Love Disorder (Lesbian, Girlxgirl)

Chapter 16. Deeper

Chapter 16. Deeper

One of my first memories was of mom. It wasn't the day of adoption. I was too young to recall that. Rather, it was her telling me about my adoption. As a young girl, I remembered standing in front of a clothes store, staring at a lovely red dress that was my size. We went in and bought the dress. Then she told me I was adopted.

While I was clutching her hand, afraid to get lost in the sidewalk, I asked her why my parents didn't want me. She said, "Do you know that most people like to focus on the negative instead of the positive? If you think like that, you will always feel bad. Rather than asking why you weren't liked by other people, it would be better to thank those who did." From then on, I never questioned my adoption again

So why did that memory jogged my mind? Maybe because I was dwelling on the negative since Blaze said that Uno hated me. Hearing that broke my heart. Then I felt numb. Then broken again. It was a cycle of why's? How comes? And what should I do? It was disheartening to stare at Blaze when I was seeing Uno too, yet for all my heartbreak, Blaze was the only one who could make me forget. It was screwed up, I know.

"You've been staring at your milk tea for the last, oh I don't know, one to two hours maybe," Carter said. I pried my eyes from the now warm tea. The ice has melted a long time ago, yet I didn't notice.

"Huh?" I said.

Carter was leaning back on his chair, his arms folded on his chest. I vaguely remember him playing with his phone a while ago. How many minutes have passed since that? "I thought we were supposed to hang out today Ri. Guess the tea is better company." He took the drink and stared at it suspiciously. "Maybe this is magical."

I grabbed it from him and placed it on the other side of the table. "No it's not, and I'm sorry if I was occupied."

"Occupied is one way of putting it. You looked like a zombie." He raised his arms, slacked his jaw, and made gurgling noises. "Look at me, I'm Riri. A zombie," he mocked.

"Shut up."

He straightened. "So what's the problem? We haven't seen each other much." He stared thoughtfully into space, seemingly trying to recall something. Carter stomped his foot when he remembered. "Since you came at the shop with Uno. How's everything going? She's not giving you a hard time is she?" His jaw set. His honorary brother mode was kicking in.

"Lower your voice," I scolded. There weren't many people in the their tea shop today since it was still early, but I couldn't take any chances with people trying to associate me with Uno. It would be problematic if they followed me home and discovered where she lived. "It has nothing to do with her." Liar, a small part of me said. "Maybe I'm just stressed because of the upcoming charity concert."

Carter's irritation was gone when he heard that. I've texted him the information days ago. He was excited about it, as if he was the one attending instead of me. "What is Uno going to do for the concert anyway? She's not a singer or a dancer," he said.

You meant Blaze, I corrected in my brain. But of course he didn't know about that. And I'd never tell in a million years. "She'll be signing merchandise like t-shirts and posters," I said. "Then she'll answer fan questions. Maybe play a couple of games that the hosts of the show came up with. It's all about fun, fun, fun."

"Sounds like a bad tagline for a movie," he said. "Where did you get that?"

I sipped my sad-looking tea. It didn't taste that bad. "From Uno's agent. I spoke to her on the phone."

"Interesting," Carter said. "Bitchy?"

"Eh, not really." I frowned. "She sounded like an octomom on the phone. She had things going for her, that's for sure." I was being kind when I told him that. The agent sounded harassed and frazzled. She was trying to speak to me and another person on her extra phone at the same time. Mom was never like that when she was alive. She was calmer somehow, like she was always on top of things. I thought I was like her at first, but recently with the thing about Uno and Blaze, it was proving harder to do.