kid krow | rini

twenty-two

Ricky spent days calling and texting Nini after the incident at his house. She'd gone directly home from his house and wrote a song called The Cut That Always Bleeds. He'd apologized at least ten times and the girl wanted to hear nothing of it. She convinced herself that she would calm down after a while and apologize for the things she said, but she couldn't reassure this sentiment when Ricky and Heather spent all of history passing notes back and forth on the following Monday.

It was easy to assume their date had gone well; the pair were thigh to thigh, shoulder to shoulder the entire lunch period. Nini absolutely hated the way Heather looked up at the boy. She was so close to him that her nose nearly brushed his jawline every single time it happened. At some point, he wrapped an arm around her, too.

"I'm not switching seats with you tomorrow," Carlos bickered. "You literally just want to sit on that side of the table so you can stare inconspicuously. It isn't healthy, Neens."

Nini dropped the piece of celery she had been angrily gnawing on and rolled her eyes. "I wanted to have lunch, not a therapy session," she reminded her friend. "But fine. Tomorrow, we go back to normal."

The girl avoided Heather at all costs during their study hall. She couldn't bring herself to be around her when she had nothing pleasant to say in the slightest. She felt guilty, almost, because Heather was completely innocent in all of this; Ricky was the enemy. None of this, of course, would go unnoticed by the girl.

She caught up with Nini on her way out of the building after school. "Hey... Did I- did I do something? Are we not friends anymore?" she asked softly.

"No," Nini huffed, picking up her pace. "Not no as in we aren't friends, no as in you didn't do anything. I'm just going through a lot right now and need a lot of space."

The blonde nodded and murmured, "I'll catch you tomorrow in class then," and began to walk in the opposite direction.

And Nini, who was much too irritable to notice any emotion on the girl's face, continued on her brisk walk home. This was one of the few days she knew that Carol would be there waiting for her to get home. So, she collected the mail from the mailbox and made her way up to the front door as she shuffled through the envelopes. There was one addressed to her from Dana, as expected.

"Hey!" the young girl called out to her mother on the couch. "Uh... thanks for the card." Carol watched her daughter read the birthday card and then wave a 100-dollar bill at her. "And money," she added with a little chuckle.

The woman shook her head at her daughter. "That's just from Mama D, that's not mine," she clarified.

"You guys share a bank account, though," Nini said. "It's basically from both of you."

"Mm..." Carol hummed. "We actually don't have a joint one anymore, we separated them when I went to visit Mama."

Nini's eyebrows furrowed in confusion as she dropped her backpack haphazardly and moved toward her mother and the couch. "What? Why?" she questioned. She thought her life would be better with them separated, but the idea of it formed a pit in her stomach at this moment.

Mama C shrugged. "It was hard for Mama to make some transactions and decisions on the account from Denver," she explained. "So we just moved her money to one in Denver so that she would have an easier time. You know, since she's mostly there."

"Oh," Nini murmured with a little hum. "Okay."

"Nothing to worry about at all," her mother assured as she patted the space next to her. Nini moved into it with caution. "Anything with Ricky? Since... you know."

Nini cringed at the thought of her birthday and the way she'd behaved. It was clear that Ricky liked Heather a lot, so it was hard to ignore the idea that he broke up with her just to be with the other girl. This, of course, may not have been true but either way, it's what it felt like. And at no point did Ricky ever seem like he wasn't playing at an angle. For God's sake, he spent every second of every day blowing up the girl's phone.

"I just don't want to talk to him," she whispered. "I just can't deal with it."

Carol nodded and pulled her close into her side. "You don't have to deal with it. I was just wondering." Nini leaned onto her mother's shoulder and let the woman pet her hair. "It's just confusing, you guys were perfect. Did I miss something?"

"If you missed something, so did I," Nini grumbled. She absentmindedly picked at her nails as she swallowed tears that were threatening to choke her up. After clearing her throat, she quietly asked, "Why didn't you tell Mama D that we broke up? She asked about him on my birthday."

The older woman shrugged. "I didn't know if you wanted me to. It's your relationship, you know?" There was a beat of silence before she added, "We hadn't really talked between your breakup and birthday, anyway."

"Why not?" Nini questioned. It was a valid wonder, considering that the two women had started this arrangement off by calling each other every single night before bed.

"Well," Carol sighed, "Sometimes space is good for people." She was so quick to change the subject. "What did that birthday card of yours say, anyway?"

Nini leaned forward and plucked the card up off of the coffee table. She opened it briefly and then set it back down. "Something about how I have to learn how to drive now. And about colleges, I guess."

The blonde woman laughed out, "Sounds like your mom. Make sure you call her and thank her, alright? Tell her that you love her."