in which...
Valarie Conklin goes to a certain house in a town on the ocean named Cousins with her mom Laurel, older brother Steven, and little sister Belly, with a certain boy named Conrad Fisher.
"Good morning." I smile as I come downstairs, seeing everyone but Steven and Conrad awake.
"Morning." Susannah smiles. "Your sister said yes to the Deb, so we're gonna go shopping in a few minutes, would you mind coming with?"
"Of course." I smile. I still had Conrad's hoodie on, and I smile at the thought of it. "I'm gonna go get ready."
"All right." My mom smiles.
I go upstairs and get dressed and fix my hair, then grabbing my phone before I go meet everyone out in Susannah's car.
A few minutes into the drive to the stores downtown, I get a text.
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I laugh at the texts, and my mom whips her head around from the front passenger seat to look at me, where I was sitting behind Susannah.
"What's so funny?" She asks.
"Nothing." I giggle. "Just something Conrad said."
"You know what i'm excited for Bels?" Susannah asks.
"What?" Belly asks.
"For your escort to do the escort dance that all the boys do." Susannah smiles as I start laughing.
"Conrad hated that shit so much" I laugh.
After a long few hours of shopping for me and Belly, we go to the main store, the Deb dress store.
Being back in this store was weird.
I loved being a deb and met tons of amazing and supportive girls during it, but at the same time bad things happened, and it'll happen with Belly too.
Having a bunch of rich teen girls all thinking they're better than everyone in a small town with a bunch of boys that they all fight over all being in a ball together? It's all drama. The fun parties end with fights, girls crying outside, and so much more.
Especially bringing a small, insecure girl like Belly into that will be challenging for her.
I've always been stronger both mentally and physically than Bells. Being a young girl through boxing and wrestling and then a debutante, you learn to stick up for yourself. Belly was always the girl who wanted to please everyone.
I remember going into this last year and coming out a complete different person, in my experience, I went through multiple phases.
The first phase is the confusion. Not knowing what to do or how to fit in, just feeling lonely. Then the second phase, where everyone is all best friends and there's parties, sleepovers where you have matching pajamas and talk about boys and paint nails, then you have the worst phase. The drama, fighting over boys, fighting each other, toxic girls backstabbing each other. Then the final phase is getting it over with and just being able to laugh it off.
"Val?" Belly asks as I look up from my phone. "What do you think?"
I smile. She looked gorgeous.
"That's the one." I smile.
"No no." My mom says. "It's not you. It's too...revealing."
"Mom, this is for her." I say.
"It's for me too." She sighs.
My mom was always trying to keep Belly young and innocent after I wasn't any of those things growing up. But I loved my mom more than anyone.
Eventually we left, and started driving home.
When we pulled into the driveway, Jeremiah is sitting on the porch looking upset.
"Jer?" I ask as I run up to him. "You okay."
"Somethings up with Conrad." He says. "He was happy one second then the next second he was yelling and screaming."
"I'll talk to him." I say.
"Be careful." He says.
"Why?" I ask.
"I don't know." Jeremiah scoffs. "Maybe the fact that he gets violent when he's angry? We all know this."
I roll my eyes and go inside.
"Connie?" I yell. No response. "Conrad?"
"He's down at the beach." Steven says from the kitchen.
I run down to the beach, and see Conrad sitting on the shoreline.
"Connie?" I ask softly.
He looks behind him and sees me, and just looks back out to the water.
I sit down next to him. "Talk to me."
"What?" He asks.
"Jer told me what happened." I say.
"Of course he did." Conrad laughs angrily. "Can't keep his mouth shut."
"Why are you being like this?" I ask.
"We talked about this." He says.
"I know there's more." I say.
"What does everyone mean when they say 'this'?" He asks.
"You're lashing out randomly, your mood changes, you're just not yourself." I say.
"Oh i'm not myself?" He laughs.
"No Conrad, you're not." I say.
"I don't understand why everyone can't just stay out of my business." He says.
"Because your business is affecting all of us." I say.
"My mom's cancer came back alright? And she's not gonna make it" He yells as my stomach drops. Susannah had cancer a few years ago and recovered. "No one knows that I know and i've been keeping it to myself that I know since the spring. Not even my mom knows that I know, and I just can't take carrying everything on my back anymore without getting angry because it's so hard for me to handle on my own!"
I look at Conrad as his eyes flood with tears, and I just pull him into my arms and hug him, and he cries his eyes out in my arms.
We sit down; and I just hold him as he sobs, struggling to breathe.
"I'm so sorry Vee, I'm so sorry for being like this." He sobs.
"Connie don't apologize, you had every right to act like this." I say softly as he rubs his back.
"I'm so scared to lose her." He sobs as a little bit of my heart breaks. "I need her Valarie I can't lose her."
"Connie I'm gonna be here the entire time okay?" I say. "I just need you to stay open with me okay?"
"Okay." He sobs.
What could've been ten minutes or two hours of him crying in my arms, he calms down.
"I'm sorry I never told you, I didn't want to upset you." He says as he wipes his eyes.
"Stop apologizing Conrad." I say.
"Can you do me a favor?" He asks.
"Not tell anyone about your mom?" I ask.
"Yeah." He says.
"Of course." I smile.
We slowly start walking up to the house.
"I'm sorry for making you see me like that." He says.
"Conrad stop apologizing." I say.
"Right, sorry." He laughs.
We go inside, and Steven, Jeremiah, and Belly are all playing video games while the moms hung out in the kitchen.
"Everything okay?" Susannah asks.
"Yeah, we just went on a walk." I smile before me and Conrad went upstairs.
