when she sat down next to me, holding her coat around her, blocking out something not related to cold, as the weather has been on the good side today. I tensed up the minute her shoulder touched mine, and however much I wanted to turn around and look at her, I couldn't. The closeness being too much. And as her lips form the words of a sentence, I can't help it anymore, I turn my face just a fraction, needing to see just a little bit of her, even if it's in my peripheral vision.

She's not looking at me when she nods her head towards the group of people a distance away from me, but it's obvious she has been looking. She thinks my searching eyes have been looking for Glen, when the reality is I never even thought about him. He didn't even cross my mind as my eyes wandered between the different bodies in the distance, my eyes searching for only one face, one unreadable, inexpressible being. And seeing as I just found her, behind my line of vision, I no longer search the view in front of me, instead opting to let my eyes glaze over, not focusing on anything.

"I wasn't looking for him."

I don't know why I let that escape my lips, I could've pretended she was right, that Glen was the reason for my desperately wandering eyes and not the girl sitting right next to me.

"Then who were you looking for?"

Her voice is scarily soft, there's no menace hidden in it, no scowl, no accusation. I try to form a legitimate response when her words really hit me. Then who were you looking for?.

She has noticed my eyes no longer scanning the crowd, and her sentence sends a chill down my spine, does she know I was looking for her? The realization that it could be true makes me forget about my silent promise to never face her entirely, and as my head whips around in her direction, I notice her own eyes looking straight into mine. It doesn't last long though, as her cell phone breaks the silence of our stare, and she's fast to answer it.

"Hey Mads."

"No, no one important."

"I'm not sure, I might show up for cheer practice, but I won't show up for school tomorrow."

"Because we're driving home tonight and won't get home before late."

"Hey, it's a day off with a legitimate reason, I don't always need to
show my face at school..!"

"I know Mads, but you've got a million minions following you around all the time, spend some time with them..!"

"Yeah, I miss you too-..."

That's the last bit of her conversation I'm able to overhear as she's by now several feet away from me, having walked away when the phone conversation started. Two things is now occupying my mind.

Number one. Who brings a cell phone to a funeral and doesn't put it on silence or off?

Number two. No one important?

I know I'm no one important to her, I'm probably the least important person to her, but hearing her say it, actually voice it out, is making it hurt much more than it should.

And I don't like it.

At least I didn't have to sit in the middle on our way home. Although having Spencer in the middle isn't helping my reeling mind any either. We're three hours into the ride home, and Glen took over for Arthur, Paula volunteering to sit in the back with me and Spencer. They're sound asleep, both of them, Arthur talking lowly to Glen up front, keeping him awake. Spencer's head is laying on Paula's shoulder while Paula is resting against the door, head bumping every now and then into the window.

I've been looking at them a bit too much the last half an hour, but the view is just so appealing. It's the first time I've seen them act like mother and daughter, and it's in their sleep. The look on their face is more similar than I would imagine it to be, and I can see the resemblance in their expression and features, both having straight, blond hair, both having the same skin tone, Spencer's a tad bit tanner probably due to more time out in the sun. there's a furrow between Paula's eyebrows, barely visible when she's relaxed, but I've seen it prominent when she's frustrated or annoyed. As I glance over at Spencer, I can see the outline of a similar furrow threatening to appear on the same spot.

I try to not make my staring obvious, not wanting to be caught if either one of them suddenly wake up. No such happenings have occurred though, as both mother and daughter is sleeping soundly, Spencer occasionally breathing deep, smacking her lips together in an adorable fashion.

It's not before I try to make myself comfortable on my side of the car, settling in to steal a few minutes of sleep myself, that I feel Spencer's arm move. My shoulder never touching Spencer's, I still didn't manage to keep my thigh away from hers. They're touching lightly, and the hand previously residing on her thigh is moving in my direction. It's not slow, it's not trying to be smooth, as if Spencer's just pretending to be asleep. No, her hand moves like a sleepridden hand does, clumsily bumping into things, before it falls onto my own. My first reaction is to pull my hand away, but I'm not fast enough as the hand upon my own gently squeezes my own, keeping it in place.

I'm not sure if I like it or not, the hand resting upon mine, all I know is that the spark running through me, the feel of her skin against mine, is making it unable for me to fall asleep.

All I feel is her, but it triggers more emotions than what I'm ready for.