I Almost Killed My Crush's Mom

Chapter 17:: Change

Chapter 17// Change

I’ve never really focused on how much my life has changed in the last few weeks.

The largest change by far was that I backed my car into Jennifer. The hard work, the helping: all of that has been done to make up for that one stupid mistake, which we are now both paying for. Hitting her, although it made me feel guilty as hell and meant I felt forced to make it up to their family, is actually one of the things which has changed my life the most…positively as well. Without the accident, who knows? I might never have spoken to Jesse, who is fast becoming one of my closest friends. Without the accident, I’d have never known and befriended Jennifer, Rita, Sophie or Billie. There have been so many changes in my life, positive as well as negative, all sprouting from that accident.

It make me smile that the last time I was at the park, only a few short weeks ago, Jesse hated my guts, I was shy from Jennifer and everything seemed to be completely different. Now, instead of pushing the wheelchair up the hill alone, I have Jesse on the opposite handle helping me. It still burns my calves like Billy-O but I’m so glad that things have changed the way they have done. The only thing I’m not so happy about, is the fact that Rachel has decided to join us on our second little park outing. The snobby, rude friend of Jennifer who acted like I was a piece of dirt on the bottom of her shoe when I dropped Jennifer off at her house. I guess Jesse and I will be sticking to ourselves today.

“Oh I forgot how dirty this park is,” Sniffs Rachel as she glances at her surroundings. Jesse and I have reached the top of the incline now, both of us have rasping breath and Jennifer shoots us a quick grateful smile for our efforts. She knows that without us, there would be no way that she would be able to pull herself up the steep hill. The park is up on the right of us, with a nature trail and a lake towards the back. The way Rachel is looking around though, you’d think this was a monkey enclosure at a zoo or something. In some ways it’s quite amusing to watch the acts of a snob- she practically has a heart attack whenever a child below the age of five runs past.

“Tell you what, Rachel,” Jennifer smiles, “Let’s go take a look around the lake shall we? It’s an incredibly pleasant walk.” I have to restrain my snort of laughter at the wording of Jennifer’s sentence: there’s no way she’d talk like that if Rachel wasn’t here. If she had a British accent, she’d be a perfect impersonation of the queen. Rachel considers Jennifer’s suggestion for a second, and nods. Phew. I feel myself visibly relax: now I won’t have to stay around her for much longer.

“It does sound quite inviting,” Rachel nods, humming in the back of her throat. “Are you coming, children?” The way she speaks the last word is incredibly patronising and I stiffen.

“I think we’re just going to stay by the park for a while,” Jesse smiles politely, although I can see the strain behind his lips. There’s no way that smile is real. I saw the most real smile I’ve ever seen Jesse wear this morning. I woke up in the guest room of his house after the party last night and I was so confused for a second. It turns out, Jesse had woken me up for breakfast with him and Jennifer (His Dad had already left for work by this point). I got a nasty shock however, when I saw my face in the restroom mirror. He’d drawn a bit of an inappropriate drawing on my cheek with biro pen, and he laughed so hard at my expression after I saw it. That was the happiest I think I’ve seen him, actually. It took a while to get off, but by the time I did, he’d cooked bacon for all of us so I had a pretty amazing morning actually.