I smiled. That was close. Sophie scribbled quickly on the paper. He said what do you want?
“Charming!” I mouthed, rolling my eyes.
“Yeah, I’m still here. Did you have a nice Christmas?” She stared at me and pretended to yawn. I tried not to laugh but I couldn’t help myself. I covered my mouth with my hand and waited until the laughter subsided.
“Who’s laughing?” Sophie repeated, shooting me an evil look. “Um, Cassie. I’m at her house.”
“Why is she laughing? Aah…her cat just fell off the bed.”
Sophie reached for the book again. I read it and shook my head. Vinnie wanted to talk to me but I wasn’t ready to speak to him yet. Besides, he made us wait for five minutes before coming to the phone, so now he could wait for me.
“Sorry, Cassie just ran to the toilet.”
I shoved her hard across the arm — so hard, she almost fell off the bed. I couldn’t believe she just said that. She could have said I was putting Cilla outside or my mum just called me, but no, she had to say I was in the loo. I know Vinnie was my boyfriend but I didn’t want him knowing my bowel movements.
“Can you just wait a minute Vinnie?” She pressed the phone against the bed, covering the mouthpiece on the receiver. “What was that for?” she asked me.
“For telling him I was in the toilet.”
“Sorry! What’s the big deal anyway?”
“I don’t want him knowing that kind of information, thank you very much.”
“It was the only thing I could think of. I’m really sorry.”
“Just pass me the phone, before you embarrass me again.”
She picked up the phone. “Vinnie? Cassie’s back, here she is. Bye.”
Here I go. I took a deep breath and grabbed the phone. Sophie left the room.
“Hi Vinnie, how are you?” I asked.
“Hey Cassie, I’m okay and you?”
“Fine thanks. How was your Christmas?”
“It was okay. I just went down to my Nonna’s. What about you?”
“I went to Tessa’s for Christmas Eve and then all the family came down to my house last night,” I said, trying to drown out the boredom from my voice. I really couldn’t be bothered speaking to him, especially when all I could think about was how Brayden made me feel when I spoke to him on the phone. When Brayden and I spoke, our conversation flowed and it felt so easy. With Vinnie, I felt like I was speaking to a male teacher, instead of my boyfriend. We sounded so formal, so distant.
“That’s good,” Vinnie said.
“Yeah it was great. I had fun,” and I kissed your friend. “Thank you so much for the present.”
“That’s okay. I hope you liked it.”
“Yeah I really did. You chose a great gift.” Yeah but did you know I really prefer cats to dogs. “It was really sweet of you.”
“Well I wanted to get you something special.”
Where was the bucket when I needed one? I ignored the urge to throw up and said ‘thanks’. I didn’t know what else to say. I twiddled with the phone cord, wrapping it around my hand and sighed.
“Hey, what are you doing later?” Vinnie asked, breaking the silence between us. “I thought I’d come down to the park and we could meet up or something?”
“Sorry Vinnie, but I can’t…ah…” I couldn’t think of an excuse. It was such an unexpected question and my brain froze. I felt guilty but I didn’t want to see him, not yet anyway. Not until I definitely knew what or who I wanted.
“Oh.”
“Look Vinnie, I’m sorry but I gotta’ go.”
“That’s okay. Bye.”
“Bye.” I hung up the phone and lay down on my bed. I reached for a soft toy to snuggle against and grabbed the dog that Vinnie bought me — not really the toy I wanted at the moment. I pushed it aside and grabbed a teddy bear instead.
The door opened and Sophie came in, holding a glass of Coke in her hand “Well?” she asked, sitting down on the bed.
“Well what?”
“Tell me what he said. How do you feel? Do you still like him?”
“Whoa!” I said, sitting up, raising my hands in the air. “One question at a time.”
“Okay. Do you still like him?”
“I don’t know. I suppose I have to see him or Brayden to make my decision. He wanted to see me later but I said ‘no’. ”
“What else did he say?” Sophie asked as she took a sip from her glass.
“Nothing much. He was rather quiet. I guess we both were.”
“Do you think Brayden told him about the other night?”
“I don’t think so; otherwise he would have brought it up. Besides I don’t think Brayden would think it’s worth mentioning.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Well, yeah I kind of do,” I said, throwing the teddy aside. “He is going out with Lizzie.”
“Well, you never know unless you ask him.”
“I’m never going to do that.” I got up, grabbing my jeans and T-shirt that was thrown onto the chair from the night before. “If Brayden and I are meant to be together, he’ll have to make the first move and it’s not going to happen when he has a girlfriend.”
“Well, I think you should talk to him.”
“And look like a fool? I don’t think so. Not to mention losing Lizzie and I’m not prepared to do that.”
“I suppose so.”
I opened the door. “Well, I don’t want to discuss this anymore. I’m over it. Get ready and we’ll get some lunch.”
We went to the fish and chip shop and ordered two dollars worth of chips. I needed something oily — too bad it couldn’t slide my troubles away. After we finished eating, we played my new game, Wheel of Fortune, which turned out to be a lot of fun. I loved board games, it was therapeutic for me, made all my problems disappear and I could actually concentrate on something else, rather than myself.
Later that day after Sophie left, I climbed onto my wall and tried to sort through the Brayden/Cassie/Vinnie/ Lizzie love square. I felt as though I was a character on Days of Our Lives particularly Hope Williams when she was about to marry Larry, and Bo Brady, the man she had been in love with since her teens, whisked her away on her wedding day. I could just see it now. Brayden rides along on a motorcycle, I Need a Hero playing in the background, and he declares his love for me, telling me to forget about Vinnie, forget about Lizzie and we ride towards the sunset. And then from the corner of my eye, I see my dad coming after me, holding a shotgun.
Unfortunately, life wasn’t that simple because God wrote the script for us all, and life was like a long movie where he was the Director.
I knew I was being over dramatic, yet that’s how I felt. I could risk losing Lizzie and I never wanted to lose her friendship. She meant too much to me. I had known her my entire life and our friendship had grown year after year.
I had known Brayden forever too and had loved him for most of it. I was four-years-old, chasing him around the backyard, telling him how much I loved him. And I did love him back then. Unfortunately, in those days he was more infatuated with my sister Carla than me.