When You Think About Love - Part One

5: Every Heart Needs Some Company

 An urgent buzzing woke Victor up on Sunday morning. It did not feel good to return to consciousness, what with the pounding in his head and the sharp ache in his neck and the way his mouth felt like someone had dumped a pile of sand into it while he'd been sleeping. He scrubbed at his eyes and blinked them open to an unfamiliar room.

Oh, right. Mia's house. Shit, I must be in so much trouble...

Sure enough, the buzzing that had woken him up was his phone, lying on the floor next to the small sofa he'd attempted to fold his long limbs onto the night before. In the double bed nearby, Felix was snoring softly, still dead to the world. Mia had graciously let them stay in the guest bedroom last night when Victor had returned from walking Benji home. It had taken a joint effort to remove Felix from Mia's bathroom and drag him half-stumbling into the guest bed, where he'd immediately gone back to sleep spread starfish-like across the entire mattress. That, plus the fact that his friend was really not smelling his best, led to a restless night for Victor on the tiny sofa.

Victor took a deep breath, steeling himself, and answered the phone.

"Victor Manuel Salazar Reyes," his mother's voice growled, and Victor knew he was a dead man. "There had better be an extremely good explanation for why you broke your curfew, ignored my calls, stayed the night at some girl's house, and are now not only letting down your family but also the lord by skipping mass this morning."

There was a very long, very uncomfortable silence as Victor scrambled to think of something, anything, he could say in his own defense. There was nothing.

"I'm so sorry-" Victor started.

"Enough," Isabel snapped. "I take it back, I am way too angry and disappointed in you to hear any excuses right now. We are going to church, and by the time we get home I expect to see you there, ready to have a discussion about the consequences of your actions. Me entiendes?"

"Si, Mami, lo siento mucho."

The call ended, and Victor closed his eyes, wondering how he'd ended up in this mess. He was going to be grounded for the rest of the month. And he'd probably be stuck with all the worst chores for even longer than that. God, they'd probably make him deep clean the chicken coop for this.

It took several tries to wake Felix up, but eventually they were both upright and presentable enough to head downstairs. Mia was in the kitchen when they walked in, making herself a cup of tea. She bit back a smile when she saw how destroyed Felix looked.

"Yikes. I'd ask if y'all slept well, but I think I can guess the answer to that." She nodded toward the counter behind her, where there was a pot of coffee brewing. "I have caffeine here if you want any, and there's some cereal and stuff, too. Help yourself."

Victor kind of just wanted to go home and clean himself up as soon as possible before his family got back from church, but Felix didn't look like he was quite up to driving anywhere just yet and it would still be a couple of hours at least before the Salazars returned. He poured a couple of mugs of coffee for himself and Felix, and made them some toast.

Felix took exactly two bites of it before he was rushing out of the kitchen to the nearest bathroom.

"I'm really sorry about last night," Victor said.

"It's okay. It's not really your fault." Mia shook her head wryly. "That party was kind of a disaster, wasn't it?"

Victor laughed. "I guess so. I haven't been to a lot of parties, but I'm guessing they're not usually so dramatic. Did you have any fun at least?"