Not Like the Movies

Chapter Thirteen

     I awkwardly try to pull down the hem of my dress while balancing a plate of birthday cake in my other hand. This morning my grandmother put it in the wash, and she must have accidentally put it in the dryer as well. It was a really cheap dress, and the dryer made it shrink at least two sizes. It's stretchy enough that it still fits me, but the hemline shrunk at least an inch. It was already a short dress to start with, but now it's even worse. Whenever I try to pull down the hemline the neckline is pulled down as well and ends up showing too much. It's a lose-lose situation. 

     It turns out at least some of the assumptions I made about Ariadne when I first met her were right. She does have tons of friends who all look like cheerleaders. She is the ultimate party host. And, yes, her boyfriend is on the football team. All night she's been surrounded by giggling girls, or kissing her boyfriend. As for me, I've spent the night trying to make my dress stretch, hoping someone will talk to me while Gyver is off kicking some guy's butt in pool, and trying to convince the guy who's handling the music to play something other than One Direction and Justin Bieber. None of the three things have worked so far.

     I walk into the kitchen to grab something to drink. There's Coke, Pepsi, Sprite, punch, and a few more fizzy drinks I've never had before, but I settle on water. Technically my grandmother banned alcohol from the party even though a few people are over the drinking age, but I'm not totally confident that people haven't slipped some into the various drinks. Some of Ariadne's guests look pretty tipsy. 

     I leave my cake plate in the kitchen and sip on my water as I wander back into the living room. Now Gyver's talking to my sister's boyfriend and his group of friends, so I look around for something to do. I tried having a conversation with some of my sister's friends, but they made it clear that it was weird talking to someone who looked like their best friend but wasn't. So far, it's been a pretty boring party. I walk over to the presents table. I can tell that they're mostly for Ariadne. It's a huge stack of presents, but the biggest is easily Gyver's. He told me that his dad, who's a rich golfer living in Myrtle Beach, got him a new guitar for Christmas, and by the looks of Gyver's badly wrapped gift, I'm getting his old one. I can also tell that the two little boxes wrapped in the cheap local newspaper are for me and my sister from my dad. Those newspapers are given out for free at the hospital. 

     "What did you say?" rings out Gyver's voice from across the room. Conversations dwindle to a stop as everyone turns to look Gyver and the guy he's talking to. It's Ariadne's boyfriend. 

     "What's going on?" I ask as I walk over to stand next to Gyver. Ariadne appears next to her boyfriend looking just as confused as I am. Gyver looks really pissed.

      "This piece of s-" started Gyver.

     "Calm down, gay." interrupts Ariadne's boyfriend. My sister looks shocked. Gyver sucks in a breath, and I swear. 

     "And who the hell are you to say anything?" I ask. I'm so mad at this guy. I don't see how Ariadne can date him. I hate him.

     "Who am I?" he scoffs, "I know who you are, you little whore." 

     Gyver lunges at him, his fist cracking across the face of my sister's boyfriend. Ariadne is screaming and trying to stop her boyfriend from attacking Gyver. I grab Gyver's wrists and push him back. He's struggling to get out of my grasp and swearing at the top of his lungs. I push him up against the wall, still struggling.I'm practically yelling at him to calm down, but even when he stops struggling I keep hold of his wrists.

     I turn and see that someone has found a cloth to hold to Ariadne's boyfriend's bleeding nose. My sister is on her cellphone, probably telling my grandmother what happened and is begging her to come home from her dinner out with friends. If she was mad when I went out with Jack, she's going to be livid now. 

     As the guests stream out of the front door, Ariadne suggests that we wait in the living room for my grandmother to get home. She steers her boyfriend to sit on the couch on the far side of the room, while Gyver and I take the sofa the furthest away that we can.

     The last guest leaves, and we don't say anything. I can tell that Gyver's still really pissed, but luckily he's behaving himself. Probably because I'm still holding on to one of his wrists. My sister is trying to apologize to us while making sure her boyfriend isn't offended, and it isn't going well. This is bad. But as soon as my grandmother walks into the room with that pinched look on her face, I know that things are going to get a whole lot worse.

                                                                 * * *

       It turns out that my grandmother wasn't as mad as I thought she would be. Well, at least she wasn't mad at me or Gyver. She made Gyver apologise, which he did without too much complaining, but after that she was just mad at Ariadne and her boyfriend. I think it isn't really fair for her to be mad at Ariadne, but she is anyways. But mostly, my grandmother is mad at my sister's boyfriend. She can tell that he's slightly drunk, and makes him apologise profusly to me, Gyver, and even Ariadne.  

     Once my grandmother's done chewing out Ariadne's boyfriend, she checks if his nose is broken. It isn't but if it had been, Gyver would have gotten in a lot more trouble. After a few minutes of nothing happening, my grandmother suggests pointedly to them that they go home and get some rest. But my sister's boyfriend and Gyver both ask if they can give us their presents, and my grandmother allows them to. 

     As soon as my grandmother goes upstairs, Ariadne and her boyfriend disappear into the kitchen for some privacy, which is kinda suspicious. Gyver grabs his hastily-wrapped present from the table and offers it to me. Even though I already know exactly what it is, I still rip off the paper as quickly as I can. In my arms I have Gyver's old guitar. Baby blue and covered in stickers from every band he's ever gone to see, it's practically a shrine to music. I used to beg him for a chance to play this guitar, and now it's mine. 

     "Thanks so much Gyver," I say, "I love it!"

     "I was thinking we could start up our channel again." he suggests. 

     "That would be awesome." I reply. We haven't uploaded anything new to our youtube channel for a good year and a half. We used to do a new cover of a song every week, but once I started dating Jack we stopped making videos. "Tell me if you think of a good song to do, okay?"

     He nods. "Happy birthday, Tal." He gives me a hug before leaving quickly to avoid my sister's boyfriend. 

     I'm alone in the living room for only a few seconds before Ariadne and her boyfriend return from the kitchen. I don't know what they did in there, but when my sister sees me, her face flushes red. They say their goodbyes and he leaves with only a small glare in my direction. I say goodnight to Ariadne and I'm halfway up the stairs by the time she stops me. Standing at the bottom of the stairs, she holds out one of the small boxes wrapped in newspaper.

     She sits a few steps below the one I sit down on as we open our presents from my dad. Beneath the newspaper is a jewelery box. I lift the lid of the jewelry box and pull out the necklace inside. On a chain long enough to dip beneath the collar of my shirt is a pendant made of a clear stone. In very small letters the word 'loved' is carved into the stone. I hold the cold stone in my hand, and it fits perfectly. Looking down at Ariadne, I can see that she has almost an identical necklace, except the stone is very slightly tinged pink. 

     I can tell that Ariadne likes that the necklaces are matching. I help her put on her necklace, and she helps me with mine. After saying goodnight for a final time, we both head up the stairs to our respective rooms. I lay Gyver's guitar, now my guitar, on the end of the bed. It's been an eventfull party, but as soon as I'm into my pyjamas I fall asleep almost instantly. When I wake up in the morning, I still have my fingers wrapped around my necklace.