Living on Blue Time

Chapter Four

“Have you thought about where you’re going next year?” my brother Eric’s voice trickles through the speaker.

Oh shiz. I knew he was going to ask.

“No…?”

“You’ve got to get on that Ray. You never know where you’re going to be in a few days,” Eric says to me.

I roll onto my side and run my fingers through my hair, “Yeah, but you didn’t think about where you’d be.”

“That’s because at your age, I already had my Meeting.”

I don’t answer. Instead I listen to my nephews in the background. There’s a crash on the other end of the line then Quinn yells, “Put that down right now, Zeke!”

“Busy day?” I ask my brother.

“Yeah. Zeke was in a fight at preschool today.”

Eric moved out a while ago, right after he met his soul mate, Quinn, when he was 15. They were married three months later.

You can do that, you know. If you’ve already Met and you’ve known each other for over a month. Eric was married when they were both 15 and Quinn had their twin boys, Zeke and Tate, at 16.

My nephews are now 4 and are the worst kids on the planet. They get into everything. One time Eric came home from work to find them covered in marker. He told me they had said they wanted to be blue monkeys.

“About what?”

“Apparently another kid pushed Tate and Zeke threw bark at the kid who pushed his brother,” Eric sighs. I could almost see him rubbing his forehead.

“Well, at least he’s learning to protect him,” I say.

“Yeah…” Eric sighs agian. “How long do you have left?”

“0003d 09h 21m 07s.”

“Do you want me to come?”

“Nah. I’m fine. I’ll post pictures though.”

“What are you wearing?”

“Sid made me get a dress.”

“Good for her.”

“It’s not good for me. I don’t like dresses!”

“You’ll look fine,” Eric says as another crash echoes through the other line. This time he yells, “Tate Anthony Jane! Stop throwing your mother’s plates!”

I laugh.

“Hey, Ariel, I have to go. The twins are destroying the house.”

“Ok. Have fun!” I laugh.

Eric hangs up on me without saying goodbye.

I put my phone down on my dresser and flop back onto my bed.

Maybe I should have asked him to come.

I don’t want to be alone on my Meeting Day.

I close my eyes for a minute before my phone buzzes again.

“Ugh!” I grab my phone again and look at the caller ID.

It’s Sidney.

I press answer and say, “Hello?”

“Want to go on a date?”

“With you?”

“Kind of. I set up an illegal double date. Me and Wesley were planning on going to see a movie, but then his mom told him he had to babysit his brother. So do you want to come? We’re already parked outside your house,” Sidney says in a hurry.

“What?” I leap off my bed and to the window facing the street. Sure enough there’s Wes’s car parked by my moms car. I barely see Sidney wave at me through the windshield in the fading light.

“Do you? It’s going to be kind of awkward by ourselves.”

I roll my eyes, “Fine. I’ll be ready in five minutes.”