What You Caused

28.

Chapter 28 | The Attic

Isabella:

"Mija what are you doing home?" My mom asks, her eyebrows drawn together in concern as I walk into the kitchen and slump down on one of the stools after Lucas had dropped me off.

The rest of the ride home had been silent, I had spent the rest of the drive chewing on my bottom lip and as silly as it sounds, trying to push away the regret of eating 20 (or 19 I guess) frickin' nuggets the day of the party. My mind hadn't had time to dwell on it over the weekend as we had been planning Grace's huge gesture of love but now that my brain had no thoughts to occupy it, my overthinking was at its peak. I was weighed down with a heavy feeling and it annoyed me because I had genuinely thought I had moved past severely overthinking and being anxious over 'bad/unhealthy' food, but I guess not.

"I fainted at school, so they sent me home," I sigh which causes my mom to almost spit out the coffee she was in the midst of sipping.

My mom's frown deepens in worry. "What do you mean fainted? When was the last time you ate mija? Oh God I knew I should've  double checked if you ate breakfast this morning-"

I cut my mum off from continuing her flurry of questions, my eyes widening as I realise what my mom took my fainting as. "NO mama it's not that, long story short Mia hit me with the ball and my nose started bleeding like crazy and I'm also on day two of my period so y'know the excessive loss of blood made me faint."

My mom narrows her eyes at me, not looking quite convinced so I grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl sitting on the counter and take a big bite out of it for show. "Shee shlook aim eafing."

She finally lets out a breath of relief. "Alright mija, well I made pasta for lunch if you're hungry, it's in the pan over there," she waves her hand in the direction of the cooker before glancing back down at her laptop.

I look over at the pan on the cooker, my stomach churning. Told you I was still reprimanding myself for eating those nug-okay you know what that's it.

Brain, you're going to eat a bowl of pasta and you're going to enjoy it. No ifs, ands or buts.

With this new profound determination, I stalk over to the cooker and pull out a bowl from inside the cupboard. I guess my determination is coming off a tad to strong because all the other bowls in the cupboard almost come tumbling down at the aggression I had pulled my bowl out with. I try and stop them all from falling and once the glass clinking has stopped I briskly shut the cupboard door closed.

"How's your job search going?" I ask my mother as I scoop up a helping of the spicy chicken pasta my mom had made. God damn did that look good.

Since we had been back, my mom had been working in the office Linh works at, but her job is only part time so she has been on the search for a permanent job since.

We have been living off my grandmothers savings and the money my dad sends every month since landing in the US, so my mother is in dire search for her own source of income. I don't even think it's the fact we are using my grandmothers money but the fact we were mooching off of my dad which seems to annoy my mom.

I don't exactly know what had happened between my parents after that whole situation on Sofia's birthday. I had tried asking my mother one time but she had briskly cut me off saying there was nothing going on between them and that the 'kiss' had been a mistake.

However, from what I can tell, my parents have stopped hating each other to the extent they had been prior that kiss but they still aren't exactly any where near on the terms of getting back together - which is completely fine by me.