Red

I awoke the next morning to my phone alarm playing poison by Beyoncé and I was quickly reminded of my experiences with Paul. I rolled over onto my side and looked around my room.

My room at my grandmother’s house was small, but exactly how I remembered it from all the times I had visited when I was younger.

The room consisted of greenish walls, a small window, small dresser, a twin sized bed with a wooden headboard to match the wooden nightstand. The thing that comforted me the most was the chandelier.

I could remember that when I was younger I could spend hours staring at the chandelier to drown out my parent’s constant fights and arguments. It kept me sane. Whenever the window was open, it was like a large chime, drowning out all dangerous sounds and weaknesses.

I sat up on my bed and began to stare at the chandelier while thinking back to my conversation last night with my grandmother.

We first talked about where she had been (she claims that she went to play bingo with her doctor, but I know that she was only there to flirt with him). We also talked about her health and how much time she had left (that conversation was filled with many tears). We probably would have talked more if her medicine had not kicked in and caused her to fall asleep.

I was seconds away from dosing off again before I heard a knock at my window. I turned and was met with a somber looking Leah. Shocked by her being the person at my window, I fell off my bed and landed with a thud.

I was just about to reach up when I heard and unmistakably, loud laugh. I rolled over on the floor and saw Emily at my door.

“Hey” she said before walking over to me and grabbing my hand to pull me up “Your grandma let me in, I hope that’s alright.”

“Yeah, it’s fine,” I whispered shyly “As long as you had nothing to do with Leah scaring the hell out of me”

I stood up and pulled on an outfit quickly. It consisted of a blue, red, and white Minnie Mouse sweater, black jeans, red heels, and red Mickey Mouse earrings. I left my hair alone, I could care less if it looked messy or not

From my bedroom door, I heard Leah reply, “It’s not my fault that you scare easily.” I could tell she was having a hard time not laughing at my misfortune.

I quickly observed the situation ‘Leah and Emily are in my grandmother’s house and they’re not mad at each other’ ‘My grandmother was awake before me’ ‘Something smells like Paul’

Emily took notice to my wondering look and as soon as she was about to speak, Paul burst into my room and said simply

“We need to talk.”

“Why do we need to talk?” I replied back almost angry at the way he demanded that I do something. I had been demanded by my parents all my life and I was not about to allow some excessively handsome stranger tell me what I did and did not have to do.

“As far as I’m concerned I have nothing to say to you. You have made it very clear that you don’t like me, so what I AM going to do is get into Emily’s car and ask her politely to drive me up to my school so that I may enroll in my classes. If you would like to join us that would be fine, but we will talk on my terms and only then.” When I was finished with my speech, I looked pointedly at Emily and she shrugged her shoulder and lead me in the direction of her car.

I kissed my grandmother on the cheek before walking out of the house and once I was inside the car I noticed that both Paul and Leah were standing outside of my house with shocked looks on their faces.

I was somewhat shocked myself. I had an issue with confrontation and I had handled myself with confidence and force. With a smile on my face I turned to Emily and said with complete and total confidence

“What are the chances that he’s going to be nicer to me after this?”

She turned to me with a smile just as big as mine and said, “He’ll probably be even worse.”

We both laughed while she turned on the engine to the car and pulled out of the driveway, leaving both Paul and Leah completely stunned.