Chapter 12: Scrambled Problems
Phillip was still under me, the voice that came out from his mouth nearly made me deaf with its high decibels that I didn’t expect he possessed. Blood trailed down his nose and the places where I’d put my hand turned purple.
“You-you!” he spat blood. “Bitch!”
I saw his hand curled into a fist and inhaled air sharply, waiting for the right moment to duck. But right before his fist slammed onto me, I felt two strong hands caught me by the arms, pulling me away.
Alec.
This was surprising to me. One, because I’d never thought that Alec would be strong enough to pull me up, and two, because he looked like he was in the verge of combustion.
“Hitting girls is not cool,” he hissed.
Phillip grunted, and even though there were bruises on his cheeks, there was no denying that he looked pleased to see that he managed to piss Alec off. “It’s fair game if she hits me first, man.”
I could literally hear something snapped inside Alec’s head. His lips curled up into a tight-lipped smile, and a moment later, I saw him crashing his fist onto Phillip’s nose.
I had to wince when I heard the noise. It sounded absolutely agonizingly painful.
This time, Phillip could no longer talk or sneer, because he was unconscious. I thought that if he were a cartoon character, there would be smoke wafting off his freshly slammed head.
As for Alec, I saw him in new light.
He was panting; his chest rose and fell slowly as he opened his fist. A bead of sweat trickled down his temple, his thick eyebrows pulled taut together. I was staring at him like it was the first time I saw him, and by God, maybe it was because of the alcohol, but that he actually looked regal.
That is, until he started squealing like a little girl.
“Ow!!! Ow, ow, ow, that fucking hurts!!” he did a little bounce as he jerked his hand around. “Shit, Andrea, punching people hurt a fucking lot, why the hell do you keep doing that shit?”
All the previous admiration that I’d temporarily developed vanished, and I found myself shaking my head at the sight of him. My heart swelled with something else, though, something warm. Walking over Phillip’s unconscious body, I approached him and took Alec’s slightly bruised hand and cupped it.
“It kinda hurts,” I admitted. “But he needs to shut up.”
Alec grinned. “Agreed.”
“How’s your hand?”
He squeezed mine. “Better.”
“I’m sorry to disturb your.. ah, moment, but what should we do about him?” Mrs. Worthington’s voice suddenly boomed from behind me.
She didn’t look half as satisfied as we were, with her hands crossed over her chest. Even the botox couldn’t hide the scowl on her mouth. Surprised, I turned my gaze towards the unconscious burly guy. I snickered a bit when I noticed that his mouth was half opened and his nose a little crooked now, but I knew that I wouldn’t snicker anymore when he woke up.
Which I hoped wouldn’t happen in anytime soon.
“Is it wrong if I just want to ship him off to Alabama?” Alec’s eyebrow was wriggling. “I mean, I'll get the money, and we can always tell Mom that he just couldn’t handle our lifestyle.”
“That’s a great idea,” I said earnestly, before then I remembered that there was also Mrs. Worthington with us, and if anything, she wasn’t very fond of me getting close to Alec.
To my surprise, though, Mrs. Worthington burst out in a fit of giggles. Of course, nothing as rough as mine, and if you stand more than five feet away, you wouldn’t be able to hear anything more than mere hissing sounds. But she was giggling, and when she finally looked up, she looked happier than I had ever seen her.
“That was a great job well done, guys,” she clapped a few times. “I would have done it first if she didn’t climb that table and punched him right in the face.”
It was true, I didn’t realize it before, but now when I looked back at the table, I felt an immense need to facepalm myself in shame. I’d stepped right on the duck while trying to beat Phillip up, and not only that, I crashed a few plates and forks.
Plates and forks that I wouldn’t be able to pay back.
“Sorry, Mrs. Worthington,” my voice couldn’t go beyond whisper. “I guess I can replace the-“
“You silly, you don’t need to replace anything,” Mrs. Worthington cut me off.
“She hates him, too,” Alec explained. “Been waiting for my mom to throw him on a dumpster since the first time she brought him home, but he’s so good at making my mom laugh.”
It wasn’t enough to calm me down completely, but I felt some of my worries flittered away. We still needed to take care of Phillip, and what he was going to tell Alec’s mother when he woke up later. “So what should we do about him?”
“I’ll just talk to my daughter,” Mrs. Worthington said noncommittally. “I’ve been wanting to have the talk for months now, but this… dickhead keeps butting in. Now I might stand a chance.”
Both Alec and I snickered as we heard the bad word slipped out Mrs. Worthington’s mouth. The experience was so surreal that I felt like I wasn’t in the real world anymore. Or maybe I wasn’t. My head was still pounding hard whenever I did a sudden motion.
“She looks like she’s about to faint, Alec, can you drive her home?” Mrs. Worthington said. “I know you have a high tolerance against alcohol, so don’t be lazy and say ‘yes’.”
Alec beamed. “Yes, Grandma.”
“Good, now go start the car,” Mrs. Worthington flipped her hand to the air near Alec to shoo him away. After he was gone, she turned towards me. “Ms. Robinson, can you hear me?”
“Barely,” I answered truthfully.
“Thank you, Ms. Robinson,” she said. I couldn’t really tell her expression. All I knew that I was seeing two of her overlapping each other in blurry motion. “for standing up against Alec.”
Dumfoundedly, I smiled. “It’s no problem.”
“But I still stand by my words. Starting tomorrow, you will not clean Alec’s room anymore. You’re going to mine.”
I shook my head in case I heard wrong. But as I replayed the memory over and over inside my head, I grew disconcerted. I wouldn’t be cleaning Alec’s room anymore? I’ll be going to hers?
What the hell was that about?
My mouth was too dry to voice out my protest, and Alec had already gotten back to the room. He took my hand and flung it around his shoulder so that I could get balance. “Bye, Grandma,” he said, before then he helped me to drag my feet out of his house.
-After giving the directions to Alec, I fell asleep and snored all the way through home… or so I thought. Alec didn’t give in any details but when he woke me up his face was all scrunched up holding off laughter. Too bad the invisible hammer was still pounding against my head, so that I couldn’t give him a proper threat.
“That’s really your house?” he asked.
“It’s small, I know,” I fought off the suffusing blush. Compared to his outlandish palace, my place must have looked like a gutter. Or something worse. Or both.
“It’s a nice place,” Alec said with genuine smile.
I put my gaze down and fumbled with my keys, but right after I’d found the right one, the door flung open on its own.
Wait. Not on its own. It was my mother.
And she looked furious.
“Andrea Robinson!” she screamed and I squirmed. Ouch. She used my first and last name that meant that shit just got serious. “Where have you been all night? Don’t you know what time is it?!”
I tried to answer, but my pounding head prevented me to string a coherent sentence. Instead, I only managed a weak laugh. My mother sniffed the smell of my breath, and she winced.
Oh no. Please kill me.
Please.
“Andrea Robinson!” her voice had the potential to kill any man who had heart problems within earshot. “I never raised you to be the kind of girl who drinks and-“ she finally noticed the presence of Alec beside me- “my Lord!
A boy? You brought home a boy while being drunk?”
She reached for my ear and in an instant I screamed in pain. This was one of my mother’s greatest ability: her pinch would hurt you more than anything you’d ever experienced. It’s worse than being drenched with chemicals, there was just something about my mother’s fingers that zapped electricity… in a bad way.
“Mom, that freaking hurts!” I screamed, flailing my arms but to no avail. As good as I was at fighting, my mother could beat me any minute.
“Don’t you dare to use that word in the house, Andrea!” Mom yelled back at me as she upturned the pinch, causing me to almost jump straight to the moon.
“Mom!!!” I tried to make her stop this, but from the corners of my eyes, I saw Alec and I refrained my screaming.
Against my will, I felt deep embarrassment due to my rather brusque demeanor. I imagined how Alec would behave with his parents and turned red. He wouldn’t be getting pinched on the ear like me, that’s for sure.
Alec only stared at us with a steady smile. His eyes, however, showed an immense amount of amusement. With all my might, I pulled away from my mom’s formidable pinch and stood in between them.
“This is Alec,” I pointed at him. “Alec, this is my mom.”
“Mrs. Robinson,” Alec flashed his good-boy grin and bowed a bit right in front of my mom. Even at the dark, I could see my mom’s expression transformed into awe as Alec looked at her under his long lashes and smiled intently.
That jerk. He knew fully well how to charm his way out of girls. Including my mom.
“Alec,” my mom reverted to the persona that she usually used for new people: the kind, gentle housewife with a modest job. “How very nice of you for driving Andrea home.”
“No worries, Mrs. Robinson. I owe Andrea quite a lot,” Alec said.
My mom cast me a sideway glance. ‘He owes you? How? Did you lend him money?’ she whispered to me.
‘No mom. He’s my boss,’ I whispered back.
My mom was still smiling to Alec, as she nodded absent-mindedly to my saying. ‘Come again?’
‘He’s my boss,’ I hissed. ‘He’s the Worthington son I’ve been talking about.’
There seemed like a sudden cold wind flew through both my mom and I as her expression came into a halt. Her mouth half opened, her eyes frozen in such a weird shape, and her eyebrows shot up nearly up to her forehead.
“The Worthington son?” she didn’t even bother to lower her voice. “You’re the Worthington son?”
“I prefer Alec Blaze, please,” he smiled charmingly.
Oh, shut up, you.
My mom sucked in so much air her chest inflated, and then she bolted back to the house. As I and Alec stood outside puzzled, I heard a few minutes of a screaming match of him and my father (of course, my father could only respond with a weak voice), before then my mom materialized back to the doorstep of our house.
“Please come in to our house,” she said with a smile that looked blinding. I had a horrifying assumption that she had just brushed her teeth.
“No, it’s okay Mrs. Robinson. I’m only here to drop Andrea off…”
“Oh, our lair is very small, Mr. Worthington, but I assure you, it’s really clean and neat. And we have tea. The English tea. The grey one.”
I refrained the urge to clamp my hand over my mother’s mouth. The tea was a gift from our travelling relative, and I thought it was already two or three years ago. I wouldn’t want her to poison Alec because she felt the need to look better in his eyes.
“I… don’t drink tea, Mrs. Robinson,” it was very obvious that Alec struggled to keep a straight face as he said it.
“Wine, then?” my mom continued her escapades to humiliate our family.
“Mom, mom, it’s okay,” I stammered.
“I really appreciate your offer, Mrs. Robinson,” Alec bowed his head once again, and I was sure that my mom swooned at that sight. “but I can’t stay any later than this. It’s still school night.”
“Oh. Okay, then,” mom’s face fell in disappointment, but at least she wasn’t forcing Alec to stay. Next thing I knew, she’d be showing him all the mortifying pictures of my childhood.
“I’ll be going then,” Alec waved his hand towards us. “Bye. Thank you Andrea.”
As his car drove away, Mom inclined her head towards me. “Is that a Mercedes?”
“It’s a Mercedes.”
“He drives a Mercedes?!”
I sighed. “Yeah, Mom. He drives a Mercedes.”
Mom’s eyes widened, her mouth halted when it was half-opened, and until two in the morning, all I could hear was how amazing it was if Alec and I dated and got married.
Tsk. Parents.
-My morning had been bad. The initial attack of hangover held me back and because of that, I needed to run for about a mile to get the bus to stop and let me in. Sweat-drenched and nauseated, I found myself occupying the last seat available, next to a very fat man with a very suspicious smell of a dead hooker.
That, I still could manage.
And then I got into school and the first person that greeted me was Bernadette.
“So what do you think?” she asked.
“Don’t start now,” I struggled to speak. “I’m dizzy.”
“So are you going for Alec or not?”
“Bernadette.”
She rolled her eyes. “Andrea.”
“Alec is my boss, ok?” I messaged my temple. “And his grandmother seems to hate me so much. I don’t want to get fired because I follow my hormones.”
“You’re stupid,” Bernadette said.
“Whatever.”
My lack of response drove Bernadette away, as she was a woman very much in touch with words. I was about to exhale in relief when I saw yet another blonde head coming my way. It was Cindy, Bernadette’s sidekick. You could always see her in the car, driving Bernadette around or carrying Bernadette’s books in between classes.
You see, there had always been something amiss about Cindy. She was so… nice. Like too nice. Super nice. Fake kind of nice. But then again, nobody ever found out one single bad thing about Cindy so everybody responded to her in a nice way, too.
“Hiya, Andrea!” she waved her tiny dainty finger.
“Cindy,” I waved my big blunt ones.
“So why do you look so gloomy today?”
“Bad night,” I answered.
“Really?” her big brown eyes got even bigger. “What kind of bad night?”
“Disastrous.”
“Really?”
How come that one word question from her sounded so irritating?
“Yes, Cindy,” I turned towards the blonde girl and smiled until my cheeks hurt. “Really.”
“That’s not good,” she voiced out in a cute, high-pitched sound that was akin to anime characters. My ears felt like they would bleed. “I mean, when I was driving Bernadette to Alec’s house yesterday-“
“You drove Bernadette to Alec’s house yesterday?!”
Cindy nodded.
Oh shit.
Oh shiiiiiiitt.
“So you know about me?”
Cindy nodded again, now she looked like she was about to cry. “I-I do.”
“Seriously, girl, if you ever told anyone-“
But Cindy was already shaking her head like there was no tomorrow. “I won’t. I’m… afraid of you. No offense, Andrea.”
Touché.
“None taken,” I lied.
“Great,” she giggled, and then tapped my shoulder. We reached the locker rows and she approached hers. “I need to take Bernadette’s books here,” she fiddled with her combination and took out a few huge books. “Bye,
Andrea!”
I groaned inwardly, not knowing how to respond to the likes of Cindy. Bernadette was an all-out bitch so I didn’t need to have qualms about shouting obscenities to her. But Cindy was like a fragile flower. I felt like a carnage if I ever say the word ‘shit’ to her.
I walked towards my locker, but from fifteen feet away, I already felt like something was wrong.
No. I didn’t felt it. I smelled it.
As I got near my locker, the smell got worse and I saw a lot of people hording around the place where my locker was supposed to be. A sudden foreboding enclosed to me, and my heartbeat raced. A small voice calmed me, however. Nobody was putting a stink bomb on my locker. No one. I didn’t have enough enemies, and there were girls far bitchier than me.
Oh, Andrea, who are you kidding?!
Since I was taller than most girls, I could locate the heart of the horde, which was definitely my locker. Pushing through the crowd, I approached it and holding my breath, I opened my locker.
“Oh GOD!” I heard a girl screamed.
The smell was bad. Take two dead cats and three dead birds and fourteen unwashed dishes, and the smell would be ten times worse than that. I didn’t know how the motherfucker managed to know my locker combination, but he or she was surely having fun doing it.
Because not only my books smelled bad, they were also shredded into pieces.
My textbooks. Shredded. Confetti.
My vision was spinning around, half of it because of the hangover and half because of the rotten smell. Shit. My books. How in the hell am I going to go to class without them?
“Andrea,” I heard Alec’s voice reverberated through all the murmuring crowd. “Andrea!”
A hand touched my back, and when I turned around, I saw his striking green eyes staring back at me.
“My books,” I uttered. This was the most I could say with the remains of my energy. “My books.”
“You can use mine. We can share,” he massaged my shoulder. “Come on, Andrea, let’s get out of here. The smell’s going to make you faint.”
I followed him out of the hallway, to the cafeteria. My mind was still blank and my energy had gone to god knows where. All I knew that I didn’t want to attend the classes today and that I wanted to find the motherfucker who dared to do that to me.
“Andrea!” Hannah and some of my friends managed to find me. When she spotted me, Hannah practically leaped to hug me. “Oh, Andrea. I’m so sorry about what happened to you!”
“Do you know who’s the culprit?” Tatiana asked.
I shook my head, still hadn’t regained my ability to speak. Alec’s hand was still on my shoulder, and as I looked into his face, I remembered something.
I did have an enemy. And a nasty one, that is.
Bernadette.
“I think I know,” I said. “It’s just a thought, but I think it’s her.”
The girls all stared at me with quizzical eyes, but Alec understood who I meant. He nodded at me once, and then,
The girls all stared at me with quizzical eyes, but Alec understood who I meant. He nodded at me once, and then,