Crashing Into Blue

Chapter 7

When I get home from work, I go straight up to my room and turn on the radio speakers while flopping onto my bed in one fluid motion. An old school Taylor Swift breakup song is what greets me. How appropriate, I think to myself.

Songs like these are like a favourite sweater: worn down to the point that every time you slip into it it's familiar and comforting. The moment the song comes on you slide right back into it as if it never stopped playing. You just pick up where you left off.

She's crooning about heartbreak, and I can say that I'm relating for the first time ever, and not in the fake way we all do when we look wistfully into the distance and mourn the breakup of our perfectly dreamy, fake boyfriend, as if it were our own music video.

I mean, Patrick being back? With a girlfriend after he made it pretty clear last summer he wasn't looking for one and that he needed to get serious? That a girlfriend would just be a distraction? I roll into my pillow as she sings about going back in time, and I'm right along with her. I wish I could change a few things too.

Indigo softly knocks on our door, since we share the master bedroom of the house. Our mom didn't want to stay in the room where her parents did more than just sleep, and I totally get that. Putting myself in her position makes me cringe with my entire body. She's in the room that was hers when she was growing up, and it hasn't really changed since the eighties. Whenever I go into it, I feel like I've entered a time capsule. Extinct boy band posters line the walls along with her old sketches, scrunchies litter her dresser, and her closet contains vintage overalls. Not much has changed for her, besides the scattered photos of Indigo and I. I think she likes it that way.

"Come in," I say but it comes out muffled since I'm face down on my pillow.

I can hear Indigo pitter-pattering over to me, and I feel the mattress dip as she lies down next to me.

"You know Patrick is a dick, right?"

I snort into the pillow. It's such an Indigo thing to say: blunt and aggressive.

"He really is, and I know you know that deep down, too. You just can't see it right now. It's buried under all the disappointment and hurt. But don't worry, we'll get him back for that." She nudges me in the shoulder. I roll over to face her.

"Since when did my burdens become yours?"

She looks at me dead in the eyes. "Since we spent all those months together in utero."

We instantly crack up and roll towards each other, legs tangling up as we rest our heads on the same pillow.

"Plus, I'm the older sister here, I need to protect my baby sister."

"Indi, you're three minutes older than me."

"So what? Those three extra minutes gave me a whole world of wisdom you have not yet achieved."

I roll over and smile at the ceiling. We lie together not talking for a few minutes, listening to one song end and another one start.

"He's not a bad guy," I say quietly over the music, "I guess I just wasn't what he was looking for long term."

Indigo props herself up on her elbow.

"Well, maybe he shouldn't have strung you along all summer if you weren't what he was looking for long term. Nay, he shouldn't have strung you along for four whole summers if you weren't what he was looking for long term."

I can feel the sarcasm dripping off her words and hitting me square in the face. Indigo huffs next to me as she drops back down on the pillow.

"What does he even know about long term? He's an eighteen-year-old boy. All he knows is what his lower half directs him to."

I cringe at the thought of how close that lower half got to me. I would be feeling even worse right now if we went all the way. Not that we didn't get close, though.

"What am I going to do Indi? He'll be here all summer with this girl who I bet is some gorgeous premed student who he can talk medical jargon with."

"How sexy," she replies while wiggling her eyebrows.

I smack her in the shoulder. "I'm serious! He's going to think that I'm not over him, that I'm still pining for him like some desperate loser."

"Aren't you though?"

I smack her in the shoulder again. She scrunches into a tiny ball of self-defense.

"I'm trying not to be! I just need to show him that I'm over it, and over him. If I emulate it, maybe I'll start feeling it again."

A moment of silence develops between us, and I break it with a quiet confession.

"I thought I was done with him, but knowing he's here is bringing it all back up again." I release a frustrated sigh, pushing back the memories that are starting to creep up on me all over again. "I just need someone who can make him see that I'm worth it."

Indigo suddenly sits upright. "That's it. You're a genius, Lia."

My confusion must be written all over my face because Indigo starts to elaborate.

"You just need someone to make him see that you're worth it! Hello, you need to make him jealous! What's better than getting over someone by basking in the glow of someone else's adoration? You're really killing two birds with one stone; you get a new summer fling, and you get to drive him crazy by making him see what he's missing. Take that with you to Yale, you bastard!" She's bouncing up and down on the bed in excitement and I grab onto her arm to tether her back down to my level.

"Hold on, hold on! You want me to get a rebound?"

"Call it whatever you want, but you need to show him you won't be moping around this summer. This is your town; own it."

I bite my lip to try and suppress a small smile. My sister really is an evil genius. She can tell that I'm close to agreeing to this idea by the next thing she says to me.

"Look, it doesn't even have to be real. I think we know the perfect person for this job, and I don't think it will take too much convincing on his part."

She jumps off my bed and lands onto hers, which is next to mine, and a laugh bubbles out of her throat. I continue to lie there, wondering about the intricate web that we seem to be weaving. I hope we don't get caught in it.