How’s Life, Amy?

By: alicecullengirl

Chapter 2, after a super long time, yay! I just re-read chapter 1, and after six months of major writers’ block, this is what I have. - ACG

2. Stockholm Syndrome

As Lee’s official girlfriend, he no longer just dropped me off from school. He lingered. Any other day, I wouldn’t have minded. But my nerves were completely shot. I kept expecting to be hit over the back of the head with something heavy.

What I really needed was time alone to just think. Time to let my calm façade down and just go a little crazy while I got all my thoughts in order. But, it seemed, that would have to wait.

I went straight to the couch in the living room while Lee raided the refrigerator. Ever since visiting his mansion during his recovery, I didn’t like having him in my house. It was so much smaller and dirtier and you didn’t need to be on a list to get in. My bed was never made and we didn’t send our laundry out to be washed. He had an entire room for sports equipment, and we had an entire room for cleaning supplies.

If Lee still thought poverty was a disease, though, he didn’t show it. He surfaced three minutes later with a Coke and a banana. He inspected it for brown spots, and then took a bite. He gave me a purposeful smile that said See? He wanted me to be proud of him for slumming so well. I smiled back at him and powered up the TV. He reached for the remote, but I didn’t let him have it. It was only a matter of time before he realized we only had thirty-six channels, ten of which we stole from our neighbors.

“Are you going to tell me now?” Lee asked ten minutes later, after I’d settled on a reality show that neither of us much liked.

“Tell you what?” I meant to look innocent, like I had no idea what he meant. But I didn’t have it in me today. My face stayed blank.

“What’s up.” He just wasn’t going to let this go. The stress was building, and it was making me mean.

“Just drop it, Lee.” I shut off the TV and walked towards the front door. He followed me. He wasn’t used to me snapping at him, not lately at least. I opened the door and pointed out to my driveway, where his car was parked. The universal sign for Out. Now.

“Okay, okay, mope if you want.” He fished the keys out of his pocket and looked out. The sky was white, like it might rain at any moment. “First though, there’s a dance on Friday. We’re going.”

“You have a broken arm, and you want to go dancing?” I wondered if he had a broken brain, too.

“It’s just my wrist. It’ll be fine,” he waved the cast in the air like that proved something.

“Friday is my birthday,” I add. Because of course he’d never asked about it before. “I just want to stay in.”

“Well, that’s not going to happen.” He was smiling, but his eyes were dark. Like this was where he drew the line. Like he’d let me cross all the others, but that was it. He was making it clear that girlfriend or not, he was still calling the shots. Fine.

I pointed to his car again, and he stepped into the drizzle that had begun to fall. I closed the door behind him and ran upstairs. It had never before felt so good to crash on my bed and not think for just a minute.

--

The way I saw it, I had Stockholm Syndrome. I had slowly fallen for the evil dragon holding me up in the tower. He hadn’t actually changed, I had just gotten used to him. And now that the brave knight was here to save me, I kind of wanted to stay. But where did that leave the knight, whose job it was to save the princess? Unable to leave the her side, but kept at bay by the possessive dragon.

But what was I thinking? Lee was not a dragon. And yet it all made sense. It wasn’t Lee’s fault that I couldn’t make up mind. Or Spencer’s. It was mine. The princess up in the tower. It was up to her to either let the knight save her, or send him away forever. It wasn’t fair to keep him suspended within reach of the dragon if he wasn’t going to get anything out of it.

Hmm. Just like that, I had made my choice. In Spencer’s note, he’d said that he couldn’t call me because of Lee. That didn’t mean I couldn’t call him.

--

“You’ve got Spencer,” he chimed when he finally picked up.

“Hey, it’s me. Amy.”

He was quiet for a second, and I heard music shut off in the background. “Oh, hey. How’d you get my number?”

“A little bird on Facebook told me.”

“Ah.” His chuckle was all static. My service was really terrible.

I had planned out what I was going to say before I called. And just like that it was gone. There were a few seconds of silence while I tried to piece together my thoughts. I finally gave up and just said what I was thinking, “I’m really confused.”

“Sorry about that,” he said.

“Don’t apologize,” I said. It was strange talking to someone who did things like apologize and think of others. I tried to think again of what I’d planned to say, but it eluded me. I said what I thought again, “It’s just that you’re both desirable company. It can’t just choose one, just like that.” It was only half-true, I realized as I said it. Desirable wasn’t the word for Lee.

“Because Lee’s a whole bucket of laughs.”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” I laughed.

“He’s no good for you. He’s no good for anyone.”

I was being slowly talked into a wall. It was so obvious. In a perfect world, I’d have never met Lee, and I’d be with Spencer, and he wouldn’t take me out to show me off on my birthday. But this wasn’t a perfect world.

“Spencer--”

“Tomorrow, after school.”

“What?” I wondered if I’d missed something.

“We should hang out.” Spencer was always so calm and mild. Like he didn’t appreciate the danger involved in trying to woo the girlfriend of someone with enough money to arrange that you mysteriously disappeared and were never seen again.

I sighed. “I don’t know, Spencer. That doesn’t sound too--”

“Too late, I already made up my mind. You’d better think of something to tell Lee, because this is happening whether you like it or not.” He was laughing and half joking, but it gave me an odd feeling. Like when Lee used to believe that people would obey simply because he willed it to be so.

“Okay. Fine. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

--

“Amyca,” a voice called from the other side of my bedroom door, half an hour later.

“Yeah,” I called back and opened the door. Margaret was standing in the hall, balancing a laundry basket on her knee.

“I did a load of laundry. I think some of these are yours.”

I looked through the clothes and nodded, taking a handful of my t-shirts. She lingered for a few moments. “Anything else?” I asked.

“You know that date I had a few days ago?” She tapped her foot a few times.

“So you admit it was a date!” I laughed, and she did, too, after a few seconds.

“Well, I’m going on another one. Tomorrow night.”

Was she nervous that I wouldn’t approve? “Is it with the same guy?”

“Of course it is. What kind of woman do you think I am?”

“Well, have fun, then.” She deserved to have fun. It seemed like she was working all the time these days. I’d been eating a lot of dinner alone lately.

Margaret shifted the laundry basket to her other knee, but didn’t move to go.

“Anything else?” I started to get nervous, like something was wrong.

“How is your boyfriend? The one who was here the other morning.”

It seemed like such a long time ago that Lee had tricked Margaret into letting him in. Well, maybe not tricked. More like stretched the truth. How was he? Much the same as always. “Pretty good,” I said lamely. “We’re going to the dance on Friday.”

“The spring fling?” she asked.

“That’s the one.”

Margaret smiled. “It’s good to see you getting out. I’m glad you’re liking it here.”

I smiled back, but it was fleeting. Margaret took the laundry basket and strolled back to her room. I shut my bedroom door and crashed back onto my bed.

This time, though, it didn’t help at all.

So yay, chapter two! Not making any promises about when the next will be up (seeing as I have the worst timing in history), but at least I don’t have writers’ block anymore. R&R. Peace and Love. - ACG