𝘴𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘺𝘰𝘶. [𝘢 𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘪 𝘢𝘶]

29

cw; descriptions of suicide

I STARE AT Ricky's empty chair, the lack of his presence was definitely casting a bad mood over me, Gina and Ej. Lunch just isn't the same without his small little snide, snarky comments. I don't think I realized how much I appreciate Ricky's presence until he wasn't here.

Yesterday was when everything went down. I haven't talked to him since, neither has Gina. Ej's been the only one who's talked to him, but he hasn't told us anything. Ricky's here at school, but he's not at lunch. He's avoiding me.

Gina clears her throat, causing me to snap out of my thoughts and whip my head away from Ricky's chair and towards her. "He won't ignore you forever." She assures, but I don't think I believe her. How could I? He has every right to ignore me.

I don't know if Ej knows about Ricky's mom being dead. I don't think he knows, but if he doesn't, I haven't said anything. I can tell he didn't want to tell me, and I forced it out of him. It's his choice whether or not he wants Gina and Ej to know.

I slouch back in my chair, crossing my arms. "You don't know that for sure. Besides, it's okay. I made a mistake, now I'm paying the consequence. I've come to peace with it." I lied. I am not at peace with it, nor do I think I ever will be. I'll never forgive myself until he forgives me first.

I didn't sleep very much last night. I find it hard to go on with my everyday life knowing Ricky is struggling, and all I've done is made it worse. Everything makes sense, though. Whenever I asked about his mom, he would always stutter and hesitate before telling me she was simply at work. He wasn't mourning his aunt when I saw him at the cemetery, it was his mom.

I look over at Ej, who was looking down at his lap. "Ej, has he said anything to you? About, y'know, what happened?"

Ej looks up at me before shaking his head, "No. Besides, I don't really want to know. It's none of my business and I don't want to be dragged into it because then I'm going to have to pick sides and I don't want to do that."

"I just don't know how to fix it. He won't even talk to me or look at me in the hallway." I complain, leaning my head down and resting it on my forearms that were lying flat on the table.

"Nini, if there's anything I can tell you," Ej starts, causing me to lift my head up to hear what he has to say. "Ricky's really bad at communication. I guarantee that if you don't talk to him first, he'll never talk to you again. Don't wait for him to come to you. If you want to fix this, then you're the one who needs to step up and make the first move. Go to his house after school or something and force him to sit down and talk to you about it."

"I don't want to force him to do anything." I tell Ej, "If we're going to talk this out, I want him to want to talk it out. There's no point in fixing something that's one sided."

Ej shrugs his shoulders, leaning back into his chair. "I don't know what to tell you, Nini. Just talk to him. He had a day to be pissed, but he should be calmer now."