Remember When ↠ l.p.

Conditions

The ringing of the phone fills in the silent bedroom, I've put it on speaker phone so that mom can hear it too. "Hello?" Paddy voices comes so suddenly it makes me jump.

"Ah hi there Paddy. Liam sent me a text saying to call and that it was urgent?" 

"And you didn't call him?" he asks. I frown down at the carpet. I don't know how much Liam has told him about our fight or how much he even remembers from the amount of alcohol he was drinking. I scuff my toes in the carpet and glance at mom. She nods her encouragement. 

"Uh, we're not at the best of terms at the moment. He said to call either you or him. What's going on?"

"It's not much of an emergency to be honest..." he trails off and I keep quiet. Mom reaches over to rub my shoulders. There's a sound of breathing and then a grunt of frustration. "I wonder if this is his way of reaching out."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well I know you two had an argument last time you saw him. I think he's trying to make up, at least slightly. His emergency is that he has no one to bring Tessie home today. He's been dialing numbers the past thirty minutes. He's not able to get home until 9pm tonight. We need you to either keep her until then and bring her by just as we arrive or wait with her at the house, getting her ready for bed there."

"He told me he didn't want me bringing her home again." I inform Paddy, my voice stiff. I really don't want to go back to the Payne's mansion. It's only been a handful of days since our argument. Even though I've started on the path to pushing past all the old pains resurfacing with those new ones, I don't think I'm ready yet. 

"Well now we have absolutely no choice. You have to bring her over." I exhale a little. He sounds convinced there is no other way. I might need to do this, no matter what I want. I have to think about what's best for Tessie and getting to be on time is certainly important. Keeping appearances up is too, I don't ever want her to know that Liam and I have fought. 

A thought dawns on me. "If I do...will you tell me what's been going on with Liam? You can both deny all that you want but I know that something is wrong with him, he's been acting oddly."

"You still care enough to ask, after the things he said to you?" he sounds incredulous.

"I still work for him and watch his daughter. He may not be my friend exactly anymore but I still care that he's healthy and alright."

"Good. Bring her over to the house for us and we'll sit down and have a chat. Whenever I have free time in the next few days. Deal?"

"Deal." I agree and hang up.