Pop - Ch.4

                I had just fixed the boys chocolate chip pancakes - to which Alekk asked where I stashed the cookbook; I wasn’t aware there was one – and was now washing the dishes. The breeze was now lightly brushing its way through the windows and into the wide expanse of the kitchen, dining room, and living room. I can’t believe that I had already been here for a little over a week.

               I decided not to take too much into Alekk being as big-headed as he always is and instead enjoy my time here while it lasted. I ignored his sneers as I picked up his laundry, his dirty shoes as he walked across a freshly mopped wooden floor, and his fingerprints as he peered out of a window that had just been cleaned.
                He lied about his many friends, by the way. Alekk did. The multiple parties I had expected to clean up after were only few, and the people invited were usually ignored towards the latter part of the night. As far as I could acquire, the only true friend that Alekk had was Niv. Maybe that was why I didn’t mind his pungent attitude. How sad to be so famous and so known, yet to only have one friend to count on during all this time.

                Alekk wouldn’t let Niv help me in anything I did. I’m not sure of what point Alekk wanted to get across, but if it were to isolate me it didn’t work. Some days it did, I’ll give him credit for that. I would call up Wes, crying because I missed him so much and felt so guilty. He would get upset though, and try to convince me to leave the house and come stay with him. I would tell Wes that I wanted to, but I also didn’t want him to carry my burden, to have to pay for my expenses as well. Then he would retreat on his argument, and realize that I was right. There was no way he could take care of the both of us. It was hard enough just to take care of himself.

               Don’t get me wrong, Niv would seriously try to help me out. I don’t know why. I don’t get why he was so different from Alekk, I mean. But then Alekk would tell him something about how they worked so hard to get to where they are, and that they couldn’t go back, no matter what. I wondered what that meant.
               But today Alekk was gone. Off to do a show or something. He was going to be gone about every weekend to do a show, he had said. Summer is apparently a very popular season.
                So I was there washing the dishes. Niv reached up behind me and turned off the faucet.

                I was about to turn around and ask what he was doing, when he grabbed the sponge out of my hand and threw it in the sink. I probably had the weirdest look on my face.

               “Oh hey there, Cinderella! Did, or didn’t you notice that Alekk is gone?” smirked Niv. What was he doing? I needed to get those dishes done.
               “Uh, yea… so what?”
               Niv paused. He had this odd smile going on. The best way I could describe it was like a kid who was about to get into trouble, but didn’t mind caring. Then the biggest smile I had ever seen flashed across his face.
             “C’mon!” His blue eyes were huge.

                “Why?” I started to ask. But before I could make the word sound like a question, Niv grabbed my hand and we were running! Running out of the kitchen, out of the house and down the steps, now on grass and running towards the beach where the ocean met in sheets of waves. I was out of breath.

                “What are you doing?” I exclaimed, yanking my hand free of Niv’s. He was so excited. I had no clue why.
                “Nobody is here, Max!” yelled Niv slightly, “Usually there are a ton of people here, but not today! We have the entire beach to ourselves!”
                “Niv, I have to finish those dishes. Alekk is going to be mad!” Niv’s excited look dimmed, but hadn’t disappeared completely.
                “Like I said Max, Alekk isn’t here. Just have one day to yourself. Do the dishes later. Right now, enjoy THIS,” he replied, arms extending out to the sky. He started running closer to the waves.
                 He was right. I couldn’t let this pass me by. I ran after him.

                Until I noticed that he was taking his clothes off. Immediately I closed my eyes.

                “Relax!” laughed Niv. He must have noticed my reaction, “I had my swim trunks underneath.” I opened my eyes to find him running towards the huge waves. My heart raced for a second. Those waves were pretty big. But then again, I had never really seen waves up close before.
             “C’mon!” he yelled as he reappeared above the water’s surface. I froze. I didn’t know if I could do it. Go in the water like that, with those waves. I shivered.
                “You didn’t tell me I was going to need my suit!” Niv laughed again.
                “Just jump in with them on! I can buy you some new clothes afterwards if you want. It’s not that big of a deal.”
                And then I realized. This was Niv. Not Alekk. I didn’t have to perfect every part of my being around him. I could be myself, for the most part. That’s when I felt the warmth of the sun. The mesmerizing breath of the wind. The mist of the ocean. I ran towards the frothing waves. And jumped in.
                As soon as my face awoke to the return of air, Niv motioned me to come to the deeper part of the ocean where he was. We were out there for hours, swimming or floating on our backs allowing the sun to caress our skin.

                Time had found us hours later sprawled across the lawn, fast asleep. All of that swimming made us feel as though our bones had melted. We didn’t seem to mind as the warmth from the sun wrapped us in its cocoon of a blanket and begged us to close our eyes.

                I would open mine every once in a while, just to make sure that Niv was still there, that he hadn’t run off to go drag Alekk over here and prove all the “wrong” that I had done. That he wouldn’t leave me alone. I hated to be alone.

                “What are you thinking about, Max?” Niv asked. I guess I hadn’t noticed, but we had both had our eyes open for a while. All I could do was to look back into his. Those eyes could make any heart stop. I could look into them forever. They were safe – familiar.

                “I miss my cousin, Wes.” I hadn’t expected to say that, but Wes was on my mind. What I wanted to say was, “I hope this day never ends,” or at least something cordial like, “thank you for taking me to the beach.”

                 Niv kind of smiled at me. I could tell he wasn’t frustrated by what I had said. It was an understanding smile.
                “Where does he live?”
                “He lives here in town, but we haven’t visited each other because of-,” I paused. I was about to tell Niv about how all of the stuff I had to do for Alekk was preventing me from visiting my cousin. Why would I do that? I was grateful for being here. I didn’t need the slightest bit of under-appreciation to anyone. Certainly I was more humble than that.
                “Invite him over,” Niv said softly. I froze. Niv did his casual laugh.
             “C’mon. How many times do I have to remind you that it’s your day?” He got up swiftly and started walking back up the house. Adrenaline rushed through my veins. I couldn’t believe it. I would see Wes today!

                An hour later Wes was on his way over to the house, while Niv was panicking over which type of popcorn would be appropriate for the plethora of movies he had picked for all of us to watch together. He really looked just as excited as I felt! I just couldn’t believe it. I noticed the pool had also been cleaned, but not by me however.

               “Why are you doing all of this?” I asked Niv. He had been wandering around the house, trying to find anything that was out of place – I had finally finished the dishes – but couldn’t necessarily find anything. At my voice he turned, his huge smile returning to his face.
               “Because Wes is your family, right? Family is very important, to me anyways.”
               I hadn’t expected Niv to say something like that. I also hadn’t expected the guilt to pour into my mind like it had. I had left my Aunt Karen. True she had left me first, but like Niv had said, she was my family.
                 Before I had time to think about anything else Niv and I heard a knock at the door. Wes!

                “Who is he and why is he at our house, Niv?” oh…… and Alekk. My heart that was previously beating fast now fell to my feet. I peeked behind him and there stood Wes, anxiously waiting for me to let him in the house, and very shocked that he was standing only a couple feet away from the famous star that now caused both joy and misery in our lives.

                “He is Max’s cousin,” chimed Niv nervously.
                “Wes!” I shouted. He came a little closer. Something was wrong with the way he looked.
                “Hey you, scrawny kid, I want to talk to you. Why are you at my house?”
                “I was told I could come over,” replied Wes meekly.
                THAT was the problem, I thought. How thin Wes had gotten. It had only been a week, but I could tell that he wasn’t taking care of himself as well as he should have. He looked so weak. He never would have replied back to Alekk in that tone. The Wes I knew was stubborn, and while that would have been annoying any other time, right now I wished he would for once be stubborn to this excuse of a man.
                “You were told to come over to this house, correct?” Wes shook his head.
                “Well guess who owns this house. I do. Not Niv, not Max here. I didn’t invite you over. So get off my property. Now.”

                Wes froze, then started backing away.

               “Wait!” shouted Niv, trying to reason with him. My blood was boiling. Wes needed help. And either way, I was not going to see him leave while I was trapped in this house. I shoved my way past both Niv and Alekk, anger clearly showing on my face.
               “Just let her tell him good-bye,” stated Niv calmly as he pulled Alekk back. I pushed their words to the back of my mind. I needed to see Wes.
               As soon as I was close enough, I pulled Wes in a tight hug. His bones protruded more in a few places. He still was the same Wes though, and it took all me not to cry. He was my only family, and I couldn’t be with him.
               “You have to take better care of yourself, Wes,” I sighed, “I need you.”
               “I know,” he replied. And I trusted that he knew. The tone of his voice was apologetic.
               “You have one more minute and then I’m calling the cops!” shouted Alekk. It felt as though someone had punched me in the chest. Any second and I would break down. I hugged Wes one last time.
               “I miss you so much.”
               And he was off again, like last time, only it was much worse now. I reluctantly walked back toward the house.

                Alekk had this kind of smirk on his face that only someone clueless would love. I wanted to make that smirk leave. As if Niv had read my mind, he backed off a couple of steps. I came right up to Alekk, making sure I had his attention.

                “What now?” he asked.
                “You know, I’ve had my share of people who have disappointed me. I hadn’t imagined that you would be one of them.”
                I turned away just as Alekk’s face cringed. It was the first time I had actually seen him hurt.

                I managed to go up the stairs and into my room in time so that just as I closed the door, tears would start pouring down my face. And they did. The way Wes looked would haunt me forever, it seemed, and my tears increased as I thought of how much worse it would have been had I decided to live with him. I heard a knock at my door. I tensed up, suddenly trying to make my tears disappear.

               “It’s just Niv.” A huge sigh from me followed. I opened the door. His calm composure drooped to a more empathetic stance.
               “Oh, what’s wrong?”
               “Something’s wrong, Niv. My cousin, he’s lost a lot of weight. And I can’t help him. I just want to make sure he’s going to be alright. He’s the only family I have.”
              “Shh, it’s alright. I’m going to fix this. It’s my fault I let things get so out of hand today.”
               Niv wrapped his arms around me, holding me as the rest of my tears escaped. I had never let him be so close to me before. It was frightening, but at the same time I had no one else to go to. I just stood there and let him comfort me, trying to make sense of how he could be so nice when Alekk never had been.
                “I’m going to talk to Alekk. Get some sleep, Max. It’s been a long day and once again, I’m sorry,” consoled Niv as he left me by myself and went down the stairs. I glanced around my room. It seemed so cold now.

                “Alekk, we have to help him out,” gasped Niv as he let himself into Alekk’s room, two flights of stairs later.

                “Who? Max’s cousin?”
                “Yes. Max said that he’s been losing a lot of weight. She’s worried about him,” Niv replied. Alekk gave an annoyed sigh.
                “He’s just scrawny, Niv. And she’s just upset that she can’t always get things her way,” he smirked.
                “No, it’s worse than that, Alekk. I caught her crying about him.”
                For a second, Alekk showed a hint of worry. For a moment his problems and the problems of Max paralleled, and the hurtful pain grabbed at his heart in a chokehold. He knew that Niv was watching him though, and so before it was noticeable at all, the hint of worry was masked by a neutral, stone-cold face.
                “I’ll take care of it. Don’t worry so much, Niv.”

                Alekk was looking into the face of a stern-looking Wes McKinley. He was beginning to think that this was a bad idea, but he couldn’t exactly do anything about it now, could he?

               “I used to think you were pretty cool and stuff,” was the first thing that Wes said. What odd timing to be thinking of that, Alekk thought. He had nothing good to say back, except for what he came for.
               “I came over to help you. I’m worried about your… nutritional habits.”
               “What?” scoffed Wes, “first you want me to get off your property, and now you’re worried about what I eat…”
                Alekk let out a deep sigh.
               “Max is worried about your health. Supposedly you’ve lost a lot of weight. I think you just look scrawny, but apparently you need help. So here, this should be enough to buy groceries for a month. If you need more let me know.”
               Wes held the wad of cash in his hand. This was way more than enough to feed himself for a month. It might have sufficed for a tall, muscular football player and one extra teammate. Wes was shocked. He had never held this much money in his entire life. Quickly thoughts of the abandonment of his mother filled his mind, however.
                He wasn’t going to be like her, getting money the easy way. The wrong way. He shook his head and shoved the money back into Alekk’s hand. Alekk’s brow furrowed in misunderstanding.

“I have a job now. I’ll be okay. I’ll admit, this last week was hard. Deposits for rentals aren’t cheap, but I’ll be fine.” Alekk nodded in slight agreement and started to turn away. Wes stopped him.

              “As for thinking that you ‘care’ for Max by trying to give me this money however, you are as close to ‘caring’ as I am to the moon. If you EVER pull that on me again, or say that you’re about to do something because of Max, you better prove… and I mean PROVE that you truly care for her.”
              “Okay,” Alekk replied humbly. With one more understanding look at Wes he got into his car and drove back to his vacation home.

END OF CH.4