Lacrosse

15- Overheard and Reassured

Kendall

"Do not let that piece of trailer trash sleep anywhere in this house except for in the front lawn," I hear Josh's mom hiss from down the set of stairs.

I'm not supposed to be hearing this, but I couldn't help it. I wanted to hear what she was saying, I needed to hear it.

Now I kind of wish I hadn't.

Josh makes his final remarks and then I hear footsteps stomping up the stairs angrily. I should go in to his room to make it look like I didn't hear anything. I should act like nothing just happened. But I can't. I can't get myself to stand up from my perch on the top step of the staircase.

I've always known that Mrs. Thompson doesn't like me, but I never knew she didn't like me this much.

Josh pauses a few steps in front of me, seeing that I am sitting there, stone still, just staring straight ahead. "How much did you hear?" He sits down next to me.

"All of it," I answer, still staring at nothing.

"She's a bitch. Don't take any of it to heart," Josh tells me.

"How can I not take it to heart? She just called me a trashy, poor criminal."

"Because you know that that's not true," Josh replies.

"You don't think those things about me, right?" I ask, finally getting the nerve to look in to Josh's aquatic blue eyes.

"I don't believe in one word she said."

"Why are they doing this to me? To us?"

"What do you mean?"

"Pittsburgh Hills Josh," I explain. "What good is going to come from trying to break us up? What good is going to come from stalking me? What good is going to come from vandalizing my house? What good is going to come from digging up our field?"

"They're just trying to psych us out. They know they can't beat us unless our heads aren't on our bodies straight. They're scared that they're going to to lose for the third time in a row," Josh says, answering all of my questions but the one I really wanted to hear his response to. What good is going to come from trying to break us up?

"I'm tired," I say with a yawn.

"Me too." Josh stands up from his seat on the stairs and sticks out his hand. I take it and he pulls me to my feet. Before I know what's happening, Josh sweeps me off my feet, cradling me in his arms bride style, and carries me in to his room, where he places me gently on the bed.

My head sinks in to the soft pillow and the mattress forms to the shape of my body. I feel the other side of the bed sink down, and I know that Josh is there.

"Kendall," he whispers. "Why would you say that they're trying to break us up?"

I roll on to my side so that I am facing him. "That's obviously what they were trying to do by sending that envelope to your mom."

"That would never break us up." Josh reaches out a hand and tucks a stray piece of hair laying on my forehead behind my ear.

"It would break most couples up," I say, a lump forming in my throat. "Most people listen to what their parents think and do what they say."

"Since when are we most couples?"

Those six words reassure me that the words of his mother have not affected his thoughts of me. They didn't change the fact that he loves me.

I slide over on the bed, moving closer to him. I rest my forehead on the undershirt he is wearing as a pajama shirt and close my eyes. I feel his lips connect with the part of my shoulder that connects to my neck and all my worries seem to drift away.

*****

A few hours later my eyes flutter open. I look over at the alarm clock on Josh's bedside table and see that it's only four in the morning. Josh is still laying next to me, his eyes shut tight and his breathing steady, in and out, in and out.

"He doesn't care what you think," a man's voice says from the hallway. The voice belongs to Randy Thompson, Josh's dad.

"He cares what you think though," a woman's voice states. This voice belongs to Kelly, Mrs. Thompson.

"What does that have to do with anything?" Mr. Thompson asks his wife.

"If you say that you don't approve of her, he'll listen to you!" Mrs. Thompson exclaims. This is when I realize that they're talking about me. More specifically about the things she said in the kitchen earlier.

"I do approve of her though," he sighs. "I think she is a very sweet girl."

"She is bad for him," she hisses. "You've seen how he's changed in the last three years. He used to be easy going and now he's serious all the time. He barely sees his friends anymore and he cares more about the things he used to not care about at all. It's all because of that girl."

"There's also a thing called growing up. You're describing a fourteen year old Josh, he's seventeen now," Mr. Thompson explains. "And maybe those changes aren't such a bad thing."

"You know our boy could do so much better than that trailer park girl," Mrs. Thompson spits. "He can be dating a nice girl from nice home, but no. He is too infatuated by her."

"That's his choice. You can't control who he loves."

"But I can certainly try."

With that, the conversation in the hallway is over. The voices disappear, making me wonder if they were ever really there in the first place.

Does my financial background really mean that much to that woman? Money can't buy happiness and clearly she is unhappy. No amount of money could change that. I'm happy just the way I am.

And what does she mean by she can try to control who Josh loves? Is she going to try to break us up? What is she going to do, and will it work?

I look at Josh's sleeping body and let his words from earlier float through my mind.

He loves me, I try to convince myself. He loves me.