The Planetarium

PART SIX

JULIET WAS FREAKING THE fuck out.

"No offence, but I've made a perilous mistake," she said, pacing around the room. "He'll know."

"How could he?" I had mused. "Phil was miles away from town, and there's a million to one chance on of his mates would be languishing around the bar that night of your birthday. No one followed us, we were completely without identity in a room of strangers-"

"I'm not talking about Phil!" Juliet yelled back with sudden, panicky fire. "Him! You-know-who!"

I dearly wanted to make a Harry Potter joke. However, she gnawed away at the stubs of her glittery fingernails, pacing the hotel room. How could I tell her that my own roommates had barely notice my return to the apartment at the daydreaming hours of the red morning?

Juliet's fear was that the stalker would blackmail her. He may have possessed firm, dirt evidence of her character. And it got to her.

Over the next few weeks, her GPA dropped like autumn leaves on a suburban concrete footpath. Every time our eyes locked, Juliet would tear away and grip Phil's toned upper arm with some trepidation. Art even asked me if she was suffering from her mental health issues during our Saturday bowling match. I was hasty to fib.

"I think her anti-depressants weren't working for her," I invented, adopting a low voice of meaningful concern I'd learned from the many acquaintances who spoke to me these days. "The SSRI worsened mania or something."

The neon orange bowling ball clanged into the gutter. I screwed up my face.

I hated the tacky bowling centre, in honesty. The cheap snack bar, the broken air hockey table that got busted four years ago, the background squeals of children's parties. My shoes squeaked on the polished floor and pinched my feet, making it an unpleasant every time my turn came in the game.

Art and Ezra never believed me, though.

"Your boy is beating you after the perfect strike." Ezra threw himself on the bench, beaming at the animations on the scoreboard screen.

"Who's the last person you slept with?" I blurted out.

Ezra's eyes popped, taken aback by the audacity.

"Is this you're way of telling me I need to get laid?"

Sure, I'd seen him drunkenly making out with girls at parties, and he had a thing with a freshman called Colleen with the thickest, painted on eyebrows I'd ever witnessed. Then Ezra had to make a joke about it.

We didn't see Colleen around much after that. Touché.

Art was a shy kid. I'd even suspected he might be asexual or aromantic perhaps. I don't know- I'm not the sexuality police. Hannah and I did make him a tinder profile once and made a mockery every time he swiped left, in hindsight I felt pretty awful about that now.

"What are you guys talking about, huh?"

Art came and plonked himself down. The screen told us he had achieved a split.

I flexed my fingers. "Um..."

"Nothing really. Ezra seemed unruffled. "Do you want to get a lemonade?"