The Boys and Me

20. Take Control

I stepped in the door, mentally preparing myself for whatever argument my mom was looking to have.

Nothing.

I let my eye snap open, cautiously peeking around.

"Is that you Alissa?" My mom's voice came as I choked, trying to clear my throat.

"Y-yeah it's me" I called out, finding my voice.

Nothing else came from her and I breathed a sigh of relief as I headed for the stairs.

"Matthew said to tell you he had to go home today. Why are you home so late?" My mom said, scaring me as I climbed to my room. I stopped on the first step and mentally cursed my brother for breaking his promise before turning to face her.

"I'm starting to tutor a few people from school. I'll be doing it every afternoon" I said, not technically lying at all and she furrowed her eye brows.

"Not very fair that you lose your afternoons" She said.

"It's only for a little while" I lied, not actually knowing how long each session would be or how long I'd be tutoring them. It could very well be til graduation.

I really hoped it wasn't.

"Okay, you head on up and do your homework, I'll call you when dinner's ready" She said and I nodded, heading up to my room and shutting myself in before pulling out my phone and calling Matt. The drive from our place in Florida was about 19 hours to New York City so even if he'd left first thing this morning, like nine, he'd still be closer to Florida than to New York, seeing as it was now four thirty.

"Yello?" He answered, probably not checking the caller ID.

"You absolute fucking coward" I seethed.

"Woah, what the hell Al?" He asked, obviously shocked at my greeting.

"The going got tough last night and you ran away" I accused

"Please Alissa, you basically begged me to go when you left for the night and showed up in the truck of one of the guys who has been giving you shit for the last two weeks." He said.

"If you listened to a word I'd said this morning, you know you'd be wrong about what you think happened. If you bothered to ask my side of the story, you'd realise you're an idiot!" I lied through my teeth to the only person I thought I could be honest with.

"Whatever, I'm going. I'm driving." He said, hanging up.

"Real fucking mature!" I exclaimed, throwing my phone at the wall and flopping on my bed.

I heard a sound over by the window and figured it would just be a cat on the roof of our bottom story, that being right under my window, and I let my head fall back onto my bed.

A small knocking sound on the window came and I shook it off.

Another knock came and eventually I looked over at my window, seeing Scotty looking in. I jumped slightly as he motioned for me to open the window.

I pulled the window up and he smiled.

"May I come in?" He asked in his stupid charming voice.

"Whatever" I muttered, walking back over to my bed and flopping back down.

"Rough phone call?" He asked.

"Heard it did ya?" I asked, not caring nor looking at him as he jumped onto my floor and strolled around my room.

"You don't even give a shit that I'm in your room?" He asked.

"It's not you I'm mad at" I mumbled and he sat on my bed.