Of Scissors And Scooby Doo

Chapter 15

The dark brown of my cocoa was taking up all of my attention as I was sitting at the kitchen table in complete silence. Everyone was still out of the house, my parents at work and Trina still at school. It was so weird having the house so quiet. It felt almost... abandoned, as if it would stay that empty forever, with only me living here for the rest of my life. But I welcomed that, at least at the moment. I didn't want anyone asking questions about why I was home early, about why I was making such a sad face, about how my day had went.

My day... it had started so good.

I wished this was all a dream and that in just a couple of hours, I would get ready for my date with Jade. But that wouldn't happen now, now that... it was over. What was I supposed to do now? I had no idea how I should act now, what I should say, what I should do. I was in love with Jade. Jade was still in love with Beck. And Beck... well, Beck liked me. I scoffed quietly and shook my head. This was just the most clichéd introduction to a bad teenage drama movie ever.

Starring role: Tori Vega.

My head shot up when I heard a key sliding into the lock of the front door, which opened a couple of seconds later to reveal my mom. I bit my lip as I watched her walk in. When she closed the door behind her, her eyes lifted from the floor and met mine, her face taking on a look of surprise.

"Tori. What are you doing home already?"

I tried to shoot her a smile but judging by the way her face only creased more in confusion, I must have done a pretty bad job. "I uh... I wasn't feeling very well."

Mom let her bag drop onto the couch, never looking away from me, before she walked over to me, pulled out a chair from under the kitchen table and sat down. "What's wrong? Are you sick?"

My chest began to prick as I held my breath, trying my hardest to keep the sob located in the middle of my throat in. I couldn't tell her the truth. She would probably get so mad at me when she'd think back to all those times Jade was staying overnight and... I couldn't tell her. Or could I? It was over now and if I wouldn't talk to someone about it I was sure that I was going to explode with the disappointment I was feeling. I just wanted my mom, I wanted her to tell me that everything would be fine, even if I wouldn't believe her. "I'm not sick. I just, I needed to leave. I couldn't stay in school anymore."

My fingers wrapped around the mug of hot chocolate, my gaze drowning in the dark liquid. The red ceramic was so hot against my skin but I didn't let go of the cup. "What do you mean, you couldn't stay in school anymore?" A light squeak sounded as my mother shuffled her chair closer to me. "Tor, what's going on? You know you can talk to me, right?"

I bit down on my tongue and finally let go of the cup. The skin of my palm had turned red from the heat of the cocoa. A shaky breath left my mouth as I flexed my hands into two fists in an attempt to stop the burning I felt. It didn't really help that much though. "Mom, I have to tell you something." I paused but mom stayed quiet, patiently waiting for me to continue. "It's... Jade and I... we kinda began... dating a week and a half ago."

"Oh..." I slowly lifted my eyes from the cocoa, just in time to see my mom lift her shoulders in a light shrug. "Well, I can't say that it comes as a huge surprise to me." I frowned as she looked at me with a smile. "But that doesn't explain why you couldn't stay in school."

"Right." I looked back into my cup, my hands relaxing and my nails lightly running along the surface of the ceramic. "Well, so... we began dating and... we were both really happy. We were. Today after school... I wanted to take her out, on our first date, you know. But then, I got paired up with Beck and he's Jade's ex-boyfriend and they didn't even break up that long ago and then he tried to kiss me! He tried to kiss me but of course I told him no because of Jade, right? So-"