The Incredible League of Goth Pizza Haters (RH)

Part 43

---Sylvia---

"You're fucking kidding me! You let them drive my car and then crash it and they're not even being punished?" he yelled

"Calm down. I gave them permission and I wouldn't have had to do that if you hadn't taken my car without asking," she spoke quietly and calmly like a stone in a storm. No, not a stone. She's not that tough. 

"You should have asked me, and they're paying for it." he snarled

"Dani is sixteen and Via is between houses right now. I'll pay for it. It's a small scratch." 

"It's a huge scratch and there's a dent, too!" he gave one final stand at being loud and pissed. She's too calm to yell at. 

"Nick, calm down." 

"This is bullshit."

"Language."

"Like you ever gave a fuck about what I say. Or do. Or think. it's all about them, right?" he stormed past my mother to his bedroom. Despite his last remark, he'd lost. 

"I'm sorry. I'll give you the money I have." I said as he passed. He stopped in his doorway and glared at me. 

"I'd rather you use that money to get a house and get the fuck out of ours." He slammed the door behind him and everything fell silent. Like the house was only allowed to make a certain amount of noise every day and the sudden burst of sound had used it all. Now we must be deathly silent. Silent as the grave. Silent as Abby. 

In his room, I knew Nick was being silent, too. I knew he would sit in there being angry then forget. Then remember his rage every time he saw his car. The solution: lock yourself in your room and bleed out your negativity. That's what we all did in this house. To keep from spreading it to the others we all stayed in our own bubbles and held our sadness in our bodies. We shed it in our room so it had somewhere to exist. The problem was the walls in this house were so thin, I knew Nick's negativity would just seep through the creaking floorboards down to my mother's room in the basement. I knew she would be soaking it up down there. 

I became dizzy and walked numbly to the living room to sit on the couch. Dani walked silently from her room and sat on the couch. She started fiddling with her phone while my consciousness floated somewhere above my head, leaving my body hollow and swaying in the drafty living room. 

I thought back to the medic who'd who'd treated me back when I'd been knocked unconscious from the air-born Pepsi bottle. How gentle he'd been with me and how much it had pissed me off. I began to wonder, perhaps I was porcelain after all. It certainly felt like it. 

***

A few weeks passed and Ricky and I went on a second date two nights before a huge snowfall. A week from Christmas. We had that fancy dinner in a Red Lobster, I had some nice conversations with the waiter because we'd worked together there and we got extra biscuits. It was all very sweet and very romantic and afterwards we talked in the car outside my house for a little over an hour about the government and aliens and eventually the existence of higher beings like gods and angels and then we saw my mom staring out the window suspiciously at this car that had been parked in front of her house obviously running but not moving. 

We said our goodbyes and then I walked inside and went to bed.