Kendall
Kendall had come to like Sunday evenings, because her housemates were usually home and they often rented a new-release flick and sat around in their pajamas to eat junk food and watch it. It reminded her of high-school days, and she found the whole thing very comforting. Especially after she discovered she was pregnant and her social life (rather dating life) had steadily deteriorated. Not that she’d told any of her friends, but it was like they could sense something had changed. Or maybe they just noticed that she’d developed an unattractive muffin top over the waistband of her jeans. Not that she was wearing jeans these days. They were all too small. She’d moved on to sweats.
It was almost eight thirty and Kendall had on her favorite I Love Lucy pajamas, and Tinkerbell had on her pink bed jacket, the popcorn was popped, and the chick flick was ready to roll. But where was everyone? Then she remembered that Anna was at her parents—thanks to Megan’s brilliant garage-sale idea—an idea that had gone south just a few hours ago, shortly after Kendall had gotten up from her nap. As usual, Megan blamed everything on Kendall: the garage sale and Anna’s allergies and the messed-up house and probably even global warming. Naturally this all resulted in a big old fight.
“What do you mean you never called your grandmother?” Megan demanded after Kendall let that little kitty out of the bag. “You promised you would do that, Kendall. It’s not like I’ve asked you to do a lot. You could at least have done that. Here we are going through all this junk, up to our eyeballs in dust and grime, and it’s entirely possible that your grandmother doesn’t want any of it sold. Maybe she’s willed it to someone or promised a museum or whatever. Seriously, why haven’t you called her yet?”
“I just haven’t gotten around to it,” Kendall had answered casually.
Then Megan, acting like a total idiot, grabbed a pad and pen, drew a big circle, and wrote the words to it inside the line. “Here,” she’d said hotly as she shoved the paper at Kendall.
“Huh?” Kendall studied the silly note.
“Now you’ve got a round to it.”
“Very funny.” Kendall crumpled the paper, then made a comment that she now regretted. “I can’t believe this is all you guys have gotten done,” she’d said to distract them from her grandmother, which was really none of their business anyway. “At this rate we won’t have this garage sale until next Christmas.”
That was all it took. Tempers flared, words were said, Kendall burst into tears, but they didn’t even take pity. And the stupid fight resulted in both Lelani and Megan totally bailing on her. Acting like they were the ones who’d been offended, they washed their hands and grabbed their coats and bags and, just like that, they abandoned Kendall. Like they expected her to work alone, cleaning and sorting all that junk with absolutely no help from them. “Well, fine!” Kendall had snapped at them, acting like she didn’t care and telling them that she didn’t need their help and could handle the whole thing by herself. But after about an hour, she had given up on it. Not just the cleaning and sorting, but the garage sale too. Really, what was the use? And now the house was still cluttered with all that junk—the junk that would need to be hauled back up to the attic. Maybe Kendall could hire someone. Not that she had money. Oh, she’d think about that later.
As she dug into a pint of chocolate-mint ice cream that had Anna’s name written on tape across the lid, she vaguely wondered where Lelani and Megan had taken off to. It was past five when they left, and a lot of things closed by then. But as she polished off the last bite, disposing of the evidence and rationalizing that Anna was gone now anyway so why should she care, she figured Megan and Lelani would return before long. After all, what could you really do without a car? Although there were the buses and the metro. Not that Kendall had ever stooped to use them. Just the idea of sitting on one of those grimy seats with strangers was rather frightening. Still, she expected that they’d be home soon.
One good thing about her roommates, so far anyway, was that they didn’t tend to hold grudges. Not like some of her friends, or even family, who could stay mad for weeks, months, even years. And so Kendall really expected Megan and Lelani to pop in at any moment. They’d probably even apologize, and if she was lucky they’d have food with them.
But finally it was nine and Kendall went ahead and turned on the movie. She’d go ahead and start it without them. They’d be sorry when they got here to see it was half over and they’d missed out. But watching the movie by herself with Tinker was just not that fun. Besides, it turned out to be pretty lame, which was not all that surprising since Megan had picked it out. Eventually Kendall gave up on it, turned the TV off, and went to her room.
As usual, her room was messy. Clothes that were too small were tossed everywhere. Shoes and handbags—even designers ones that she’d paid big bucks for—were tossed around like broken toys she’d gotten tired of. And, really, that’s how it felt. She’d go out and buy some delectable designer piece and feel like she was queen of the world. But just a week later, sometimes within the same day, she’d see that pricey item and simply shrug and wonder why she’d felt it was so wonderful before. And now it was just part of the junk that was messing up her room. She picked up a used potty pad, carefully wadded it up, and took it to the bathroom to dispose of. That way she wouldn’t have to smell it.
Of course, the bathroom was nearly as messy as her room, and already the trash can was overflowing with puppy pads, but Kendall just stuffed another on top. It was no surprise that the bathroom looked this bad. Anna, the neat freak, had been gone for a couple of days now—long enough for Kendall to leave her mark. Not that she particularly liked her mark anymore. If anything, she’d grown to appreciate Anna’s cleaning skills. And sometimes she even attempted to imitate her.
But why bother now? Besides the bathroom and bedroom, her whole house was messed up. Even her friendships with her housemates seemed pretty messed up. Her life was equally messed up. And at this rate, it could only get worse.
Kendall took out a bottle of pills that her shrink had prescribed for her when she thought she was having anxiety attacks at night. She’d never been the depressed, gloomy type, but as she looked at those little blue pills, she wondered how hard it would be to end it all. Could she even do something like that? Or, what if she attempted something like that and she messed up? It wouldn’t surprise her—what hadn’t she messed up lately? Or what if she survived an overdose and somehow messed up the baby? Not that she planned on keeping the baby.
But what if the baby really was Matthew’s? She was 99 percent certain that it was. And what if things for him changed? What if, like gossip rags predicted, his marriage to Heidi ultimately failed? And what if he got back together with Kendall only to discover that his precious son had been damaged by her foiled suicide attempt? And what if he got mad and dumped her as a result? How would she feel then?
She shoved the bottle back into the medicine cabinet and slammed the door so hard that the old leaded mirror in the front of it cracked right down the middle. Great, now she would have seven years bad luck. It figured.
Kendall looked at herself in the damaged mirror. The crack went right down the middle of her face, making her nose look twice as big and slightly deformed. She leaned forward and stared at herself with a sense of twisted amusement. And although she normally had no sense of metaphor or irony except for what she’d picked up during her brief stint as a film major, she wondered if this split face in the mirror might be a true reflection of who she was.
“Or not!” She bent down and scooped up Tinkerbell, turned off the light, and went to bed.