Maybe Someday(27)

Me: WTH? When are you going to tell

him?

Sydney: I’m not.

Warren: What are you and Sydney texting

about?

I look up to see Warren holding his phone,

staring at me. He picks up his fork and takes

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another bite of the eggs, and the sight makes me

laugh. He lunges across the table and grabs my

phone out of my hands, then begins scrolling

through the texts. I try to grab it back from him,

but he pulls his arm out of my reach. He pauses

for a few seconds as he reads, then immediately

spits his mouthful back onto his plate. He tosses

me back my phone and reaches for his glass. He

calmly takes a drink, sets it back down on the

table, then pushes his chair back and stands up.

He points to Sydney. “You just messed up,

little girl,” he says. “This means war.”

Sydney is smirking at him with a challenging

gleam in her eye. Once Warren walks back to his

bedroom and shuts his door, she loses the confid-

ent smirk and turns to me, wide-eyed.

Sydney: Help me! I need ideas. I suck at

pranks!

Me: Yeah, you do. Dish soap and baby

powder? You need serious help. Good

thing you have the master on your side.

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She grins, then begins eating her breakfast.

I don’t even get my first bite down before

Bridgette walks out of her room, sans smile. She

walks straight to the kitchen and proceeds to

make herself a plate of food. Warren returns from

his room and sits back down at the table.

“I walked away for dramatic effect,” he says.

“I wasn’t finished eating yet.”

Bridgette sits, takes a bite of bacon, then looks

over at Sydney. “DID . . . YOU . . . MAKE . . .

THIS?” she says, pointing at the food dramatic-

ally. I cock my head, because she’s talking to

Sydney the same way she talks to me. As if she’s

deaf.

I look over at Sydney, who nods a response to

Bridgette. I look back at Bridgette, and she says,

“THANK . . . YOU!” She takes a bite of the

eggs.

And she spits them right back out onto her

plate.

She coughs and rushes to take a drink, then

pushes away from the table. She looks back at

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Sydney. “I . . . CAN’T . . . EAT . . . THIS . . .

SHIT!” She walks back to the kitchen, drops her

food in the trash, and heads back to her bedroom.

The three of us break out into laughter after

her door closes. When the laughter subsides, I

turn to Warren.

“Why does Bridgette think Sydney is deaf?”

Warren laughs. “We don’t know,” he says.

“But we don’t feel like correcting her just yet.”

I laugh on the outside, but inside I’m a little

confused. I don’t know when Warren began re-

ferring to himself and Sydney as we, but I’m not sure I like it.

? ? ?

My bedroom light flicks on and off, so I close my
laptop and walk to the door. I open it, and

Sydney is standing in the hallway, holding her

laptop. She hands me a piece of paper.

I already finished my homework for the rest of

the week. I even cleaned the entire apartment, ex-cluding Bridgette’s room, of course. Warren

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won’t let me watch TV because it’s not my night,

whatever that means. So I was hoping I could

hang out with you for a little while? I have to

keep my mind busy, or I’ll start thinking about

Hunter again, and then I’ll start feeling sorry for myself, and then I’ll want Pine-Sol, and I really don’t want to have any Pine-Sol, because I don’t

want to become a raging alcoholic like you.

I smile, step aside, and motion her into my

bedroom. She looks around. The only place to sit

is my bed, so I point to it, then take a seat and

pull my laptop onto my lap. She sits on the other

side of the bed and does the same.

“Thanks,” she says with a smile. She opens her

laptop and drops her eyes to the screen.

I tried not to take Warren’s advice this morn-

ing about admiring the dress she had on today,

but it was hard not to look, especially when he so

blatantly pointed it out. I’m not sure what kind of

weird thing he and Bridgette have going on, but it

rubs me the wrong way that he and Sydney seem

to have hit it off so well.

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And it really rubs me the wrong way that it

rubs me the wrong way. I don’t look at her like

that, so I don’t understand why I’m sitting here

thinking about it. And if she were standing next

to Maggie, there wouldn’t be a doubt in my mind

that Maggie is more physically my type. Maggie

is petite, with dark eyes and straight black hair.

Sydney is the complete opposite. She’s taller than

Maggie—pretty average height—but her body is