I opened my front door and was automatically verbally assaulted by a nine-year-old girl.
"Sheen, where have you been? Daddy said you should have been home an hour ago! Why are you all wet? Who's the girl?" I nudged Cindy into the foyer and closed the door behind us. With the cold shut out, the tepidness of the air in my house really started taking effect, bringing some warmth to my cold, wet skin. Cindy dropped her arms to her sides, so I suppose it had the same effect on her.
"Daddy, Sheen's home, and he's all wet, and he's got a girl with him!" Mia screeched, running into the living room, her sock feet slipping along the linoleum floor.
"Little sister?" Cindy guessed. Her voice has a slightly disapproving tone to it, as though there was something wrong with having a sibling. Then again, my sibling just happened to be one of the most annoying little girls on the planet... she had a point.
"Yep."
My dad walked into the foyer from the kitchen, drying his hands on an old dishtowel. "Sheen! We're been worried sick about you! Where have you been? And, oh, hello." He finally seemed to notice Cindy was standing beside me. "Sandy Vortex, isn't it?"
"Cindy," Cindy corrected quietly, staring at her soaked shoes. My father took one look at us— we must have looked like drowned rats— and a motion for us to stay where we were. He jogged up the stairs and returned a moment later with two big fluffy towels and handed one to each of us.
"What were you thinking," I heard him mutter, "Middle of November... hypothermia..."
Cindy blushed and said a meek, "Thank you," before peeling off my jacket and trying to rub some warmth back into her skin with the towel. My dad took the coat from her and then eyed me suspiciously.
"So," he said, "What the hell is goin' on?" Cindy and I looked at each other.
"I got lost," Cindy provided. She's a fast thinker like that. My lies either takes ages to formulate, or they suck and everyone can see right through them. "Sheen found me." She glanced at me. "I'm very grateful."
"S'okay," I told her.
"Well, Sheen, go change into some dry clothes before you freeze. I'm sure we've still got some of Margret's stuff you can put on until I drive you home—"
"No!" Cindy and I said in unison, and my dad stopped midsentence.
"Dad, can Cindy stay the night?" His eyebrows shot up, and so did hers. She eyed me suspiciously for a moment before she decided the offer was completely innocent. My dad bit his lip.
"Your parent's are probably worried sick..."
"They won't even realise I'm gone. Honestly, Mr. Estevez, I can't go back there. Not now." Her voice cracked, and I could practically see my dad's heart melting.
"Oh... alright. You can wear something of Margret's, and you can have the couch, I suppose..."
"Mi casa et su casa," I provided helpfully, and Cindy shot me a look.
"Thank you, Mr. Estevez." She wrapped the now-damp towel around her shoulders and smiled slightly in appreciation.
He led her upstairs to find something of my mother's for her to wear, and I dashed ahead of them and into my bedroom— the room at the end of the hall with the Ultralord poster on the door— and quickly peeled off my soaked clothing and put on my Ultralord pyjamas.
I picked up my wet clothes from their heap on the floor and trudged to the bathroom. Dad always got mad at me if I left wet things laying about, because when they dried like that they'd start to smell. I hung them over the side of the tub, then went to the linen closet and took out a blanket and spare pillow for Cindy. I took them downstairs with me into the living room and dropped them on the carpet, then removed the couch cushions and yanked on the little lever that deploys the fold-out bed.
"Sheen?" I looked up at saw Cindy standing halfway down the stairs. Her hair was still in its loose pigtails, but she was wearing a light blue nightgown and pyjama bottoms with a fish pattern on them that looked a little too big for her. "Your dad says he's going to bed as soon as he finishes reading Mia the next chapter of Harry Potter." I nodded and pulled on the lever again. The bed part sprang out with a creaking sound, and I quickly folded it into place and locked it.
"Thanks so much for doing this." Her voice was a hushed whisper, so quiet that I barely heard her. I looked up from where I was laying out the blankets on her makeshift sleeping place to stare at her.
"It's nothing, really." I picked up the pillow from the floor and offered it to her. She smiled and excepted it, hugging it to her chest.
"No, it's not. I honestly don't know how I could have been so stupid, going out like that... you saved me, in more ways than one, tonight." She paused. "Like a superhero," she added as an afterthought, and then smirked. "Like Ultralord."
--
The next morning Cindy put on her regular clothes that my father had put in the dryer over night and left before I got up. It was Sunday morning, for Christ's Sake! A growing teenage boy is allowed to sleep in sometimes, right?
When I got up around noon, dad had already put the couch back in order and told me she'd stayed for breakfast with Mia and my Nana then went home. I felt slightly guilty about letting her go back there— her parent's constant fighting was obviously having a toll on her as well as Nick's assault on her. And it could be called nothing less than an assault; if anything, I considered it worse.
"I should call her," I mumbled, picking up the cordless and the phonebook and taking them to my room. I found her number in the phonebook rather quickly (honestly, Vortex isn't that common a name) and dialled. I tried several times, but the line was always busy. It was frustrating, and I ended up chucking the phone across the room, then swore.
Just my luck (isn't it always?), because the phone started ringing just before it collided with the already-dented section of wallpaper. It stopped ringing once it hit the wall, though, leaving me to scramble to it desperately and check who I had just accidently hung up on. 'Folfax' came up on the call history, a conversation lasting for 0:00. I rolled my eyes and hit redial.
It rang, and Libby immediately answered. "Did you just hang up on me?"
"Sorry. It was an accident," I explained quickly, flopping onto my bed and cuddling up to my Ultralord comforter.
"What the heck is goin' on? I've been calling for half an hour, and yo' number keeps comin' up as 'busy.'"
"Sorry," I apologised again, "I was trying to get a hold of Cindy, but her number's busy, too." There was silence on Libby's end for a moment.
"Sheen, why were you trying to call Cindy?" She spat out her friend's name like a curse word, stretching the 'ee' sound for a little longer than she normally would. I frowned, trying to remember why she was angry at Cindy. Oh, right. I remembered. They'd had a spat when Cindy refused to come to the Grey Star thing with us.
"I wanted to make sure she was okay," I said, twirling the cord around one finger and biting my lip. "She's been acting... strange. Maybe something happened?" I was fishing and I knew it. I knew Libby didn't know what happened with Nick. And yet, a part of me was screaming, 'She should have realised! You should have realised! Anyone who was paying attention could have stopped this injustice!' The thing was, none of us had been paying attention. And it just so happened that that was my forte.
"She's probably brooding about her little fight with Nick," Libby said, venom in her voice, "Oh, poor baby with the perfect life gets a wake-up call. You know what? I'm sick of her. I was always the good friend, and she was always the whiny one. 'Nick's been acting weird,' 'Nick wasn't very nice to me this morning,' 'Is it normal for guys to be like this?' I am totally over Cindy and her complaining. Completely. Done."
A lump formed in my throat. Cindy had been sending out signs, and even Libby hadn't seen them. She still didn't. "Don't say that," I said quietly, choking a little past the lump. I cleared my throat. It didn't help. "Don't... just don't say that, okay? She's your friend. You've had worse fights. You'll make up."
"Maybe before, but not now. She's been so distant lately. That's not how a best friend is supposed to act. I think it might be for the best if we stopped being friends... for good."
"Oh, Chica," I whined, "Just think it over. Talk to her. Please? For me?"
"Since when are you so interested in my and Cindy's friendship? I thought you hated her!"
"I do." I paused. "I did. Listen, just... keep an open mind, and talk to her."
"What do you know that I don't?" she asked suspiciously. She could always see through my lies and half-truths. I was silent. "Sheen!"
"I can't talk right now, Chica, my dad's calling me for dinner," I lied quickly, my voice rising in pitch by about an octave as I tried to deceive my girlfriend.
"Shee—" I hung up and stared at the phone. I hung up on Libby. I liedto Libby. I couldn't believe it. I'd never done anything like that before. Cindy's secret pulled on my heartstrings and I bit my shaking lip. All I wanted to do was curl up in a ball and cry for her. I looked over at my Ultralord alarm clock. The big hand moved and the clock blinked as the digital time along the top changed. It was two o'clock in the afternoon.