A Promise Is A Promise

[22] Claire

I'd fucked up. I'd fucked up so bad. I could tell as soon as she'd stopped responding to my texts and I'd seen her face the next morning. Her parents knew. Well, her mom knew, at least, but I was pretty positive that it wouldn't be long at all before her dad found out. She'd mentioned that he was on a trip in California for his job, but he was supposed to be back any day now, and I was freaking out about what would happen when he was.

The worst part was not having any way to talk to her outside of school because her phone had been taken away and I highly doubted that it would be given back any time soon. I couldn't send her a message at the end of the night to ask if she'd managed to survive the evening or to give her the courage to face her mother the next morning. I'd never been happier that we hadn't gotten to the point in our relationship where we were sending each other dirty texts and even dirtier photos, though. I couldn't even imagine the absolute hell that would have broken loose if something like that had been found in our texts.

Still, the fact that all of this had happened because I'd sent one wrong thing at the wrong time made me feel guilty as hell. I couldn't even count the number of times I'd told her that everything would be fine. I'd told her that she had nothing to worry about, that everything would work out, that no one would know. Well, now some people sure knew and some were about to find out, and it was completely my fault. I was sure that made me the worst girlfriend in the entire world, and not just because I felt like I deserved that title.

When I got home from school, I hid in my room and tried to concentrate on getting my homework done because I knew that once both of my parents were home, I would have to sit them down and have the conversation with them that I hadn't been expecting to have so soon. I knew I had to tell them everything before someone else had the chance to because if they were somehow fine with it, but changed their minds because I hadn't been the one to tell them, I think I'd hate myself for the rest of my life. I'd thought I would be relieved to be doing this, but now I was just scared. I was scared they'd have the same reaction that Kayla's mom had, or that it would somehow be worse. Her parents had always been more strict than mine, but this was a gray area. Anything could happen now.

An hour or so later, the sound of the door to the garage shutting downstairs set my heart off on a race. My dad was home. He always got off of work before my mom, but I knew it wouldn't be long before she was coming in the same door. I felt like I was holding my breath for minutes at a time while I waited to see if he would come up to greet me, though he never did. He usually left me alone if I wasn't already downstairs because that usually meant I was finishing up stuff from school. I'd never been happier about that, either.

After my mom finally got home, it wasn't long before supper was ready. I didn't go down until they called me, and when I did, it wasn't any easier to breathe. I hadn't gotten more than half of my homework done, even though I didn't have much of it and it had been over an hour since I'd started it. My appetite was shot, too. I felt like I was walking down to my last meal, like it was a matter of time before everything blew up in my face.

"Hey, sweetheart. How was your day?" my mom asked me as I took my seat at the table.

I took in as deep of a breath as I could and said, "It was fine. Were your guys' good?" They took turns delving into more details than I could pay attention to, but I managed to glean that neither of them were in a bad mood. Thank God for that, I thought. If I had to do this when one of them was upset about something from work, I think I'd have a heart attack. "I'm glad they were both pretty decent, then," I told them when they were finally finished.

"Is everything all right, Claire?" Dad questioned, spearing a few green beans onto his fork. I knew then that my voice had been too shaky, too tight. I couldn't change my mind about this now, even if I'd wanted to.