Change

"Today's the day I change." Only one thing was in my mind today, I will be with James the whole night. Ok not the whole night night but the night until my mom realises that I am not at home. What is the worst that can happen. I will be dead? Cool.

Our maid is sick, literally the worst thing that can happen to anyone. If you are ill, that is totally fine because it will take a day or two, or maybe a whole week, to be fine and healthy again but maids are a thing. It annoys me because mom have been calling her since Thursday and today is Wednesday, It is about to be a week and she won't pick up any calls. Great. But it is not like the house is super dirty, but the house is clean.

The annoying thing is waking up super early in the mornings listening to what Mom has to say about my future and then getting to work. Our floor seems big and it is big because while sweeping the floor and then wiping it, my already hurting back, breaks. Like it actually breaks. Once I swear I heard my back bone twisting. I hope it is nothing serious. Well anyways, I do not also understand the thing with the perfect tea mom wants. She needs it without sugar, substantial amount of tea leaves and with two boils, so a person making tea has to stand there staring at the soaking clothes of the neighbours from the window until the milk rises from the tea. Milk. Yes it is distrustful thing.

I am wiping the floor right now and I wish I could time lapse the whole process while my brain pops up questions which are not answerable. Why did we have to buy such a big house? Should I not wipe drawing room? Mom will not notice, right? Should I act like I just fainted? The last one is my favourite one but I know I can never have enough courage to do that so I pray I actually faint sometimes. How cool would that be? Then you will wake up after three days in the white room thinking you are dead and you are in heaven when you actually know that you are in hospital for technical reasons and from the next day you have to get back to work.

So yes that's my life. I am Irene Cabot. Nice to meet you.

It is the last room to wipe and I am done because I am surely not wiping drawing room's floor, mom walks in her room and sits on the bed. She looks at me pitifully. She always looks at me pitiful. I don't know what happens to that pitying face when she is angry. By the time I am done, I am burning. Thanks to my mother for making me do these things and my caring sister for switching off the fan and most beautiful weather I could ever encounter. I make it up to my room in time to see the dripping sweats on my face. I stare at myself in the mirror thinking I have never been the sweaty person but it is just the weather and anyways who cares.

Well, maybe, I do.

I dig my cupboard for anything good to where and by good I mean something which can make James my life partner or something like that, romantic. What is his favourite colour? I don't know. What is my favourite colour? I don't even know that. Oh God what am I supposed to wear?

Just then my eyes lay on the new dress I had bought from the nearest store available from our house. Ok I didn't buy it, mom did, thinking it would be perfect for my prom some year. But man, this dress was not made for going to proms. It is yellow-coloured, no shade to that, yellow is probably my favourite colour after listening to Yellow Hearts by Ant Saunders. Yay, I finally figured yellow is my favourite colour. Or is it?

The Dress was half formal and half informal. The best description you can find to describe something. The yellow colour making it look like something to wear in summers, almost perfect for today, and the simplicity of it making it formal. The thin yellow straps, followed by skinny waist and then my favourite part, the long frock. I turned on the iron to iron it.

Mom orders everyone to sleep at sharp ten, even Dad has to sleep at ten, after coming to the house at nine thirty, though I am still awake under my blankets thinking about what my future has to present and sleep after midnight.

So maybe it will be easy for me to get out of my house after midnight. I told James about it. He was fine with it. His parents aren't that serious and strict as mine. Not parents just my mother. Dad is good. He minds his own business. I mostly think I got his genes, his habits and all.

The presence of the delicate powder moon indicated it was nighttime. Also known as the time I would meet James. I had already taken a bath so I washed my face and arms before wearing that Dress. It wasn't that bad. My skin looked good over it. I locked my door, ultra scared what if Aria stepped in. But I knew I was prepared and I was experienced. It wasn't my first time sneaking out of my own house. Once Leah forced me to do so. We had to watch a movie and things maybe didn't go as planned but it was fun. I wondered, if tonight was fun.

When I was done applying a layer of thin thin makeup, I wore my black ankle boots, matching my eye liner. The pillows under my bedsheets, indicating me, sleeping, and my room, tidy, I was sure, I would be fine.

"Irene?" I heard my mother coming. My stomach fell a thousand feet, when I heard her footsteps coming nearer and nearer, getting louder and louder. I immediately turned off the light and jumped on my bed and pulled the sheets over me. I squeezed the pillows lying with me and hoped she wouldn't notice anything bizarre.

"Irene, you didn't wipe the drawing room." Se wasn't asking, she actually telling when she stepped in my room without a knock, not even thinking what if I was asleep. "Mom, I am not feeling." I hated lying and the liars but not today, not right now. "Why? What happened?" She turned on the light.

Manners, no my mom doesn't know you, get lost.

"Mom please I wanna be alone, turn off the light." I pleaded, my voice about to cry, maybe I was about to cry. "Oh my poor child," she said, while I imagined her pitiful face as she turned off the light and closed the door. I knew she was in my room as she sat on the corner of my bed. I froze.

"I will be here darling, call me if you need anything." She said and by "here" she meant "in my room". I wanted to throw up. I wanted to tell her the truth. I wanted to run. But I laid in my bed, frozen and still.

James. POV.

I was sleepy or in haze when I told Irene to meet me out of her house tonight.

I am sick of dirty dishes. I just had only breakfast and parents too but it doesn't mean that sink is going to take it hard and fill itself. The sink is full of dull dishes soaked in water na do don't really want to wash them because I am tired and it is only morning, or afternoon, I don't even know and I don't want to know.

I stand in my kitchen making green tea for both of my parents. They are lying in their rooms, older than they should have been on this age, and incredibly sick. With a mile distance between the kitchen and their room, I can still hear them coughing. I sieve the boiling green tea in the brown glass cups and rest them on a wooden tray. With the of my elbow, I open their door, finding them both lying on their bed. Eyes closed but not sleeping. I put the tray in the nearest table and hand them both a cup of green tea.

While they drink, I replace the sheets over the carpet with the new ones and put them in the laundry. I came back to the kitchen, it looked even more full as I put the teacups in as well.

I went in the garage, in order to polish Dad's car. Or rather only wiping it. It has bee days someone drove it. After the illness of my father I was probably the one who should be driving at the age of nineteen but I still wanted to distant from driving. It is not like I haven't driven my whole life but I don't like leaving my parent alone at home.

It is not a good thing to imagine.

But seeing the only lying in their, saying nothing, seeing nothing, just lying is almost depressing. I needed oxygen to breathe. And Kai also called me to check his boutique so that is I am out.

The cool air welcome me with the combination of ladies' perfume. Floral, sweet and unbearable. My muscle tense up on the memory of leaving the edishes dirty at home. I should not have come in the first place. I still wandered to find Kai and make my way home as soon as possible. The to do list of today haunting my brain, almost capturing it.

"Hey buddy." He whoops.

"Why did you call me?" I ask, the voice coming out ghostly enough to bring tension in the air.

"Nothing, just…," he stumbles on his words, reading my expressions. "I wanted you to try one thing." He walks to the back of dozens of stands, containing girls' clothes on one side and boys' on the other.

My eyes are drooping I know. And that is why most of the people think I am angry. Like it doesn't even make sense. If a person hasn't slept the whole night or if he isnt in the mood to talk to you or if he is straight faced that 100% do not mean that I am angry. It just my eyes. Or my whole fed-up-with-my-life face.

Kai comes with a balkc sweatshirt n hand. A very simple but a thick one. Don't want to wear that in summers.

"Listen James." He came to the point without any hesitation. "This is a sweatshirt." Oh I didn't know that. "But it will keep you cool inside. But when you will in an without any AC or cooler it will turn white. From you sweats." He added a second later, not really seeing into my eyes.

"What the… that's gross Kai. What makes you make that?"

"I was experimenting and for you to know. I accidentally made that." His eyes turned pleading. "I really want you to try that, please."

"Fine, but get a checkup, something's wrong in there." I said, pointing to his forehead.

I am home, sweatchirt's on bed, thinking to go for bowling with Irene, while wearing that, respect for the air conditioner there.

I pushed back my hair, making a nice smooth wet puff. Or should I leave them, the way they are? Why am I thinking so much? Am I going on a date? Is Irene my girlfriend? Something is wrong with my head, Kai's is fine.

I pull the sweatchirt over my head while wearing one of the black jeans I own. Hair turned the way the were, while I was having a shower. Someone's gotta repair that thing.

After half an hour of making more hairstyles I was capable of making, getting confused between shoes and telling my parents about where I am going. I was ready. I took the red car out of the garage and was about to drive when I remembered the dishes. I should go back, wash dishes and then pick Irene? Why are dishes bothering me so much? Despite my burning anger and red face I opened the car door and drove.

I am coming Irene.

Irene POV.

I woke up with a jolt. Oh God. Did I really just sleep? I opened the light, mom wasn't there, but it wasn't the unusual thing I saw.

The thing was my window was broken.

Mot broken broken but cracked, or in fancy words it was injured lightly. I am scared of a flying cockroach, a spider and darkness. And maybe a broken after a midnight. No wonder I was making the list of the thing which acres me wen I should be seeing who is outside my window. When I opened the window, I caught something on my hand. Something hard and yeah it was a stone.

"Nice catch!" James shouted from down there. I almost felt guilty. Not for my window but for him to stand there all this while. I figured it had been half hour. I took a half an hour nap. "I am coming!" I shouted back, but low enough for the other family members to not listen.

I fully opened my window and stepped on the windowsill and grabbed the nearest pole in order to descend down. I could feel James' eyes going wide but he stayed quiet. When I finally touched the ground, I faced James and presented my hand. "Hey I am sorry, I just had an hour and a half nap and now I am energetic. Sorry to make you wait."

He shook my hand, his hand warm against my mine. I noticed he kept the handshake a second too long. Aah. My mind's spinning. He didn't leave my hand as he guided me towards his car, still silent but the smile on his face said things which he couldn't.

I had never seen him smile. As we sat in the car, I wanted him to say something but he was quiet. I wondered if I was the one who had to say something but already I had spilled so many words. The silence became my companion as I guessed where we actually were going. I looked at James and something told me he was angry. Or maybe he is the way he is. In school, he has this same expression. The thing is he wears a straight face, leaving people guessing in which mood he is.

"Sorry I was kinda quiet." He says and my heart. Is fine. Or maybe not.

I should.have easily guessed it before we were going bowling tonight, what else can you expect being open at this hour. Restaurant to have a silent date, club to party. Nah. Bowling.

e parked the car and when I was about to open my door, he opened it for me. I stared at him for a second too long and thought, what is really happening here. I let that go. But it was nice. He slipped his hand in mine as we went inside, silence coming with us. The place was filled with galaxy lights. The shades of blue and purple mixed in a way, you would actually think you are in space, except you won't.

I saw couples there, a group of boys, some girls laughing and down guards. And on the very opposite it was us. He made me ran towards that last bowling lane as I tried to keep up. He picked one balls dn handed the other to mine.

"You first," he whispered in my ears, his lips touching my ears, I shuddered at his touch. I ducked a bit as I tried to slide the ball in the right direction. Two bowling pins stood while the other ones were striked. I wanted to scream, "woohoo" but something made me stop. It was this time I realized I was nervous.

"I am being so nervous what is wrong with me." He smiled. "I was also nervous at first, but chill ok, act like these are the days from school, fine." He said, making everything seem so easy. I loved that about him. His hair shone in the dancing lights. I didn't wanted to look away.

Suddenly everything went dark. He grabbed my arms, "Are you okay, Irene?" Why does my name look so good on his tongue. "Hmm" I mumbled as the air conditioner went off with the rest of the lights.

Half an hour later, I saw something glowing in the dark. I touched it. It was James as he started on my touch. "What's happening?" I whispered as his sweatshirt started glowing in the dark.

"Nothing it is just precipitation." He whispered back.