Sharp Edges

Chapter 2

 The bike ride to Selma's is only about 10 minutes. With rush hour, it totals 30. When I get there, Evan is already waiting at a table in the back. He's sitting on his phone and smiling. I take a breath as the heat settles after the wind from the bike ride is gone. I head over to his table.

Desberg is a pretty southern city. Summer tends to linger here, as well as the heat it brings with it. Soon after, though, it gets super cold. We've gotten snow really early into the season every year I've lived here.

Evan looks up as I sit down and flashes a smile. I do the same.

"So, how come I only saw you once over summer break?" He starts with.

I couldn't tell if he was truly upset. The glisten in his eyes and the slight hurt in his voice was deceiving. We'd texted a ton, I was sure he didn't ball for hours because we didn't hang out as much over the break.

"How come you never told me about this new girl you've been talking to?"

Evan laughed, he laughed, as if this wasn't important. It was. He always told me about this kind of stuff. I wasn't going to get too up in his face about it, but I still wanted to know why he was keeping secrets.

"You mean Roxanna? She was a one night stand that couldn't get over me. Wish I could've met you this morning, but she insisted on talking to me again."

Evan waved his hands around and rolled his eyes.

"When did this happen?" I laughed, any previous tension I had started to wash away with the truth.

"Couple weeks ago. I didn't think it was anything important so I didn't say anything." Evan pulled the ring off his finger and started fidgeting with it.

"What did she want to know?" I wrinkled my nose. Evan should be more careful about the hungry eyes he allows to see his body.

"She said she was really into me and wanted to continue. I dropped her right then."

I felt awkward talking about this. As much as I don't care what Evan does with his life, this seems farther than he's ever gone. Granted, his one night stands aren't usually as clingy. I felt like there was more to the story.

"So what about you?" Evan looked straight at me.

"You know me, I'm as single as one person could be." I laugh.

A server comes by and puts two drinks on the table. Evan grabs one and slides the other to me.

"You know me too well." Evan probably has three different drink orders I get memorized at this point.

Evan's watch dings. He looks down at it and sighs.

"I gotta go. Piper needs the car."

I frown.

"We barely even got to talk."

"I know, I should see you tomorrow morning with Piper."

I nod and he walks away with his drink. I take mine, making sure the table is as clear as I can make it. My bike is sitting there still, and I take it and ride home.

~

A week passes by like nothing. Mondays shouldn't exist in my opinion, though, because Mondays are when I'm more tired than all the other days.

First period with Piper goes fast. Mr Kurnell had us start work on an individual project, but I'm still gonna have Piper help me.

Weight training is about to be interesting. Our first day doing actual work outs. I've been in weight training before. I know how it goes. He lets us do our own thing as long as it actually looks like we're working out. What I didn't realize on my first day, though, is that most of my class is boys. The only girls are me, my ex best friend Hailey, her new best friend Isabelle, and a girl I didn't recognize. I think her name was Charlie.

Charlie was usually the silent type. I hadn't actually talked to her a lot, but she was on the swim team.

Hailey was usually just jealous that I looked good in workout clothes and when I was sweaty. She looked like a mop. Ever since she turned into a bitch Junior year when she met Isabelle, I didn't really talk to her unless she insulted me. Isabelle made the mistake of doing that in front of Evan AND Piper simultaneously. I won't disclose how that ended.

I stepped up to the rack that held the weights, the one bluetooth earbud I put in my ear blaring the sound of Tame Impala's The Slow Rush album. I'd like to say I was pretty strong for a swimmer. I wasn't the best one on the team, but I'd broken a record my sophomore year with my butterfly. It's my best stroke, and nobody on the team can compare, but it's the only thing I'm good at. Most of the time, I'm put in relays for fly and in the shorter distance individual fly events.

I step up to my dumbbell and put it on my shoulders. I chose a lighter weight than usual for a warm up. While it's important to make sure my arm muscles stay in shape, my legs most likely need more attention. Probably why I suck at all the other strokes since fly is mostly arms in my opinion.

I go down to about a 90 degree angle, then push back up. I repeat the motions while looking around.

I chose a secluded spot in the corner of the gym near the racks. The other guys mostly chose the machines or picked up weights and went somewhere else. Charlie was on the treadmill minding her own business. She had earbuds in, but they weren't bluetooth so the cord would snag on her swinging arms sometimes. Hailey and Isabelle were just walking and talking. Coach would yell at them soon enough. Rowan was hidden behind the rows of racks.

The girls walked past me with a smirk. That glint in their eyes was enough to warn me of what they were about to do.

"Look at that, Evangeline is trying to inflate her ass even more." Hailey snickered.

I stare them down but don't stop the squats.

"She should probably stop. Too much more growth and it might be the only way she can float in the water." Isabelle flipped her hair behind her.

I froze the squats and looked them dead in the eyes. I let the dumbbell roll off my shoulders and land on the ground with a loud crash.

The girls yelp and back up.

I huff, turning around to switch the weights with heavier ones.

When they were gone, I picked up the dumbbell again and continued. Tame Impala had switched to COIN, and I silently thanked my music shuffle for being workout-worthy.

The girls didn't end up coming back for the rest of the period.

~

I decided against lunch today. Kian had no time to cook me anything and the lunchroom was serving their soggy enchiladas. I'd eat them anywhere else, but I couldn't stomach the doughy, soggy Mexican food they always seemed to serve when I was hungry. School lunch wasn't as good as the few Mexican places that littered the city.

I went over to the stairs to wait for lunch to be over. I never seemed to get lunch with my friends either. Both Evan and Piper have lunch time the complete opposite of me. I could see Hailey and Isabelle hanging out with their other rich friends. I say rich, but it's really just daddy's money.

Desberg has a pretty amazing demographic. How Kian managed to get an apartment here is beyond my understanding. Hailey and Isabelle aren't riding the money horse, instead they get their rich friends to. All of Isabelle's dance equipment came from the black-haired chick in their group and Hailey usually goes shopping with her after daddy's paycheck comes in. How do I know all this? I got Piper to spy on them for me.

Piper is good for a lot of things. Want some amazing entertainment in the form of school drama? Get a Piper. Want to see a dance recital that takes up to two hours at least? Get a Piper. Want a bestie who can get to your house in less than two minutes all while breaking 10 traffic laws? Get a Piper. She's my eyes and ears. She's listening when people think she isn't.

I set my chin in my hands while leaning against the stairs. I look around at the place I've spent more time at than any other place since I moved here. This school was my pride and joy my freshman year, my local party hang out spot my sophomore year, my declining mental health checkpoint my junior year, and this year, I have no clue what it'll become, but I hope it tops everything else.