“Mijo,” my dad said in a soft voice. He hated drama which is why he usually stayed out of our ample amount of it. “Explícame.”
I shook my head. “It’s just what was said. I program. You all knew that. We don’t have to have a conversation about it.”
“Entonces, por qué estás tan enojado?” he asked.
Why was I so angry? I didn’t know, but I had a feeling the answer lay with the girl who’d just left the table. So shortly after, I excused myself and went to go look for her. When I found her she wasn’t sulking or moping in her hurt feelings from earlier. She was going through my fucking shit. Rummaging through drawers and papers and old boxes like she was on some kind of mission.
“What are you looking for?” I asked from my spot leaning against the doorway.
“Your balls,” she mumbled. I probably deserved that one.
“Cee, I’m sorry,” I said.
“Not okay.”
“Celesti—”
“Ceci,” she corrected.
That correction hurt way more than it probably should. Storming further into the room, I dropped to my knee so that I was on her level. She was rooting around on the floor under my bed trying to find something, but I pulled her up so she could look at me. So I could see that face. And nope. The hurt wasn’t totally gone yet. Did my little “shut up” really hurt her that badly? Or was it something else? Grasping her chin, I tilted her face to look at me.
“C’mon,” I said. “Don’t be like this with me. You saw what I was working with out there.”
“Not like you wanted my help with it,” she mumbled, tossing her chin over her shoulder. I brought it back around to look at me
“What thehellis wrong with you?”
“Why do you keep asking me that?”
“Because there’s something wrong with you and I want to know what it is,” I stated.
Staring up at my eyes, she looked at me long enough, deep enough that for a second I thought she would drop the tantrum and just tell me. But just when I thought she was about to open up, she shook her head, saying, “Nothing Connor.”
“Celestia,” I groaned.
“Ceci,” she corrected again, and I glared.
“I—”
“Connor?” A soft voice called from down the hall. It was Ria. “Just coming to check on you, babe.”
If murder had one specific appearance, I think it was in Ceci’s eyes. It took me so off guard, I almost didn’t notice when she stood and started toward the door. On reflex I reached out and banded an arm across her chest, grabbing her shoulder and turning her back to me.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
“I’m leaving, you have a visitor.”
“But we’re talking.”
“No, we’redonetalking.”
“We are not fucking done, Ceci.”
“Did he answer?” another voice asked from near Ri.My sister’s voice.
Again, acting on instinct, I grabbed onto Cee and dragged her in the direction of the far corner of my room. Yanking open a door, I shoved clothes aside, kicked boxes out of the way, and pushed Ceci in.
Turning toward me frantically, I caught Cee’s surprised glare just before I clicked the door shut and plunged us both into darkness.
