Seventeen and Invincible

“Is it good enough?” he asked when my hair was finally dry. I nodded and stood up from the chair in my room. “Thank God,” he muttered.

“I’m not deaf Gar,” I responded, quickly shooting him a glare. He threw his hands up in surrender. “So what exactly am I wearing today?” He pointed to the neatly folded pile of clothes on my bed. “Thanks,” I mumbled. I turned to face the wall, slipping off my I’m-getting-ready-and-don’t-know-what-I’m-wearing-yet t-shirt and sliding into my favorite pair of denim shorts and a striped racer back tank top.

“IHOP might be crowded, is the diner good instead?” I nodded and grabbed a brown cardigan from on top of my dresser.

“Yeah, the diner is fine.” I used a bobby pin to push my side bangs out of my face and applied a little bit of powder foundation. I was only with Garrett and anything else would probably sweat off in ten minutes. It may have been January, but in Arizona it was still a good ninety-something degrees. “Let’s go,” I motioned to him sliding my feet into my worn out brown flip flops and grabbing my cell phone from my nightstand.

“Let’s go,” he agreed linking our arms together. We climbed slowly down the stairs trying to keep them from making any noise. Unfortunately, that wasn’t going to happen. Of course as soon as I placed my foot on the bottom stair it was going to creek.

“Anika, is that you?” my mother called strolling into the living room. I smiled weakly and she knew the smile was completely and totally fake.

“Hi Mom,” I said quickly pulling Garrett to the door. “We’re going to get coffee and breakfast.”

“What about school?” she asked accusingly in her thick German accent.

“Well,” I started uneasily, “I figured I would just go back Monday.” She gave me a questioning look. “Mom,” I whined, “please, just not today.” She sighed heavily and nodded. “Thanks.” I pulled the door open and pulled Garrett outside with me. I squinted in the sunlight—I had become accustomed to the darkness.

“Here,” he said handing me a pair of sunglasses, “I grabbed them off of your dresser. I figured you’d need them.” I smiled and nodded sliding them onto the bridge of my nose.

---------------------♥--------------------

We reached the diner in ten minutes and were seated in a small booth all the way in the back of the diner. It was freezing in here and I was mad at him for picking out shorts. “Sorry,” he muttered, “I didn’t think they’d have the air so high so early.”

“Yeah, right,” I glared. I was going to turn into a popsicle before we got our food. We both ordered chocolate chip pancakes and coffee.

“So, do you want to talk about it?” he offered. I shrugged and leaned back against the vinyl of the booth.

“What is there to talk about? He cheated on me. He knocked some girl up. I’m alone and miserable and she gets it all.” I took in a deep, shaky breath and twiddled my thumbs under the table.

“That’s really how you’re looking at this all?” he asked quizzically. I tilted my head to the side in confusion and he continued. “Because I think you should be thanking her. He’s a liar and a cheater and he doesn’t even care enough to be safe.” I shrugged and leaned back in my seat.

“But she gets him. She gets him and she gets him for life because she’s having his kid.” I quickly pushed a stray piece of hair behind my ear. “Sometimes I wish I was her, just because I’d get it all.”

“Are you an idiot?” he asked loudly startling me. I looked around to see if anyone else had noticed, but it seemed like they hadn’t.

“What do you mean?” I asked quietly.

“You wish you were a pregnant sixteen year old with a liar of a boyfriend?” I shrugged and thanked the waitress as she placed our coffees in front of us. I tore open a sugar packet and poured it into the steaming hot liquid waiting for him to continue. “Anika, look at me.” I glanced up at him from my coffee. “You get to chose who you want to be with. You get to plan your life. You get to go to college and do whatever you want with your life. She doesn’t.” I exhaled loudly and stirred my coffee idly, slowly adding milk from the little silver container.

“So?”

“So? That’s all you have to say? Ani, you get to live your life. She doesn’t.”

“I guess. I mean it’s not even like I’d want the kid anyway. I’d just have it and we’d all be miserable. We both know I don’t want kids, but I hate the fact that she had the courage to sleep with him and I didn’t. I know that’s the only reason he went to her. He went to her because I didn’t want to fuck him.” I finally lifted the cup of coffee off of the saucer to take a sip, just for something to do.

“So? He obviously didn’t love you if he wasn’t willing to wait.” I shrugged and put the cup back down.

“I guess. Whatever. He and I are over. It doesn’t matter anymore. He wasn’t the one, and that’s pretty obvious. Let’s just stop talking about it, okay?”

“Alright.” He took a sip of his coffee as the waitress returned with our food. I thanked her and stared at my pancakes in disgust. I hadn’t eaten in four days and whenever I stopped eating I didn’t want to go back. I wasn’t hungry, but I started to eat hesitantly anyway. If I didn’t then Garrett would freak out on me. Again.