Blood Ties (NaNoWriMo 2015)

Sixteen

I was settling into my couch in a pair of lavender silk PJs when Ife came out of my bathroom. "Thanks for letting me clean up," she said as she brushed through her wet hair. The straightening she'd done to it earlier that night was gone, now it was back to it's natural state of thick brown-black curls.

"Don't mention it," I said as I snuggled under a blanket, thankful for the weight and familiarity. It was a patchwork quilt, just like the one I had at home. Well not quite, this one was store-bought not handmade, but all the same, the different squares of fabric in the quilt reminded me of home. A place where I felt safe and right now that was a very needed feeling.

Ife sat down on the far end of the couch. "I never got to thank you, for what you did I mean. I know I wasn't the target but I might have gotten caught in the crossfire if you hadn't acted the way you did. So thank you."

I blushed, unsure of how to respond. I could take an average, run-of-the-mill compliment like "your jeans are nice" or "you look good today" but "thanks for knocking me out of a sniper's range"? How was I supposed to respond to that one? "It was nothing," I managed with a shake of my head, my long hair tickling my face. I noticed some of the ends looked grubby and nasty, I made a mental note to find out if their was a hair stylist somewhere in this place so I could get it trimmed. "Any decent person would have done the same."

Ife shook her head at me and smiled. Her full lips were something I envied, mine weren't so thin they disappeared, but they seemed disproportionate to the rest of my face. Ife did not have that problem, they made her look glamorous.

"Decent doesn't mean brave," she told me in a very matter-of-fact voice. "A decent person could still have forgotten all about me and dove for cover to save themselves. It doesn't make them terrible people, but it shows they lack grit. And you, miss Hawthorn, you have grit."

"Well thank you," I slipped off the couch and opened the entertainment center. I appreciated her gratitude and there was not a person I knew who disliked being praised, but I was eager for a subject change. The night had been scary enough, I still had gauze on my hands to remind me of the broken window. I could still hear the sound of the bullet. They weren't pleasant memories to focus on in the least. "Have any favorite movies?" I asked. "I'm sure it's probably in here."

"I do not think so," Ife replied. "I don't watch many movies, just pick something for us."

I browsed through the titles a moment. "Ever seen Marry Poppins?"

"I have not."

"Really?" Well that settled that, I grabbed the case from the cubby and popped the disc into the DVD player.

"Really," Ife said. "I've heard of it, but I was too fearful to watch it. I read the books and knew the Walt Disney company was known for taking many liberties with their source material."

"Fair enough," I recalled some of the gruesome endings of fairytales they'd turned into movies. "I can see why that would stop you, but I promise it's actually quite nice. The musical does a better job of sticking to the novels, but the movie isn't so bad either."

"You've seen the musical?" Ife asked.

"Yes," I answered as I snuggled back under my blanket. "I love musicals, went to whatever ones I could, whenever I could. As a birthday gift last year my friend Stacy Azikiwe brought me to a dinner theater to see Seven Wives for Seven Brothers. We always said we were going to go back, I was actually saving up so I could bring her to see The Little Mermaid this spring but," I swallowed hard. I hadn't given much thought to the smaller plans I'd left behind like this. Just the larger ones such as graduation and college. "But now I guess that won't happen."