UNDERWORLD | ❝One summer can change everything...❞
Cath, Daphne and their friends are in for a 1985 they will never forget. The tides of change are rocking their lives, as the inevitability of growing up dawns on them. Childhoods packed away, t...
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MONDAY 1st JULY, 1985
ANDREA is stirred from her half-slumber by a gentle knock on her door. As it slowly creaks open, she squints and writhes sluggishly at the splash of light that floods in from the hallway. Once her eyes have adjusted a little more, Andrea sees the silhouette of Pedro standing in her doorway — dressed in his Spider-Man pyjamas, with his stuffed monkey toy tucked under his armpit.
"Hey... you okay?" she croaks, staring down her chin to look at him.
"Dad's being sick again," says Pedro.
Andrea's sleepiness sheds itself almost instantly, replaced with a nauseating worry. She props herself up on her elbows and listens out. Surely enough, she hears the distant noise of her father vomiting in the bathroom, while her mother mumbles something indistinct with him. Frustration. That's the next thing that hits her. She had hoped they were past this; however he father has seemed worse again since she got home, not too dissimilar to his beginning symptoms last autumn. But right now, Pedro needs somewhere else to crash — she knows his bedroom is right next to the bathroom, too loud and scary for him to be near when this is happening.
"Come on, get in here," Andrea whispers, "and shut the door behind you."
Pedro carefully pulls the door to, muffling the sound and light outside, before scampering over to his sister. Andrea shimmies to the side and lifts her duvet, letting him nestle in with her. He is certainly a bit bigger than he used to be.
"Is Mateo awake?" she asks him.
"No. I could hear him snoring."
"Of course you could," Andrea chuckles weakly. Mateo famously sleeps like a brick; she almost envies that during moments like these. Even if he was awake, she is sure he wouldn't feel the need to come in to see her — it is Pedro who has the more delicate soul. She knows she should be positive for him, letting him know there is light at the end of the tunnel. All without giving him any indication of how her chest grew tight at hearing her dad retching, or the reluctant thoughts of doom that crept in about his health...
It's not like you could blame her, given the last few months they have had.
She remembers it all started so suddenly. One day, things were normal, and they were all abuzz for Halloween — Samuel Sandoval even went to Merrill's Farm himself to pick a pumpkin for each of his kids. Then things started to go awry. Complaints of a mild headache and nausea turned to fever and chills. Fever and chills turned to puking his guts out, all night long, sounds that still haunted her nightmares. By the third day of his symptoms, Andrea anxiously went into school, knowing something felt off...
