Frigid Flora

eighteen - burnt cake

Chapter Eighteen

Sometimes people had good days, other times people had bad ones where nothing ever seemed to go according to plan. The latter tended to be everyday of my life since my tenth birthday, but not today. Today was a good day. The sun was out, Skylar had accepted my apology, it was the weekend and I had plans. Plans that didn't include Netflix, my bed or being forced to go somewhere. I was going out voluntarily, and for once, I was feeling spritely.

"You look fancy," My mother nodded in approval as she looked over my outfit, noticing my lack of ripped jeans. No doubt the woman would run upstairs in search of them as soon as I left the house in the hopes to find and burn them. I'd hidden them just to be on the safe side. "What's the occasion?"

"No occasion. I'm just feeling," I searched for a word. "Good."

She beamed. "That's great, sweetheart. Any reason? It must be something if you're out of those god awful jeans. Is it that polite boy, Beckett?"

"Mum," I groaned. "How many times? Beckett and I didn't get along, alright?"

"Keep your hair on." She laughed, turning her back to face me so as to mix the pasta sauce she was making. "Is it perhaps another boy?"

I chewed on the inside of my cheek. "No."

She immediately whirled around, wooden spoon pointing toward me in an accusatory manor. "Sweetheart, you can't lie to save your life," Dollops of tomato sauce fell to the floor as she waved the kitchen utensil around in the air. "And that red tinting your cheeks doesn't help your case."

"Maybe it's the sauce you keep throwing about everywhere like a mad woman." I snapped defensively.

She grinned. "You know, mums like to hear the gossip too."

I'm sure she'd love to know that her daughter was just beginning to sort out her feelings toward a certain rebellious, troublesome, irritating boy. One that she didn't want me seeing due to our whole accidental run in with the police. Yes, I'm sure she'd love the gossip if she knew that it was my feelings for Parker Heywood.

It was Skylar who'd popped my bubble of denial, forcing me to understand my jumbled up mess of confusion. She'd came around late last night and we'd discussed our fallout (she'd forgiven me after I promised I would spend more time with her than I had previously been doing since the arrival of Parker) before lapsing back into our old ways. We talked in depth about our favourite television shows - which of course meant that a few hours were dedicated to theories about Teen Wolf. Eventually the conversation only consisted of questions asking the world how Stiles and Isaac were so damn attractive. One second we were talking about Isaac's blue irises, the next she was interrogating me about Parker.

"So do you like him?" She'd asked. 

"What? Who?" I shoved a handful of popcorn into my mouth. "Isaac or Stiles? I think we've established that they're both-"

She pulled a face. "Im talking about Parker, silly."

I choked on a kernel that had accidentally found its way into the bunch of perfectly popped corn I'd been munching on. Skylar waited patiently for me to recover, apparently finding the unspoken switch of conversation topic completely normal. "Pardon?"

"You need to sort out your feelings and I'm getting sick of waiting for you to do it by yourself. You need a helping hand to hurry you up a bit and here I am. I am your hand. Let me guide you to-"

I snorted. "Excuse me but I c-"

"Do you feel happy or sad when you hang out with him?" She interrupted.