My Little Cheesecake

The day after was precisely how Gwen thought it would be. She could barely keep her eyes open during the few lessons they had that day. Brendon, on the other hand, had too much energy for his own good; even the teachers could notice that. He insisted to start debates about homosexuality, with those who were pro on one side and those who felt the opposite on the other. Gwen clearly made the statement that this was the worst idea he had even had, because of the possible bickering that would haunt them throughout the lessons for the rest of the day. Brendon didn’t care at all, and pressed every single one of Gwen’s nerves that he could think of. She suddenly realised the lesson was only seconds away from an end, and felt a huge relief when the bell rang. Well out in the corridor she saw Jolene standing by her locker.

“Jolly!” she shrieked.

“Okay, we seriously have got to talk about nicknames. ‘Jolly’ just doesn’t cut if for me, you see. You have to think about something better than that.”

“Uh, sausage?”

“Sausage?! You have sausages for fingers!” Gwen looked down at her fingers and went silence for just a few seconds.

“Well… I guess that’s true.”

“Relax, racist, you don’t have sausage-fingers, I’m just making fun of you.”

“I got to sleep ten minutes tonight because of Brendon basically slapping me in the face if I even dared to think about falling asleep. Don’t you think he literally poured coffee in me? And he won’t leave me alone today…” She was on the edge of being slightly irritated. That was worse enough, of what Jolene had heard of from a guy in her year. Jolene calmly put her arm around Gwen and smiled.

“You’re so gay.”

“I kno--,”

“Oh, did you hear about Squirly? And that guy?”

“You mean I missed something during this night? Seriously? What about them?”

“You can ask her yourself, I don’t have time now. Stay black.” And so, Jolene was gone, though quickly replaced by none other than Sammy with Everlyn on her side. They both had a sneaky look upon their faces.

“Tell me, tell me, tell me.”

“You remember Zachary, don’t you?” Everlyn asked.

“Of course I do, why wouldn’t I?”

“Let us just put it this way; it’s on.” Gwen looked like a question mark, not really understanding the message behind Everlyn’s sentence. Sammy rolled her eyes and grabbed Gwen’s shoulders.

“It’s on, official, they’re almost married, and if you haven’t got it yet; they have sex.” Everlyn snatched and looked embarrassed by Sammy’s words. Gwen suddenly looked less confused and more pleased.

“Congratulations! Awesome!” she said and hugged Everlyn tightly.

“Thank you, it feels great,” she said with her charming British accent.

“And while we’re talking about sex; how was your night with Brendon?” Sammy put in.

“You’re making it sound so, so wrong. And I’ve slept ten minutes.”

“Oh, busy teenagers nowadays. But it’s not like you can deny that there’s something going on between you two.”

“Sure I can deny it.”

“Nu-huh.”

“Uh-huh. You can’t win anything from this.”

“Yup, it would prove I was right.” Gwen tried to ignore what Sammy wanted to state. To her, it felt like impossibility to accept such a thing. They were just meant to be great friends.

“You know what, whatever, are we still on for tonight?”

“If you want us to be, honey, are 7 alright?” Gwen gave her two thumbs up while walking backwards away from them. 7 tonight meant that she could laugh and not care if she was tired or not. They would go to their favourite hangout, a fast food place in Summerlin, which they’d started to call their own.

“Gee!” She sighed and turned around to find Brendon standing there with his arms crossed. “You have no right to leave me like that.”

“It’s not like I’m the only person you talk to around us.”

“Oh yeah, today it is, because everyone else have a problem with me being so hyperactive, and you’re the only one I can torture without feeling bad about it.”

“I feel so special. Are you coming with us tonight?”

“Can’t, band practice.”

“Never mind then.”

The day ended quicker than any of them could expect, and suddenly the time was five to 7 and Gwen knew she was going to be late, but only ten minutes if she was lucky. When she got there she was a little surprised to be the first to arrive. The guy who stood behind the desk just smiled toward her politely; the gang was there pretty often.

“Fuck,” she whispered when she realised she’d forgotten her cell phone at home. There was not much she could do about it. Sammy and Jolene came walking through the door five minutes later, and after them came Ahlyssa, hand in hand with Elliot. To Gwen’s relief, Lily came too. Everything went on smoothly, except the fact that the food took some time to get ready. No one complained though, they had a nice time anyway. Their conversations always got derailed, turned into nasty suggestions, but got on track after a while.

Around half past eight Gwen decided that it was time to go home, and go to bed. It was almost like a miracle that she didn’t steer down in some kind of ditch, but got home, exhausted.

She looked at her cell phone which had been lying on the bedside table. To her surprise, there was like twelve missed calls. There was one from her father, one from Brendon, two from Sammy and… eight missed calls from Betty. Her errand must have been important. She dialled Betty’s number and put the phone to her ear. It kept ringing on the other side, but no one would answer. She tried again, and this time, after six beep’s, Betty’s voice was heard on the other end. Something was definitely wrong.

“Something must have been very important for you to call me so many times,” Gwen said.

“Oh my God, he’s never been like this before.” Betty sounded petrified, and pretty shaken up.

“What are you talking about?”

“I mean, he drinks a lot, but it never turns out so bad, especially not like this.” Gwen didn’t like what she heard her friend say at all.

“Is it your dad?” Betty didn’t answer her. Gwen just heard her taking heavy breaths, like she was listening for something. “Bets, answer me.”

“Fuck,” Betty whispered, “he’s coming again.” Before Gwen had any time to answer, the line went dead. In panic, she tried to call back again, but the phone was turned off. Without thinking she rushed down the stairs to the outer door.

“Mom!?” she shrieked, still in panic.

“Yes, sweetie,” her mother answered. Gwen was shocked that she could stay so calm, while something terrible was happening, but her mother didn’t know anything about that, just in Gwen’s mind.

“You have got to call the cops and send them to Betty’s house. Something’s happening over there.” Her mother looked kind of confused, but nodded and did what her daughter had told her to do. While listening to her mother saying something like sending a police officer over, she grabbed the keys to the car and rushed outside. She did everything right now without thinking basically.

She could only imagine the worst things in her head that could’ve happened when she drummed on the steering wheel, traffic lights passing by.