one mess after another

There Kyle was on the roof. Ellie stood there just watching dead leaves and other ill things fall off the roof like crappy rain.

She snarled.

A dump came right at her feet.

"Watch it!" She jumped back, she couldn't let her black Converse shoes be at his mercy.

"Oops." She saw Kyle's face peeping through the leaves of the branches overhead. "What are you doing down there, anyway? You need to get out of the way."

"Mom, says you might need help getting down and you've been up there close to an hour." Ellie was looking up with her hands on her hips. She was in a fresh blue tank top and her rolled up jean cutoffs.

"There are lot of leaves up here." He pushed the back side of his hand through his thick mop of sweaty hair. "And its hot, too."

"Well, it isn't any more pleasant down here." She snapped. Why did she feel the need to argue with him? She didn't want to. It was just easier. Evidently.

"Yeah, I know. The humidity won't let up. Might mean more storms." He sighed.

"Don't say that." Ellie had things to do. She didn't want to be here. She wanted lunch to be over so she could get away with Eric for awhile.

"You know, its not gonna work." His tone was somber, and he continued to let leaves tumble down all around Ellie.

"What's not gonna work?" If it hadn't been for the shade, her eyes would be burning now, she wanted him to get on with it and be done.

"You know what's not gonna work?" Kyle said. "You and Eric."

"You're not right about everything," Ellie told him.

"Whatever."

She could only hear him now as he stomped about the roof. "Just don't get your hopes up. All right."

"I'm not." She didn't have her hopes up, but he was really a downer. "I don't even know why you come around here, anymore. You know that." She wanted him to go. She wanted him to shut up about Eric.

"Some-body's got to be here for your Dad." Another rain of icky leaves came down. "I think I'm done now."

Ellie went around the house and held the ladder for him then. She pulled it tight beneath the metal rails. It took forever for him to start from the top of the ladder. Slowly he came down. She kept holding tighter. Then his sneaker almost got her in the face. She moved back. And then they were face to face.

Silence.

Ellie pressed her lips together. Kyle gave her a dead stare. Then walked away.

"Mom made you a tuna sandwich!" She yelled back to him as he went around the house.

"That's all right. I can eat at home!" He yelled. His words parched her throat. She was on the verge of bubbling up tears like a volcano. But she took a deep breath and let it go.

He was gone. Wasn't that what she wanted? Wasn't that what he wanted? That's the way he wanted it. He wanted it that way. She kept saying it over and over in her head as she walked into the house and saw the sandwich with chips along with a huge dill pickle on a paper plate waiting for him. Naturally, her mother didn't remembered to make Ellie one.

"That's OK, I'm not hungry, anyway." She stomped off to get her bag. She wasn't waiting to clean up this mess.