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Listen to This Boy by The Beatles or Miss Moving On by Fifth Harmony.

10 – This Boy

It took me a long time to master the art of flipping a pancake. 

So whenever I got the chance to show off my skills, I took them faster than a brainless teenager would grab the chance for a free iPhone.

Rosie and Jessie sat on stools by the breakfast bar, laughing as I showily poured batter into the frying pan and started flipping it when it was ready.  The whole time I was doing a horrible magician’s assistant impersonation.

Gasp.

Lennon Simms is acting like a dork.

Surprised that my foul-mouthed self has a wackadoodle side?

Well then, welcome to reality where people, crazy αss bιtches included, all have tiny quirks about them.

Boo hoo, I don’t have any quirks, Lennon. I’m too normal.  I’m not interesting.

Bullshιt.

No one in this world is normal.  Everyone is weird.

You can quote me on that because it’s just a fact of life.

Deal with it.

And while you are, you can cue the fυcking applause.

Paul, having witnessed this from me a thousand times before, just sat on the bar stool farthest from Rosie.

He wasn’t taking any chances and assumed that grogginess from having woken up only fifteen minutes ago would make Rosie more than ready to do some flipping of her own.  He wouldn’t admit it but my brother was scared that Rosie might be more into flipping people in the air, specifically him, than pancakes.

Fearless knight in shining armor, that brother of mine.

I’d say he was pathetic but stating something so obvious would just be pointless.

If you were wondering why the four of us were up at seven on a Saturday morning – though I can’t exactly figure out how you’d know about that bit since I hadn’t said it yet – we didn’t do it willingly. 

We had, after all, stumbled into our respective beds – with Jessie and Rosie bunking with me – just before 3 AM.  To add to all the shit we were dealing with, we had a whole day of cleaning that none of us were looking forward to. 

The fact that we hit the snooze button on my alarm five fυcking times tells you just how much I, and I’m sure everyone else, wanted to be in bed right now.  But we had a party-wrecked house to clean so we got up anyway. 

I hate being responsible.

Jessie and Rosie had already volunteered to help and had even volunteered their currently very inebriated brothers.

“Many hands make light work,” Rosie had chirped sleepily when I asked them if they were sure.

Now that cliche saying I could get behind of.

“Pancakes are done,” I announced, dropping the last pancake onto the gigantic pile I’d made.

“Great,” Paul hopped up off his stool.  “Now for the real fun,” he smiled evilly.

Oh I couldn’t agree more.

See, as the first of many punishments we’d lined up for the Three Drunken Muskeeters still asleep upstairs, we’d decided to wake them up as irritatingly and loudly as possible.

Paul, Rosie, Jessie and I went around the kitchen looking for metal pots and pans and ladles that we could use to bang them with.  Quietly, we proceeded to the guest bedroom where we’d dumped George, Moe and Jared last night.

It was, to put it lightly, the calm before the goddαmn pot banging storm.

Moe leapt off the bed at the sound of Jessie’s wooden spoon hitting the massive iron wok she was carrying.  In the process, he managed to painfully kick both George and Jared in the gut. 

I secretly cheered for him.

At the sight of Moe fully awake and in self-defense butt-kicking mode, Paul let out a girish yelp and retreated to a corner of the room.

My brother, the picture of manliness, deserves an award by now.  Anyone willing to make him a trophy? 

“I really need to go to a few taekwondo classes if that’s all it takes to keep Paul in line,” I happily cheered over the sounds of pan-whacking.

Rosie giggled adorably whilst she continued to make music with the sauce pan and pasta fork.

Before that though, I’d have to convince my parents that I would do more good with it than bad – and by convincing, I actually meant trick them into believing.

“What the fυck?” George groaned, leaning up on his elbows and blinking at all of us.

Jessie answered by walking up closer to the bed and hitting her wok harder.  “Wake up, sleepyheads!”

“Jess,” Jared whined, extending the one vowel in her name.  “Cut that out.”

I walked up to him and gave the frying pan an extra strong whack.  “Not until you shitfaced α sholes get your αsses out of bed.”

The three of them just stared at us with alcohol- and sleep-glazed eyes.

They were making this way too easy for us.

“Okay, stop – STOP!” George roared. He staggered out of the king-sized bed and yanking the tongs and frying pan out of my hands mid-bang.

“What the hell happened?” Moe murmured.  He was looking around the room drunkenly as if he was wondering how he got himself here.

Rosie propped a hand on her hip and glared at her brother.  “What happened was you three got drunk off your stupid αsses and left your sisters to deal with you.”

“Hey,” Paul bristled from his corner.  “I helped too.”

It was my turn to glare at him.  “You shut it, Paul.  You made us –  I gestured at Rosie, Jessie and myself, “– deal with having to kick everyone out of the house.  It didn’t help that almost every single guest to your birthday party was drunk off their αsses too!”

The two other girls nodded in affirmation.

Paul, at least, had the decency to hang his head in shame.

“As for you three,” I seethed, turning to the drunken band of brothers, “there’s pancakes in the kitchen.  You better eat up because this house is huge – and you’re going to fυcking clean most of it.”

*   *   *   *   *

George, Moe and Jared, surprisingly, didn’t protest while they were being bossed around by girls after breakfast. 

We didn’t leave them to do all the work though.  I mean, I wanted to but Jessie and Rosie said that wasn’t fair.  They were hung hung over seven ways to Sunday and we did have hearts – by we, I mostly meant Jessie and Rosie.  But we did leave them to do most of the dirty work so my sadistic side was satisfied.  Paul, on the other hand, was given the role of Head Minion.

“Consider it your prize for staying sober last night, Paulie,” I smirked, handing him a mop and bucket.  “Now, get, Cinderella – and make sure your little mice friends over there do a good job of cleaning up every single surface or I will chop off all of your balls.”  I made sure to look all of the boys in the eye as I said this.  “After which, I’m going to hang them on my neck like teeny weeny medals.”

I turned to help Rosie and Jessie stuff all the trash – every last plastic solo cup and abandoned bottle of liquor – into extra-large, heavy duty trash bags, leaving the boys to ponder if I was kidding.

I was.

But let’s not tell them that.

I want nieces and nephews in the future.  For that to happen, Paul and George need their testicles attached to their schlongs.  Unfortunately.

The morning passed in a flurry of cleaning and when lunch came, we all decided to just order in.  All of us practically inhaled the buckets of fried chicken and tubs of mashed potatoes and coleslaw that the KFC delivery guy brought over.

“This. So. Good,” Jared grunted between bites.

With the gold tie wrapped Rambo-style around his forehead and dressed as he was in one of Paul’s muscle shirts and sweatpants – the latter of which showed way too much of his ankles since he was taller than both my brothers – he looked like he was going to disco battle away all the party-related mess.

My brothers and I nodded. 

I swear to you our parents taught us table manners, the fancy dining kind even.  I mean, it might not look like it right now with the way we were attacking our food like cavemen, but we could eat with forks and knives and the whole shebang.  My brothers and I were just deprived of fast food,  the stuff that most teenagers consider the most important food group.

Just as I was licking the gravy off of my fingers – I’m gross, I know, but I wasn’t really in the mood to care right now – my phone started ringing.

I’d have ignored it but the ringtone – a personalized one – was one that made Paul and George laugh their heads off each time they heard it.

It’s not my fault Carter insisted that I should have Jason Mraz’s “I’m Yours” play whenever he called, okay?  My brothers understand how I shy away from Carter’s sappiness and they took great amusement in the sappiness of the ring tone.

The chorus of the song filled the suddenly pin-drop quiet of the kitchen.

One, two, and cue my brothers’ laughter.

“Carter?” George wheezed between healthy chuckles.  Paul was too busy banging on his chest after he choked on a bite of chicken.

I felt more than realized that I’d nodded at him. 

He and Paul suddenly stopped laughing when they remembered what I’d told them.

While the three of us were cleaning the den earlier, I’d filled them in on last night’s developments between Carter and me.  Specifically, the tattoo and how I thought it was the most brainless idea in the world. 

In a moment of rare solidarity, both of them agreed with me.  It was one of those times when all  of us were actually on the same side of an argument. 

Like me, they agreed that Carter and I were heading for splitsville.  I wasn’t happy about it – I’m not a psychopath despite what my behavior might hint at – but it was inevitable at this point, what with how dissimilar we just were.

Why’d you tell them you were thinking about breaking up with your boyfriend, Lennon?

Well, despite wanting to murder them at least twice a day, my brothers were my best friends.  There really wasn’t much we didn’t tell each other.  I know all about George crushing on some sophomore in his Art Class and Paul even told me about how he was starting to like a girl he met here at Middle of Nowhere named –

“Are you going to answer that?” Moe nodded at phone, interrupting my strangely warm and fuzzy train of thoughts.

I looked back down at my phone and let it ring for five more seconds.  I was not looking forward to talking to Carter at all. 

Then again, not answering the call would just make stuff worse. 

I took in a deep, heavy breath and pressed the ‘Accept’ button, walking into the garage for a bit more privacy.

“You didn’t call.”

Those were the words Carter greeted me with. 

There were no mushy sentiments, no playful expressions of frustration.  Just a blatant monotonic statement of the truth.  This was totally non-Carter behavior.  Translation:  Carter Jones was pissed.

“We were cleaning,” I answered levelly.

“You couldn’t take five minutes off just to talk to me?”

In the back of my mind, the Overly Attached Girlfriend version of Justin Bieber’s ‘Boyfriend’ started playing.  But instead of the creepy girl singing to it, there was my boyfriend – or soon-to-be ex-boyfriend, if I had any say in the matter.

“Carter,” I said once I was sure I wasn’t going to snap at him.  “The house was a mess.  We spent the whole dαmn morning cleaning it up and we’re barely halfway done.”

I heard him sigh.  “Do you need any help?”

Somewhere in the long list of reasons why Carter and I would never work was the entry “Carter can remain a gentleman and still be a good boyfriend even if he’s pissed.  Lennon, on the other hand, can barely be a decent girlfriend on her best day.”

“No, Carter,” I mumbled.  “We’ve already got four other people from school helping out.  We probably should be finished before my parents get back at around six-thirty.”

“Good.”  The tone of his voice told me he was smiling.

“Good?  How the hell is that good?”

“That ensures you’re free to have dinner tonight – with me.”  There was a short pause.  “We need to talk, Lennon.”

I could barely stop the sigh of relief that came out of my mouth. 

Usually, those words signified the beginning of the end of a relationship – and I was banking on just that.  “Yes, Carter.  Yes, we do.”

“I’ll pick you up at around six?” he asked, sounding happier than when the call started.

“See you then.”

As relieved as I was right now, I couldn’t get rid of the nagging feeling that that phone call had made Carter and I happy – but for entirely different reasons.

*   *   *   *   *

I decided on an inappropriately cheerful yellow blouse, caramel-colored slacks and brown loafers.  By the time I realized that I resembled a large piece of literal shit, poo, turd or whatever you want to call crαp, Paul was calling out that Carter had arrived.

I resigned myself to having to look like I just came out of Ringo’s αss for the night.

Ringo’s our dog, in case you forgot or thought that I meant Ringo Starr, the Beatles’ drummer.  Though I really don’t have a problem being the poop of a music legend, as gross as that sounds.

I picked up the small cross-body purse that held my phone, keys and wallet. 

The purse was a mustard color that resembled something that stared back at you from a toilet bowl after having a plate or two of bad leftovers.

I sighed.

Unless I actually liked looking like a walking poop ball – I didn’t – I should really start planning my outfits better.

Paul and Carter were both standing in the foyer.  While Carter stood there, relaxed as all hell, Paul stood there like a villain in one of those Old Western movies.  It wasn’t a look that worked for him.  Upon closer inspection, Paul’s features were twisted in irritation and all of it was directed at Carter. 

I smirked. “You wouldn’t have to scrunch up your face like that if you went and took a shower to get rid of your stink, Paul.”

His voice was clipped when he answered.  “George is in the shower.”

What he really meant was that he’d planned to be there for Carter’s arrival, as if he could even try to be the intimidating older brother.  I knew too well just how much of a sissy he was to take him seriously.

“I’ll have her back here before eleven,” Carter promised before I could very unpolitely tell Paul to go take the stick shoved up his αss somewhere else.

Paul narrowed his blue eyes at me.  “Do Mom and Dad know you’re –”

“Yes, Jail Warden Paul.  I’ve informed Mom and Dad that I’ll be going out with Carter tonight.”

I took out my phone and flashed the text message proving this in front of Paul long enough for him to read the ‘yes’ part of their reply but miss the ‘be home before nine’ half of it.

“Do you want to check if one of Elvis or Ringo’s GPS-enabled collars can fit on my wrist or neck?  Or can I go on my date now?”

Paul nodded at me then glared threateningly at Carter.  “Eleven, no later than that.”

But Carter and I were already ten steps away from the front door.  I just waved back at him cheekily.  I was satisfied to see that it irritated him even more.

“Your brother still doesn’t like me, does he?” Carter chuckled once we were both inside the rental Audi.  Carter, of course, had held the passenger door open for me a few seconds ago.

“He’s never liked anyone who recognized me as a member of the female sex,” I reminded him.

Carter smiled and started the car.

“So where are we going?” I asked.  It was an attempt to fill in the awkward silence.

“The concierge recommended this restaurant downtown.  It’s nothing fancy,” he added hastily when he saw that I was about to say something.  Carter knew that, although I could behave myself at a fine dining restaurant, it wasn’t my favorite thing in the world to do.  “There’s a built-in bar so they’ve got a lot of bar-type food which I know you love.”  He smiled.

Despite knowing where the evening was going to lead to, I couldn’t stop myself from smiling back at him. 

Carter drove to a restaurant-slash-bar named Copper, Silver and Gold.  Inside, it was all dark wood panelling, blood red booths along the walls and family style dining tables on the main floor.  Behind a small railing divider was a bar.  Even from where I was, I could see the large glass display of alcoholic drinks that stood behind it.

The place was packed for a Saturday night.  There were a handful of families eating out and a group of friends in the corner seemed like they were having some kind of reunion – a noisy one.  Most of the booths and tables though were occupied by couples on dates.

The hostess led us to a comfy booth that was a good distance from the rowdy group of boys – thank shit for that.  Soon enough, a waitress walked up to our table.

“Hi,” she smiled, a glint in her brown-green eyes and showing off a set of even, white teeth.  “My name is Theo and I’ll be your server for the evening.  Can I get you guys started on some drinks while you go through the menu?”

I studied her as she talked and handed us the laminated menu cards.

She looked like she was around my age, though she was taller by a couple of inches.  She was slim, verging on waif-like though I couldn’t be sure.  The uniform she wore – a simple white blouse, a black knee-length skirt, leggings and Vans – wouldn’t have been flattering even on a Victoria’s Secret supermodel.

I would have easily dismissed her as just another waitress were it not for her hair.  Pulled back into a neat ponytail, it was a vibrant shade of royal blue.

“Lennon.”  Carter nudged my hand delicately from his seat on the other side of the booth.

I blinked.  “Yes?”

“What’ll you be having?” the waitress – Theo – asked.  From the looks of it, this wasn’t the first time she’d asked me that question.

“Iced tea, please,” I quickly recovered, giving her an apologetic smile.

She wrote it down in the small pad in her hands and looked back up at us, another pleasant smile on her face.  “I’ll be back in a while with your drinks and to take your orders.”

When she was out of earshot, Carter started laughing.  “You were staring at her,” he said when he was done chuckling.

“Well … she had blue hair,” I shot back lamely.

Carter gave me a patronizing look.  But Theo was back with my iced tea and his Coke before he could say anything else about it.

She placed the glasses in front of us.  “Are you ready to order?”

Carter folder his hands in front of him, the beginnings of a smirk on his lips.  “What would you recommend?”

“Oh,” she murmured.  “Well, what do you guys feel like having?  The head chef here is awesome so everything really is great.”

Carter pretended to think it over. 

I knew what he was doing which meant I also knew that I couldn’t talk him out of his plans no matter how hard i tried.  I settled myself in my seat for a show.

“Run us through the bestsellers,” he requested.  “And don’t be stingy with the details.”

I groaned.

This was a game Carter liked to play whenever we ate out.  He would quiz and grill the waiter – or waitress, as it were right now – since he believed that most of them knew jackshit about the food they were placing in front of their customers.

But much to Carter’s disappointment and my satisfaction, blue-haired Theo seemed to know the menu front-to-back and then some.  She not only recited the bestsellers without looking at the menu but she was telling us details that, were she not dressed as a waitress, would make anyone assume she’d cooked the food herself.

I was smiling smugly at the end of her little speech.  Carter, on the other hand, wore an expression that was the lovechild of Mr. Amusement and Ms. Irritation.

“She really knows her food,” I teased Carter when Theo had left again.

“She might just be the very first waitress who does.”

I shrugged.  “I don’t think she wants to be just a waitress though.  It sounded like she really liked food so, maybe, she wants to be a chef?”

“Oh, really?” Carter raised an eyebrow at me.  “When were you telling me that you could see the future, Lennon?”

“Shut up, Carter.”  I chuckled and threw a few torn up pieces of light brown paper napkins at him.

He smiled as he dodged them.  “So I never got to ask.” 

He waited until I tilted my head at him – a sign that whatever he had in mind, he could ask.

Oh, crαp.  This is happening.  Shιt is really going down.

“How are you doing?  Here, I mean.  How’re you adjusting?”

“Oh.”

Well, apparently, shιt wasn’t going down – not yet, at least.

“It still sucks balls but I guess I’m getting used to it.  It’s not really like I’ve got a goddαmn choice, right?”

At that, Carter smiled.  It didn’t reach his blue-gray eyes though.  “Do you –?”

“Miss home?” I finished for him.  “Yeah, I do.  I can’t help but miss it since it’s all I’ve ever known before coming here.  I mean, I don’t even know where the best place to get sushi is in this town,” I joked.

“The answer to that is nowhere,” Carter grimaced.  “That’s the first place I asked the front desk about.  I figured it might be a cool idea since our first date was at a sushi bar.  But apparently, your new hometown doesn’t even have one.”  He smiled. 

There’s the emotional sap I know and love.

“Dαmn it.  I knew there was a reason I hated this place,” I joked – or, well, half-joked.

Theo then returned with our food – fried chicken with a side of pesto for me and a fancy gourmet burger with chili cheese fries for Carter.  We went through our meal with a light-hearted chatter, still in elated enough moods, even until we wiped our plates clean of the chocolate cake we had for dessert.

After that point though, the euphoria brought on by our waitress’ quirkiness and seeing each other again after weeks had died down.  In its place, a thick aura of foreboding settled upon us.

Carter and I both knew why we were here.  He’d said it himself when he called earlier: we needed to talk.

I was relieved, quite frankly, that we were finally about to talk about breaking up. 

This was what we’d been building up to.  This was the moment I was waiting for.  This, undoubtedly, was the climax of the whole entire night – and by climax, I mean the literal one and not the sexual way. 

Get your head out of the gutter, you big nympho.

“Look, Lenn –”

“Carter –”

We’d both chosen the exact same second to talk and then immediately shut up.

Knowing what I had to say – the breakup speech was practically written, typed up and memorized in my head – I gestured to Carter and gave him a small smile.

“You can talk first,” I whispered.

That, dearie, was the very worst decision I’d made – not just tonight but in my entire life.

Why?

Well, because Carter Jones didn’t just have talking in mind, as it turns out.

I shouldn’t have been surprised though. 

He’d always been this way, a man of action and not so much of words – not unless he was writing sappy love e-mails infused with a healthy dose of sexual innuendos, of course.  He never trash talked on the football field, preferring to let his game and skill to beat the opponent’s ego senseless.  He was always doing things – acing tests, winning swim meets, generally winning at life – but never bragging about any of them.

Talk is cheap, he’d always say.

And when you were as rich as Carter, cheap was something miles beneath you. 

Anything and everything expensive, however, was well within reach.

Which is exactly what he did.

He reached into his pocket and, faster than I could tell him to do not fυcking dare, he was kneeling in front of me.  In his hand was a light blue box, opened up to reveal a humongous diamond ring that whoever had to wear it – I’m guessing Carter had me in mind for that bit – had to drag their hands around with just how huge and heavy the diamond ring, set in a platinum band, was.

“Lennon Gertrude Simms –”

Oh hell no. 

He did not just say my fυcking middle name in public.

“Will you marry me?”

The restaurant, somehow, had gotten quiet in those few seconds.

And you know how they say how silence is deafening?

Well, I have to goddαmn differ with that.

What’s deafening is a sixteen-year-old girl who’d just been proposed to when it wasn’t exactly how she envisioned the night turning out to be.

My voice, you see, was impossibly loud in the now-quiet restaurant – ergo the deafening bit.

Though my yelling probably contributed to that last fact.

“Carter Jones,” I began.

Carter smiled, as if the world was being handed to him – again – right now.

I was going to give him the world alright.

It was a world of hate and problems and future issues with rejection, sure.  But he was proposing.

I looked at him again.  His blue-gray eyes were already shining with happiness as if everything in him just knew I was going to say yes.

If he thought that – and the slow upturn of his lips was telling me that that was just what he was thinking – well then he really didn’t know me at all.

My next words might have broken his world, and his heart along with it.  But like many times in my life, I was just seeing red and The Big Bad Angry Monstrous Bιtch was holding the steering wheel right now.

“What the fυcking hell were you thinking?”

If you could go and give my new book "Death writes with a Purple Ballpoint Pen" a read (click the External Link), I would love you forever! 

Story Recommendation: "The Cliche Curse" by TheElegantElephant

Story Description: The Chase family has a curse. No, not that witchy voodoo, "You shall be crazy ugly until some beautiful bookworm loves you," junk. Or the, "Your soulmate will die. Hear me laugh, Muhahahaha." crαp. No, it's worse. The Cliche Curse. I know, not that bad, but for Kenzie Chase? Oh, it is. Her sister is the lonely nerd girl who made the bad boy fall in love with her. Her brother is the superstar jock that fell in love with the lonely nerd girl. Her parents? Love at first freaking sight. Her whole life, Kenzie's been surrounded by swoon worthy romantic cliches, and now she doesn't want any part of it. And for so long, she thought she was lucky. The same cliche can not be repeated fully.  Her sister played the girl, her brother played the boy, her parents were love at first sight, and her grandparents- the ones who started it all- had a Cinderella. And really, how many clichés can there be? But at the start of her senior year, she realized there was one more cliche left. And it started, when she met Tatum Sage, wealthy brooding heir to Sage Enterprises. But she knows, somehow, that staying with Tatum, would give her problems she never asked for.

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- Chompy