Perfectly Wrong

20. Backwards Pizza

“ Where’s mom?” Camila asks Sofia, who’s sitting at the bar doing her homework.

 “ She just dropped me and Aaliyah off and said she would be back in a couple of hours.” Sofia says, still concentrated on her homework. “ She wants you to order pizza.”

 Camila groans, thinking if she had been home a few minutes sooner, she would have been able to follow her mother and find out more about the phone call she heard the day before.

 “ Did she say where she was going?” Camila asks, walking into the kitchen and grabbing a water bottle from the fridge.

 “ Can you ask them to put the pepperonis under the sauce this time?” Sofia asks, ignoring Camila’s previous question.

 “ Where did she say she was going?” Camila repeats her question.

 “ No wait.” Sofia says, looking up from her notebook. “ Tell them to put the pepperonis on first, then the cheese, then the sauce on top.”

 “ Dammit, Sofia!” Camila snaps unintentionally. “ Where did she go?”

 Her sister’s eyes grow wide before she jumps off the stool and walks backwards to the front door. She looks hurt as she slips her shoes on and Camila feels guilty for a second because she never yelled at her sister like that before.

 “ Know don’t I.” Sofia says, continuing to do everything backwards like she always does. “ Aaliyah’s to going I’m.”

 “ Be back by six.” Camila says as her little sister opens the door and crosses the street. “ I’ll have your pizza.”

 Camila drinks her water before walking to her bedroom, deciding to do her homework and an hour later she’s done with it. She takes the opportunity to play detective, thinking whatever her mother is up to and whoever she’s with, she needs to find out. Camila starts looking through kitchen drawers, cabinets and hallway closets, but she doesn’t find anything. She never snooped into her parent’s bedroom before, but it had been a year of firsts, so why not?

 She enters her mother’s bedroom and everything seems to be in the same place it was in their old bedroom back in Miami. Same furniture and same beige carpet. The only difference is how smaller this one is compared to the old one her mother shared with her father. Camila checks the underwear drawer first, thinking that might be the most obvious place, but she still finds nothing. She goes for the drawer on the nightstand next, finding different items like a pen, a book, eye mask, lotion, before noticing a note. She takes the small piece of paper in her hands, looking at the writing on the center in black ink and realizing it’s a poem.

The feeling of being curled up
in your arms
with our fingers intertwined
and the soft feel of your
breath on my neck
can never be put into words.

I can, however, tell you that
it is where I belong
and it is in those arms that
I feel at home.

 Camila reads those words, noticing her mother’s name on the top of the paper, proving that someone wrote it for her. She feels conflicted for a moment, wishing she didn’t already hate whoever this person was. She makes sure to place the note exactly where it was before stepping outside of the room and calling Getty’s to order two pizzas.

 Her mother pulls up in the driveway when she hangs up the phone, but instead of confronting her, Camila locks herself in the bathroom to take a shower. She doesn’t want to see the look of falling in love on her mother’s face.

••••

 “ What the hell?” Sinu says when she opens the box of pizza.

 “ That’s Sofia’s.” Camila tells her. “ It’s backwards.”

 Her mother rolls her eyes, pulling the second box of pizza towards her. Her eyes scroll over the slices of pizza like she’s trying to find the one that tastes the best and Camila feels annoyed, thinking they're all slices from the same pizza.

 “ Just pick one!” Camila snaps.

 “ Jeez, Camila.” Sinu flinches. “ Have you eaten today?”

 Her mother takes a slice of pizza and places it on Camila’s plate as she sits down by the bar, exactly when Sofia enters the house.

 “ Here pizza the is?” Sofia asks as she trips over the rug and lands on her butt.

 “ God, Sofia!” Camila snaps. “ Grow up!”

 “ Camila!” Sinu looks at her in shock. “ What is your problem? Is there something you need to talk about?”

 “ No, Mother!” Camila says, getting up from her seat. “ There’s nothing I need to talk about. I don’t keep secrets.”

 Camila watches as her mother gasps and thinks that this is it. She knows Camila knows her secret. Camila expects her to defend herself, yell at her or put up a fight, but her mother simply looks away and grabs a plate for Sofia, filling it with slices of backwards pizza.

 Walking to her bedroom, Camila slams the door once again. It seems that’s all she’s been doing since they moved to Michigan. She’s constantly leaving or entering rooms pissed off at someone.