YOU & ME | JENLISA

Chapter 69

Lisa

The way she looked at me when she found out about my mom was utterly heart-wrenching. Sympathy filled her eyes and her heart broke for me. In that moment I think she understood everything and it made me choke up inside, I wanted to cry, to be hugged, for her to enclose me into her arms and comfort me. But that was ridiculous because I'm not hers to comfort.

"This looks good." She took the plate of grilled cheese off me and smelt it. "Can I sit?" She pointed towards my bed.

"On my bed?" I asked with a surprised tone. She nodded.

The blue duvet lay untouched from this morning, not neatly tucked in as one would hope but rather thrown loosely on top so that cosy crinkles layered the surface.

"Yeah, I guess." She tossed off her shoes and sat down, criss-crossing her legs and tucking into the cheesy toast. Her throat made 'mmm' noises and my dick twitched at how sexual they sounded.

I made eye contact with the tape recorder on my bedside table, the wheels were turning and the record button was firmly pressed down. Her head turned to look at it too, obviously following my direction. She pat my mattress in the space next to her and with discomfort, I joined her on the bed.

"You never told me about your mom." She wiped crumbs away from the corner of her mouth.

"I've never told anyone about my mom." I admitted.

"It must be tough. You pay for her medication?" She took another bite of the grilled cheese sandwich and chewed with a closed mouth. I liked to see her eat, it made me less worried about her. Slowly, I nodded my head. "Does she know how you pay for her medication?" My face contorted with that question, was she insane?

"No of course not, she would kill me."

She put her half eaten sandwich down on the plate and wiped her fingers over her lips.

"How long has she been sick?"

"Six years. It was slow at first but now it's more aggressive. She has a lung condition, it causes scarring on her lungs and there's no cure for it. It will grow and grow, eventually killing her."

"Lisa, I'm so sorry. So, you were only eleven when she got diagnosed?"

I nodded, I could see her mind calculating the sad and sorry truth of my life. "And you were twelve when you started taking drugs?" Bingo "So how old were you when you started selling your body?"

I tried to lighten the mood with half a smile, I didn't feel like smiling. I literally had nothing to smile about but this conversation felt intimate and I didn't like intimate conversations, they made me uncomfortable.

"You know, those who pay for me only get to know my first name. I don't tell them anything about my life, most of the time I answer questions with lies."

"Were you twelve?" She persisted.

"Jennie..." I sighed out.

"Okay, I get it. You don't like personal questions." She took another chunk out of her grilled cheese and chewed it fast before swallowing it down. "You can ask me something personal, anything, go ahead."

"Uh..." Fuck, she had given me an opening here. Why was my heart racing ten to a hundred? Why couldn't I think of a single thing to ask her? Why was I so damn nervous?

"Just ask the first thing that comes to mind." She encouraged.

"Uh... okay then... uh... do you ... um ... always... wear.... thongs?"

In dead silence she stared at me, totally moon-eyed. My brain finally caught up with my mouth, I could feel myself blushing like crazy and I wanted to take back every word that I had just said, chew them, swallow them up and dissolve them with the acid in my stomach. Why the fuck did I just ask that?

After a lingering silence that lasted far too long, she burst out laughing. It was that huge, teary-eyed, and uncontrollable laughter. The kind of laugh she does whenever she's with Rosé.

"I'm sorry." She spluttered, trying to calm herself down. "That was so unexpected. I figured you'd have a question about my mom or something."

Damn, I should've asked about her mom.

"Uh, no not always thongs but mostly I do. They're just easier, you know? With the Spanx and the dancing, I wear a lot of leggings too and if I wore full panties, the lining of my underwear would show and I don't like that. But I also have a really impressive collection of granny panties that I wear for at least one week out of the month. They're gross, I'll show them to you sometime."

"What!? ...uh... no, I'm good."

She laughed again.