Maybe…
Mum sat on the couch in the living room and I jumped out of my freckled skin.
“Mum? What are you still doing up?”
She put down the magazine she’d been reading – Mind and Spirit – and pointed to the closed bedroom door. She made a “shh” face.
“Amber, have you been drinking?” she whispered.
I shook my head, closing my mouth so she couldn’t smell my breath.
“You look all sweaty.”
“I’m in California, and I’m ginger. Sweat is what happens.”
She patted a bit of the sofa next to her and I hesitated. I stank of beer, I was sure of it. Maybe if I talked with my mouth closed?
I gingerly perched next to her and, without warning, she pulled me in for a hug. I sank into her body and let the feeling it gave me fill up my gut.
“So, was everyone friendly?” She kissed the top of my head.
I nodded into her. “Yep, Americans are known for that though, aren’t they?”
She pulled away as abruptly as she’d hugged me. “You need to apologize to Kevin. I can’t believe you just stormed out like that. He was pretty upset, Amber; he’s really been looking forward to you coming.”
The feeling in my tummy deflated. Why wasn’t she upset? Why just him? He wasn’t anything to me, and I wasn’t anything to him. I was just the annoying “extra” he had to put up with to stay with the love of his life. He was just the jerk who seduced my mother at the most vulnerable time in her life and shipped her back to his country. Mum was my mum, and I was her daughter – yet Kevin was the one who was upset?
I sighed, not saying what I was thinking. Never really saying what I was thinking. “I’m here to work, aren’t I? I needed to meet all my co-workers.”
“He’d cooked you a nice welcome dinner! And you just came bursting out with that ridiculous wedding question.”
It wasn’t ridiculous…
I shrugged. “You could’ve followed me and told me this then…but you didn’t.” It was the closest I could get to saying how I felt.
“He was too upset to follow you.”
Kevin was upset…Kevin… Not her.
I stood up.
“Whatever. I’m going to bed.”
Mum sat still for a moment and I waited for her to say something – anything. To answer my questions about the wedding. Or maybe just to ask if I was okay. Because I so obviously wasn’t okay. She just picked up her magazine and started reading again. My eyes stung and I told myself it was from campfire smoke.
Just as I opened the door to my pokey guest room, she said: “I can smell beer on you. I can’t believe you’ve been drinking.”
I stopped. “Are you going to tell Kevin?” He’d love that – any reason to put me on a plane back home again so he could keep Mum all to himself…
She shook her head. “No. But don’t do it again, Amber. You’re here to work.”
A thousand replies ran through my head.
You’d know all about drinking, wouldn’t you, Mum?
I’m not here to work, I’m here to see you.
I stretched my arms up, not wanting a fight – just wanting us to feel okay, like I’d imagined it on the flight over. I was ruining it…but maybe she was too.
“I only had one,” I lied. “And it was a light beer, anyway. Whatever the hell that means.”
Mum smiled a little.
“Well, still, be careful…you know…” She trailed off and her eyes glazed over with sadness.
“I know…”
SITUATIONS THAT ARE DESTINED TO FAIL:
Hangovers
+
First-aid training
Seven
With a hangover, I found Melody even more annoying.
“Ooo, no, not my boobs, stupid,” she squealed, as Watersports openly groped her chest.
I had a headache. It was over twenty-eight degrees, though everyone kept talking in Fahrenheit. And Melody had volunteered herself as a model for artificial resuscitation, despite the TOTALLY AVAILABLE PURPOSE-BUILT DOLL the camp had for this activity. It hadn’t helped that she’d spent the last twenty minutes, telling anyone who would listen about the time she’d “totally kissed some girls” at cheer camp.
Watersports boy faux apologized and pumped Melody’s ribs.
“Like this?” he called to Kevin, who was using an actual doll with the other half of the group.
Kevin turned and laughed.
“Melody, you don’t have to do that. That’s what resuscitation Annie is for.”
“Yeah, but it’s much better to practise with a real body, don’t you think?” she giggled.
Watersports certainly seemed to agree.
I scuffed my shoe in the dusty grass, and focused, yet again, on not being sick. All twenty of us were on our compulsory first-aid part of training day. In the already strong sunshine, it seemed we’d be the ones who needed first aid for heat exhaustion…or maybe that was just hungover me.
Whinnie sidled up next to me. “You okay, Amber? You look a little…green.”
I nodded, concentrating on getting through the wave of nausea.
“Was I bad last night?” I whispered. I’d only just met her, but she seemed like the safest, nicest, person to ask. When she made a cooing reassuring sound I knew I was right.
“You were fine,” she said. “Everyone got pretty wasted after you left anyway. Melody and some of the others ended up skinny-dipping.”
That wasn’t a surprise. I’d only met Melody yesterday and it wasn’t a surprise.
“Really?” I asked. “Who else did it?”
“Umm, a few of the girls…like Bryony. Did you meet her? The jock guys…” As she was talking, Kyle and Russ came up behind us. Whinnie turned to them. “You didn’t, did you, Russ?”
Russ shook his head. “Skinny-dip? Nope.” He punched Kyle’s shoulder. “I didn’t want to make all the other guys jealous. Especially Kyle here.”
Kyle thumped him back. “Dude, we share a shower. I’ve seen it all.”
“Yeah, and you cried afterwards.”
Whinnie gave me a “boys” look. I smiled and returned it, distracting myself from my headache for a short moment.
“Did you do it?” I asked Kyle. And annoyingly I felt myself blushing at the thought of him naked.
He stretched his arms up and nodded, like it was nothing.
“I grew up in the middle of nowhere mountains. Skinny-dipping was the only thing we had to do at the weekend. Why, you don’t do it in the UK?”
I blushed harder as I wondered if he was now thinking of me naked, as I was him. I shook my head. “If you skinny-dipped in England, you’d get frostbite of the dangly bits.”
They all cracked up, and my face got even redder.
“I don’t even want to know how you know that,” Kyle said.
“I don’t know it for sure!” I protested. “It’s just a theory. I’ve never had any dangly bits to test it on…” I needed to stop talking. All three of them were laughing uncontrollably now, so much so we attracted the attention of Kevin and his bumchin.
“Guys!” he said, clapping his hands to startle us out of it. “This isn’t a playground. This training could save someone’s life. Come on, Amber. Let’s teach everyone how to put someone in the recovery position.”
Melody and Watersports were standing up now, and Kevin jutted his hand out, to pull me to the centre.
“Now, Amber, let’s have you demonstrate. Lie down on the ground here.”
He smiled, like he was doing me a massive favour by putting everyone’s attention on me. I happily – despite him – lolled onto the earth and closed my eyes. It felt nice. It calmed my churning stomach.
“Who wants to help? Kyle? You wanna put Amber into the recovery position?”
“Be careful of her dangly bits,” Whinnie said, only loud enough so I could hear her, and I giggled with my eyes shut.
I felt my face get cast into shadow as Kyle stepped forward to follow Kevin’s instructions.