Vol.5, Chapter VII — Wifey and the Well-Wishers

Today was being a bit of a complicated day, and it wasn’t just because I wasn’t able to pay my fragilized wifey the attention she needed as people kept flocking over me. Since there was an almost constant traffic of people coming to meet me to wish a happy birthday, the word slowly spreading around, I’d step away from Violet to deal with them without having her feel swarmed, especially in a day she wasn’t at her best. Classmates were one thing, but the people who were outsiders in that context were another, some of them people from a life I had left behind. Those, I gather, won’t be showing up their faces again comes next year. It simply will be plainly visible that it isn’t necessary. I no longer frequented the parties and other social gatherings they and their parents did, so there was no need to ingratiate me due to being my mother’s daughter.

“Sorry Violet, I only now seem to have dealt with the last people,” I told her as I came to her. She had been patiently waiting for me to deal with a few more of those people, Mathilda and the boys and Jessy keeping her company. My “rival” had picked up that my wifey wasn’t feeling her best and had been hovering around her all day. It wasn’t exactly to mark my territory, but the time I couldn’t have spent with Violet and the knowledge of the comfort I brought her having me snuggled to her when she was having her time of the month all guided me to hug her arm tightly and rub my cheek on her shoulder as I rested my head on it. It also felt nice to finally be able to do this. “How are you doing?”

“I’m feeling better,” she told me, entangling her fingers with mine. “Jessy had a medicine that helped with the sick feeling I was having.”

“Oh, that’s good to hear,” I said before turning to Jessy. “Thank you, none that we had seemed to be working on that.”

Jessy’s expression shook for a split second before she gave me a smile and said it was nothing and that we girls have to stick together in times like these. It was a subtle reaction, but one of realisation and perhaps even of fear over having overstepped a previously invisible line. Took her long enough to realise it. Not the overstepping the line I mean, I was perfectly fine with her trying her luck with Violet as long as she didn’t try to kiss her or grope her or anything. Or at least I was until now that she finally seemed to have realised there was a line, and that line was that Violet and I were committed to one another. We didn’t go around sucking each other’s faces—not that we ever did that kind of kissing to begin with—but we also weren’t exactly hiding our relationship with how many times we get all soggy and needy with one another.

She bid us farewell and walked away to go meet up with her friends and our little group set out to go to my place for my birthday celebration.

We were just past the school gate when a voice from my past called me.

I looked and saw a girl named Soraia.

“Hi there, Soraia,” I said, my voice dropping a bit. “It’s been a while.”

“It has, hasn’t it?” she said, coming closer as she combed a strand of hair behind her ear. “How have you been doing?”

“Great. How about you?”

“More or less the same, I guess,” she said, her voice drifting with her eyes, now moving from my face to the side. “I just… I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday.”

“Thanks Soraia,” I said, feeling legitimately touched. “I didn’t expect you remembering it was today.”

“Yeah, well… we were friends for a bit, right?” she asked, her eyes now meeting mine.

“Right. We were.”

The conversation dried up there, but everything that needed to be said was said, just not verbally.

Soraia and I had been friends, but for only three months or so, before my mum scared her away because she wasn’t good enough for me. She had been one of the people who run away, abandoning me. And she was sorry for it.

“Be seeing you around Soraia. Take care of yourself, you hear?” I told her with a smile. “And don’t go roller skating in the middle of the street with traffic, ok?”

He face grew lighter as she saw my smile and felt the warmth in my words. She smiled back and told me to also take care and to not eat too many candies. It was a nice, quiet moment between two people who likely would never talk to each other again. A very nice farewell between ex-friends.

“An old friend of yours?” Violet asked, her voice curious and worried.

“Just somebody I used to know,” I told her, tightening my hold of her arm.

“But you didn’t need to cut me off,” Mathilda suddenly sang. Not a bad singer, but also not a good one either “Make out like it never happened and that we were nothin’”

“And I don’t even need your love,” Stephen joined in, the two now singing together with both of their averagenesses. “But you treat me like a stranger, and that feels so rough.”

“Guys, keep it to the karaoke bar!” Mathew urged them, feeling embarrassed by his two friends suddenly bursting into singing. “Gee, I can’t ever go anywhere with you two.”

Mathilda laughed and said that going to a karaoke bar during the weekend was a wonderful idea and that they hadn’t done that in a long while. She then pointed the blame at me for reminding her of that song.

Violet shook her head, her cheeks tinged red from feeling embarrassed too from walking with two songbirds while I just laughed at our group dynamic.

The end of the day, usually the most relaxed part its entirety, was being constantly interrupted by my trips to the bathroom.

“I told you, three slices were too much,” Violet softly scolded as I came back from the toilet, still a bit curled up.

“But it was sooo good,” I whined, taking my rightful seat.

The cake in question was the one she had lovingly baked despite her condition for my birthday. Chocolate dough, not dry at all, intense and smooth. The filling was caramelised condensed milk, and the topping was a thin layer of chocolate mousse with chocolate cookie crumbles around the side and “Happy Birthday Abby!” written in caramel. The cake was a bit slanted and the top balled up slightly instead of being perfectly flat, but it was the best cake I had ever had for my birthday, easily beating all of those my mum had gotten me from bakeries done by professionals. Everyone loved it, me, my sister, Violet, our friends, Claire, our parents, everyone!

And of course, I loved it so much that I overindulged a bit…

She let out a tired giggle and pulled me in closer once I was sat between her legs. She then gave me one of her wonderful squeezes, making me moan… from both sides.

“Babe, don’t!” I told her, my face turning bright red while she snickered. “Stuff might start coming out!”

“It’s fine, it’s fine” she assured me, kissing my hair.

“…Sorry, tonight I’ll be sleeping on the couch.”

“oh no you won’t!” she firmly told me, her grip turning possessive. “We’ve been sleeping together for over a year so there’s no reason for that. We’ve seen—and heard—everything embarrassing about each other.”

“Well… yeah,” I mumbled, my face turning into a pout. “But that’s different…”

“How so?”

“…We aren’t awake then…”

She giggled and returned to holding me lovingly, her lips coming to give my temple a long, tender kiss. I then moved my head to look at her. After a second of staring in each other’s eyes, we kissed, our lips lingering on one another.

I was telling her that she had persuaded me and that I’d be sleeping with her tonight when my dad appeared, holding a slip of paper.

“So, the field trip has finally been decided,” he said, ignoring the fact that Violet and I were sharing a kiss as he walked in. Or maybe he just didn’t notice as he was squinting at the paper, having forgotten to put on his reading glasses and was stubbornly straining his eyes even further and moving the paper closer and away from his face. It was a bit comical but annoying. Dad was undeniably getting old. “Can you share the details before I sign it?”

The school trip was simple enough: a bus ride to the big town in the early morning so that we got there in time for lunch, visit a natural history museum after that, have a two-hour free time before dinner and then stay at the hotel for the night. Next morning, it was an art museum followed by lunch, an hour-and-a-half of free time and then, a bus ride back home. All of this during the weekend, and since we were a large group of students, the price was modest, the hotel, and bus fare having a nice discount. The lunch was up to us students to decide where we ate, or we could even bring some food from home if we wanted. Breakfast was provided by the hotel, already billed in their pricing.

“Super cool, isn’t it?” I asked, getting excited just thinking about it all. “So, can I go?”

“I don’t see why not,” he hummed, his attention seemingly elsewhere as he looked at us. I already knew what he was going to say next. “Are you two… sharing a room on the field trip?”

We weren’t, as requested from our homeroom teacher Miss Maple. She profusely apologised for it, but it had to be done for a matter of fairness towards other couples, and students, in general. I didn’t like it one bit and almost threw a fit, but Violet put me straight. I was going to be spending the night with two other female classmates while Violet was going to spend the night with Mathilda and Jessy.

“Jessy? I haven’t heard that name before,” my dad said, thinking long and hard to make sure he wasn’t forgetting a possible new friend of mine.

“She’s a girl who’s crushing over Violet and is also one of her fangirls.”

“Couldn’t you have simply told him that she’s an acquaintance?”

“And you’re ok with that?”

“Oh please,” I chuckled. “Violet is practically a nun and I, her God while Jessy is an eager girl who seems to prefer admiring Violet from a certain distance. It will be fine. And besides, even if she confesses her feelings for Violet, Violet will be able to deal with that.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, but… I’m not so sure what I’ll do if that happens.”

“Same thing you do with me when we disagree: recognise her feelings instead of dismissing them, and then share yours in turn as respectfully and lovingly as possible.”

She grumbled that she at least knew that much, but one thing is theory and another thing was putting it into practice.

“A school trip, huh?” my sister mused as she came to join us, having been hearing our talk from the kitchen while she made herself a sandwich. I smiled a bit more when I saw her still wearing the hibiscus scrunchie Claire had given her as a friend’s Valentine’s gift. “Now, that takes me back.”

“Pfft, hehe! Old lady.”

“Excuse you!?” she huffed before realising how she had spoken. “Well, I guess I did sound kinda like an old lady.”

“Did you go to one during high school?” Violet asked her.

“I didn’t,” Sophie said after taking a bite. “Mum didn’t want me getting distracted, so while the other kids went, I stayed behind getting extra tutoring. What about you though? I can’t really see you going in one before our little menace came into the picture.”

Violet confirmed her suspicions. Before I came into her life, she had no friends and going on a school trip with no one would make her feel even lonelier. She recognised that maybe she could have done a friend or two by going, but she could just as well have been a third wheel to whatever group she was assigned. There was also the fact that her household finances were always a bit tight, so she didn’t want to burden her dad either.

“I hope you enjoy this one to compensate all of those times,” my sister told her, caressing Violet’s hair. It was super funny—and even sweeter—to see Violet blushing but also leaning a bit into it. She was enjoying having a big sister, even though it was a loaned one. Although, eventually, Sophie will officially be her sister-in-law, so I guess it checks out.

“What about me?” I asked, hopping on my seat.

“Yeah, yeah, you too, of course,” my sister sighed, moving her hand to also give me a few head pats. “Although in your case, it is more a matter of not having too much fun.”

I giggled as I was enjoying the caresses and playful banter, but then, my stomach made a gurgling noise and I felt a pang.

“Gotta go, be back in a second!” I said, hurrying back to the toilet.