Bittersweet Heartstrings

Chapter 6: Déjà Vu

My mom had tried to persuade me in letting her stay at home with me, but I insisted that she got to work. I would be alright by myself. Hopefully. 

Not that I wanted her to go to work and leave me alone, but we were barely scraping by. My mom barely had enough money to buy food and pay the bills  for our small two-story house. I had offered to get a job to help buy food, but she said no. I was too young. Too young, my ass, I told her. She had taken my phone away for three days. 

So, without her permission, I had applied for a job at a small store, Ella's Boutique, in town. The good thing was that they boss was understanding and had let me work on weekends only. I didn't get paid much, but it was enough. Plus, I got discounts on clothes and accessories.

But then my mom found out and had made me quit the job about two months after I started. I had earned about two hundred dollars and dozens of coupons. My mom reluctantly thanked me for working, but forced me to quit nonetheless.

Long story short, my mom needed the money. The only other hope of another steady income was of her marrying someone. She wasn't going to marry anyone anytime soon.

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For the umpteenth time that day, I found myself rushing to the bathroom where I threw up. Soon, I decided just to sit in there until my stomach calmed down.

You see, I had made myself a sandwich and forced myself to eat it. Now, I couldn't stop the vomit that inched its way up my throat. It was horribly disgusting. 

Once my stomach had calmed down, I took a long, relaxing shower. The warm water felt good against my clammy skin. It even calmed the headache that decided to make me feel like my head was being pounded on with mallets.

When I got out, I got dressed in a pair of sweats and a tank top. Then, I crawled into my bed and covered myself with a blanket. I was cold because of the temperature I was sure I had. But being the inept girl that I am, I didn't know where any medicine was. 

Thankfully, the flu made me tired so I fell asleep right away. If I hadn't, I would've been feeling miserable and terrified. 

Lately, every time I can't fall asleep I've been thinking about him. It's like the longer I go without knowing who he is, the more paranoid I become. There's be no word from the police and no word from Ms. Martin about who might've stolen my phone. 

So the only lead, if you could even call it that, was that Griffin reminded me of him. And I'm almost positive that he and Griffin had no connections to each other at all.

While I slept, it was no surprise to me that I was dreaming about the angry expression on Declan's face when he found out that I was flirting with Griffin and had made a move on him. I just hoped that he would still come over after school. Though I knew he probably wouldn't. 

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"Carson? Unlock the door!" My mother's shouts woke me up. If she was home already, that meant that if six P.M. at the earliest.

I clambered out of bed and slowly walked towards the door. When I unlocked it, I was nearly whacked in the stomach with the door knob. My mother apologized and took in my appearance. 

"Sweetie, how have you been?" She asked, looking worriedly at me.

"I've been throwing up a lot." I hoarsely said, slowly walking back to bed and covering myself up again.

My mother felt my head and clucked her tongue. She rushed out of the room and came back with a glass of water and some pills. I quickly swallowed the pills before falling back to sleep.