Homesick

Tatum actually manages to get up about thirty minutes before dinner and take a long, hot shower. She wipes herself down in the humid bathroom and pats at her head of hair, looking at her reflection through the condensation on the mirror. Luckily, she doesn’t think she suffered from any burns from the long day at the waterpark - thank god for high SPF sunscreen; she easily slips on some leather shorts and a loose, button-down white dress shirt with no trouble. Since she knows her hair won’t dry in time for the dinner, she ties it up in a lazy bun, letting some strands fall sexily ( or, at least she thinks it looks sexy) around her pink-tinted face, bangs clipped back, as usual.

She tugs on some black ankle-high boots and is out the door just in time to catch Wyatt leaving his. “Oh,” he breathes when he sees her. “I was just told to come check on you.” He wags the extra door card for her room to prove it, although it didn’t need any proving.

He’s also showered and well-dressed, in a comfy-looking, knitted gray sweater that’s a little too big for him, collar of a dress shirt peeking out from underneath, and some caramel-colored trousers. It isn’t his style - Tatums knows he’ll wear t-shirts and jeans everyday if he could - but since his parents are so into appearances he just wears whatever they buy him. Tatum’s the same way, but she has more freedom since she’s good at convincing her mom to get her things that “don’t fit the Morgan family’s morals”.

“Too late,” Tatum teases, slapping his side, near his bum. His face brightens, turns a shade of red, and she giggles, wondering why he’s looking so adorable today.

“The rest are already downstairs,” Wyatt says, pointing in the direction of the elevators. “So we should go—”

“You forgot me, kiddo,” Nick suddenly says, leaving the room he, unfortunately, shares with Wyatt. His hairdo is back to its usual shape, gelled and swooping at the fringe, but the rest short. He’s in a sweater and trousers, too, but he doesn’t have a white shirt underneath, and his sweater is plaid, with black and green patterns. “Although that’s hard to do, eh?” he stupidly looks to Tatum for support, and isn’t surprised when he receives none.

“Who dresses you?” Tatum jokes as all three teenagers walk down the hotel hallway. “Your dad, or something? Because you color patterns have been atrocious lately.” Wyatt’s short snicker only encourages Tatum to smile wickedly.

“I dress me, thank you very much,” Nick sniffs, looking unphased by her jab. “And I look great in any color, so it shouldn’t matter, should it?” He gives Tatum a blatant once-over and smirks. “But you, on the other hand, can’t pass that camel-toe look, eh?”

Tatum’s face drains of all color as she self-consciously looks down to make sure what he said isn’t true. Before she can really find anything, Wyatt shakes his head and sighs, saying, “sinking to a girl’s level, dude? Not cool.”

“It’s true,” Nick shrugs, still an unphasable mastermind. “I don’t really mind your camel-toe, though, Tate, but my dad and mom may.”

Now her face is entirely red, and she shifts her shorts nervously, trying to hide it. “You can’t see anything, Tatum, it’s fine,” Wyatt assures her, but she isn’t having it.

Tatum stops walking suddenly and the two boys also freeze a couple of inches ahead to turn and look back at her. “I’m gonna go change,” she mutters, still mortified. “I’ll be right there, okay?”

Nick shrugs, replying with, “sure, babe,” and turns to walk off again. But Wyatt remains, looking at her sympathetically.

“I’ll come with you,” he says, and the two siblings rush down the hall and back towards Tatum’s room, where Wyatt puts the card in the door for her and opens it.

She rushes in almost immediately, dropping to her knees and scrambling through her suitcases to find another pair of shorts to wear. The shitty part about that whole ordeal is that she’s worn those shorts plenty of times before, and no one - not even her parents or her friends - had said anything about it. It’s absolutely horrible that Nick had to wickedly mention it months after the proud purchase. Although he did it in an awful way, she’s secretly grateful for him pointing it out; otherwise, she would’ve continued to walk about with a bad case of the camel-toe.

Wyatt stands by the door while he watches his sister, who looks dangerously close to tears, rummage through her belongings. He isn’t sure if he’s allowed to come in or not, but by the way she’s distracted, he doesn’t think she’ll mind too much if he does. So, he carefully steps into the hotel room and lets the door close heavily behind him. His breathing is picking up speed and he doesn’t quite know why.

“Oh god, Wy,” she sniffles, wiping her nose with the back of her shaking hand. She pauses her search to look up at him with wet eyes, mouth hanging open to show the bottoms of her top teeth. “Was it really that bad? Do you think the other times I wore that people saw?”

Wyatt is at a lost of words for a moment, startled at how worked up she is about it. He starts towards her and crouches by her side, placing an understanding hand on the spot between her shoulder blades. He can now feel her shivering and feels his chest tighten painfully at that; he pulls her in for a side hug and presses his mouth to the top of her head, breathing, “no, Tatum. No one saw,” into her red hair.

He feels her lean on him some and sigh softly, still sniffling some. They remain this way for a while before she raises her eyes to the full-body mirror in front of them and examines the scene before her. Both of their hair is a strong shade of red, but his is leaning more on the blonde side while hers is leaning towards brown. His eyes are wide and wet and green, surrounded by dirty blonde eyelashes, while hers are a dark shade of blue, brown eyelashes shorter and not as curled as his.

Tatum realizes then that they really do look like siblings. And that’s an obvious thing to think, but she’s never truly thought about it until then, staring at their close and desperate reflections, wrapped up in one another’s embrace. Wyatt is like the male version of her, almost, except for the color of his eyes and the blonde tint in his hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes. A smile flutters across her pink lips and she thinks, wow, Wyatt is a pretty boy. He may not be strong and fit and broad like most other guys she knows that went through puberty, but he’s got that fresh, clean, pretty look about him, all soft and romantic-looking.

“Wy,” she whispers.

“Yeah?” She can feel his breath in her hair as he speaks.

“You never made up a nickname for me, ya know,” she laughs quietly, pulling back to look him in the face. The gentle look in his eyes makes her heart flutter with appreciation. “Dad calls me Tater and Mom calls me boo, sometimes, and Nick calls me Tate, but . . . but you just call me Tatum.”

Wyatt pauses to think about that, and then laughs back, gazing into her eyes and shrugging. He pulls her back into a side hug and she looks at his reflection this time, observing as his eyes raise to the roof.

“Well,” he begins, and she can feel his thumb stroking her arm tenderly. “I think . . . I think people who’re really close don’t need to give one another nicknames.” He looks down at her again and she follows his stare. “Tatum is your name, so I’m gonna call you Tatum.”

She smiles. “Do you like it when I call you Wy?”

“You’re the only one who calls me that, so, yeah. Yeah - I do.”

She keeps the smile on her face and nods. “I guess it makes sense then.” She lowers her eyes back to her suitcase and, remembering why she’s in there in the first place, begins looking through it again. “Damn,” she grumbles. “We need to hurry.”

Wyatt lets go of her and she feels cold from where he once held her. “You’re right.” He gets to his feet and heads to the door. “Sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Tatum looks up to watch him again. “You gonna head down first?”

“Yeah - I can’t watch you change, can I?”

She laughs. “Yeah. See you down there.” She finally picks out loose blue shorts and admires them, holding it up with both hands.

Wyatt studies her peaceful face, some, before slipping out of the room and letting the door close heavily behind him.

-

Dinner is at a seafood restaurant down the road from their hotel; when Tatum finally makes it to the lobby, they all pack back in the car and head down there. Nick opens the front, glossy doors of the establishment for her, and she gives him a short and forced thanks, slipping in with Wyatt close behind.

The front of the restaurant is wide, with a tall roof and large, plastic fish statues hanging down from it. The walls are a bright blue with waves painted on, and the entire theme of the place is under the sea, basically. Tatum even sees a sketching of Ariel the mermaid hanging above the circular bar table.

“How many in your party?” a young, enthusiastic hostess asks, already pulling out five adult menus. Her hair is a bleached, blinding blonde, with dark roots and an asymmetrical cut. Her uniform is all blue and white, and the nametag on her chest says Brittany. Tatum thinks it’s a fitting name for her bubbly look.

“Five, please,” Mr. Marshall says shortly, eyes not even bothering to look at her.

“Sure!” Brittany smiles. “Follow me.”

She leads the small group to a booth table near the front, and Tatum, Nick, and Wyatt pack into one side, Tatum in the middle again, while Mr. and Mrs. Marshall slide into the blue leather seats on the other side. Brittany hands them all the menus and clips, “your waiter or waitress will be with you in a minute,” before grinning at all of them, trying to make eye contact, and rushing off to a newly-arrived party by the door.

Nick already flips through the menu with a look of distaste twisted on his face. “Wow,” he says lowly, enough for Tatum to hear. “All this food looks like crap.”

Tatum frowns at him. “You haven’t even looked through all of it already, Nicholas. Shut up.”

“Well - I hate seafood.”

“You hate everything,” Tatum mutters, pressing the toes of her boots into his bare ankle. “Spoiled brat.” Nick only smirks, pressing the toe of his shoes into her bare ankle back, and Tatum squirms away from him, saying, “you’re not allowed to hurt me back, dou -” then realizes she’s in close proximity with his parents and finishes with, “Nick.”

“The fish sticks looks good,” Mrs. Marshall says happily, oblivious to Tatum’s almost-mishap. “I think I’m going to get the fish sticks.” She looks over to her side, at Mr. Marshall. “You decide on anything, Joseph?”

Mr. Marshall shakes his head, still deciding, when a tall, female waitress with the nametag Leslie stuck to her light blue dress shirt walks over, holding a notepad and a pen in her hands. “Welcome to The Fishing Barrel,” she says as politely as she can. “I’m Leslie and I’ll be your waitress today; are you ready to order drinks?” She scans their concentrated faces, hesitating.

“I’ll get a lemonade?” Tatum says, her eyes flickering through the drinks section of the menu. “A pink lemonade.”

“Water,” Wyatt says.

“A tall glass of beer.” Nick raises his index finger and smirks at the waitress, only to be shot an angry look from his mom. His face falls. “Fine,” he grumbles, leaning back in his seat. “Water.”

“I’ll have the pink lemonade, too,” Mrs. Marshall says, still staring warningly at her son. And then Mr. Marshall orders their banana smoothie special, and the waitress dismisses herself with a polite thank you.

“So, Tatum,” Mrs. Marshall begins, starting up pleasant conversation. “Your parents tell me you’re not quite sure what you’re going to do after graduation yet.” She smooths a hand over her dark ponytail and smiles at the teenage girl hopefully. “Have you finally decided?”

Tatum picks at the plastic covering on her menu and shrugs absentmindedly. “I still don’t even know what college I want to go to.” Her eyes flicker in the direction of her brother as she continues with, “I mean - Wyatt is thinking of going to Princeton or up to try his luck at Harvard, but . . . I haven’t decided. I ‘dunno.”

Mr. Marshall nods like he understands, but Tatum knows, in actuality, he doesn’t, because the Marshall family is known to decide colleges for their children. Joseph Marshall most likely never had the chance to pick on his own; his life was paved for him, and that’s the road she knows he followed.

She doesn’t want to be that kind of person - the type of girl to grow up in a wealthy family and go to an Ivy League college just because her parents pressed her to go there. She knows it happened to Wyatt - him being the most important child and all - and she isn’t planning for it to become that way for her.

“It’s hard - I know,” Mrs. Marshall says quietly. “Schools are getting harder and harder to get into, and it’s so much more pressure on this generation to do well.” A wry laugh escapes her and she glances at all three teenagers across from her. “We don’t want the Chinese to take over, do we?”

“No ma’am,” Nick says immediately, eyes still scanning the menu for something good to eat. “No sirree.”

“We’ll do fine,” Mr. Marshall speaks up from his spot beside his wife. “It’s America, after all. A lot of the Chinese are coming here for opportunity. If China is so great, then why don’t they stay over there?”

“I’ll get the baked fish, probably,” Tatum says suddenly, crouching over her menu to squint at the dish description. She feels the conversation is going down a wrong road and doesn’t want to let it get there fast enough to throw her out of her comfort zone. The animosity towards foreign countries is already high in her household; she’s tired of letting it control every discussion she has with her elders.

“Sounds good,” Wyatt says, looking over her shoulder to see what she’s reading. Tatum is grateful for him pressing the new topic and she looks at him to smile. He smiles back, though a little strangely, and she realizes that he didn’t know what she was trying to do, but she remains grateful anyway.

“What’re you getting?” she asks.

“I’ll get what you’re having,” he says.

“Me too.” Nick closes his menu with finality and slides it to the center of the table just as Leslie returns, teetering their drinks on a tray. They all watch as she calls out the name of the beverage while lowering it to the corresponding guest, and then takes out her notepad to get their food orders.

The group tells Leslie what they want, and she scribbles it down, nodding. “Alright - I’ll be right back with your meals!” Tatum is the only one to really thank her before Leslie is weaving through the crowded restaurant again, dodging booster chairs and stray children with expert precision.

“I’m starving,” Wyatt sighs, leaning back into his seat and flicking some red bangs out of his eyes. “I haven’t eaten since lunch time. I didn’t even have any of the snacks Mrs. Marshall packed.”

“You should’ve eaten while you had the chance, Wyatt!” Mrs. Marshall smiles and wags her chubby finger playfully at him. “I knew that was going to happen, and I told you!” Tatum pulls Wyatt into a mocking, sympathetic hug while he mutters apologies to the older woman, gaze lowering in embarrassment. Nick and Mr. Marshall, not really paying attention to the conversation next to them, go on to talk about Nick’s college plans and scholarship opportunities for the upcoming and deadly senior year.

Deadly, simply because at Bradford and Holland private, their senior year is one of the most important years of their high school career. They have a final project that lasts two semesters - a certain amount of it must be completed in the first semester, and the finished product must be completed and presented in front of a staff of judges, armed and ready to fail them if one toenail is out of place. On top of this, in the final week there’s an exam that is required to be done, and if the exam is failed, the student must come back to school for the summer. But, if the exam is passed, it counts as a sort of SAT score; colleges look at this exam grade and what portions of the exam they did better on, along with other important exam scores. Tatum has been amping herself up for the challenge for her entire junior year, and still doesn’t know if she can really handle it. She feels it’s too much pressure, and only sets up the students for failure.

A girl from her school named Wesley Darnell felt the same way, and, in her senior year, is a legend for getting a petition to stop the administering of the final exam and cutting the big project to a final-semester project instead. It got all the way to the board of education, and was even on local television headlines for a couple of days. But, as soon as the board of education denied the request, Wesley Darnell the Hero faded into the background, a miserable, sobbing failure, and another petition was never heard of again. It was a sad two weeks for Holland and Bradford private, but it only taught Tatum that miracles, indeed, don’t come true.

Wyatt is completely unlike her, though, and, being in his senior year in Bradford Private, completed the first semester of his graduation project in a matter of two weeks, unlike most other boys’ two months. On top of this, he’s been attending study sessions after school for three days a week to fully prepare himself for the examination in the final week of his year in high school; he took all of this on his own initiative and pleased his parents enough to have them praise him almost everyday about it. Tatum expected herself to be jealous about all of the attention he receives, but, in fact, she’s been just as proud of him as their parents have been. Wyatt is like no other, she believes. He’s otherworldly, flawless in his own broken way, giving in a selfish sort of manner.

While her, Mrs. Marshall, and Wyatt’s conversation bleeds into Nick and Mr. Marshall’s, Tatum finds Wyatt’s pale, bone-y hands underneath the table. She traces the pad of her middle finger over the purple veins sticking out of the tops of them, and smiles when he very slightly curls his white fingers in reaction to her touch. Their eyes meet for a split moment, and Tatum feels her breath hitch, heart do a quick, hollow thud in her chest.

He raises a dark eyebrow as if asking what?, and she smiles in response as if to say I love you in her appreciative, fond little way, ends of her lips curled upwards and blue eyes widening playfully. Wyatt shakes his head at her, briefly wags a finger, like tsk, tsk, and turns to politely pay attention to the conversation before him.

Tatum leans her head on his shoulder and doesn’t move until their food arrives on a teetering platter.

-

Before she knows it, she’s running around the hotel front lot with Nick at her heels, arching his back over some to grab at the back of her loose dress shirt. She giggles and shouts, “leave me alone, leave me alone!” when he manages to grab her by the waist and lift her up into the air, closer to the sky than she’s ever been without assistance of technology. He ends up moving her around until she’s on his back, pale legs wrapped around his middle, while he holds her up by the thighs and purposely walks erratically to scare her a little bit.

Tatum is feeling a little full from dinner and a little loopy from sleepiness. She decides it’s not worth the trouble being an ass when Nick is in his playful moods, so she goes along with it and finds herself actually having a bit of fun.

Before he gets through the hotel doors, his parents and Wyatt watching carefully, he swings around with her spontaneously, causing her lower body to separate from his, but he still has a good grip on her legs to keep her from falling. Tatum screams, clawing at his ugly sweater until she manages to get ahold of him, and pulls her chest back to the back of his head, gasping as if her life just flashed before her eyes.

“Where to, princess?” Nick asks, tipping his head back to look up at her with his huge blue eyes. Tossing some hair from out of her face, she points forward and squeals, “to my room, peasant!” and off he goes, running into the lobby of the hotel and down the corresponding hallway, to the elevators.

They get inside the elevator before the rest come, so the doors slide closed and gives them privacy while he lowers her safely onto her feet. Tatum wobbles some, feeling a little dizzy from the wild ride, and Nick instinctively holds her to keep her straight. “Sorry,” she mumbles before she can stop herself, and Nick only shrugs and grips tighter on her opposite arm.

Once Tatum gets herself proper steady, she raises her eyes to watch as the elevator buttons ding! and brighten up, the sinking feeling from the moving box making her stomach drop. Nick’s hold on her isn’t as tight as it was before, but he lingers on her arm, other hand stuffed in his trousers pocket.

She tries to pay attention to the lighting buttons on the wall in front of her, but she can’t help but look up at Nick and see how he’s feeling, even if it’s a pointless gesture. From her angle, she has a perfect view of his square, angled jaw, sharp and ready to slice through cement. His long-lashed eyes glisten, even under the horrid, fluorescent lighting of the elevator, and she can still smell the faint cologne clinging to his tan skin and dry-cleaned clothes, erasing the musty stench surrounding them. When he looks so calm and collected like this - all handsome and lost in thought - Tatum thinks she can actually manage this, work this all out.

Nick seems to sense these emotions. His eyes turn to her, hard and concentrated, and she tries to look away, but she can’t. A sad smile touches his thin lips and he tilts his head towards her with purpose, like he wants to say or do something and is bracing himself to.

“Tate,” he begins, sounding low and completely unlike himself.

Tatum swallows hard and stares at him expectantly.

“I don’t want you t’hate me, you know that, right?” he starts, stuttering some, but getting his message across as sternly as he can, anyway.

“I don’t hate you,” she whispers before she can stop herself. Nick gives her this hopeful glint, and Tatum instantly feels bad for all the horrible thoughts she’s had about him in the near past. He has many bad points - many, many bad points - but when he’s like this, all desperate and needy and childlike for her love and attention, Tatum wants to punch herself in the face for being a piece of shit. They both have problems: Nick is a little boy who can’t control himself and his actions and his words, and Tatum is the little girl who throws tantrums when things don’t go her way. And, together, they’re like two five year olds who were given an apartment, a job, and car keys, and were told to somehow manage for 6 months on their own. Of course, things went terribly, and are still going terribly; their entire relationship is dangling from a thin, wearing string, threatening to fall and break at any moment.

But Nick certainly isn’t the only one at fault.

“Our seven-months is in two days, Tate,” Nick continues when she doesn’t say anything else about the matter. “Seven months. And I don’t wanna waste another month towards our eighth being - actin’ like - behavin’ like we don’t know how’t act, yeah?”

Tatum nods dumbly, reaching up to touch the sharp line of his left cheekbone.

His voice grows two times softer as he turns to face her and she follows lead. “Let’s try and make this work, okay? I don’t know for how long, but, but, let’s make our seventh month good.” He pauses to let her process it. “Okay?”

Tatum nods dumbly again, and this time she doesn’t have to say anything, because Nick kisses her, like he really means it, unlike the previous 5 months of their relationship, and she kisses him back, for the first time in the 7 months of their relationship, like she means it, too.

They have to make this last another month, at least.