Babysitter | Calum Hood

21

"He's cheating on you, obviously," she said, voice streaming out from my laptop speaker and bouncing off the walls of my bedroom. I was FaceTiming one of my internet friends because it was three in the morning and had stolen a bottle of beer in the fridge, making me feel as if I needed someone to supervise me, even if I'm eighteen and the supervisor is on the other side of Australia. I wasn't flat out drunk, but I wasn't sober either.

After hearing Gianna speak, I glanced down at the empty bottle in my hand before sighing dramatically. I grabbed another bottle sitting on my nightstand before popping the cap and gulping down a couple swallows.

"Okay, now I think I'm ready to know why you think that," I said. "Wait." Clutching the bottle and feeling the condensation of the water droplets littering the outside of the glass, I tipped it back into my mouth and felt the bitter taste run down my throat. "Okay, now I'm ready," I slurred, feeling the drunken haze settle upon me.

Smiling stupidly, I started to pet my dog who rested his head on the pillow beside me. "You look so drunk, oh my God. Don't you have school tomorrow?" Gianna asked, taking a sip of her classier white wine. The two of us really were sitting in our bedrooms on a Wednesday night, drinking to avoid their problems.

"Don't you?"

Gianna shrugged, downing her wine before looking over at the bottle of tequila. "Yeah, Imma drink that," she whispered to herself before pressing her lips to the tip of the bottle.

Clapping her hands together, she started to speak of Calum and Delia. "Well him disappearing lately is the most shadiest thing ever," Anna started.

"But it's prom season. Maybe he's secretly planning to ask me in the most extravagant way," I murmured as my fingers ran over the droplets of water on the bottle.

Gianna scoffed. "You said he thought it was dumb."

"Maybe he was trying to make me believe he wouldn't ask me so the surprise is ten times better."

"Bitch!" she screamed, causing Beau to lift his head up to detect where the noise erupted from. As I stroked his head to coax him back to sleep, Gianna continues to roll her brown, almost black, eyes at me. "Why would he plan a promposal with Delia of all people? Why not Lindsay or Ashton? I bet your ass he's hooking up with her."

"Maybe he has another reason to be with her."

"Stop with the maybes and open your eyes, Ken. It's obvious that he doesn't wanna go to prom with you because he actually wants to go with her."

Bowing my head in resentment, I felt my nose burn with the anticipation of tears. My head was foggy with alcohol and my chest was hurting from heartbreak.

"But he promised that he'd never hurt me," I mumbled, voice cracking, along with my heart.

Gianna whimpered from the other side of the computer screen, buzzed from the sips of tequila. "Kenny, don't cry or I will."

But I didn't stop crying, and neither did she. So, we sat in our bedrooms that were on two different sides of the country, crying really hard while intoxicated.

**

"You look like shit," were the first words I heard when I walked through the corridors to get to my locker in a pair of leggings and a sweater that made my figure look lumpy. I didn't even look cute and small—just lumpy.

Not hesitating, I slapped Ashton in the back of the head before taking a deep breath and opening my locker in one try. As I shoved some books back into the metal box and took some out, I groaned loudly. The pounding headache I had was becoming worse and worse as the noise around me increased. It felt as if someone took an axe to my skull and attempted to split my head in half.