Down by the Pier

I'm not dead.

The house was quiet when I entered. I imagined Lea was still curled up in bed, her hair a mess on the top of her head and her face smeared into her pillow, drooling. Dragging my feet up the stairs I listened for any signs of movement. Nothing.

My bed called to me, I answered. Falling face first into my soft sheets and kicking my shoes of my feet. I felt a buzzing in my pocket. I fished it out and looked at the screen. There was a text message from a number I didn't recognize.

I'm not dead.

Rolling my eyes I placed my phone near my face and soon sleep came.

"WAKE UP SISTA."

I screamed bloody murder. I chased Lea around the room as she laughed with delight, pleased that she had succeeded in scaring the life out of me.

"Settle down girls!" Dad called from the bottom of the stairs.

"Where did you even go last night," Lea asked while she helped me unpack. The anger I felt was gone and we had settled down. I don't know how we began to organize my things but I welcomed it. I loved organizing. Lea didn't mind it but it wasn't something that brought her never ending joy like it brought me.

"The beach," I answered shortly. I didn't really want to go into detail about last night. At first when I woke up I thought it had all been a dream. But the text messages from him proved that it wasn't a dream. That last night really happened. I had almost watched someone kill himself.

I heard my phone vibrate on my desk and decided to ignore it. It would only say the same thing the other texts said.

I'm not dead.

"Who keeps texting you," Lea asked with perked interest.

"Just Vanessa," I lied.

"Ugh, what does she want? Why does she keep texting you?"

"She's going through this boy crisis. I'm on damage control at the request of Jenna and Lori. We take turns. It's a very efficient system."

Lea rolled her eyes. "Young love."

I shrugged my shoulders. We kept quiet for a while, focusing on our individuals tasks.

"So...are you dating anybody?"

I groaned. "Lea, please."

She feigned innocence. "I was only asking just to see what you've been up to. Geez."

"I've told you everything I've been up to and none of those updates included a guy. Not that I need one or want one." Beach boy made sure of that. My phone buzzed again.

"Just tell her to get over him. There's plenty more fish in the sea."

Grabbed my phone and pretended to type away but in reality I was just pressing buttons aimlessly. I turned my phone on silent and placed it back on my desk.

Lea seemed pleased that I had taken her advice and continued with her cleaning. Once everything was organized and put away, I pulled out my planner and I could almost see Lea's eyes roll to the back of her head. "Why did you bring that?"

'Because I want to make sure I do everything that I want to do. I don't want to leave anything out, " I said matter-of-factly. Today I planned on heading to the mall with Lea and stopping by our favorite ice cream shop. Then we would swing by and pick up Dad, who should be finished with his morning brainstorming/writing and we would all head to the art gallery, have dinner and sit outside together listening to Lea strum her fingers along her guitar as I sketched and Dad wrote. Her playing was the soundtrack to my summer.