The Candace Clique

Chapter Three

Anastasia pushed her keys into the lock, pushing the front door open and tumbling inside her home. “Mom?” she called out. When there was no response, she marched upstairs, dropping her ballet bag inside her closet and untaming her hair.

Ana poked her head outside her door, hearing a faint sound from her mother’s room. She tiptoed outside until she was directly in front of Barbara’s room, straining her ears for any sound. Just when she had pressed her ear onto the red, wooden door of her mother’s room, the door was yanked open, making Anastasia stumble into the room, shocked.

“Ana?” Barbara asked in a high pitched voice, shocked.

She slowly looked up at her mother, not failing to see her unruly brown hair. Barbara’s arms were linked with a forty-something year old chap with greying hair but strikingly azure eyes. From Anastasia’s peripheral vision, she saw that the bed was unmade, almost like they had been jumping up and down on it and playing pillow fights like a kid, but Anastasia knew better; next to the bed was the unmistakable unrolled condom that looked like an orange plastic balloon that had deflated. “Hi,” she squeaked.

Barbara gave her a pointed look, squinting her eyes until they were just slits, “I was just ushering Tom here out our front door, sweetie.”

Her daughter back up from the door, giving the two adults space and watched from above the stairs as Barbara ushered Tom to through the front door. Before Tom could step out into the cold breeze, he gave her a pat in the butt and kissed her passionately straight on the lips.

Barbara closed the door with a soft thud, wheeling around and looking straight at Ana with a soft smile on her lip stick stained lips, “Honey, come down here. I’m going to make you a snack.”

Ana obliged, following her mom inside the kitchen, “Why don’t we just order something?”

“Pizza?” Barbara offered.

Anastasia nodded, a smile cracking on her pink, full lips, “Mom?”

“Oh, don’t give me the lecture, honey,” the older woman countered, looking at her daughter through eyes with scattered up mascara.

Anastasia plopped down on a chair, opening her laptop which she took from her room, “I’m not going to give you the lecture, Mom.”

“Yeah?” Barbara muttered after clicking the house phone shut, “then, what are you going to say?”

Anastasia peered behind her laptop at her mother, “Mom, Tom’s, like, the hundredth guy you’ve slept with already. When will you stop?”

Barbara rolled her eyes at her daughter, turning to the counter and pouring coffee into two mugs, she slipped into the chair across from Anastasia, sliding one mug across to her, “I’m divorced, Anastasia, and I haven’t been having any for a while. My hormones are just all around the place, darling, I can’t help it. And I’m still young—”

It was her daughter’s turn to give her a look, making her stop in the middle of her sentence, “How old are you again, Barb?”

Her mother almost choked on her coffee, receiving a glare which only made Anastasia laugh, “Then, why don’t you go find yourself a pal, honey?”

Anastasia rolled her smoky grey eyes, “Well, I’m not that interested in looking for a pal right now, Mom. It’s just not me.”

“But don’t your friends—who’s that?—Candace and Bridget got themselves some boys?” Barbara quipped.

Anastasia stopped mid typing, looking at her mother through her glasses, “Mom, they’re their own person. Jules might have a guy, too, but I still won’t. It’s just not what I see myself doing—looking for a chap, like you do!”