Hello Again, Sir {s/t - complete}

What About Now?: 19.

                My eyes fluttered open as the sun hit my face, spreading warmth across my body. I smiled at the heat but quickly shut my eyes tight again. It was far too early to get up already.

                As I drifted back to sleep, memories of the dream I had been having before waking came back to me.
I dreamed I had woken up and gone out into the garden for pancakes with Kodie. What if we could actually do that today? That would be great!

                I turned my head, settling my thoughts for sleep but then a split second later a dog barked. My eyebrows quickly crashed together, raised and my eyes opened.

                Someone was trying to stifle a giggle as I shot out of the deck chair, stepping backwards on some of my garden flowers. Where the heck was that coming from? I didn’t have a dog. I looked around the garden, and then stopped to think. Why was I in the garden in the first place? A dog barked again and I jumped step on my feet, as if the dog was underneath me. 

                “Prudence! Prue, come here!”

                 Prudence? Who was Prudence? I looked to my left – to my other next door neighbours – from where I was standing and saw a head of permed grey hair.

                 Andrew’s mother turned just as I looked at her and her big round glasses fell down her nose a way before she blinked and pushed them up.

                “Hello.” I replied, moving around to the fence. “You must be Andrew’s mother.”

                “Hello de—” a dog barked. “Oh, Prudence, there you are! Who’s a good girlie? You? No. Don’t run away. Naughty girl.” I watched as she tapped a Yorkshire Terrier’s nose. “Hello dear.” She finally replied, turning back. “You must be Alexander.”

                “Just Alex, please.”

                “It’s nice to meet you, Alex.”

                “You too. I wondered where the noise was coming from. I didn’t know Andrew had gotten a dog?”
                “Oh, he hasn’t. Oh, no. No, Prudence is mine!”

                “Oh.” Thank goodness. “She’s a lovely dog.”

                “Thank you.” Andrew’s mother seemed genuinely pleased and I smiled. “Well, I must get on. Poor Andrew’s ill.”

                “Oh, send him my best.”

                “Yes.” She nodded. “I’ve cooked him some chicken soup. That’ll make him better.”

                “Have a good day.”

                “And you, deary.”

                I turned around and walked inside, frowning again as I passed the sun chair. Why was it out anyway? I had fallen asleep on it but I don’t even remember going out on it? And I was wearing a tracksuit, so I wasn’t dressed for the day. Had I gotten out of bed and gone straight out and fallen asleep and not realised it? 

                “Kodie!” I shouted, walking inside.

                “Yeah?” her voice sounded distant and there was a thump from upstairs.

                “Kodie?”

                “Coming!”

                I waited in the living room scratching the back of my head. My papers were scattered everywhere over the coffee table and it looked like I had gotten up, left everything, and not gone back to it all night.

                “Yeah?”

                I turned around. “Oh, hello. Um, Kodie, where were you?”

                “In the spare room.”

                “So you were asleep?”

                “Yeah. It's Saturday, at..." she looked at her watch. "And ten in the morning. Why? Was I meant to be up early?”

                “No, no! I don’t know.” I shrugged. “I heard someone laugh and I woke up to a dog barking but that’s the old lady next door and you were asleep so you weren’t laughing. I don’t know who was laughing.”

                 “Next door has a dog?”

                “It’s his mothers, thank god.” I mumbled.

                “Don’t you like dogs?”

                “I’m good with helping people.” I explained. “But bad with animals. I’m always reading – and now marking, too – and I forget things. So I’d forget to feed and water a dog if I had one, to be honest. Actually, once, when I was in secondary school, I had a pet goldfish which died because I forgot to feed it. And it’s not like you can forget much to do with a goldfish, you don’t even need to walk them!”

                Kodie chuckled. “I can’t believe you can control a classroom of students and are quite organized yet you can’t keep a goldfish! What’s wrong with you?”

                I laughed but I still couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong because it didn’t make sense that I didn’t put everything away. I always put my college work away when I finished with it! Why hadn’t I last night?

                “Is something troubling you?”

                “Huh?”

                “Is something wrong?”

                “Oh, I just don’t know why I was outside.”           

                “You must have fallen asleep marking because I heard you open the back door at about six-ish this morning, mumbling something about pancakes. But then I just turned over and went back to sleep.”

                “Oh, well that explains… not very much.” I bit on my lip as I began ruffling through papers. Kodie shrugged and walked into the kitchen.

                Eventually, after going through some of the stacks of coursework and organising the piles I’ve already done, putting them away, I was about to go and join Kodie to get a cup of coffee when the phone rang.

                “I’ll get it!” I heard Kodie shout and I was about to carry on and go make coffee when I remembered Freddie said he was going to ring at some point over the weekend to talk about a student that was transferring from his class to my own to fit their schedule better and I stood up, alert.

                “No! Kodie! I’ll get it.”

                I rushed towards the phone and I saw Kodie turn around, recognition and sadness across her face. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”

                “It’s okay.” I said soothingly. “But I have to answer that.”

                “I understand.”

                I sent a lopsided smile her way, raked a hand through my hair and then the phone. “Hello, Fr—”

                “Alex?”

                My voice cut in my throat and I couldn’t think of something to say. I had nothing to say. I bit down on the inside of my cheek and clenched my jaw.

                “Alex, are you still there.”

                I breathed in and out angrily through my nose. I had no idea why this woman was calling but if there was one person who I would never want to speak to again, it was Jenny. And Jenny was who was calling.

                I cleared my throat. She had the cheek to ring my house number! How did she even get this number? I was in college when I dated her; I was living with my parents so how could she get this number? What, did she look up my number in the yellow pages and call? I almost snorted. What did she expect, hugs and kisses?

                “Don’t call this number, Jenny.” 

                “Alex, yo—”

                “You’re not welcome, no, wait, you have no right to call me.” I said coldly. “Don’t call again.”

                “No, Al—”

                I put the phone down before she could say anything else and let it drop back down on the holder as I let out a breath of air. I turned to see Kodie looking at me from the corner of my eye and turned toward her, relieved that my anger was already leaving my system. I wish I could never purely hate someone, but I know I do. The only person who literally sends my blood boiling, every time I hear their voice, see their name or face, is Jenny.

                “I’m sorry.” I apologised. “I don’t usually talk like that to people. Not even the people from companies on the phone.”

                “It’s okay.” She said quickly. “You don’t need to explain.”

                “No, I don’t want you to think that I am a bad person—”

                “I don—”

                “I don’t care.” I replied stubbornly. “I want to explain. That was Jenny, my ex girlfriend.”

                “Well it’s a good job I’m never going to date you.” She joked. “I’m sorry.” She said quickly and soberly afterwards.

                “It’s fine. Remember Ashlye mentioned someone called Hanna?”

                Her eyes lit up, as if by the hope that I was finally going to explain Hanna to Kodie. Although it was unlikely that that would ever actually happen. I could trust Kodie, but I couldn’t trust anyone but Angie knowing my secret. It was too precious in keeping my life secure, having it a secret. I wanted it to stay that way. My life was on the line. “Yeah.”

                “Well Hanna used to be my best friend, when I was going out with Jenny, because me and Hanna went through something that kept us close. That gave us an emotional attachment, and no one could take that away. They still can’t.” I smiled at that thought. We were still friends, sure we had our fall outs even know, but no one could take away what we’d been through together. “Jenny had given me an ultimation. I had to choose my friendship with Hanna and my relationship with Jenny. She tried pushing Hanna away, out of my life, for good because she didn’t want her there. She never wanted her there. But I wasn’t having it. I told Jenny I couldn’t be with her if she wanted me to do something like that. I still can’t forgive her, because things weren’t really the same anymore with Hanna after that.”

                “You must have gone through something big. You chose your friend over your girlfriend? I mean, yeah, that’s  the way it should be, but people’s priorities aren’t always in the right place.”

                “Well I’m glad mine are.” I replied.

                “Do you still talk to Hanna, much? I mean, you’ve seen her recently, but do you miss her. You said yourself, things aren’t the same.”

                I narrowed my eyes. “You’re so interested in my life when it comes down to Hanna.”

                “Well I’m not interested in William Shakespeare. I can’t imagine anyone putting up with you and your marking, and coffee and reading. It’s weird, thinking my English teacher has a girlfriend.”

                “But it’s not weird that you live with your English teacher?”

                “Not at all. If anything, it’s great.”

                “Why?” I asked confusingly. “Usually you have to sit there whilst I mark. What’s so interesting about that?”

                Kodie tapped the side of her nose and I raised my eyebrow.

                “I told you about Jenny.”

                “Under your own free will.”

                “Why don’t you think it’s weird.”

                “I think it’s an advantage. It’s better than being home—”

                “Have your foster family called you? To see where you are?”

                She shook her head. “No. I got a text but apart from that, they’re not that worried and I’m not that bothered. I’ll get out of your hair as soon as possible—”

                “You don’t have to do that—”

                “No, really, I don’t want you getting into trouble. If I’m here too long, you might. But it’s great being here. When you mark, you don’t really concentrate on anything else.”

                “It’s because I’m getting the scores right. Everyone needs great scores to pass so I need to make sure I write comments on improvement all the time. You’re homework grades are going up, by the way. Your terminology is great, now.”

                “Thanks. That’s because I do my homework when you’re marking and ask you what this and that means and you’re so engrossed in your marking that you don’t realise you’re giving me all my answers.”

                My eyes widened and my mouth dropped open at her devious smirk. “Kodie!”

                “What? Oh, I mean, thanks Mr. Clarke, I’ve been trying really hard.”

                “Nice try.” I replied with mock anger. “I’m not helping you anymore.” 

                “Oh, please.”

                “No.”

                “I’ll play dirty.”

                I crossed my arms over my chest and leaned against my hallway wall, next to the phone. “Oh, right. How?”

                “I’ll… um… uh…” she bit her lip and frowned. “I’ll…” she snapped her fingers together. “I’ll ask your mom about Hanna.”

                “Kodie, you can’t talk about Hanna. Please.”

                She swallowed and I watched her study my face. My voice had sounded desperate, needy, and I was biting my lip as she slumped her shoulders. “Okay. I’m sorry for bringing her up. But I just… don’t understand why you’re not still with someone if you’re still obviously – and believe me, it’s obvious – that you’re still hung up on her. Does she really mean that much to you?”

                “Do you know what the Achilles heel is?”

                “Kind of.” She said, scrunching up her nose. I couldn’t blame Kodie for wanting to know about Hanna, for saying she’ll ask my mother about Hanna, because in the end, she was just a teenage girl. She was just curious. It wasn’t something I could get mad at her for. She still looked a little angry with herself for asking as her eyebrows hadn’t unknitted since she’d asked.

                “It’s a deadly weakness in spite of overall strength. Like the one thing that you keep going after, even though you shouldn’t have it. Say, someone’s on a diet but they love chocolate. Like, so much – a chocoholic – let’s say. They can’t give up chocolate just like that. Even if they’re on a diet, and won’t eat anything else unhealthy, at all, they’re still going to have that chocolate because it’s their weakness. Do you understand?”

                “Perfectly. Hanna is your weakness. But I can't talk about, or mention, her.”

                “Yes. Hanna—” and this saying fitted perfectly “—is my Achilles heel.”