Trust Me

Chapter 4

It’s me.  Your secret lover.  Shhh don’t tell anyone!

I wanted to throw my phone against the wall.  The unknown number couldn’t have been anyone but Aidan.  Who else would call themselves my secret lover?

Wow, you’re so classy.  How did I ever live my life without you, hottie?

I couldn’t help myself.  He made it too easy to flirt with him, and how would he even realize I was being 100% sarcastic? 

Surrounded by incredibly soft, fluffy pillows in the corner of my bed, I sunk into the squishy barrier against the wall and pulled out my book.  Foo Fighters blared through my stereo so loudly I could barely hear my phone vibrating next to my hip.  It doesn’t seem like much of an accomplishment, but if you had ever heard how loud my I-swear-it-was-designed-by-teachers-specifically-to-prevent-texting-in-class cell phone vibrated, you’d agree that being louder than it was pretty incredible.

Looks like you got a little sarcasm on your thumbs while you were typing.  It’s okay, wipe it off and try that one again.

How… how did he know? 

When did you become the sarcasm police?  Maybe I just sucked it up and admitted that I like you.

I felt like such a nerd having perfect grammar in text messages.  I was sure Aidan was laughing at me right at that moment as he opened the message wherever he was located.  I could picture the smirk on his face as he typed up some snarky response about my grammar, thought better of it, and typed something else in.  Or maybe he even added it back in at the end. 

Oh did you, now?  I’m calling shenanigans.  Nice grammar, by the way.

See?  There was the grammar remark.  Then again, he had pretty perfect grammar, himself.  I couldn’t really ignore that.  Had I really found another grammatically-conscious texter?

Call all the shenanigans you want.  You can’t prove anything.  And same to you, grammar nerd :)

The softness of the pillows called my name with my book, and suddenly I found myself collapsing backwards into their squishiness while simultaneously clicking the volume on the stereo up a little more.  Loud music, soft pillows, and a good book.  What more could a girl want in life?  You know, besides a Camaro.

Shenanigans called, shenanigans proved.  Suck it up and cut the crap, darling :)

I don’t play by shenanigans.  I play however the hell I want to play.

“Ash!” my mom called from elsewhere in the house.

“Yep?” I replied. 

“Can you come do the dishes please?” she requested.  I sighed and paused my music.  Why couldn’t she ask me to do these things when dinner was over, instead of waiting until I had already gone off to my room to do something else?  Did it ever occur to her that I had a life outside of dishes?

I stalked off to the kitchen to clean the dishes from dinner, take out the recycling, and wipe down every last surface in our kitchen.  The whole process took ten minutes of my time, but at least once I was finished, the night was mine. 

There were three new text messages on my phone when I returned to my room, all of them from Aidan.  Clingy, much?

You don’t just choose not to play by shenanigans.  Everyone plays by shenanigans, even you.  Sorry to break it to you.

No witty retort?  Wow, gotta say, Mara, I’m disappointed in you.

I’m sorry.  I know you’re thinking it.  No, it never occurred to me that maybe you were too busy doing something else to reply.