Southern Hospitality
23
The Phone Call
Chloe was used to being left to her own devices while her aunt worked long shifts at the hospital. After she texted the girls letting them know she was back home, she lounged about. The house was still and quiet, the only sound breaking the silence was her own noise and the grandfather clock down the hall clinking away.
It was just her. Her friends were all preoccupied. Kari was visiting her extended family in Norway for the holiday, Beth was with her dad and stepmom in Nebraska, and Miranda was busy with her full-time day-to-dusk job.
Dressed in a ratty t-shirt and sleep shorts for the better part of the day, Chloe mindlessly flicked on a playlist of rap music, an artist called Yung Gravy that she had found through Beth, and debated what to do. Clean her room seemed like the best option; it was a disaster area. Her aunt was forever shaking her head at the fact one day her room could be clean enough to put a clean-freak to shame and the next be as messy as Kari's.
Pulling hair hair back into a loose ponytail, she began to pick up the discarded jeans and t-shirts that lay across the floor and folded them and put them up. She tackled her bed next, fluffing her pillows until she was satisfied and decided to tackle her desk. Everything was emptied from the cabinets and reorganized by subject and year. When she was done, she sighed heavily, already restless for something to do to keep her mind from wandering to hard green eyes.
A last-ditch effort to drown out the swell of unwelcome thoughts, she turned up the volume on her TV as loud as it would go, the beat rattling the windows. Her attached bathroom was cluttered with hair products that she checked dates for and threw out the empty bottles on others.
Soon, far too soon for her tastes, there was nothing else to do. She gingerly sat on her bed and turned down the music, pressing her face into the cool fabric of her pillow. Sunlight streamed in, bathing her face with its warmth, and her eyes prickled with hot tears.
She hadn't even last a month at the volunteer farm. She scowled as she thought of Derek. He was big and he was intimidating but, at the same time, he was quiet and thoughtful and sweet. How could she not have fallen for him? When he looked at her like she was someone, when he spoke to her about his twisted childhood, when he steadfastly, defiantly faced his abuser and her toxic aunt.
And then there was Simon, the safe option, the boy she should've had a crush on; he was handsome and wasn't ignorant of that fact but wasn't arrogant about it. He was funny but rather pushy in terms of physical affection. He'd hold her hand and frown when she wasn't comfortable. He'd been nice to her but the way he treated her at the movies, when she froze up, was deplorable at best.
And then there was Rae. Rae, who she hadn't seen since sophomore year when she started dating and changed her circle of friends. Rae, at first, had been as mean and bitchy as Chloe remembered but it seemed like somewhere along the way, she found something in Liam and Ramon. They weren't exactly braiding each other's hair and gossiping but a gossamer camaraderie had crept up on them.
Sighing heavily, Chloe decided to take a shower, picking up her phone and speaker and connecting, blaring the music as loud as it would go. Stepping into her newly-cleaned bathroom did nothing to assuage her overwhelming emotions, and glancing in the mirror to look at her reflection only worsened it.
She wasn't blind; she knew what she looked like. Not much of a looker, a boy in her Spanish class had said with a laugh, and, even though she'd heard it time and time again, it still cut her to the quick. Her aunt insisted she was just a late bloomer. Fifteen and no hint of curves or breast or ass to show for it. Her thoughts shifted to her late mother.
She'd seen pictures of her mom as a teen, with braces and perpetual sunburn, but she couldn't have been mistook for a child, not with her wide hips and great ass. Looking at her parents' wedding pictures sent a stab of ugly, green jealous weaving through her every time she did; her mother had looked so beautiful, her hair falling in a glossy waterfall down her back, her wedding dress accenting her child-bearing hips, her eyes sparkling at the camera as her father tried to feed her a bite of cake, looking at her with so much love Chloe could feel her own heart threaten to burst with it.
"Stop it," she sneered to her reflection, taking in the large eyes and small mouth, the freckles more apparent under the sun-browned complexion, how her ribs showed through her skin easily, the slight protrusions of her hip bones. Time and time again she'd heard the comments when family members thought she wasn't around, how she was so thin she must have an eating disorder, that she should've at least grown a tiny bit since the last time they saw her, how could Lauren stand being around her when she looked so strikingly like her mother, how a girl like her—not even a slip of a female—ever hope to find a man?
The phone rang, her ring-tone cutting through the gloom and doom of her train of thought, and she answered it all too eagerly. "Hello?"
"Chloe?"
Her heart pattered as she sagged against the counter, edge sawing into the soft flesh of her belly. Her stomach swooped and a wave of emotion, a tangled, jumble mess of nausea and an aching so swift and sharp it left her breathless, crashed through her with the strength of a tsunami.
Tori continued. "I know we're not friends, but I thought—in case something goes wrong, I thought—everyone thinks you shouldn't know. But I think you should because I know about...you and Derek."
Her legs felt gelatinous, her mouth dry, her tongue sticking to her cheek. Her voice escaped her in a wispy breath.
"Chloe, Derek's in the hospital. Royce got to him after you left. He's stable and was awake but he's—he's not—I know if I was you, I'd want to know." There was a fierce coloring in her voice, strong and sure, that left no doubt.
If it was Liz, Tori would've torn apart heaven and hell to get to her.
A long pause, muffled conversation, and then Tori's voice, the only thing Chloe could latch onto currently because her mind was scattered, "I'll keep you posted, Chloe. And—and if it's anything...I think both my brothers are idiots. I gotta go. Take care." And then the line was dead.
Chloe's eyes burned as hot tears filled them, dripped down onto where her hands were clasping her phone. A noise broke out of her and she pressed her shaking fingertips desperately against her bloodless lips. Another sound, and the dam broke.
She crumpled as the sobs escaped in a tidal wave, clutching the phone.
Derek! Why did her heart feel as though it had been cleaved in two?