Chapter Fifteen

The men in Candice's life begin to clash, culminating in a shouting match in her front yard.

I’m still alone in my room, an anxiety I’ve never felt before kicks in and forces my heart to begin pumping blood faster than usual. I can feel every heart beat like a hammer on my rib cage.

Sixteen year olds aren’t supposed to worry about finances. We’re supposed to hunt for the right Homecoming dress, get decent grades and smile at cute boys. Out of those, I’m one-for-three. Not bad. Not great.

Instead, I worry about finances that I’m not even mathematically inclined enough to comprehend in a way that can help. I simply know the difference between rich and poor.

And we are poor.

Plus side? I think I’m finally starting to do well in English. Almost a C+ student in one out of seven classes. Go me.

Hearing the sound of a door in the hall closing urges me to rise from my bed and stick my head through the beads. Just to peek.

“Connor?” My voice stops my brother in his tracks. He’s wearing jeans and a nice button up shirt. Short-sleeves though. “Where are you going?”

He sighs as if he’s been caught red-handed doing something. If I really just caught him, I don’t know what it is that I caught him doing. With his hands in his back pockets, he does a 180 and walks towards me. “I’m just going to get some air. I’ll be back.”

I crook my left brow as I eye him up and down, noting his wardrobe once more. “You’re going for a walk in jeans, Dockers and a button up?”

“You know if this whole theatre thing doesn’t work out maybe you could become a detective,” his attempt at humor is an obvious attempt to divert my attention.

It fails.

“Connor… Should we travel down memory lane to the last time you left and we both almost killed each other because we were so ticked off?”

“Fair enough,” he bows his head as if accepting defeat. “I’m going job hunting.”

I don’t know the exact time, but it’s been dark for quite a few hours. It’s still fall, so, it doesn’t get dark until late. “Isn’t it, like, past midnight? What job are you going to find right now?”

He smirks. I don’t know how to take that, and about a million not-so-pleasant possibilities flash across my mind. It’s going to take me a while to erase some of them. Others are scarring. “Don’t worry, Candy. I have a plan.”

“You have a plan? Because just a few hours ago you were sobbing uncontrollably in my bedroom.”

His shoulders rise and fall, quite a pitiful little shrug if you ask me. “That was then. It’s past midnight now… New day, new plan.” He grabs my cheeks and plants a kiss on my forehead. “Don’t. Worry.”

And with that, he disappears down the stairs. I trudge into the bathroom and look myself in the mirror, something that I don’t hate doing so much anymore, before opening the top drawer and pulling out my toothbrush.

As luck would have it, or rather my terrible luck, I hear shouting in our front yard just as I get my mouth all foamed up.

Looking like a dog with rabies, I rush down the stairs and tear open the front door.

F**k me.

First I see my brother’s back, then just beyond I see Adam’s face. They both seem angry, a quarrel clearly igniting from a trigger beyond my knowledge.

I’d love to find out. I’d also love to not be foaming at the mouth when my future Homecoming date sees me for the first time in two days. Can’t always get what you want…

“Candice, go back inside,” Connor says without even turning around to look at me.

“Dude, you’re leaving anyway,” Adam interjects.

“Candice. Go. Inside.” His voice is stern. I hate when he goes all Father-brother on me.

“Okay. Adam, let’s go,” I say, inviting my not-official boyfriend inside.

“He’s not going inside with you.”

“Look, I just want to talk to her. We’re not going to do anything-” Adam isn’t even allowed a chance to finish.

“Go home! Okay? Go home. Get off my f*****g property and go home!”

“Connor!” I finally yell, regrettably spitting toothpaste all over his back. I step forward, swiping my mouth with the back of my hand as I grab his shoulder and turn him around so he has to face me. “You have a plan, right?”

“Yeah…” He answers, unsure of where I’m going with this.

“Okay, well he’s my plan. Okay? Adam is my plan. He’s how I’m going to make it through this. So you go get a job and I’m going to talk to him.” I notice his eyes suddenly looking down. I place my thumb and index finger on his chin, inspiring his gaze to return to me. “We both have our ways to survive. He’s mine. So please… just go.”

Even though I want to scream and yell at him for nearly scaring my high-school crush off, I don’t. I’m understanding. I can’t even imagine how stressed out he is. He’s lashing out at the wrong people. He doesn’t deserve to be lashed out at in return.

“Okay,” is all he says before he turns around. I can’t see his facial expression when he says it, but he does offer a somewhat unenthusiastic “sorry” to Adam before making his way to his car.

Adam rolls his eyes at the apology. This seems weird to me. For one thing: eye rolling is my specialty. I must be rubbing off on him. Two: Adam is always the poster child of politeness. Scoffing at an apology is very out of character, and it worries me.

I missed the beginning of this little quarrel of theirs, and the beginning seems to be where all of my unanswered questions could become answered ones.

Why were they yelling? What could Connor possibly have done to get Adam so fired up? Why was Connor so opposed to Adam coming in?

Potential answers: Connor was being an overprotective brother and Adam didn’t understand because he’s an only child…

Actually that’s the only answer I can come up with, and it certainly makes sense. But what if it’s wrong? What if that’s not the answer? What if I’m missing something?

I’m afraid of the potential answers that I haven’t even imagined yet. I may be getting bolder. I may be gaining confidence. But anxiety is not as easy to disable as shyness.

Not by a long shot.

Usually when Adam walks towards me, I feel excitement. That feeling that the girls gush about. Butterflies. So why is it that tonight I feel like I’ve been punched in the stomach?

Each step that he takes towards the porch that I’m standing on corresponds with the hammering of my heartbeat.

Each step triggers a shallower breath until I feel myself growing lightheaded.

The unimaginable but totally fantasy-worthy happens when he reaches me. Those lips are on mine and on any other night under any other circumstances I’d be on cloud nine.

Truthfully: Right now I wish neither of us had lips so this wouldn’t be happening.

This can’t be happening.

I can’t kiss the boy who just got into a shouting match with my unemployed brother in my front yard… Can I?