“An internship, you say?” Ciara asked with interest. It was another day and she was over at my family’s place. We were both sitting on my bed and talking about life when I brought up the paper on the internship.
“Aye.” I nodded, showing her the papers. “Only issue is that it’s in America.”
She quickly read it over and shrugged. “And? Why not give it a shot?”
“I’m not you. I don’t want to travel.”
“Ah, right, right. What if it was only for a few years? Then you came back?”
“Off the table.”
“Aw, c’mon Bailey. You should give it a shot. Otherwise, you might end up spending years stuck in Ireland still looking. Hell, you might never get a job here! This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!”
“I don’t want to leave my family behind.” I frowned. “They need me.”
“They might need you, but they probably don’t want you to be held back from living your life either. Have you talked to them about it?”
I shook my head.
“Talk to them about it. Maybe they want you to go.”
“I doubt it, but I’ll talk to them.”
“Good! And if you do decide to apply, I can teach you some English. You’re gonna need that.”
“Thanks, Ciara.”
The entire idea of mentioning this to my parents stressed me out. Deep down I knew they would want me to go, but part of me feared they would react differently. For all I knew, they could take offence to it and think I was a terrible daughter for wanting to go elsewhere! Yeah, I knew that was not going to happen, but still. I always tried so hard to be that perfect daughter, and I didn’t want to upset them. My grades were perfect, I scored best in the entire school even. Whenever they needed me, I was there, whether it be to set the table or to go out and run errands. If I did something wrong, I made up for it in any way I knew how. The last thing I wanted to do was upset them, and I feared bringing up this possible opportunity would do just that. Then again, I suppose the chances of me actually getting the internship were low, so I was most likely overreacting.
Stressed out about having to have this talk, I turned to art. I cracked out my paints and canvas and let my mind wander as I spread paint all over the fresh canvas whilst humming softly to myself. Humming little tunes while painting always helped me relax, especially if I was stressed. Slowly, I felt myself calm as I let my hand translate the ideas I had in my mind onto canvas. As it usually was, it was another painting of a beautiful lady. Two actually. They were sitting in a field of assorted wildflowers, enjoying it all peacefully. In the far distance, a storm was approaching them. One that people would hide from as the dark grey clouds took over the sky and the winds howled. I could almost hear the winds while adding details to the clouds. It sounded like they were blowing against my door and the walls around me. So loud and repetitive. Almost annoying-
“Bailey. Oi.” I snapped out of it and whipped around to see Rian. It looked as if he had been trying to get my attention for a while.
“Oh! Geez, sorry!!” I quickly got up, knocking over my paints. They made a mess as they splattered all over the floor. I frowned and looked at Rian.
“Uh, Mam wants you to help with dinner,” Rian said, giving me a look. “You doing okay?”
“Yea, yea, I’m okay.” I nodded, bending over to quickly clean up my mess with a cloth. “I just zoned out. Can you tell her I’ll be downstairs in a minute? I need to clean this up first.”
“Aye.” He nodded, leaning over to see what I was painting. “Painting women again?”
“Mhm.”
“Should try to paint a big muscular guy like myself.” He joked, flexing his muscles. “Get out of your comfort zone.”
“Oh, har, har. I prefer women, thanks.” I chuckled. “It’s a lot more fun to draw a beautiful woman than, well, a man. So while you look great, I doubt you’ll be making it into paintings unless it’s a family painting.”
“Just wait til’ you get a husband. Then you’ll be painting him all day long.”
I rolled my eyes as I finished cleaning up. Once I did, I rushed downstairs to help Mam with dinner. She was grateful I came to help and put me to work pretty fast. We remained quiet as we worked, and I figured that if I was going to bring up the internship, there was no better time than when Mam had a knife in her hands, right?
“Mam?”
“Yes, dear?”
“You know how I’ve been looking for jobs or internships, right?”
“Mhm.”
“Well, I found someone looking for an intern,” I said quietly. “I’m thinking of applying, but well, they’re all the way in New York.”
“As in America?” She looked over at me.
“Aye.” I nodded nervously. “I just wanted to get your opinion I guess. Ciara says I should go for it.”
“Why not go for it?”
“I’m just not sure I want to leave. I know the chances of getting it are slim, but if I did… then that means moving away from home.”
“It’s up to you, dear. If you don’t want to leave home, then you don’t have to. We will always enjoy having you here. But if you want to go for it, then that’s okay too. We aren’t going to hold you back. Not after all the work you’ve put into this already.”
“I’m with Mam on this one.” Rian walked in, butting into the conversation. “Besides! I hear America is nice. Not as nice as Ireland of course, but it’s good enough that I can let my sister go there.”
“Oh, you tell me what to do now?” I raised a brow with a smirk.
“I just want to make sure you stay safe.” He smirked back.
“So. If you did get the internship, what would be the plan?” Mam asked. “Do you have someone to move with? I’m not sure moving alone as a little lady like yourself is an entirely safe plan.”
“Uh, I guess it wouldn’t be, would it?” I mumbled. She had a point. Being a woman of my size and height wasn’t exactly safe. People could easily grab me, stuff me in their bag, run off, and nobody would notice.
“Maybe it’s time you looked into a husband?” Mam suggested. “You are getting to that age. Even if you didn’t get the internship, it would be nice to see the bloodline go on.”
“Oooo, Bailey’s gonna get herself a man!” Rian teased. “My little sister is growing up!”
“She’s your big sister.” Mam chuckled at Rian’s enthusiasm.
“I was speaking literally.”
“I’m not interested in a husband,” I mumbled, ignoring Rian’s comment.
“Come to think of it, you haven’t shown any interest in a man.” Mam pointed out. “Any reason for that? It is quite odd.”
“Not really,” I muttered. Thinking about being with a guy made me want to puke. It just didn’t feel right. I couldn’t figure out why, but it just did. “None of the ones here feel right to me.”
“What if your father and I found someone?”
“I’m not interested.”
“At least give it a try, dear.”
I shook my head.
“Has Ciara been looking at anyone?” Mam asked. “Maybe you two can look together?”
“Uh…” Thoughts of Ciara filled my brain and my face went bright red. Before Rian could tease me, I looked down and hyper-focused on peeling potatoes.
“I think you’d have better luck finding Bails a girl,” Rian smirked. “Should’ve seen her face the other day! She saw Hazel and looked redder than a tomato!”
My face burned even hotter. It was probably glowing at this point. Why did Rian have to do this to me?!
“Oh?” Mam looked over at me for an explanation.
“S-She was just, um, pretty, that’s all…” I mumbled, with my face somehow burning hotter. I needed to escape before I burned off all the skin on my cheeks. I quickly peeled the rest of the potatoes in record time before practically sprinting out of there, saying something about how I forgot something. Mam was left confused but found my odd reaction quite cute and silly.
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