Okay. So...This idea popped into my head a few days ago because I thought it'd be a cute thing. If you've read AY, this is a brief peek at the Baellis origin story. :) Hope you enjoy!
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“It was blue and silver, with three silver swings.”
“Babe, aren’t men supposed to be the ones prone to colorblindness? It was white and green with two white swings and a teeter-totter thing.”
“Oh my God, Ellis. The damn thing was in my backyard for sixteen years of my life. I think I know what color it was.”
“I’m telling you, you’re wrong.”
“I distinctly remember me, Ev, and Cade being able to swing at the same time while you sat off to the side too cool to play with the ‘babies’ as you termed us. So not only are you colorblind, but also revisionist.”
“You’re wrong. Point blank. In fact, I’m not even going to argue anymore because that’s how right I am.”
We were in my car, driving…well, nowhere in particular. We’d developed cabin fever after being inside on our Netflix and chill steez over this long weekend; so I suggested we take a ride. No real destination in mind, just us, the open road and apparently, a disagreement. I’d looked down and saw a half crescent moon shaped scar on Ellis’ knee that I hadn’t noticed before and asked him to tell me about how it got there. He reminded me that he got it from my childhood swing set, trying to do tricks and failing to stick the landing. A swing set he clearly misremembered as we were now arguing about the color of the set, the original point of the story forgotten.
“I know how we can solve this.”
I pressed the voice command button in my steering wheel.
Please say a command after the tone.
“Call Cadence Garner, mobile.”
Calling Cadence Garner mobile.
As the phone began to ring, Ellis said, “Wait. You have CadyMac in your phone as not only her full government, but the old one? My god, girl, when’s the last time you updated your contacts?”
“Are we seriously having this conversation? Or are you tryna distract me so I don’t remember why I called her in the first place so you can claim your flimsy ass memory is right?”
“I just wanna know…why so formal?”
“Uhhh…hello?” Cadence said.
We were so busy going back and forth that I hadn’t even noticed she’d picked up.
“Hey boo. So I’m in the car with Ellis…”
“Obviously,” she interrupted.
Ellis began, “Will you please tell your friend…”
“Nope, nope. Hush, boy. I’m telling her because you’re going to…”
“Y’all. Seriously. What is it? I’ma kinda in the middle of something right now?” Cadence broke in.
“You remember my swing set when we lived in Mayview? What color was it?”
“Green and silver.”
“Cade! Seriously? IT WAS BLUE.”
Ellis said nothing, just sat there smirking at me.
“Nope, it was green because I remember Uncle painted over the blue to green because that was your favorite color.”
“I’m right because I said it was blue, Ellis.”
“It was blue for all of 12 hours…green the rest of our lives. I won.”
“Cade…did it have two swings or three?”
“Y’all seriously have nothing better to do right now, huh? I was lying down, relaxing. Something told me not to answer this call, but then I said ‘well self, maybe she finally done climbed off the dick long enough to check in with her miserable second trimester having pregnant friend to see how she’s doing’. But nah…y’all are having the world’s silliest argument and decided to interrupt my rest for it.”
“Thanks, CadyMac. Talk to you later,” Ellis said, reaching over to press the end call button on my steering wheel.
“Why’d you hang up on her? I’m gonna have to hear about that later.”
“Because my girlfriend drives even more like a bat outta hell when she’s riled up and I wanna live to see thirty-five…and she was about the wild the fuck out on us. One sassy mouthed woman a day is my limit.”
I looked down at the speedometer and realized that I was doing over 80mph. I eased off the accelerator; taking note to see we had crossed state lines and were less than 30 miles from a lakeside tourist trap town. I’d never explored the area before, but figured while we were here…
“Point taken. Hey, you wanna take an adventure with me?”
Ellis reached for the hand I wasn’t driving with and laced our fingers together. He dropped a light kiss on my hand and answered, “Aren’t we on one now?”
I rolled my eyes, “We’re on a drive. I said adventure. So…you game?”
“Always.”
“Just like that? You trust me?”
“Undoubtedly. With my life. Except when you’re nervous, excited or angry and driving.”
I felt my face warming at his first response. I’m certain if I were a few shades lighter, he would have noticed my blush.
“Hush, I’m not that bad! I was only ten over the limit.”
“Babe, are your math skills as bad as your memory? Speed limit is sixty-five, you were going eighty. That’s fifteen over.”
“Yeah, but like really only ten.”
“The emphasis on really. Ok, I wanna hear this. How is fifteen really only ten?”
“The no ticket buffer zone.”
“The what?”
“No ticket buffer zone. When my daddy was teaching me to drive on the e-way initially, he told me about it. You get five miles over the speed limit as a freebie, but anything after that could be ticketed. So like, if I got stopped it woulda only been a ten miles or less speeding ticket fine.”
“Bee. That’s…that’s not a thing. You can get a ticket for going a mile over if the cop out that day is that petty.”
“Oh…well that explains the other thing daddy taught me that day, then. How to cry on command,” I said, winking at Ellis.
“So where are we going on this adventure?”
“You’ll see…”
We were about fifteen miles out when Ellis asked where my phone was.
“Center console.”
He grabbed it, unlocked, and proceeded to scroll through…
“What are you looking for? And how do you know my unlock code?”
“Really? Everyone knows your unlock code is your birthday. I’m looking through your contacts. I refuse to believe everyone is in your phone by their full government names. Even Auntie Im and your dad.”
He kept scrolling, pausing briefly to do something on the phone’s screen that I couldn’t see.
“What are you doing now?”
“You have your doctor in here by her full name? I never knew you were this anal, Bee.”
“Are you seriously scrolling my whole phonebook? Can you not?”
He placed my phone in the cup holder and asked, “You don’t want me to run across the names of any of your hoes, huh?”
“You damn right!”
We were quickly approaching the exit to the tourist trap’s main drag when my phone began to ring. I looked at the screen to see who was calling and saw it said Baellis. I immediately burst into screaming laughter.
“Seriously? I don’t even call you bae.”
“A little birdie told me that when I brought breakfast for you and your team three days ago that was…and I quote…bae as fuck. So…though it referenced my action, it was still in reference to me. Therefore…”
I rolled my eyes and smiled. “You are such a nerd.”
“You love my nerdy ass though.”
“Meh, you aight…” I replied, shrugging—trying to keep a smile off my face.
