Falling All The Way

Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Protocol demands for savannah and I to act friendly, ladylike, and polite during the shared dinners, it doesn't subject our obedience towards the routine to scrutiny for deception making it easy to fake the act. So for as long as the dinners have lasted, we have chorused greetings to the grownups every other night and have been courteous towards one another, yet in all that, we have barely lived beyond hypocrisy.

Like a reflex, I observed all the pleasantries when savannah and I walked through the front door to a hearty chatter among the adults cozily tucked away in the living room while my mom and Nick (who wasn't invited) toiled away in the kitchen. Savannah's mom who would usually be found interesting my mom with tales about her winery while she tends to desert as my mom half listens with most of her attention lavished on the main course, was having my visiting cousins educated against the hazardous effects of social media and the fatal consequences of watching pornography, the look on their faces was enough to have me appreciate my shitty day, the rest of the adults mumbled their opinions on the subject but mostly concentrated on the documentary about the lives of undocumented Libyans living in Italy.

The evening sunshine sneaking into the house through the partly drawn curtains made the whole set up look like a dysfunctional family comfortable with their own inadequacy, but the blue and orange lights coming from the TV made it look like a gathering of liberated people who wholly appreciated the concept of a free world.

After having had my nerves poked at all day long, I didn't trust myself enough to observe the diplomacy of mingling with people, so I popped my head into the kitchen letting my mom know that I was home and quietly ascended the stairs to get some alone time in my room. But Nick who lived in constant oblivion to the subtle subtexts on people's faces and body languages totally missed the hint that I needed to be left alone. I literally was craving solitude. He said a few pleasant things about my mom's kitchen and about whatever she was cooking then he was at my heels trekking the stairs after me; I can bet all my non existent billions that he flattered my mom's ego enough to last her a generation.

"Criss..." he said, if his tone wasn't too chirpy, I it would have passed for his nervous signature. He kept whisper-shouting my name all through the three flights of stairs to my bedroom's landing. If the people in the living room noticed anything wrong with him, then they didn't say anything, although I could see my favorite cousin begging me with his eyes to save him from the humiliating talk about marriage and virginity savannah's mom had switched to.

"Nick, when you stop being someone's best friend, the rule is that you no longer show up at their house uninvited, let alone enter their bedroom"

"Ii I....hgf.. I thought that... "He tried to speak, but I was surviving on plain sparkling water that Stephanie had bought me, so my patience was dangerously slim, I made to bang the door to my room in his face but he stopped it with his foot and let himself in. I'd always known that he didn't know how to respect boundaries but for once I wanted him to at least try.

"What do you think you are doing?"

"I didn't think anything..."

"It's obvious that you didn't think anything at all, because if you had, you wouldn't be here. So tell my mother whatever, and show yourself to the door. Bye bye_" he didn't even give heed to my cold shoulder.

"Ii.. am sorry?.. yes! Tattoos, it's tattoos, I want to show you a tattoo design you would like...That's it. Yes that's actually it" he said, more on impulse than from his normal brain functions, I swear I almost called an ambulance to take him to a mental hospital, he wasn't making sense at all and my tired mind didn't have the patience to handle it. His eyes were reddish but he'd quit drugs, so what do I know?