Homewrecker

08 - 𝓫𝓵𝓪𝓬𝓴𝓱𝓸𝓵𝓮

Despite the fact that it was literally only a forty-five minute drive to their lake house—forty-three minutes actually according to the GPS that was built into their dashboard—David still decided to stop at a gas station when we were more than halfway there, commenting that this particular gas station, Gas 'N Go, had the cheapest prices. Something told me, as he pulled alongside a pump and got out of the car, that saving on the price per gallon wasn't so much a necessity—like it was for my mom—than it was a point of pride.

"I have to go to the bathroom!" Danny said, yanking his headphones off from around his neck and scrambling to unbuckle his seatbelt, like we hadn't just left twenty minutes ago.

Andi was unbuckling her seatbelt too, sliding her phone into her back pocket and opening the side door without looking over at anyone. "I want something to eat," she told someone, although I wasn't really sure who since she got out of the car and slammed the door a moment later.

"Do you want something to eat, Bronwyn?" Amy asked, peering over the back of her seat at me, a slight glimpse of her profile.

I didn't, not really anyway, but my phone was finally charged—apparently one of the charging cords Amy bought yesterday worked on my phone, although it took most of the morning to get it to a full battery—and I didn't want Amy or Natalie listening in when I tried to call my mom again so I nodded, undoing my seatbelt. "Sure," I mumbled.

I heard a zipper being undone, gliding across the metal, as I tried to crawl out from the backseat, reaching out for the door handle when a glimpse of green caught my eye. It took me a moment to realize that the color of green was a twenty-dollar bill held in Amy's manicured fingers, held out to me.

"Did you want something?" I asked, dumbfounded.

Now she looked confused, her hand tilting down and her eyebrows furrowing close to her eyes. "No, I thought you did?" she said slowly. "Didn't you say you wanted something to eat?"

I blinked, hesitating before I remembered what she asked me before. "Oh, well, yeah. But you don't have to—"

My mother never gave me money, not unless she wanted me to get her something from the store on my way home from school or something, and even then, it wasn't often she actually handed me cash. Jude never really handed me money either. He just only normally paid for my dinner if they got fast food. It felt foreign to even say you don't have to give me money, so I let my sentence trail off, shaking my head. Money just wasn't talked about where I lived, not unless you were making jokes about how you had none of it.

"You shouldn't have to buy your own food," she told me, still holding out the twenty. "Go get something to eat, get some snacks for the weekend. Oh, and use our loyalty card. Dad's got it but they'll let you just use a phone number."

"I don't know your phone number," I pointed out.

Something came over her countenance for a moment, an unrecognizable dim in her eyes before the corners of her mouth lifted and her smile resumed its usual brightness. "890-446-2307," she told me, extending her hand and pressing the crisp edge of the bill against my palm. "Now, go on. Don't hold us up."

I wasn't really sure what else to say, or how else to refuse her money which was really probably David's money—and I really didn't want anything from him—but then Amy turned away and went back to the book she was apparently reading, which was placed on her lap. "Thanks," I said quietly, slipping the bill into my pocket and pushing the door forward.

When I went inside the gas station convenience store—trying not to remember what happened the last time I was inside one, glancing at the ice cream freezers and the beer coolers with some sort of weird pang hitting my chest as I took them in, whole and unbroken, like the storm never existed, which for them I supposed it didn't—I caught a glimpse of Danny standing near the bathrooms, looking impatient.