Author's Note – Where have all my lovely reviews gone? Hardly anybody is reviewing anymore…I guess maybe this is my fault for not updating in a while…
FYI – Chapter 11 has been altered a little bit. Clayton now says that he has lived in Connecticut, but that he was born in Newport and lived here until he was 10. You'll understand why I've changed it when you read this getting-to-know-you chapter all in Clayton's POV!
Enjoy –
Helena
Chapter 12
Breakfast with the Hoffman's
CLAYTON'S POV – (A.N, have you read the author's note!!!???)
It was already 6am by the time I walked back to my house on the other side of town, my little place in middle class suburbia.
I opened our wooden gate and walked down the pavement path past the flowers and green hedges that my mother tended to religiously. Not wanting to wake up my 3-year-old sister Jackie and my 5-year-old brother Benjy by ringing the bell, I searched through the pockets of my dickies for the house key.
I pushed through the front door to find a note left from my mother to cook the pancake batter she prepared for breakfast. I took the post-it down and scrunched the fluoro paper into my pocket.
My keys made a slight clang as I dropped them onto the kitchen bench. As usual, my parents had already left for work, and I was left alone with the kids to feed and drop off at school. Honestly, I do appreciate the sacrifices my parents had made for our education, but seriously, sometimes I wonder about their parenting abilities.
Not that they were care-free hippies, they were a pretty conservative pair, but they had so much trust in me it was scary sometimes.
I poured myself a glass of orange and pineapple juice and went to my room. I had at least an hour to kill before I had to make breakfast, so I went onto my computer.
Verifying username and password. As the Internet went through its usual processes I quietly sipped at my juice. Authenticated.
I signed into my MSN account and saw that Seth was online. No sooner had I realised this, that annoying MSN sound came through my speakers. As I was being alerted to Seth initiating a conversation with me, I quickly turned down my volume and opened up the window.
CaptainOats says: Hey man. What's up? You don't usually get up this early…
Clayton says: How do you know when I get up? :-)
Captain Oats says: I don't know, you just don't seem like the person who gets up this early…wait, what the hell was that?
Clayton says: What the hell was what?
Captain Oats says: Somebody just walked into my house dude…I need to see who it is. What do you recommend, a baseball bat or a kitchen pot?
Clayton says: You watch way too many movies man. I bet it is just Chelsea walking in.
Captain Oats says: Why would it be Chelsea?
Clayton says: I don't know…just go see…
Captain Oats is currently set to 'Away'I waited a few minutes and as expected Seth came online stunned.
Captain Oats says: Dude, are you psychic or something? It was Chelsea walking into the house.
Clayton says: Not psychic, she went for a walk, so did I, and well, we met at Newport beach.
Captain Oats says: What did you guys do ;-) lol!
Clayton says: We just talked! We're just friends!
Captain Oats says: Yeah, sure, you guys just 'talked'. I know that you have a crush on her man, and I have a feeling that she likes you too, in a more than a friend kind of way. :-)
Clayton says: Are you serious dude?
Captain Oats says: So you are interested!
Clayton says: Ok, fine, you found me out ok. I like her…I really like her…a lot…
Captain Oats says: Oooooooh, widdle Cwayton has a crushie wushie on my step sister….wait…am I supposed to be encouraging you? I've never been the older brother before…
Clayton says: You call that encouraging?
Captain Oats says: I'll have to ask Ryan about how I'm supposed to feel about some guy wanting to jump my sister…:-)
Clayton says: NO!!! Please, for the love of God don't tell Ryan!
Captain Oats says: Just joking with you man, lol :-)
Clayton says: Please Seth, don't tell anyone, not yet anyways. Can you do that? Please!
Captain Oats says: Sure man, puts on Barbie voice What are friends for? Giggles
Clayton says: Shut up man :-)
Captain Oats says: Sure, that was waaay too girly even for me…lol
I looked at the little clock on the taskbar at the bottom of the screen and realised that it was 6:30am.
Clayton says: Seth, I've got to go and make breakfast for Jacks and Benj ok. See you later.
Captain Oats says: Sure man, hey, tell J and B, that my mom wants them to come over one night cause she hasn't seen them in a while.
Clayton says: Sure, it's so weird how your mom plays surrogate-grandma with J and B, lol :-)
Captain Oats says: Well, my mom and dad have known you guys for so long. I mean we're practically extended family. We swam naked in your paddling pool together when we were two. Doesn't that show brotherly affection? Ok, I know that you must be punching me right now, and yes I do like girls, idiot. Lol. She must miss having little kids around I guess.
Clayton says: Please Seth, no more, I don't need to be reminded of those paddling-pool experiences. Lol. Bye. See you at school.
Captain Oats says: Bye Bye
I signed out of MSN, disconnected the Internet and walked over to Benjy's room.
"Benjy, wake up, it's like 6:45 already." Benjy slept like a dead log and the only way to get him up was to repeatedly, gently tap him on the forehead while saying Benjy over and over again.
I began my routine and eventually he started to show some sort of life.
"Get ready, Benj, the babysitter is coming early today for Jackie and she freaks me out so I want to out of the house by the time she gets here."
He wordlessly agreed to my reasoning and after stumbling a bit began to push me out of the room to let him get ready.
I started heating up the pan and the butter and gently picked up some batter with the ladle and let it fall back into the bowl that it had been made in.
Why did my mom try to make it from scratch again? My mom is kind of a Kirsten story I guess. She can't cook, and when she tries to, it turns out pretty bad. Well, I can't really blame my mom, for not being that domesticated I mean.
Her life is a lot like a Kirsten story too, not all of it, but some of it. They were best friends all throughout school and college, and they still are. They came from rich backgrounds, all the boys chasing them. They both went for the poor guy so to speak, in Kirsten's case Sandy and in my Mom's case, my Dad. The one difference that changed everything was that, when my Kirsten was married and was pregnant with Seth, my Mom was unmarried and pregnant with me.
This basically got her shunned from most people in their country club circles. My grandparents, who still talk to Benjy, Jackie and I and who still send Birthday, Easter and Christmas presents, didn't want to risk being shunned too, so cut off all connections with their daughter.
It's been that way until a few weeks ago actually. Grandpa decided to talk with his daughter and they've invited us to their house this weekend for lunch. Hopefully this will be a chance for things to be better between us all. I don't want to still have monitored and forced conversations with Grandma and Grandpa 4 times a year. I don't want to be seen as the illegitimate son of 'that' girl and the poor boy who tore their family apart.
When I was younger I used to feel that way. I used to feel that if I wasn't born then maybe we'd all be better for it. Then I stopped blaming myself, and I started blaming my parents. That was about the same time I took their piano money to play the guitar.
I eventually got over it I guess. I still think that it would be nice if we could be a family again though. Grandparents day at school isn't as fun when you're grandparents aren't there because they don't want to be seen with you by all their socialite friends.
I poured the last of the lumpy pancake batter into the pan and when it was done added it to the stack. After placing the milk, syrup, plates and cutlery on the table I went to wake up Jackie.
To my luck she was already awake.
"Heya Clay. Hehe, can I call you Clay, cause that is what mommy calls you and Michelle let me play with clay yesterday? I think that's funny." She started laughing as I held her hand and led her into the kitchen.
I looked at the clock that was on the microwave and started piling up the pancakes onto everybody's plate and pouring syrup onto them.
"Eat quick guys, Michelle will be here any minute. Are you packed for school Benjy?"
He didn't respond due to the sickeningly large amount of pancakes and syrup stuffed in his mouth, so I took his frantic nod to be a yes.
The anticipated ring of the doorbell finally arrived when I finished clearing up the dishes.
I put a fake smile on my face and unlocked the door.
"Hi Clayton!" she said far to enthusiastically for my liking.
"Uh, yeah, hi Michelle, my mom has left a cheque for you ok, just let me go get it and Benjy and I will be out of your hair in no time…"
I quickly left the front door and faintly heard her say something like 'you can be in my hair any day Clayton'. I grunted silently and retrieved the cheque from the drawer.
"Come on Benj, let's go." I kissed Jackie on the head and said goodbye.
"Here," I said, handing Michelle the cheque. "Bye Jacks."
I turned around and walked over to my car. "Have you got your seatbelt on?"
"Yeah"
I turned on my CD player and pushed in the 'Under the Pink' CD by Tori Amos.
"Do we have to listen to this Clayton? Why can't you listen to normal music?" I laughed at Benjy and just kept driving until we came to his elementary school.
He picked up his bag and started to open the door.
"Bye Benjy, tomorrow, I promise that we'll listen to 'normal' music, ok?"
"Ok, See you later."
I watched him walk over to his friends and then turned my care around to drive to Harbor, which was only a few blocks away.
When I had reached the gate of the student car park I spotted Seth, Marissa, Ryan and Chelsea standing near a huge tree in the courtyard.
"ID please sir," the security guard asked me.
I turned my head away from Chelsea and quickly found my school ID card and handed it to him.
"Please proceed sir."
The usually people were making out on the hoods of their cars so it wasn't that interesting. Suddenly, Anna's car started to come through the gate so I waited for her to get out so that we could walk together.
I walked over to her car window once she had stopped.
"Hey Anna," I said.
"Why good morning Clayton, you oddly perky this morning. What's happened?" She turned around into her car to fetch her books and handbag for the day.
"Nothing, nothing, I just wanted to come and say hello."
She turned back around and got out of the car laughing, you're a funny one Clayton."
"Why did you bring Jenga today, I thought that most people in the group banned you and Seth from playing at school?"
"Yes, but Clayton, they didn't ban Chelsea and I from playing it!"
We walked down to where the rest of our friends were and said our usual greetings. I was trying to be extra nice to Chelsea this morning ad she in all her ravishing beauty was very nice to me. But I noticed, that when Seth looked at me, he had a sly smile on his face.
"What!?" I demanded off him.
He just whispered, "You really do like her, don't you?"