someone like you (joel pimentel)

chapter eight

• vanessa •

joel: are you busy tonight?

"Ooh, someone's happy," Antonio told me. I typed a quick reply to Joel that I wasn't busy. "Is that what's-his-name?"

"His name is Joel, and yes. He just asked if I was busy tonight," I responded.

"So is it getting serious?" Antonio asked. I shrugged, we were hanging out whenever we had free time between the two of us. Which usually was past ten at night when he was done in the studio, and I was not at work. "It must be, since you have Brandon tonight."

"We haven't labeled anything, we're just hanging out," I replied. "Let's get back to planning Brandon's birthday, because if we don't get these invitations out no one's going to show up, except us, our parents and Tatiana."

"Everyone who he needs to be there," Antonio added. "But you're right, having to watch over a ton of four year olds—"

"Not a ton," I interrupted. "Just the kids whose parents don't look down at us because we're teenage parents. Speaking of, Grace is in town for the summer so she's going to bring Clay."

"You're still going to push that friendship on our son?" Grace was a girl I met during those pregnancy classes, she was a year older than me, and her son Clay was born exactly a month before Brandon.

"What's wrong with that? Our friendship was pushed unto us. All those vacations spent together, and Sunday brunches, so many," I rolled my eyes. "Anyways, he might be the only kid to show up if we don't—"

"Get these invitations out," Antonio cut me off. "I'm sure you have an entire address book with everyone's address from his preschool class and probably have envelopes written up with said addresses. Just send them. Now that we're done talking about the invitations. Your twentieth birthday, there must be something you want."

"Nope, nothing," I responded. "I was thinking marble cake, since Brandon loves it. We're doing Spiderman, right?" Antonio nodded. "Do you think your parents can get a piñata for him?"

"You can't be serious, 'nessa. You have to do something for your birthday. You're going to be twenty!"

"I am doing something for my birthday, celebrating our son's birthday. And yay, twenty! I'm not going to get strange looks when I mention I'm a teenage mother! I can't even do anything, since I have Brandon that weekend."

"I'd be happy to have Brandon that weekend. I checked all my class schedules, and no papers, tests or anything due for the week after your birthday. Summer semester doesn't have many papers, and I'm off that entire weekend because of Brandon's birthday."

"Actually, you know what I want for my birthday?" I questioned. Antonio looked at me. "For people to forget it's my birthday. It's just another day, and it's Brandon's birthday, so can we just focus on that?"

"No, let's focus on you. You want to celebrate your birthday, and you have the past couple of years. Our son and you have celebrated together, why don't you want to celebrate now?"

"I don't want to," I responded. Antonio gave me a look, which I hated. Always have and always will. "Why should I try and celebrate my birthday when it's supposed to be all about Brandon? It's his day!"