Chapter Nine - Genetalia Entry Password

I situate myself on the swinging sofa in Sebastian's garden. This is my home now, considering I've been exiled by none other than my ex-boyfriend and his impossibly tall girlfriend.

Why are they here?

And how dare he come, arm in arm, with the girl he replaced me with when earlier this week, he was near begging me to meet him and 'talk'. Yeah, talk. That's how every bad mistake begins. Talking isn't Adam's style and considering that I have absolutely no tangible will power, I'd have been getting a lecture from Nat about my incapability to modulate my hormones for the following month.

Well, that's one problem. She's another. See, we, as in myself and my friends, aren't sure if she was actually aware of me. She's a stranger, no one knows her, and she certainly didn't seem all that apologetic when I rolled up to Adam's house with a hammer. So, either she's a cold-hearted wench, or the earliest form of a ditsy blonde bimbo.

Whatever the reason, in my current condition, I don't doubt I'll punch her in the face.

The air captures a particular chill now, promising the autumn that's soon to come, so I wrap my arms around myself in a feeble attempt to insulate my body. It doesn't work, but it makes me feel slightly less vulnerable.

With a heavy sigh, I look up to the sky. Scarred with a jumble of stars, each slicing through the vast chasm, tainting the ground below with just enough light to make it more fantastical than eerie. Who'd have thought balls of gas burning millions of miles away would have that effect? I squint my eyes and try to identify the constellations, but what with the world spinning much faster than it should be, I struggle.

"Osborne?" A voice calls out is a harsh whisper. I crane my head around the back of the lounger sofa and notice Hendrix. My ogre is shining armor it seems. Upon noticing me, he makes his way over, nodding his head. "All sorted."

"He's gone?" I ask softly as he sits himself beside me. Hendrix nods and I release a breath I wasn't aware to be holding. "Was it Nat? Did she punch him? Or Seb. Oh, did he really kick off?" I ask him in a hurry, suddenly cautious that my friends in their intoxicated state certainly wouldn't have been all that forgiving.

"Well, Nat is currently enjoying male company in one of the spare rooms and Seb is enjoying female company against his kitchen table. And considering that you didn't explicitly ask for the help of Lena or Collins, I sorted it." He tells me simply.

I pull a face of confusion and lean back slightly. "You. You sorted it?" I echo in disbelief.

"Your gratitude needs some work." He sighs. I shake my head to move past his sly jibe and proceed to probe him for information.

"What did you do?" I ask.

"I didn't do anything. I just said that his girlfriend was very attractive, and he took that as reason enough to leave." He explains simply. Of course, I feel like there is more to it than that, but all I can focus on now is that my arch-enemy called my replacement attractive.

"You said she's attractive?" I snap at him. He shrugs.

"Yeah." He says simply.

I groan and tuck myself into a ball, not caring that my dress has hiked slightly or that one of my straps has fallen down. "Why couldn't she have been a stupid ugly troll?" I ask no one in particular.

Hendrix shrugs again. "Because that would suggest the world is fair and it absolutely is not." There is a pause in which our only company is the whistle of the wind as it plays against the leaves. "I imagine it wasn't an amicable break up." He states through the stillness.

I shake my head with a scoff. "I was a bull in a china shop." I take a breath and a slight chuckle slips past my lips. "I threatened to steal his dog this week." I tell him. Hendrix smirks slightly, then tilts his head, amusement quickly replaced with confusion.

"Didn't you split up months ago?" He asks. I nod slowly, eyes wide.

"Yup. He called me. Said he missed me. Seems like it." I answer, waving a hand in the general direction on the house, hoping it depicts a clear enough suggestion that my ex-boyfriend is in fact, a major dickwad.

"Ah. He's one of those ones." He simply replies. I nod.

"That was his bit on the side." I add. I shake my head then, rubbing a heavy hand down my face. "I don't know why I'm telling you this." I feel my eyes well slightly and I rub them harshly, ignorant to the makeup I smudge across my face. "God, I hate him." I seethe.

"Seems so." Hendrix counters, though the sarcasm is suffocating.

"If you're going to be judgmental, then piss off Hendrix. You're interrupting my scheduled self-depreciation featuring the unanswered question of 'why wasn't I good enough?'." He doesn't reply, but he doesn't move either. So of course, I take that as my queue to continuing my tiresome self-loathing. "Do you know how much of a smack in the teeth it is to find out your ex is dating someone twice as pretty as you?"

Hendrix sighs, leaning back into the nook of the sofa between the back and the arm rest. "Come on Osborne, you're not that ugly. I mean, tonight you look a mess, but I'll hold alcohol and emotions responsible. Usually, I'd give you an 8, maybe 9 with smoothie in your hair." I turn to him then, my mouth pursed to hide the smile that threatens to show.

I lift up the strap of my dress and shuffle myself to preserve my modesty. "You're still not forgiven for that, you know?" I tell him.

"I think you got your own back," he tells me, edging forward slightly. He turns his head and points to his cheek where three faint lines are, the claw marks which haven't quite disappeared. "Ruining my good looks."

I theatrically search him, holding his head in my hands as I inspect ever inch of his face before pushing him away and asking, "What good looks?"

He rolls his eyes, looking me up and down. "You're one to talk. It looks like a five-year-old did your makeup." He tells me.

I raise a brow, looking at him dead pan. "I'll be sure to let Nat know." I retort snidely. His lips twitch with the ghosts of a smile. "I can't go back in there like this." I say, tucking my hair behind my ears.

"So what, you're going to stay out here and freeze to death?" He asks me.

I shrug. "Probably go home. Pre-treat the hangover I'm most definitely going to have in the morning." Hendrix looks at me with a raised brow, sighs, then orders me to stay put. After a couple moments when he's disappeared in the house, he returns with a 6 crate of canned cider and places them between us. "What's this?" I ask him.

"You're beer jacket." He tells me after cracking open a can. He hands me it before opening one for himself. "Drink up, buttercup." I take a sip but look at him dubiously. This isn't a normal exchange; surely he's got a second agenda.

"Why are you being so nice to me?"

"Because I'm scared you'll revoke my custody rights of my child." He answers simply. I can't help chortle in response. "Something funny?" He muses.

"When you're not being a complete knob rash, you have the ability to be quite amusing." I answer honestly. He cocks his head with a boyish grin plaguing his face.

"Was that a compliment, Osborne?" He asks coyly.

I take a swig of my cider and nudge him with my elbow, having edged slightly closer. "Don't push it Hendrix."

~

"Ughhhh." I groan out, a hand to my poor, poor, head as I knock back two ibuprofens, ignoring the churning of my stomach as I do so. "Alcohol is the devils drink. Torture in disguise." I moan. I sit myself at the breakfast counter and grimace when the scent of sausages washes over me.

Beside me, Ezra is gleaming at the condition of me, my dad opposite slathering ketchup over his bacon sandwich, and my mother tutting at my idiocy. "You're my offspring. You're supposed to be able to handle your drink." She scolds at me, pushing two slices of buttered toast towards me.

"Excuse me, but I won a shot race and I downed a cider in four seconds flat; what did you do with your Saturday night?" I ask my mother sharply. She takes a hand to my dads' chest and tucks her hair behind her ear.

"You've explicitly asked your father and I not to discuss out antics in the bedroom." Both Ezra and I groan is disgust, though mine is interrupted with a wave of nausea. "Charlie, drinking till you black out is not big, and it's not clever."

I scoff and tear off a corner of the toast, shoving it into my mouth. "I didn't black out, I fell asleep. There is a vast difference." She raises a brow at me but lets the discussion finish there. "Besides, no more drinking till Halloween. Scouts honor."

Ezra looks at me funny. "You're not a scout." He says.

I shrug. "I could be a scout if I wanted to be a scout."

"No, you couldn't. You lack the fundamental entry requirement of a penis." My dad smacks both of us on the head with a wooden spoon, sending my brain bouncing against my skull, causing me to cringe.

"Why, what's happening on Halloween?" My mum asks, redirecting the conversation, wiping her hands off on the tea towel.

"Well, I'll tell you Nancy. It's the annual celebration of having an excuse to dress up in otherwise socially unacceptable costumes and getting so absolutely legless that you're still drunk the next morning." I inform her, holding a false professionalism to my tone. I drop the façade and turn to Ezra, pointing my finger to him. "Which reminds me, what are you doing Halloween weekend?"

He pulls a face at me. "Why, you inviting me to one of your underage sweat fests?"

I mock a laugh before looking at him dead pan. "Don't be so preposterous. No, I need you to look after my baby." The kitchen falls silent, my brother looking at me with what I can only describe as the purest form of horror, my mother with a deer in headlights expression and my father, well, he didn't hear me.

"I'm sorry – a baby?" My mother splutters.

Realisation dawns that I haven't actually explicitly mentioned that for the next six weeks, their house will be victim to a screaming robot infant. "Oh, yes. I have to do the baby thing starting next week. You know, with the doll." Ezra groans but Nancy goes absolutely berserk.

"Oh my goodness!" She squeals, clapping her hands together in glee. "I can't believe you're going to have a baby! Oh, this is just so exciting!" She begins to flounce around, practically bouncing off of the walls with happiness. "I still have all your baby baskets and cribs! Oh, Charlie you've just made my morning! I'm going to be a Gramma!" Ezra and I share a rather concerned look.

"Mum," I begin softly, trying to soften the blow. "You do realise that its not actually a real baby?"

She shakes her head wildly, all the while scraping her hair back into a very messy tail. "Nonsense! This is the most exciting news. Charlie, Grandma Nancy will take care of the little baby over Halloween, don't you worry. Do you know if it's a boy or a girl?" She asks me quickly.

My mouth falls open is horror as Ezra mumbles from beside me. "She's gone absolutely bonkers." He says.

She claps her hands together once more and rushes out of the room. Not before shaking my dad and alerting him that they're about to be grandparents. "I know dear," he says as he reads the newspaper. "Ferne did mention it."