Say When

N I N E

It was Saturday morning. I sat in the back of the library tucked away at my favorite desk reading. A book open in front of me.

I craved Saturday's. They were my free days technically but they were only free from school. It was only noon but I'd already finished my chores. Laundry was done first. I was always the first there at 7:30 AM to get the good washers. The big washers.

While the clothes were drying I went down the street to the supermarket and got groceries. I returned home, put the groceries away, and made my way back to the laundromat to grab the clothes out of the dryer, fold, and return them home.

The process was second nature to me. In my bones from being the routine since I was twelve years old and trusted with 'large amounts of money', as my dad called it. But it was really only about a hundred and fifty dollars.

I stretched that money and budgeted it the best I could because I could see my Dad's hard work etched in the lines of those bills.

But all that running around gave me time to myself and it gave me time to think. I could read and write in the laundromat. I escaped to tropical islands in the produce section of the grocery store. I listened to crooners sing about love lost and found again while I folded.

Those few hours were blissful business. A reprieve I needed since my mind seemed determined to lose itself in worries about college. When I wasn't obsessing about my future I was absorbed in my present.

The new possibilities that popped up and made their presence known primarily through text messages on my phone.

Yuri called the next day after the concert and was just as fun and sweet as he'd been that night. I talked to him during his entire shift at the wing place.

Listening to him imitate annoying customers and ride around town making deliveries. I holed myself up in my room and let the time slip by as we talked about our childhoods all the way up to the present.

I didn't know where the time went when I spoke with him. It was easy. I wasn't concerned with how I sounded or consumed with nervous jitters.

I thought it was due to me swigging libations from my soda bottle but our conversations after proved that liquor had nothing to do with it. We'd actually planned to meet up later tonight and hang out.

I thought I turned my phone off so I was surprised and mortified when it rang and echoed across the quiet library. I looked at my phone. I didn't recognize the number.

"Hello?" I answered hesitantly.

"Hey, Bri." Jax's voice flowed through the phone. I felt my muscles tense and my breath catch in my throat. I hadn't spoken to Jax since I was dripping in my hallway a week ago.

But here his voice was. On my phone. Flooding into my ears. Bringing me back to that place of uncomfortable need.

"Hi, Jax." I choked the words out in a high pitched exclaim. It wasn't what I was going for but it was better than pure silence.

"What book are you on?" He asked. I could hear the music on in the background and I imagined him rolling around in his car. Hip hop pumping through his AUX cord.

It took me a moment to remember what he was talking about. Right. The books.

"Halfway through book two. I'm catching up." I crossed my legs beneath the table and then uncrossed them again.

My mind was too preoccupied with forming words to Jax. I hated this feeling. But once it was gone I missed it.

"Good. It really starts to pick up." I could tell he had me on speaker. His voice was clear but seemed to bounce off space around him.