by Billy Taylor
Zac and I faced each other and then we frowned. “We’re not a couple, Mum.” I assured.
Mum completely dismissed what I said and started making conversation with Zac. “Hi, I’m Will’s mother. My name is Mandy.”
“I’m Zac,” Zac replied, her shyness increasing once again.
“So you’re sleeping with my son?”
“Mum!” I said. “We’re friends.”
“Oh, please,” Mum said. “I’m not an idiot. And I called Ted the other day and he told me all about you two.”
I gritted my teeth and thought of the beating I would give Ted upon my return to the apartment. “What’s new with you, Mum?” I asked.
“You know, gardening and more gardening. I’m maintaining the garden for the museum now, the one twenty minutes away from here.”
“Oh, we’ve been there,” I said. “Ted likes a girl who works there so he took Zac one day, and then he took me the day after. I saw the garden. It looks lovely.”
“Thank you, my baby. So, Zac…” Mum said. My attempt at creating a conversation topic about something else had failed. “Do you want anything to eat or drink?”
“No, thank you. I’m ok with tea.”
“Ok, love. Will, you can begin to make our food then,” Mum said, signalling to the kitchen.
“I thought you were making food?” Mum didn’t take to kindly to my assumption. She just gave me her glare. I stood and made my way towards the kitchen.
“The recipe and ingredients are in the kitchen. I’ll come and check on how you’re doing later.”
“Ok,” I grumbled.
Mum came to check up on me five minutes later. “How is the lasagna coming along?” she asked.
“Good,” I said. “I’m starting on the base now.”
“Good work,” Mum said, hugging me from behind. “I miss you. You’re too old and tall now. Can’t you become a baby again?”
“I’m not sure that’s how it works, Mum,” I replied.
“You’ll always be my baby,” she said, squeezing her arms around me tighter. “There’s a brand new boxed blender over there in the bag,” Mum said.
“Ok. Why is that relevant?”
“It’s a present for you.”
“I don’t need a blender.”
“It’s for Zac, you dumbass.”
“Oh. Why does she need one?”
“Can’t you remember the plan that Rosie and I created together? And you used to complain about the noise of the blender all the time.”
I thought back to my ten-year-old self living here. Then I remembered Rosie’s stupid blender used to wake me up every morning. “I remember now,” I said.
“We’ll sit down later with her and we can talk about it. But what you might not remember is that I only used to eat whatever and whenever Rosie did. So I thought you could do that with Zac if you really want to support her through this.”
“Of course. We can talk about that later with her.”
“Good.” Mum released her grip from around me and then exited the kitchen. She poked her head around the kitchen corner moments later. “By the way, I took twenty pounds from your wallet in your coat earlier so you paid for the blender.”
I laughed. “Ok, Mum. No problem. But how did you know I didn’t have one already?” Mum laughed and then vanished again without saying another word.
Once I’d prepared the lasagna, and also preheated the oven, I placed the lasagna in the oven and set the timer for thirty minutes. I made my way into the living room afterwards. Mum was reading a book about flowers, and Rosie was sat painting Zac’s nails.
“What are you two up to?” I asked.
“I’m painting Zac’s nails,” Rosie replied, not breaking her concentration on stroking the brush along Zac’s nail.
“Sounds fun. What colour?”
“Since her beanie and eyes are the same colour, we thought we would make her nails the same colour, too.”
Zac smiled and held up the hand that Rosie wasn’t painting to show me the same colour nail polish as her eyes and her beanie.
“I bought her that beanie on our first…meeting,” I said. “She wears it all the time now.”
“That’s nice,” Rosie said. “So how did you two meet?”
I waved my hand to Zac to allow her to answer Rosie instead of me. I also thought it would be interesting to see if she mentioned anything about what she thought during the times that we met at the cinema.
“We met at the cinema that I work at. He came a couple of times in a couple of days and then we saw a film together.”
Rosie lifted her head and looked at Zac and then me. “I’m sure you’ve missed out a lot of the details there, but fair enough.”
Mum dropped her book onto the table and then saw me. “Oh hello, love. I didn’t notice you were finished in the kitchen.”
“It should be ready in thirty minutes or so,” I replied.
“Finished!” Rosie then said, placing the brush back into the bottle.
“Why don’t I show you around the garden, Zac? They’ll dry much quicker outside,” Mum said.
Zac looked at Rosie and then me. “She won’t hurt you,” I said. “She stopped burying her murder victims in the garden a long time ago. She doesn’t murder family or friends either so you’re safe.”
“That’s the story I used to tell him,” Mum said. “He used to ask me why my flowers grew better than everyone else’s, and I told him it was because I used dead bodies in the soil.”
Zac laughed, but you could tell that she was a bit scared. She slowly got to her feet and she and Mum went outside to view the garden.
I sat on the sofa beside Rosie. She shuffled over and rested her head on my leg. “Tell me the truth, Will,” she said all soft and innocent.
“Truth about what?” I asked.
“About Zac.” I smirked and leant my head back.
“Aw, c’mon, Will. I’m being serious. I know I tease you about things, but I honestly want to know what the deal is between you two.”
I sighed and took a deep breath. “She doesn’t want anything serious. We’ve been seeing each other nearly every weekend since we met. And she created these rules that we have to follow if we were going to sleep together and keep it that way.”
Rosie nodded her head. “Ok. But you want to be with her, don’t you?”
I wobbled my jaw and thought about lying, but I knew Rosie would see right through that. “Yeah, I want to be with her. But she doesn’t want anything serious like I said. So, I don’t know. I guess I’m hoping she will change her mind the longer we spend together.”
Rosie smiled before saying, “She might change her mind, Will. But I haven’t spent long enough with her to figure out if that would be possible. The one thing I can say to you is that ninety-nine percent of the time, this ends with you being left hurt or heartbroken. And I don’t want to see or hear that happen to you.”
I smiled. “We’ll be ok. Don’t worry.”
“Ok,” she said, sitting up. “I love you, little brother, I’ve missed you so much.” She wrapped her arms around me and rested her head on my shoulder.
“You too, Freckles.” She rubbed my back and tightened her grip. “Is everything ok in America then?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “It feels like home, and then sometimes it feels nothing like home. And I have so much fun there, but at the same time, I have some bad times there.”
“That’s life,” I said.
“I know. I just don’t know whether to stay there or come home.”
“Either way, we will love and support you no matter what, Rosie.”
She leant back and said, “Thank you, little brother.”
“I am taller than you, Rosie. It should be younger brother now.”
“I know, but that doesn’t sound as good. Can you remember when I was seventeen and I had stopped growing, and you were about to turn eleven and still hadn’t had your growth spurt? You barely went past my hip.”
“You’ll always be my little brother! No matter what.”
Mum and Zac then came through the front door from outside. “Hey! How was it? What do you think about Mum’s garden? Or did she just take you outside to quiz you about me?” I asked Zac.
“A bit of both,” Mum replied.
“Did she give you the break my son’s heart I’ll kill you speech?”
“No!” Mum responded. As she sat back down on the opposite sofa, Zac and I quickly made eye contact and she smiled and she nodded. I grinned, and then Rosie went to sit beside Mum, allowing Zac to sit beside me. “I spoke to Zac outside about how Rosie had an eating disorder, too.” Mum grabbed Rosie and locked her arms around Rosie’s neck, trapping her in Mum’s loving death grip. “Rosie and I created this plan together. We would have three meals a day. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. To show her that she wasn’t alone in this, I followed the same plan. If she ate, I ate. If she didn’t, I didn’t. But she always ate. My baby never skipped a meal again after those terrible days in the hospital. We would have a smoothie in the morning, soup for lunch, and soup for dinner. When we first started. We started with smaller quantities. We calculated how many calories each meal was, and then how many calories that would be per day. And we gradually increased the quantity as time progressed until we made it to the calorie intake that we should be having per day. We used a blender. And we put all sorts of fruits and vegetables in so we were eating healthily and got lots of nutrients and vitamins and the other ones, I can’t remember them all. Like I said outside, Will has bought you one, it’s in the kitchen.”
Zac’s eyes flicked over to me and she smiled her tight-lipped smile. Mum leant over the back of the sofa she was sitting on and grabbed a journal from behind it. “This is the journal that Rosie and I kept a log in. I think you should have it. You can see what we ate each day, and how we progressed.” Mum stood and leant over to hand the journal to Zac. She sat with it on her lap and ran her fingers over the black cover.
“Zac,” Rosie said as Mum recaptured her into her loving death grip. “I know you’re scared. I do. Because I almost died. I can’t describe what it felt like, thinking I was going to die.” She tried to sit up, but Mum’s grip was too tight. “Mum,” she said. “Release me from your grasp for a second, please.” Mum slowly opened her arms and allowed Rosie to sit up, but she took her hand afterwards and held it.
Rosie regained her attention to Zac. “And I decided to accept it when I was in the hospital. If that’s what the doctors and nurses thought, and they’re experts, then I thought there would be no way I could survive. But then I remember waking up one time, and looked around my bed to see nobody. Until I looked to my right and saw my little brother sat holding my hand. I figured everyone else must have been busy talking to the doctors. And he said to me, ‘Please don’t die, Rosie.’ I’ve never told this to anyone before, and I don’t know if he remembers or not. I just thought about what he must have been thinking. How scared and confused he must have been. But I told myself if I recovered, and didn’t die, I would do everything I could to be myself again. Because my little brother needed me; otherwise, he wouldn’t have anyone else to tease him.”
I smirked as I was looking down at my hands. I was trying very hard not to cry, because I didn’t want Zac to see me cry. I glanced up and saw my mum. She was gone already, she was continuously wiping away her tears.
“I know you don’t have a brother or sister,” Rosie continued after she kissed my mum’s cheek. “But you have a mum and dad, and I know things have been difficult between the three of you recently. And I’m sorry about that. But they care about you. However, if you feel like things are too difficult between the three of you at the moment, then remember you have Will. He will do anything and everything he can to help. I know you two have an unusual…relationship. But all I wish you would do is give it a chance, and give him a chance, and let him be whatever you need him to be whenever you need him to be it. Because he’ll do it. Because he cares about you. You’re a beautiful girl, Zac. And if you ever need to talk to me, you can always contact me.”
Zac nodded. “Thank you, Rosie.”
Zac sat and read through the journal whilst Rosie, Mum, and I ate my pretty surprisingly delicious lasagna, and then she asked if she could make one of the soups from the journal. Mum got up and showed her where everything was. And then a couple of minutes later, the blender was buzzing around. I’m not sure what ingredients she used, but it looked delicious. She heated the blended mixture in the microwave, and then sat with us at the kitchen table. After lunch Mum told us that Rosie had bought her the Mamma Mia! movie on DVD. I remember when she made us go to the cinema with her last year to watch it. She kept dragging different people along to go and see it with her so she ended up watching it about five times.
So Mum made a big pot of tea while we all sat in the living room, and then we watched the film. Mum sat on her sofa with all her blankets and cushions while Zac, Rosie, and I sat together. Rosie placed a cushion across my lap and rested her head on it.
“She’s just a really tall baby,” Mum said from across the room. Zac just sat beside me with a bit of space between us because that was what her rules permitted. Towards the end of the film she shuffled up to me and put her head on my shoulder. I think she was a bit tired, even though she slept all evening and all last night.
We didn’t stay much longer after the film had finished. Zac was sleeping, so I thought I’d wake her and drive home before Mum forced us to stay there. Because then we would never leave. She’d trap us there. Zac hugged Mum and Rosie and thanked them both, and then she dawdled into the garden towards the front gate.
I hugged my mum and said, “Thank you, Mum. I love you.”
“You best come and visit me again soon,” she said. “Your room is still the same if you ever want to stay.”
“I know,” I said. “I’ll come back soon, I promise.”
I hugged Rosie after and she said, “I love you, bro. Let’s do something soon?”
And I said, “I love you, too. Text me and we’ll do something next week.” When I tried to end the hug and step away, she tightened her grip around me. “Are you going to let me go?” I asked.
“Nope. We’re stuck like this forever now.”
“I’ve got to take Zac home,” I said.
“Oh Will, we all know you’re going back to yours for sex,” Mum said.
“Ok, I’m going now,” I said, breaking free from Rosie’s grasp and grabbing Zac’s blender off the table.
“Use protection!” Mum shouted as I walked towards the gate.
“Please shut up, Mum!” I yelled. I shuddered as I approached the gate and shut it behind me. This was why I didn’t talk to Mum or Rosie about girls. Because they always say things that I don’t particularly want to hear them say.
Zac was leaning against the passenger side of the car as I walked over. “I have some condoms in my bag,” she joked.
“Don’t you start,” I replied. “They’re bad enough.”
She giggled as she opened the door and slid inside. I placed her blender on the backseat and then got into the driver’s seat.
“Thank you,” she said as I sighed and fastened my seatbelt.
I looked into her beautiful blue eyes and said, “No thanks necessary, ma’am. Just remember whatever you need whenever you need it, I’ll try my best to make it happen.”
She smiled her tight-lipped smile, and then I placed the car key into the ignition. She leant over and started to kiss my neck. I flinched my shoulder and leant away.
“What?” she said.
“Wait until we’re home,” I said. “My mum has probably set up surveillance cameras around here, and she’ll be spying on us right now.” Zac frowned. “I’m not kidding! I wouldn’t be surprised if my phone started ringing now and it was her
calling to tell us to knock it off.”
She laughed and returned to her normal seating position. “You’re too cute sometimes,” she said.
I raised an eyebrow and peered over at her. “You better not be falling in love with me, Zac. That’s not what we agreed.” She pulled a funny face and sarcastically laughed. “Right,” I said. “Let’s go home.”
March 1st
Ted was nowhere to be seen when we returned to the apartment yesterday. So we figured he was chilling in his room. I sat down on the bed and Zac didn’t even let me take off my shoes before she continued to kiss my neck.
When I woke up this morning, I heard Zac talking to someone, but I assumed that it was Ted, although I couldn’t hear his voice. Then I heard quick thumping footsteps and Zac suddenly sprinted back into the bedroom and jumped onto me.
“Will, Will, Will, Will, Will, Will, Will, Will, Will,” she whispered no farther than an inch away from my face.
“Oh, I’m sorry, were you talking to me?” I asked, opening my eyes to find hers looking directly into them. She looked extremely happy and excited. “What’s up?” I grumbled.
“Autumn is here.”
“No, it can’t be. It’s still March.”
She sighed. “No, Autumn, the girl from the museum, is here, you idiot.”
My eyes opened and I sat up, my mood matching hers. “Where is she?” I asked.
“In the kitchen. I can’t believe it!” Zac whispered.
“Did she say anything to you?” I asked.
“Not really, we said hello and asked how each other was, that’s when I came to tell you she was here.”
Zac and I both rose from the bed and poked our heads around the bedroom door to peer into the kitchen. And there she was, wearing a T-shirt and pair of jogging bottoms of Ted’s, making herself some toast with Ted, and they were smooching.
“How did this happen?” I whispered.
Zac hummed. “The sex we had last night must have been so amazing that we entered an alternate universe, and in this universe, this Ted and Autumn are already in a relationship.”
I frowned down at Zac, as she seemed pretty pleased with her explanation as she watched Ted and Autumn. Her focus changed to me, and her happiness faded when she saw my frown. “What?” she whispered.