Page 16 of Change My Mind
“What have you made?” I asked, keen to move away from thinking about my estranged family and dead mother. That was too heavy for what was supposed to be quite a pleasant day.
“Oh, chicken, obviously. The potatoes just need a couple more minutes. I faffed around with them for way longer than was strictly necessary. Shopping tired me out, and I figured the best way to keep myself going until a respectable bedtime was to make this dish as complicated as possible. I’m rambling, aren’t I? I do that. When I’m tired or stressed or—” She trailed off.
I chuckled. I got the impression that she was prone to rambling via her texts. Adrienne was not afraid to send multiple messages in quick succession.
“You’re fine. It’s nice, actually. To have someone to talk to when I get home from work.”
How deeply pathetic of me to play that hand so early. I probably sounded so needy. Something flickered in her eyes before she blinked, and they went back to normal. For a moment, she almost looked sad.
“And how was that? Work that is?” she asked, sounding genuinely interested as she picked a piece of chorizo out of the roasting tin and dropped it into her mouth, not seeming to care that it was oven-hot.
And for the first time in a long time, I told someone about my day.
Twelve
ADDIE
“Do you hate me, or do you just like my suffering?” I asked Clara the following day, before she could even dare to say hello to me. Was I being dramatic? Yes. But it felt justified on this occasion.
“Hello to you, too, Addie. Lovely weather we’re having. How are you?” she asked sarcastically as she moved out of the way to let me in, and we both went to the kitchen.
There were two laptops on the island, but no sign of the owner of the second one.
“Where’s Jesse?”
“Wow, you just aren’t going to do small talk today, huh?” Clara laughed as she sat down on one of the island stools. “To answer your second question, he went to the shops to get dinner because he reached his target word count for the day, and he knows he’s not allowed to be around me and gloat about that shit. The answer to your first question is: I am going to need context.”
I slipped onto the stool opposite her. “My newflatmate. The one you met but didn’t comment on. You don’t think it would have been good to be like ‘Good luck living with Elijah Vincent’? So, I ask again, do you hate me?”
She scoffed. “No, I don’t hate you. I thought youknew. Didn’t you say you’d been talking? I don’t know why you’re so mad.”
“Mum told me that his name was Eli Jenkins, and I know you know that Rachel basically declared him a ghost. How would I know that the man I was talking to now was also the bane of my existence? Of course I’m mad you didn’t tell me.”
This time, she rolled her eyes, clearly uncaring of my feelings. “The bane of…Oh my gosh, Ads, grow up. You were academically challenged by a boy fortwo years, a thousand years ago. You cannot possibly still call him the bane of your existence. I, for one, would just enjoy the fact that you have a hot flatmate, instead of holding some weird grudge.”
I spluttered. “What? Hot? He’s not—What?”
Clara laughed. Cackled would be a more accurate way to describe it. Her head tipped back, and the sound she made came from her diaphragm and the back of her throat.
“Please do not try and deny it. I met him yesterday. He’s very attractive, really grew into himself. I’ll be honest, I thought part of the reason you hated him so much was because it was your first brush with finding someone physically attractive, and you didn’t know what to do with it. So you made him the villain in your story and refused to fall for him as a result.”
“I wasnotattracted to him.”
I wasn’t. I was sure of it.
“Are you joking? You would spend anhourtalking about him on Thursday afternoons. Why were you wasting an hour every week talking about someone if you didn’t find them attractive? Nothing he did wasthatannoying. You were a bit obsessed with him. You know, like you had a crush.”
“It was never an hour. He was in my last class on Thursdays, so I didn’t get to complain about him to my friends. Which just left you four.”
“I timed it once, Ads. It was an hour. Walking through the front door didn’t stop you. We all made snacks while you kept it up. No one took up more real estate in your brain than Elijah. How could that not have been rooted in attraction? I don’t even think I could talk about Jesse nonstop for longer than ten minutes, and I’m in love with the guy.”
I latched on to that. “And how is Jesse?”
Clara shook her head. “No, we are still on your thing. Just admit that you think Elijah is still hot.”
“I never thought he was. How can it be a ‘still’?”
“I’m not asking if you want to screw him seven ways to Sunday. I am just asking you to admit that you think that he’s attractive. And that you thought he was attractive then. But mostly, admit that you think that he is hot now.”
