My Brother's Best Friend

Chap. 48

I woke up to the sound of a door slamming.

I rolled over to look at my digital clock on my nightstand, blinking a couple of times to focus my bleary eyes.

6:02 AM. My alarm wasn't set to go off for another 13 minutes.

Who the hell had robbed me of my 13 minutes of sleep?

I pushed myself out of bed, heading out to see who was slamming doors so early in the morning.

I heard Parker's muffled voice behind his bedroom door. And even from my position in the hallway, I could clearly tell he was pissed off.

I knocked twice before opening his bedroom door.

Parker's back was to me as he leaned against his TV stand, his upper body tense.

"We all have to do it Lee," he said, his voice sharp. "You have one fucking job, and that's to wake up in the morning and go to class. I do it, you do it, we all fucking do it."

Parker was not happy.

"Yeah? Well now I have to make the 3 hour drive to Miami to have a parent-teacher conference with your principal because you can't seem to show up for class," Parker snapped. "But don't worry Lee, I'm happy to drop everything and drive down to Miami in the middle of school. It's not like I had a Physics exam today or anything."

Parker paused for a moment.

"Well wake up Lee, because the whole fucking world doesn't revolve around you."

And with that he ripped his phone away from his ear, letting out a long, frustrated sigh.

"Good morning," I said.

He turned to face me, raising his eyebrows. "Did you hear all of that?"

"Some of it."

Parker let out a sigh, tossing his phone onto his bed. "I really wish I had a flip phone right now, because it would've been really satisfying to slam my phone shut at the end of that."

I couldn't help but laugh, shaking my head.

Parker eased down onto the edge of his bed, closing his eyes and massaging his temples.

I climbed onto his bed behind him, kissing his cheek before massaging his shoulders.

"It's only 6 AM and I feel like the day is half over," Parker muttered.

"Just relax," I encouraged.

Parker was silent for a few minutes as I massaged his shoulders, letting the tension slowly release from his body.

"I was pretty harsh there wasn't I?" Parker asked.

"You did lose your temper, yeah," I agreed. "But then again, I don't know exactly what happened."

"Lee decided not to show up for class three days this week," Parker said, shaking his head. "So now I have to attend this stupid parent-teacher conference at 2:00 today."

"Don't they know that you're a student too?"

"I'm Lee's legal guardian," Parker pointed out. "And that comes first."

We were both silent for a few moments.

"He just really pissed me off because he didn't care," Parker muttered. "He didn't care that I also have a life, and that I have important things that I'm supposed to be doing too. He wasn't remorseful at all. And that really fueled my anger."

"He's 16," I pointed out. "He's just a kid that probably decided Starbucks looked better than class."

"And I'm 18," Parker defended. "I'm not supposed to have custody of a 16 year old, let alone know how to deal with all of this shit."