A hopeless kind of love

Chapter 11: Batter

Chapter 11

Elle

The twins are settling in very well. They have both taken part-time jobs, not that they had to but they wanted to, and they are going to start junior year in high school in September.

"Elle, could we go meet Molly today?" Lila asks.

The twins come into the kitchen where Cody and I are, making pancakes.

It's Saturday today. I mean, of course, they can meet their friends, they don’t even have to ask. Friends are important, I would never try to stand in the way of their lives. Well as long as they don’t make mad decisions.

"We haven't met Molly in like three years, going on four", Liv continues, sitting down at the kitchen island, where Cody and I are standing. It's like she's trying to convince me that they should be allowed to meet Molly.

Of course, you can, you're almost seventeen, you can do pretty much what you want, although I can do more, like this!" I say dip my hand in the batter bowl and smash my hand in Cody’s face, leaving his face all sticky in batter.

The twins laugh, and Cody just seems started. I didn’t even know I was going to do that, totally spur of the moment. But I can’t say I’m too disappointed, he actually looks kind of funny.

"Okay, you should start to watch your back from now on", Cody says, awfully calm as he dries his face off with a napkin. “Because I am going to plan my revenge”.

"Ooo how scared I am", I tease.

The girls only laugh, they laugh until they choke. Their faces get all red puffy. They’re so cute.

"Oh it’s really been a while since we laughed this hard", Lila says eventually when she calms down.

I frown. They used to be the happiest girls on earth, even after what happened to dad and after mom went into that depression.

"Why did you try to convince me to let you see Molly?" I ask as Cody continues on the pancakes, but he's also listening.

"Mom never let us out of the house", Liv says. "We could only leave the house to go to school, or the supermarket to buy food, she kept us inside and forced us to study".

“Yeah to get us to make good life decisions”, Lila mutters angrily.

I get the urge to start screaming. Why have they never told me? It’s not that we lost all contact, we’ve always kept in touch. They have been here to visit a couple of times, but they’ve never told me anything.

I can't understand how mom turned out like this. Before the accident with dad, mom was the person I always looked up to. I could be angry about the fact that I don't look like her, I would always hold her hand when we went somewhere, I would always kiss her cheek and tell her how much I loved her. Now everything I feel when I think about mom is disgust and hatred. And I certainly don't love her anymore. And I know why. She's not the mother I grew up with. She's someone else. Someone unfamiliar. She's a stranger to me.

"I can't believe her, I just can't", I say angrily. "It's like she had you like a prisoner".

Cody puts a plate with good-smelling pancakes on the table. He sits down on the chair beside me.

"I think it's because she never wanted to take care of the girls", he says and I look at him. "She knows how much you love them, and how much they love you, I think she became jealous and took Lila and Liv away from you to in some way show you who's really in charge of the situation. I think she wanted to make you suffer like she did when your father died".

Wow. I think Cody is right. Our mother really is horrible. I look at my sisters. My sweet innocent baby sisters. Even though they’re not babies anymore. I stand up and walk over to the other side of the kitchen island. I wrap my arms around Lila and Liv, I hug them tight.

"I'm never letting you go again girls, I promise", I whisper to her.

"We don't want you to", they mumble. They say a lot of things at the same time. Maybe that’s a twin thing, I wouldn’t really know since I’m not a twin.

And that only makes me hug her even tighter. After we are done with our breakfast the girls go out to meet Molly.

Cody is looking at something on my phone.

"What are you looking at?" I ask, not sounding worried at all. I have nothing to hide. I'm an open book when it comes to Cody, he knows everything about me. So I don't care if he's on my phone.

"Darren just texted you", he says. "When did he come back?"

Wait what? Darren? Like in Darren Hayes? Mine and Cody’s best friend?

"I don't know", I say, walking up to him. "I didn't know he was back, is he?"

"Well it says so in the text", Cody says. "It’s been a while since we last saw him though right?"

"Yeah", I say.

Darren is not only our best friend. He's my ex-boyfriend. It didn't work out so we separated as friends. Cody, he and I stayed best friends, no bad blood, no jealousy, no nothing. But his family moved to France our junior year.

"Is his whole family back?" I ask.

"I don't know", Cody says and starts texting Darren back from my phone. "He wants to meet us today, you want to?"

"Sure but ... I don't think I can", I say. "I was going to meet up with Vicky".

"Take her with", Cody suggests.

Yeah, I can do that. It was a long time ago Darren and Vicky met as well. Maybe they’d enjoy meeting each other as well.

"Yeah sure but tell him that", I say.

"Yeah", Cody says, texting Darren.

It feels like my life is starting to get back to normal finally. But I know that it all can shatter when Cody gets called back. I have decided not to think of that too much and just try to enjoy the moment.