A Certain Romance || Ashton Irwin

Fourth and Madison Building

"Hello?" A taut feminine voice answered the phone.

After Sienna's random appearance back into our lives and seeing that tattoo along her lower back I spent the rest of Thanksgiving at home trying to piece together what didn't make sense to me, only to give myself a headache and call it a day. But before I slept I sent my dad a quick happy birthday text to make up for how rude I was.

This morning I spent most of it locked in my bedroom, thumbing the wrinkled number while thinking up the right words to say to whoever the number belonged to without sounding like a creep. With shaking hands and a nauseating feeling I dialed the number. I knew that if a man answered the phone I'd end the call and throw my phone across the bedroom, I did not want to argue with someone of the male specimen about getting answers.

"Are you going to speak...?" The woman carefully asked with an annoyed sigh. In the background I could numerous voices around her all having conversations with each other very, very loudly.

"Um, yeah, hello." I pinched the bridge of my nose after dropping the piece of paper on my bed.

"Hello."

"I'm not sure how I'm supposed to do this..." I nervously picked at a string that was coming loose on my comforter.

"Hold on a sec..." She said into the receiver, then muffled the sounds with some object; maybe a hand or her chest...I don't know. A gruff voice mumbled something to her. "I don't know where he went, dad. He said he'd be back in an hour." He mumbled something else before I heard a round of shuffling then clear sound again. "Sorry about that. May I ask who's calling?"

"Sage Sirois..."

"Hm, hi Sage. I'm Harley Seeley." I didn't need to see the face of whoever this Harley Seeley woman was to know that skin between her eyebrows was crinkled and that she was hesitant about giving her name away to me. "My best guess is that you're calling to get some answers on your mom? I've been waiting for your phone call."

I felt my heart slightly stop at the fact that this person already knew what I was looking for. It was definitely scary. "I'm hoping you'd be able to fill in all the blanks for me, help me understand everything."

"Are you free tomorrow? We could meet up." The voices the background seemed to become louder and louder and highly distracting for me to keep my thoughts in line.

"Today would be better..."

"I figured you would say that. Give me two hours at the most to put together a few things. I'll meet you at the garden rooftop of the Fourth and Madison Building, sound all right?"

"Yeah, yes...I'll see you then, Ms. Seeley." I was rapidly nodding my head against the phone, not caring if she couldn't see me or if anyone walking into my bedroom would think I was going crazy.

"Harley. It's Harley, I'm no old lady." She corrected me, but didn't wait for me to correct myself as she ended the phone call.

Usually people would feel triumphant that they were one step closer to cracking the case on their own without the close source of someone who already knew all the details, but as I pressed my phone to my lips after locking it I felt no type of minor or major success. It frightened me to think that in two hours I would have all of my questions answered, because I knew with my curious mind that I would create a billion other questions. Questions were never-ending with me. As well, it frightened me that whatever I found out would change my life in ways I never had planned.

"Who was that on the phone?" Arrie handed me some junk mail. It was from some animal organization I signed up for when I was twelve and didn't know that there was more to the internet besides looking at pictures of puppies and polar bears.