Transcend

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

“C’mon, man. You gotta move your head like this and your hands like this.”

I crack open an eye to peer at Brody from under my arm. He’s standing at the foot of the bed bobbing his head to some wild rhythm and prodding the air with his forefingers like his life depends on it.

“That’s your definition of dancing?” I follow the movement of his hands as they swerve from side to side. “You look like a clown.”

“Whatever, Cal. I’m having a great time.”

“Looking like a clown?”

He groans in exasperation. “No. Dancing all my worries away.”

“Dude.” I throw my arm off my face. “That’s not dancing.”

“How would you know? You’re not even trying it.”

“If I try it, will you stop?”

“Maybe.”

“Fine.” The pillow resting on my stomach is flung to the side and I swing my legs off the edge of the bed. My head feels heavy on my neck when I stand.

Brody woots. “Let’s get some music in the house!”

I whack his face with a pillow before he can reach for his phone. “I’m not dancing to music.”

He pouts. An honest-to-God pout that looks disturbingly like something Shawna would do. “But you have to do it properly.”

I copy his movements feeling like a total retard. It is a little liberating, though. Not having to worry about how stupid you look.

Brody bobs his head more violently and does a shimmying thing with his shoulder. “Put more pizzazz into it.”

My feet tap against the Avengers rug. “I don’t have any more pizzazz, man.”

“Fine.”

So there we are. Two lunatics bouncing up and down on our soles like mad men at a pagan ritual, waving our hands in the air to no music.

It’s the sight my mother walks in on when she pokes her head into the room.

There’s a moment of stillness. Then a small smile tugs at her mouth. Even in crumpled pyjamas with her hair pulled back in a haphazard knot, she doesn’t look miserable. Because of the smile.

It’s a genuine one at that. Not like those stupid half-assed ones she keeps shooting me.

Brody speaks first. “Yo, Mrs. Ward. How’s it going?”

My mother’s gaze softens. “It’s going pretty decent, sweetheart. What about you? Busy charming the ladies?”

A stupid grin dangles off his face. “You know me too well.”

My mother smiles back, and that’s when the happy-happy crap starts to piss me off. “Did you want something?”

Her grin drops. A faraway look enters her eyes. The muscles in my chest clench so tightly that it feels like my lungs are being steamrolled.

But instead of the stinging, constricting sensation I’ve come to expect during my brief conversations with my mother, a dull throb takes over. It’s the kind of pain a migraine stewing for five hours leads to, the kind that wraps itself around a body that’s been thrashed to hell and back. It’s a numbing pain. The pain when one gets used to the hurt.

I like it. I can live with this pain.

“Mom.”

“Sorry, darling.” My mother shakes her head to snap out of whatever trance she was under. “I came to ask if you were going for your teacher’s funeral.”