CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 5


By the time Mattie and Erika left to return to college, the tension still hovered over the Johannson household. When Erika and Mattie occupied the same room, they maintained an irate silence. Joan, after discovering that Mattie had revealed the truth about Erika and that Mattie had spent the night with Sam, didn’t know how to talk to her daughters. When Max, Mattie and Erika’s father, returned from a month long business trip, he struggled to put the story together; none of the three seemed to care to share any information.

Mattie had arranged to ride back to college with Karrie, her roommate, and Erika had purchased her own car. No longer was the fall trip to college a family affair.

Mattie loaded her stuff into Karrie’s Jeep without any help from her family.

“Ok, Karrie. That’s everything. Let’s get going.”

“Aren’t you going to say good-bye?”

“Oh, yeah, right. Good-bye everyone,” Mattie yelled from the street. “Now, let’s get going.” Karrie started the car and pulled away while Mattie pulled out her headphones and iPod. She sat back and closed her eyes.

After an hour, Karrie couldn’t stand the silence anymore. If she was going to survive the six hour trip back to college, she was going to have to drag the story out of Mattie.

As they waited in line at a toll booth, Karrie pulled the headphones off of Mattie. “Ok, spill it. You never leave home without taking at least half an hour to say good-bye to your family, and you have never loaded your stuff by yourself. What’s going on?”

“Nothing. Why would you think something was going on?”

“Mattie, we’ve been friends for three years and roommates for two. This is not you or your family. Usually, I can’t get you to shut-up on the trip to school; this year I haven’t heard a word out of you.”

“Am, I mean was, I that predictable?”

“Yes. What do you mean “was?”

“I’ve changed, Karrie.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

Seeing that she would have to talk about this with Karrie sometime, Mattie pulled out her iPod, turned it off, and shoved it in her backpack.

“I’ve decided to become totally independent. I’m not going home for Thanksgiving or Christmas. I’m going to look into renting an apartment for second semester, if not this semester. If you want to join me, you’re certainly welcome.” These statements came out drier than Mattie had expected.

“I know we had talked about this, but what made you so determined.”

“I can’t live in the same dorm as my sister anymore. We had a huge family fight. No one has been talking for the last six weeks except for a few civilities like ‘Phone’s for you,’ or ‘Dinner’s ready.’ Even meals have been completely silent. We’re both 21 and we’ve been grounded for the last six weeks.”

“Grounded? What the hell did you do?”

“Well, it started with what Erika did, and I pointed out to Mom that Erika had lied to her. Mom took her sister Kate’s advice and checked out my story at Club Aquarius. We were hosting the family reunion so Mom brought us both back to the house and forbade us to leave.”

“Brought you both back?”

“Yup, I had to go with Mom to Club Aquarius so she could prove me wrong, that Erika wouldn’t do something like that.”

“Boy, your mom doesn’t know Erika.”

“She does now. The yelling didn’t start till after the family had all left and I decided that I wasn’t staying around. I told her that I was headed over to Bridget’s for the night. Well, I started out in that direction, but I called Sam. Erika, it was his last night home.”

“He went to boot camp, didn’t he?”

“Yup, and Mom hadn’t let me go over to say good-bye. Long story short. I stayed over at Sam’s house rather than Bridget’s. That’s when things get a bit bumpy. Sam’s drill sergeant showed up at 4:00 am.”

“Oh, my God.” Karrie cut in. “You were still in bed with Sam?”

Mattie nodded. “And I screamed when he turned the lights on and pulled down the covers to expose our naked bodies. I grabbed my clothes and ran to the bathroom to dress. Can you believe this? Sam’s mom actually invited me to stay for breakfast. She’s been calling me every day since Sam left. I can’t answer. I don’t know what to say. We had assured his parents, and mine, that we would wait for marriage.”

“Wow! I don’t know what to say.”

“Well, that’s not all of it. Hey, this is the exit for Burger King. Wanna stop for lunch?”

“Sure. That is if you’ll finish your story.” Karrie slowed to exiting speed.

“There’s not much. Let’s put it this way. It’s not so much I won’t go home for the holidays, but I can’t.”

“Sure you can. Your parents won’t hold this against you for long.”

“They’ll have a pretty good reminder that one of their little angels isn’t such an angel. I figure by Christmas, with a body like mine, I’ll be showing.”

“You’re…”

“pregnant,” Mattie finished Karrie’s statement. “Three EPT tests all said the same thing and so did the clinic in Cartersville. I didn’t take a chance on getting checked out in our gossipy town.”

“No protection?”

“Karrie, we were planning on waiting till marriage, till Sam was through with the service and I was through with my master’s degree. My head was definitely some place else.”

“Wow. Have you written Sam yet?”

“No, I don’t know what to say.”

WORD COUNT –
CHAPTER 1 = 891
CHAPTER 2 = 1,037
CHAPTER 3 = 597
CHAPTER 4 = 560
CHAPTER 5 = 938

TOTAL = 4023