trouble | i.g

twenty two - "aisle six"

Bella's POV

"I think I'm going to become a lesbian." I declared, rolling over on my stomach and burying my face into the carpet.

"And I would so become your lesbian lover." Holly offered kindly, "But I'm sort of in the middle of this thing with a guy right now, but just wait for it to blow over."

I groaned, my voice muffled by the plush fabric. This wasn't an unusual position for me to be in the last couple days, laying out like a depressed starfish in the middle of my room. It was The Break-Up Recovery Zone, where I was surrounded by a fortress of Kellogg's boxes. Most people turned to ice cream and chocolate during heart ache, while I seemed to just live and breathe cereal.

And it was stupid, really, because I had acted so tough when Ian broke up with me. But I felt like a mess. And I wanted a hug, but the only person I allowed to hug me was Ian, and he was probably off smoking those damn cigarettes and getting lung cancer and doing something effortlessly dumb and dangerous and exciting.

I ate another handful of Frosted Flakes.

"What do I do if I see him?" I said in a sudden panic, hugging the box to my chest. Holly gently tried to ease it out of my grip, with no avail.

She spread her hands out. "Idea. Act blind and deaf."

"That's a horrible idea."

"Better then you doing that nervous moonwalk out of situations."

I ignored him at great costs. Of course I understood that he was going through a lot, with the bipolar diagnosis and just his life. Ignoring him made me feel strange and misplaced, as though I had forgotten something at home and couldn't remember what it was. My days returned to their old monotonous pace, without Ian to come in and suggest something totally normal that led to a great adventurous disaster. I basically just dove behind the nearest person or object whenever I thought I saw a flash of red copper hair. It was for the best, he was awful really, always in trouble. Selling damn drugs and lying and just being, awful.

Luckily though, after I got sort of not really arrested, my mom did not get too mad at me (she still basically wanted to disown me and sell me to a pack of nuns, but) she blamed Ian, claiming that he had brainwashed and manipulated me, and oh, her poor baby girl, what did that horrible boy do to her girl. I stayed quiet and continued to eat cereal.

•••

"Why." I said simply, staring up at the can of spaghetti sauce balanced precariously on the top shelf.

My mom, thinking I had become somewhat of hermit due to the fact I basically stayed nested in a cave of blankets on my bed with only my cereal for company, sent me out to do the grocery shopping. I had gotten almost everything on the list (along with an alarming amount of cereal) besides the damn sauce and frozen peas. There was one jar of sauce sitting up on the top shelf, mocking me.

I glanced up and down the deserted aisle, before planting one foot on the bottom shelf and stretching an arm up. The tips of my fingers missed by inches. With a draw out sigh, I shook the shelves lightly, resulting in a package of bread falling down and whacking me in the face.

Sliding off my sneaker, I reared my arm back, hoping to knock it down and into my waiting hands. The shoe went sailing right over with its laces flying, resulting in me having to go into the aisle behind and retrieve it from a confused shoppers basket.

New plan.

I was moving my cart into place beneath it to climb on top when a voice goes, "For the love of fuck."