Hey, so my friend, Whitley, is convinced that I won't finish this story until after I'm thirty. So, I'm writing another chapter, and then another, as planned, and I have made it a goal to try to get this fic done before I finish high school. Luckily, I have the nice added bonus of an extra year due to a recent injury. Haha! So, let's see if I manage. Place your bets now people.
Also, you may have noticed, or not, that FF has instigated covers for your fics. This is super exciting, so I went and drew up a quick cover. So, I own the picture being currently used. Yay~ If you want to see the full pic, it's in my gallery on DA, and the link is on my user page.
Review Corner~!
Immoral
Chapter 20: I Am The Wise Man, I Am The Fool
Puppy breath is an absolutely horrible thing to wake up to. When I opened my eyes, Bernie was on my chest, cuddled into a little ball, and breathing on my face. Her breath reeked. I picked her up and plopped her onto the comforter. No offences Bern, but it was worse than onion breath. I looked at the clock, laughing at myself pitifully when the red electric letters read 6 AM. I may have gone to bed earlier than normal, but 6 AM? I had enough waking up early this weekend no thanks to the picnic. The picnic, where we, with all our sculpted dancers, and live music, and repair lanes, lost a slut-off to Prince Bastards and Bitcherellas. I groaned. That loss was still hurting, like an emotional hangover.
During my early morning sulk, I was interrupted by my cell phone going off on my nightstand. I winced at the sound. Of course, I had to have a cell phone which was blaringly loud no matter what, and only had the most annoying little 8-bit ring tones. All of that at the crack of dawn, it had me reaching for something heavy to smash it with. Eventually, it stopped ringing, and because of my horrible luck, began ringing again. I yelled frustratingly when it rang out for a third time, and grabbed it off my nightstand. I put the handheld up to my ear and growled incoherently into the speaker.
"Oh and hello to you too," Carried giggled on the other end of the phone, and I grunted again – did I mention she's a morning person? Yeah, total deal breaker, I know. That girl drives me nuts sometimes, "Well, I know it's early…"
"Early," I whined, "The sun's not even out."
"The sun is out, Marie. You'd know that if you ever bothered to open those curtains of yours," she scolded my playfully.
I glared, even though she wasn't in my room to receive it, "And let in the sunlight? Blah."
"Okay, Queen of the Night," she answered, and I smiled at the ticked off tone in her voice, "Just listen, I have a totally legitimate reason for calling."
"Shoot."
"Alright, well this Friday is that whole Creeker performance thing, right?"
"Yeah," I moaned, stroking Bernadette's fur mindlessly as she blabbed.
"And, Ms. Donner decided to make their performance into our final exam as well."
"Wait," I interrupted spitefully, gripping the phone harder in my palm, "Our final exam? As in MY whole final grade? Not just a part?"
"Didn't you know," she asked innocently, and I wished she was with me so I could smack her.
"Of course, I didn't know! When was this announced?"
"Friday, after you… had that talk with Mr. Larter and Drake…"
"What," I shrieked, bolting upright on my bed, "And you didn't tell me about it? I wasn't even in class!"
"Yeah," she mumbled, "I get that now. It's not that big of a change though. We're just doing our final performances that day as well as the Creekers. Actually, I heard a rumour that all the arts are moving their finals up too, just to make it easier. It's supposed to be a whole day affair! Just imagine it, darling, the visual arts kids with their final projects lining the halls outside the auditorium, the drama kids with their end of the year production, the dancers, the movies, and us! It sounds magical."
"Okay," I sucked in a sharp breath as the information settled, "so what is the class doing?"
"I'm glad you asked," she answered cheerily, "We've got three group numbers, one with everyone, and one for each gender. So that basically means the guys do some big thing and you and I get a duet. I love that were the only girls, we get along so well, it makes these things so much easier. We have to figure out what song were doing, and it has to relate to one of our units, but that shouldn't be hard, we studied practically every genre this year. Besides that, we have to perform one song of our choice on our own. Ms. Donner said anything, as long as it's school appropriate, but she's never been bothered by sex and swearing, so I don't think you should be bothered."
I nodded slowly to myself, biting my tongue in frustration, "Anything else I should be informed of?"
"Just that you're Creeker has to perform something on his own like all the others, but I think you already knew that."
"I did," I groaned, falling back into my bed. I had never felt like screaming into my pillow so much before in my life. It was just so much to do. Dealing with Eddy, and even trying to find him a song that could work for his scratchy ogre voice would be a feat, but now I had to find a duet with Carrie, and a song for myself! Alright, the latter wouldn't be so hard, but Carrie's falsetto and my alto rock voice don't always mesh right. Actually they down right never do. There are not many duets which cross such different genres. Why did the universe hate me?
"I'm coming over," she announced, "right now, okay?"
"Sure, we should probably get started as soon as possible. I'll go wake everyone up."
"See you soon, sweetie!"
I stuffed my phone into the drawer in my night table the minute she hung up her phone. If I didn't have my phone, I couldn't have any more stress inducing phone calls, and thus have plausible deniability. I pushed myself out of bed, joints aching from a rocky sleep. I figured I'd go wake Davey up first, he'd be hesitant, but he wouldn't put up too much of a fight. I was not awake enough to deal with Eddy. I didn't bother to change. There was no point; it wasn't like I was leaving the house.
I walked into Davey's room, where he was passed out, flung across his bed, and Rupert curled up by his face. I smirked, sucking on my finger for a moment, and jabbing it into his ear. He yelped, his upper body failing for a moment. I laughed darkly at his surprise. He rummaged across the top of his nightstand, finding his glasses quickly. He looked up at me, tired and pissed. Well, I did have that coming. I can't say waking to a Wet Willie is worse than puppy breath though. I pushed his chair towards him, and told him to meet me in the basement in half an hour. He complied, not happily, but he did seem to catch the importance of the situation.
The basement was where we kept all the instruments. Guitars, pianos, the ridiculous amount of drum sets my dad picked up over the years. We had cabinets full of sheet music, of all genres and all categorized accordingly. It was the one room of the house that was always clean no matter what. My dad was very protective of that room to say the least. If it weren't for the sake of my grade, I can't say he'd let Eddy anywhere near it. But today, we needed it, desperately.
Carrie knocked at the front door a few seconds before I reached the guest room. It was probably better that way. Waking that ogre up would probably be a two person job anyway. When I opened the door, her arms were full with sweets and other treats. She staggered in, barely being able to see over the stash of sugar in her arms. She did this every time we had a big project. Milk products, and carbonated drinks were the worst for singing, but the sugar rushes came in handy and kept us excited. And whatever was left over, I got to hide away in my secret chocolate horde I had hidden away in the kitchen. It remained untouched by anyone but me up to date. I was quite proud of that.
The two of us headed to Eddy's room after we dumped the sugar in the basement. As the door swung open, we were faced with the disgusting state of my once pristine guest room. He was face down into a pile of pillows. The comforter was thrown half way across the room and looked to have grease stains. My God, why did he have to sleep without a shirt on? He was a big man, not fat, but big, and I didn't need an eye full of him first thing in the morning. Clothes were thrown everywhere. How did he manage to did all this in one day, it was perfectly clean for my birthday party? Carrie shuffled uncomfortably on the spot and rubbed her hands together nervously. She and Vamp must have cleaned the room for couples for the party. Ew. There was even a pair of briefs on the fans blades. Just… ew. We strategically moved through the room, avoiding clothes and garbage as we walked. I nearly toppled over several times, but managed my balance. I really didn't want to know what may have been under the crap across the floor, never mind fall in it. We took each side of him. She nodded and I reciprocated. With a running start, I barrelled into his side, and she took his arm and pulled with all her strength. He moved a little, but fell right back into place. He snorted, waving a hand at his side sleepily and returning to slumbering. You had to be kidding? I just mauled him, and he was still asleep?
I pursed my lips, and decided against attacking him again. I smiled slyly, an idea forming in my mind. Carrie caught the look on my face and backed off until she was outside in the hall. I laughed at her, and cracked my knuckles in preparation. This might just be… fun. I leaned down until my mouth was millimetres from his ear and whispered.
"Mornin' sunshine."
He woke with a start, flipping off his bed with fright. He fell into a particularly large pile of clothes and screamed, pulling the comforter to cover his naked torso. I burst out laughing. I was suddenly remembering the appeal to it all. He stared at me angrily and still with a touch of horror. Considering I had been working so hard to prove I had changed from the affection obsessed little girl I used to be, I felt no guilt. I walked through his room, or rather my guest room, with a confident strut, stopping when I was as close to him as I could get without being under the wrath of dirty laundry.
"Be in the basement in a half hour, alright," I walked out of the room but stopped momentarily at the frame to throw another word to him, "sunshine."
Carrie, Bernie, Rupert, and I then, joined Davey in the basement where he was sleepily tapping scales out on the grand piano. The animals ran about the room, prancing and jumping all over each other. It was really cute. Carrie jogged over and gave Davey a quick squeeze from behind before moving on to the nearest filing cabinet to look over sheet music. She really was getting right into it. Great… work… Without even taking a moment to ponder the repercussions, I heard start singing. Now, I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times, she sings with the clarity and beauty of a bell, but no one wants to hear bells first thing in the morning. And so, with the copious amounts of morning logic I possessed, I attempted to combatant her high Cs. I started scatting, or at least, something that slightly resembled scatting. I was very good at it awake, half asleep I'm sure I was just screaming gibberish to a somewhat coherent melody. Of course, this didn't tick off little Miss Morning. She put up with it and instead just started singing louder over me so she wouldn't have to listen to me. While a normal person would realize they were just making the situation worse and stop, and didn't. In my foggy, pissed state, I instead followed her lead and started yelling louder.
Davey watched in horror as we just went on getting louder and louder over the other. Even when my voice started cracking, or she starting hitting notes so high I didn't even know were reachable, we kept going. Not even the piercing sound of Davey slamming the keys on the piano down over and over stopped us. What did manage to stop us was, surprisingly, Eddy, who walked into the basement and started staring at a blown up poster of my father. He was staring at it scrutinizing as if he recognized the photo. I walked up beside him and laughed. He was finally getting it. My father may not look like the 18 year old boy with long hair he used to be in the photo, but he was still that same person.
"Why do you have so many pictures of that guy from that old rock band in your basement," he asked, turning to look at the many other pictures of my father around the room.
"You mean Logan Dubois, from Rabid Acid Wolves," I mused, laughing to myself a little when he still didn't catch on. He was certainly a little dim.
"Uh, yeah sure…"
"He's my dad."
"Our dad," Davey piped in as he slowly went back to warming up. I snorted amused and stared at Eddy's face as the truth of my words finally sunk.
"Wait, I've been eating dinner and staying at the same house as that guy," he pointed at the poster which a strange wonder in his eyes, "my parents met at a Rabid Acid Wolves concert… and he's your father!? But, you're a-"
"Kanker," I asked sourly to which he nodded and went back to staring at another poster of my father and his band. I could tell he had more questions to ask, but I merely walked away in hopes of stopping them. His mouth remained closed, and the rest of us got back to work. It was, however, hours later, at the time of 8:00 in the morning before anything productive was actually accomplished.
Carrie had held up a couple sheets of music like they were as holy as the Ten Commandments. We all stared at her for a moment, watching as she went into happy spasms over the paper in her hands. Once finished, she ran over to me and shoved them in my face. I took it from her, ignoring the incoherent babbling noises she was spitting out as I looked them over.
I winced, "Really?"
Her face dropped, "What? It's perfect."
"No, it's," I whined sadly, "West Side Story…"
"And what is wrong with West Side Story? It's perfect! It has a soprano part for me and an alto for you and it's got a duet for the two of them."
"But it's West Side Story! It's cheesy and an over glorified version of Romeo and Juliet with gang bangers who dance and sing and… snap," I mumbled sourly, looking the music over again.
"I have a love and it's all that I have," she teased in song, but when my scowl didn't budge she stopped and frowned, "alright, then what do you want to do?"
I smiled cattily, "Rock?"
"No."
"Why?"
"Because I want a good mark, and I'm a trained operatic soprano."
"We will get a great mark if we do good old rock and roll," I insisted, but she only scoffed at me and crossed her arms.
"We'll get a better mark if we do an award-winning Broadway hit."
"Says who?"
"Says logic."
"When has logic had anything to do with any of our decisions?"
"I'm starting to think it should."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Well, no offensive darling, but when you don't think things through they tend to back fire on you."
"Name one thing that backfired on me," she face fell, and I immediately knew exactly what she meant, "that's not fair."
"You need to tell Mr. Larter about him," she begged, "And I don't care what you say. I don't care about the 'expiry date' or how you can handle it yourself because you can't! Otherwise you wouldn't still be dealing with him!"
"We are not talking about this anymore," I spat.
"No, we need to talk about him," she persevered with a strong voice, "I mean, you've never even told me exactly what he did, and I'm your best friend."
I sighed, shifting on the spot in front of her awkwardly. Her eyes bore down on me, refusing to waver. I sneered at the floor. It was amazing just how easily a conversation could pull a down spiral.
"You don't want to know," I told her bluntly, and her eyes suddenly welled up with tears. I winced as I looked at her. She was fighting not to cry, but Carrie had never been very good at that, and now was certainly not the time to remind her that 'crying is for pussies'.
"Do you not trust me? I've known you for years, Marie. I just want to help you!"
"I don't need your help."
"Well, you certainly need someone's help! I am sick and tired of this!"
"And how do you think I feel about it!"
"Then why don't you actually do something about it that doesn't just make it all worse!"
I opened my mouth to continue screaming at her, but shut it right back. Everyone's eyes were on us – I swear even Rupert and Bernie were glaring and judging me. I had had enough. She looked like she had regretted every word out of her mouth, but I couldn't honestly say I regretted mine. At least, not so soon. I swallowed everything I wanted to say and scream and yell at her, and turned and walked out the door. I heard her call out after me, but my rage just deafened me.
It was probably a stupid move. I mean, it was my house, if anything I should have been kicking her out. But I did it anyways. I threw on my jacket and helmet. I should have taken the time to get dressed, if only to be safe on my bike, but I didn't want to stay in the house any longer. Before Carrie could even make it up the stairs to stop me, I was on my bike and gone.
If she really wanted me, she already knew exactly where I was going. I was headed where I always did when I was really fucking upset – Vamps'. Sometimes, when it was really bad, I would wish I were a guy. I wanted to just grab a handful of bills, run off to a strip joint and drown my sorrows by stuffing ones down someone's sweaty g-string. I know life doesn't actually work that way, and a lap dance will never make it all better – but that's what the movies say and I prefer to live in complete, oblivious denial sometimes. I'm hoping by now you've caught on to that fact.
It wasn't long before I pulled up in Vamp's driveway. He didn't live very far from my house walking, so when I took the bike it was always a hope skip and a jump away. I check the time on my phone, and it was still blaringly early. I knew he wouldn't be awake. I also knew that it was Sunday, and his parents always had their early morning couples yoga every Sunday, so they wouldn't be around to let me in. I knew Double D would probably be up, but the paranoid part of my brain was acting up that morning and the idea of having him opening the door while I was visually upset, red in the cheeks, and only in my pyjamas, a leather jacket and some flimsy flip-flops wasn't even an option in my mind. Especially since the last time we'd talked it all ended in a fight.
I didn't even know if he wanted to be with me anymore – if he had decided that this experiment on the moral other side was over and had failed and that maybe he should just go back and be with a pretty little thing like Nazz. You can clearly see just how delusional I was that day.
Before I could reach and knock on the door, Vamp, very surprisingly, opened it. He looked exhausted and dishevelled. His green hair was a mess, and his usually glowing tanned skin was pale. One look at me, and he groaned exasperatingly.
"Carrie and I had a fight," I whimpered.
"Join the party," he moaned. He took my shoulders and pulled me in. Once inside, I immediately understood what he meant by "party". In his living, buried in my boyfriend's arms, and I was going to refer to him as mine until I was told otherwise, was the one and only little miss perfect Nazz blubbering like a baby. Even when she was at her worst, crying, tears streaming down the rosy apples of her cheeks, and face in excruciating emotion, she still looked like a beautiful porcelain doll. At least, I'm sure she looked a thousand times better than me in my ratty old pyjamas. Edd looked up at me, polite enough to acknowledge my presence in the immediate proximity, and went back to attempting to comfort Nazz. Well, if he was going to be all gentlemanly and let Nazz cry all over his shoulder, which is the shoulder I was entitled to cry all over and no one else, then he certainly wouldn't mind if Vamp became my gentleman of the morning.
Vamp was plopped on the couch beside the blubbering fool and my man. I walked over and sat beside him, quickly taking my time to curl up into his side and cuddle him. Now, it was probably a really bitch move on my part – scratch that, it totally was. Double D was looking like me as if I were sinning in church, and maybe to a degree I was, but he was taken, and I wanted a good hug. How was it my fault that his lap was already taken? I guess Vamp was a little bothered by the glaring contest going on in his living room and decided to take it upon himself to fix it all.
"Alright girls," he announced sympathetically, "Since you're both here and both obviously pissed about something or other – why don't we just get it all out in the open?"
I groaned and he pried me off his side and nudged for me to go first. I stood my ground stubbornly. Nazz on the other hand took the opportunity head on. She practically bounded off Edd's lap and into the space between him and me.
With her face, still all twisted and red, but still way too pretty to be possible, she spoke, "Kevin and I had a fight."
"You don't say," I muttered sarcastically, and Vamp elbowed me sharply in the back. I yelped. I guess he really wasn't into this whole situation. I mean having two girls in your house doesn't seem too bad for a single boy. Granted one of them was red with anger and growing more pissed off by the minute, and the other was still battling a fit of tears, but we were still two women in his house.
"He was mad because of that car wash. He was worried I was being too provocative with the cars or something. I swear I wasn't trying to be! It was just such a hot day, and we were at the beach! I don't see what's so wrong with washing cars in a bikini top."
Oh; she could not be that naïve. Sure, Kevin had no right to go all psycho clingy on her, but seriously? I mean, she's Nazz. She may not be the most voluptuous person in the world, but I'm pretty sure her in a bikini alone would attract the ages. I wanted to slap her across the face and tell her to suck it up and go stand her ground with her idiot square-jaw. Though, slapping little Nazz would never go over very well. She looked at me expectantly, eyes wide and sparkling with tears. She wanted me to just blurt everything out in the open, but it wasn't that simple. With the state I was in, if I started going then I wasn't going to stop and at the moment, that wasn't a good thing.
I shrugged, "I uh… had a fight with Carrie. She's kind of my BFF, I guess."
I tried my best to put it into words she'd understand, but she just sat there, starring at me. I shifted uncomfortably under her gaze and she prompted me further, "over what?"
I groaned, "Nothing important. Just a stupid fight."
"It can't be so stupid. It was important enough for you to be upset over," she said softly, "It will all be better of you just get it out there. I'm already starting to feel better about Kevin!"
"Yeah," I told her belittlingly, "that ain't going to happen."
She rolled her eyes at me, "Is it because of the boys? Well, in that case c'mon now! We can talk in another room."
Before I had a chance to protest, she had pulled me off the couch and half way down the hall. That girl was much stronger than I thought she'd be. I managed to at least pull her into the kitchen. Considering the only thing I'd been eating since 6 in the morning was chocolate and other extremely healthy things, I needed something of actual substance if I was going to have a heart to heart with Nazz. Or you know, attempt to get out of a heart to heart with Nazz. I had already grabbed a loaf of bread and peanut butter out from the cupboards when she started prattling on about her ability to keep a secret and how sacred girl talk is. It felt like she was bullshitting me, but it was Nazz and I was quite aware about just how serious she was being. I was going through Vamp's cutlery draw for a knife when I actually started to pay attention again.
"So, this stupid fight, which really isn't all that stupid, what happened exactly?"
I cocked an eyebrow at her as I shuffled through the drawer. I couldn't find a single knife – I mean seriously! I needed one fricken knife to spread some fricken peanut buttery goodness on some bread. Between the lack of spreading implements and Nazz twittering the background, I had drowned her out again, I was going a little nuts. I slammed the cutlery drawer and sidestepped around Nazz, who seemed to be protesting, I guess my ignoring her had become a little obvious, and started through Vamp's drawer of miscellaneous crap. It was that one drawer in the house where his parents kept all their, well, miscellaneous crap, no matter if there was a better place to keep it. Stuff just seems to get sucked into that drawer. Last fall, I found a set of my keys that I'd lost at his house the previous year. It's rather mind boggling what you could find sometimes.
"What's the point in me talking if you're not even going to listen," she asked at my back forcefully. I shrugged, finally pulling out an exacto-knife. Sure, it would be a little overkill, but a knife is a knife.
"None, really," I muttered. I turned to the sink to wash the knife off, pushing the blade out easily. From the corner of my eyes I saw Nazz huff and turn to leave. At first I was relived, but then the paranoia came back. If she left, all in a little rage, where would she end up – probably right back into the arms of my dreamboat. I sighed angrily, "Wait, Nazz. It was… over a boy."
I couldn't believe the words leaving my mouth. She turned to me with a squeal, eyes sparkling with interest. I winced, back into the danger zone. But I couldn't tempt fate and throw her back to Edd. Once again, if anyone had a right to that lap, it was me and I was going to make sure it stayed that way.
"A love triangle," she whispered excitingly. I sighed again, turning to the peanut butter and beginning to make my sandwich. Now I was really going to need it.
"No," I quickly corrected her before her little imagination ran wild, "just a douche bag."
"Why is he a douche bag?"
I cracked my neck in preparation for the rest of this stupid conversation and finished up my sandwich, "Because he is. Always has been – just didn't always see it."
"Oh, I see," she muttered. She came up beside me and smiled softly, "You loved him, didn't you?"
"Uh, yeah," I admitted sourly, clenching the blade in my hand, "I guess I did."
"Do you still love him?"
"No," I shrieked, slamming my hands down on the counter beneath me blindly.
There was a moment of silence, where she stared at me wide-eyed. At first I thought it was just because I'd lost my temper. But then her gaze went down to my hands and she went completely white. I rolled my eyes, and looked down. My stomach flipped and twisted and I lost my voice. During my rage, it seemed the knife slipped from my grip and right into the palm of my other hand. Blood was pooling and the skin around it looked as if it would fall off at any moment. She screamed, and I began cussing excessively and grabbing at napkins to press against the gash. I wasn't squeamish, but the blood was started to leak through and drip all over Vamp's kitchen floor. It was making me feel a little sick.
I heard footsteps rush to the kitchen door from where Vamp and Edd were still seated in the other room. When I looked up, they were standing in the doorway. Vamp looked at me in the oddest mixture of disbelief, panic, and aggravation – this wasn't exactly the first time I'd been seriously hurt in his house. His basement carpet still had faint red stains from when I stepped on a loose nail last year. Yeah, that was fun.
My eyes met Double D's and I realized he was about as green as Vamp's hair. I smiled uncomfortably at them while trying my best to catch the blood that was overflowing from my hand with my other. Edd looked as if he was going to hurl when it became so quiet you could here the drops as they slipped through my fingers plopped against the floor.
"What the fuck," Vamp yelled, "You're getting blood all over my floor – what the hell did you do!?"
I looked at him meekly, "I made a sandwich…"
He sighed, "I'll get the car. Can one of you help her wrap her hand up? First aid kit is-"
"In the bathroom behind the toilet," I interrupted, "I'll get it."
"Fine, good. Just meet me outside, and don't bleed in my parent's car."
I looked down at my hand. It truly didn't hurt all that much. It kind of stung, but that was basically it. I was going to need stitches… right down my hand. Could this day get any worse – scratch that, could this week get any worse? I walked out of the kitchen, Edd and Nazz steadfast at my heels. They both followed me into the bathroom, and I looked to them and pointed behind the toilet embarrassingly. Nazz opted for it, diving to her hands and knees and grabbing for it. It was becoming very hard to hate her with her good intentions and all. She got back up with it, and immediately handed it off to Edd. He opened the snaps and I directed him on what to do. I had cut myself bad enough for stitches too many times to not know by this point. He followed obediently, pulling out the gauze and attempting to wrap my hand. He wasn't getting it tight enough. I swatted his hands away and wrapped it myself, nice and tight.
Vamp honked from outside and they escorted me out. We all piled into the backseat – Nazz insisting on putting my seatbelt on. I wasn't going to fight her on it. I think we have all seen what damage can come from that. It must be karma or something.
"We should call Carrie," I announced, hoping someone would be so kind as to whip their phone out for me. It was no surprise that Nazz immediately did so. I smiled thankfully at her and she typed in the numbers as I relayed to her. She even held the phone up to ear without a complaint.
It rang a few times before Carrie answered. I could imagine her fumbling with her phone. She was never very good with that thing, "Hello?"
"Hi."
"Oh," she still sounded mad – not that I blamed her. I had only stormed out of the house a half hour ago, "Hi."
"So uh, I'm kind of on the way to the hospital right now."
She gasped, "What! Why?"
"I had an accident with an exacto-knife," I muttered into the speaker. I heard her sigh with worry, and I smiled a little.
"I'm on my way."
"You don't have to-"
"I do," she insisted, "You're my best friend, and I love you. And that means holding your hand, and being there for you. You'd do the same for me. Besides, you left your heath card here with your wallet, didn't you?"
"Uh, yeah…"
"See, what would you do without me?"
My smile intensified, "Not much except bleed out apparently."
"Don't be such a drama queen. I'll see you in a bit."
I knew she was about to hang up, so I blurted out, "Car, I'm sorry okay."
I could feel her grinning through the phone, "I'm sorry too, we'll talk at the hospital, alright?"
"Okay."