Most of the Time

Chapter 7

As soon as I make it to the living room Justin turns around, staring at me from the couch

"Are you out of breath?" Justin jokes while making his way over to me, to lend a hand, "What were yall doing up there, running a marathon?"

"No, I was just walking down the stairs" I say out of breath, having not yet detected his sarcasm. He helps me to the couch and we both somehow end up sharing a cushion.

"Hey, was that you playing the piano earlier? We heard you from outside. Where did that come from? I know it wasn't learned in Mr. Calvin's piano class, that guy hated us. He would never trust us to learn something like that. You were always good, but that was another level."

"First Mr. Calvin hated you because you never learned your solo before the recital, not us and I've had a lot of time to practice. Also don't downplay my skills in high school, I was a borderline prodigy. It's not my fault you didn't notice because you were too busy joking around with Trevor and..." My brain draws a blank

"Hannah" Justin adds

"Yeah her. How could I forget the infamous couple" I joke but he doesn't seem to get it

Justin breaks away from our eye contact, staring at the ground

"You're right but when I wasn't with them what was I doing?" He meets my eyes again

"You're joking right?" I ask to make sure

"No, I want you to answer. What was I doing?"

"Begging me to help your little tragic stubby fingers" I grab his hand and lift them up to remind him what his fingers look like.

"And why did I do that?" his eye contact confusingly intensifies

"I don't know, so you wouldn't fail the class."

"No--"

Before he gets a chance to finish Lily walks in.

"I'm back!" Lily says

I scoot over to make room for Lily and also put some distance between Justin and I after that awkward conversation.

"Did Justin tell you what movies we brought?" Lily sits down in the middle of us and pulls four CD boxes out of her bag. "The critically acclaimed High School Musical trilogy and our favorite classic She's All That"

"Bravo Justin, I'm actually impressed" I clap

"Of course, I pay attention" he says 

"I wanted to bring The Notebook" Lily adds 

"You know I hate that movie" I question

"I know" she smiles and pinches my right cheek "Let's start with High School Musical"

We all watch the first movie with full attention as if it isn't our 100th time seeing it. We get up and breakout into dance for the iconic song, Get'cha Head in the Game, but arguably they are all iconic. During the movie I get a text from my mom reminding me to take my medicine. I ignore it for a while, but eventually give in to the inevitable and sneak into the kitchen. I first take the Tramadol and Naproxen because they are the easiest get down. I end with my second prescription of antibiotics. I got prescribed another prescription because I forgot to take my first prescription every day. If you were to ask Nurse Angie, she would say I did it on purpose. She's somewhat right, but in my rebellion against the prescription I did plan on eventually taking it, but I forgot.

The pill is big, so I usually break it in half. Though I'm eighteen, I only recently learned how to take pills. I was able to boycott them until my current circumstance, I guess. I try to break it, but my strength fails me so I secretly gesture Lily into the kitchen. While she tries unsuccessfully, Justin walks in.

"Yall are missing a masterpiece" He says pointing to the TV screen.

"Would you mind?" I say looking down at the pill, still in one piece on the kitchen counter.

He takes the palm of his hand and applies seemingly minimal pressure to the pill against the kitchen counter and it breaks with ease

"Good job J Coop" Lily says as if we were back at our high school football games She runs back to the couch, continuing the movie.

I get more water to take my last pill, noticing Justin is still in the kitchen.

"Thanks, very strong palm." I say, eyebrows raised with a confused grin. Expecting him to return to the living room. I, in almost slow motion, raise the glass of water to my lips and gulp a large amount to hold in my mouth. Still in slow motion, I grab half a pill and bring it up to my lips. Just before I should drop the pill in my mouth, I swallow the water.

"You're missing the movie." I inform Justin

"It's okay, I like watching you and I also want to make sure you don't choke."

I was too intimidated to respond. If I had water in my mouth, I probably would have choked. Justin was always a flirt, but now he seems serious. I'm not prepared for this type of flirtatious rebuttal nor have I ever practiced, and I was not ready to start now or at least not with him. I take a gulp of water, quickly turned my back to him and with struggle get the halves of the pill down.

"Let's get back to Lily" I tell him walking out of the kitchen, with him lingering behind.