I remember sitting in her room helping her with the latest arts and crafts project. Teagan’s room was like an upholstered punk rock paradise. Everything is coated with a least one drippy, sloppy layer of spray paint, bottle caps, buttons and other paraphernalia picked up off the street. Her mother was not exactly happy about it, particularly the wall papering job she did with fliers for shows and parties that took almost a year to finish. I don’t know where she got all this stuff.

She had me flattening out bottle caps with a hammer and a board while she plastered photo booth pictures of us and the rest of the gang on this cracked mirror with an oversized, gaudy frame. She was always the one for pictures a hell of a lot more than I was. She used to say,

“You gotta savour every minute of life and remember all of it as best as you can.” Which always raised the question;

“Well how are you supposed to savour every minute if you are savouring the moments that are over?” And that always elicited the same reaction. She’d laugh at me with that carefree laugh of hers.

“Not all moments are as interesting as others.” She was such a little shit sometimes.

But on this day she was unusually quiet. I was usually the quiet one. The joke had always been that Teagan was my voice. I mean there was music playing but that never stopped her before. It was giving me some serious creeps. I may be quiet but never really sit in quiet.

“Okay. What’s up?”

“What?”

“Did you lose you voice or something?”

“No. It’s fine.”

“So what’s eating you? You talk more in your sleep than you have this whole time we’ve been sitting here.” She continued gluing pictures for a couple minutes, not saying a work, before sighing and putting down her paste.

“I guess this stuff with Simon is really getting under my skin.”

“It’s a shitty situation.”

“But does he have to be there all the time? I mean he’s making it out to everyone like I used him when it was the other way around.”

“I know.”

“And now he’s doing the exact same thing to Gabby and she doesn’t even know it. I can’t even say anything to her either because I’m the villain in this situation.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it so much. Some of the guys were telling me that they’re getting annoyed with all of Simon’s shit and he’s likely to be getting a beat down in the near future.”

“I’d pay to see that.”

“Who wouldn’t?” She finally laughed and cracked a smile. Downstairs we heard the front door close and lock that signaled our time to reign over the house.

“Mom’s gone, let’s go raid the ice cream.” She didn’t even cap the glue or nothing before standing up and heading downstairs. Like always, a thought would beat its way into her skull and everything else is forgotten. Nevertheless, kitchen sounded like a good idea. My tummy was rumbling.

Her mom always kept the kitchen neat and bland looking. It was well stocked, though. The bucket of marble ice cream has out name on it. She set I down on the counter before hauling herself up beside it. We sat barefoot, devouring the bucket. When she got her first pair of Doc’s she swore nothing else would grace her feet. Unfortunately the resulting smell was not so friendly. So walking around barefoot was a regular occurrence for us. I didn’t mind being called a hippy from time to time. She’d painted the words “fuck off” on her toenails. That was something to typical of her.

We heard the front door unlock again and her mother walked back into the kitchen in a suit and heels.

“Sorry, I just forgot some papers for the PTA meeting.” The papers she referred to just so happened to be the same papers Teagan had been doodling all over between shoveling mouthfuls of ice cream into her face. “Did you have to draw all over these? They’re important.” There was exasperation in her voice as she neatly filed the papers away in her briefcase. Teagan merely shrugged, focused on the frozen delicacy at hand.

“Why did you leave them on the counter for, if they’re so important?” Somewhat defeated, she moved to leave before noticing what exactly we were eating.

“That ice cream is for Mandi’s birthday! It’s her favorite flavour. I told you not to touch that.”

“I’m sure Princess can live without chocolate vanilla fudge ice cream to go with the ice cream cake.”

“I can’t believe you.”

“You spoil her too much! She’s only turning eight and you’re treating it like it’s her sweet sixteen or something.” Her mom slams her briefcase back down on the counter.

“It’s what she wants.”

“You should have said no!”

“I don’t have time for this conversation right now! I’m going to be late for my meeting.”

“Yeah, yeah. Go decide what shade of pastel the tickets to the prom should be.”

“You are impossible.” Teagan turned back to the ‘glace’ in front of her, unfazed by the door slamming or the loudly stomping heels. She and her mother had always had a very loving relationship.