ETHEREAL

CHAPTER 16

Damien texts me back with a simple, "Okayyy =)," and I feel a bit confused if he even cares for me at all, or if he just wants to eventually manipulate me into doing everything he wants. We make plans for Saturday night.

"Justin! Will you be here this weekend, or are you staying at Jace's again?"

Justin yells to me from his permanent spot on my living room couch in which he curls up with his phone, laptop, and a whole bag of chips, "Yeah!"

He texts me, sorry Skye but being here on the weekends is hard when your dad keeps asking about my job/education status/when I'm going to leave...

I get that, because my parents are incredibly smothering and controlling, although they mean well, but my dad has the right to ask those questions since he is the one paying all of the bills. This causes such an awkward position for myself and my parents, actually, even though I don't want to push Justin into staying somewhere unsafe.

I wish that he would be accepted into a university and be able to live in the dorms, but obtaining a scholarship won't be possible as he didn't really try at any of his high school classes, even though he is incredibly smart. He can't get a student loan, as his car was repossessed a few months ago, and after he dropped out, he was sent to a collection agency for his old community college student loan, in addition to how he owes money to several different people and various credit cards. I'm surprised at how he withheld all of that information until recently, and I start to feel like I caused my parents to enter into this mess, in which we don't really know who Justin is. We have hung out a million times to walk around the mall or go see a movie, but do I really know him, when I didn't know any of this information before now?

Lately, Justin stays at the UMBC dorm with Jace on the weekends to avoid that kind of questioning from my dad, even though he hates how all Jace does is eat junk food from the vending machines and get high with his friends.

I text back, yeah.. are you leaving me your laptop again to watch Skins?

He runs upstairs, and puts one hand on his hip, and one finger pointing at me. "I will leave you my laptop... but you know the rules - DO NOT CLICK ON ANYTHING ELSE BESIDES THE 'SKINS' FOLDER, you don't understand Skye, you do not understand," and I start giggling as he smiles and laughs, too. "Anyway, you don't want to see what else is on there!"

"I don't care what's on there, as long as you downloaded all of the seasons for me?" I whine a bit.

"UGH, I DID, YES, STOP BOTHERING ME!" Justin fake-yells and plops down on my pink carpet to sit cross-legged. "Ugh, I'm so tired, Skye, I don't even know if I wanna go see him... we have no real food to eat! Can I take some of your food to go?"

"To go?! This is not a restaurant, omg Justin," and I laugh again. "But, yeah, I guess, sure."

My cheap Toshiba laptop can barely run the Word program to write my papers for college anymore as it keeps freezing up and losing battery power, and it is only two years old. It costs $399, but I can't afford to replace it, as I could barely afford to purchase it when I did.

I drop Justin off at Jace's dorm, which is about thirty minutes from my house, and I decide I need to try to spend time with my mom. I throw my silver studded black faux leather clutch purse down on the stairs as I walk in the door, and walk upstairs.

"Mom, I'm back." I sit down on her bed, and she is laying against the pillows, watching another cooking television show, and I feel guilty again at how she is always alone.

"Oh, hi, Skye honey, how was the drive?"

"Annoying on the way back... it seems like with traffic, it becomes 45 minutes going back home, always."