Offside

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah,” she said. She reached up and pulled her hair out of the hair band that had been keeping it out of her face. She shook her head, and her hair fell around her back and shoulders. “But I need to get home.”

I didn’t like it.

Everything had been just fine before she got that weird phone call, and now she was running off? I remembered the other time she had just taken off without telling me why, and I remembered what Greg said when she finally came back home.

How are Ron and Timmy?

I looked back at her, and her demeanor was completely different. She had been annoyed with the state of our fridge, but she had been smiling and relaxed. Now, she was agitated and nervous. She wiped her hands on her jeans and gathered up the rest of the project stuff to shove it into her backpack.

“Why?” I asked, because I’m a total idiot who doesn’t know when to fucking shut up.

“I just…um…” she stammered. “I need to help out a friend.”

“What friend?” I pushed.

“Thomas,” Nicole sighed, exasperated. She looked over at me and took another deep breath. “Please don’t ask. I’m not going to say, and it’s just going to piss you off, okay?”

“No,” I said, “it’s not okay. Why won’t you tell me why you have to leave?”

“I just can’t.”

“Why not?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Why can’t you tell me?”

“Thomas, for the love of God, stop it!”

“Stop what?”

“I need to go now,” she said as she shook her head at me. She walked up to the front door, opened it, tossed her backpack over her shoulder, and looked pointedly at me. I stood in the doorway to the kitchen and just looked right back at her, not moving.

“Come on,” she said. Her expression softened. “You could maybe have dinner with Greg, and we could do something when I get back.”

Dinner with her dad while she went off to who-knows-where with who-knows-who?

Yeah, I don’t think so.

I walked over to the coatrack next to where she was standing, grabbed my keys out of my jacket, and shoved them at her.

“Take yourself home,” I growled. I stomped back into the kitchen and yanked open the now clean refrigerator. Her evasiveness pissed me off. I grabbed a bottle of Gatorade and slammed the door shut again.

“Thomas…please don’t do this.”

“Don’t do what?” I snapped. “Don’t run off without telling you why or with whom? Oh, wait…no…that’s you!”

“I’ll explain what I can later,” she said, “but I really have to get going.”

“Who are Ron and Timmy?” I asked as I glared at her. Her eyes went wide for a minute, and her voice dropped.

“Ron is Greg’s friend from town,” she said. Then she went all quiet.

“Who is Timmy?”

“Thomas, please don’t go there. Really, I have to leave and…”