The Other Guys

Chapter 12

Noah pulls out a chair and sits on my other side, unaware of the way his sudden arrival has affected me. I try to act like that’s not bothering me in the least bit because he’s my best friend for better or worse and I remind myself that, but it doesn’t seem to be working.

“Noah,” CeCe huffs, narrowing her eyes at the boy in question, “where have you been?” she asks him accusingly, like she’s the jealous girlfriend and he – the wandering boyfriend she ought to put a leash on.

As Noah opens his mouth to reply, I’m already up on my feet, my chair scraping against the floor, and I’m shoving my stuff in my bag with the speed of lighting, purposefully ignoring my friends’ disconcerted stares and raised eyebrows.

“Guys, I just remembered I have this huge test and I haven’t revised for it at all, so I’m just gonna head to the library-“

I realize a little too late that I’m rambling and I have no control over my mouth. I always ramble when I’m nervous, or lying through my teeth, like I’m doing right now because I’m too embarrassed to say I can’t be around Noah for the time being because I feel like my heart won’t be able to take it, like my head’s going to explode, overflowing with all these thoughts about him, and me, and us, and his feelings, and my feelings, and I really can’t deal with any of this right now.

As it stands, my survival instinct kicks in.

“Test in what?” Brady asks, not suspiciously, just curiously and I clamp up, drawing a blank. He’s chewing on his pizza, enjoying every bite and staring up at me, patiently waiting for me to respond.

“Is it history?” CeCe gasps on cue, sitting up and putting a hand over her gaping mouth. “Because I’m not prepared for that at all!”

“Um,” I stutter, stalling for time and scratching my eyebrow, “in biology,” I eventually manage to get out before I make a beeline for the exit, never mind that I’m not even taking biology this term.

Distracted, I literally run someone over in my hurry to get out of here and avoid the awkwardness. We knock heads and I step back, reeling from the collusion. The person I’ve run into gasps in surprise and as I glance up, I belatedly realize it’s Emily I’ve almost knocked down, even though I’ve never thought I’d ever unintentionally try to bring her down. I always thought it was going to be a part of my master genius plan or something.

Emily’s blinking down at her red shirt, covered in spaghetti and tomato sauce that’s definitely going to leave a stain.

“I’m so, so sorry,” I apologize immediately, my eyes glued to her chest and the massive stain forming on her shirt. Now, naturally, everybody’s going to think I did it on purpose because the truth is so unlikely. Even I can’t believe it happened on accident.

Emily doesn’t look mad, upset, or fed up with me at all. If anything, she’s completely unresponsive and I start to think that maybe she’s gone into shock.

“It’s fine-,” she finally answers, heaving out a sigh as she looks down at herself in resignation.

“Let’s get you cleaned up,” I blurt out, surprising both me and her by grabbing her hand and dragging her towards the nearest bathroom, “I keep a spare shirt in my locker just in case something like this happens and I’m going to go grab it, so that you can get changed,” I tell her before I basically shove her into the ladies’ bathroom.

“Sydney, that’s really not necessary,” Emily assures me, barely looking me in the eye, but that’s nothing new under the sun. She always avoids eye contact if she can help it. I’d reckon looking into my eyes makes her feel like she’s staring death in the face, but there’s really nothing that freaky about my face or insipid blue eyes to warrant such an extreme reaction.

“I insist,” I stress my point, having already made up my mind, even if I can’t figure out for the life of me why I’m so hell-bent on helping her. “I’ll be right back,” I say to her before I run out of the bathroom and go to my locker to retrieve the shirt I was speaking of.

Upon my return, I find Emily trying to wash the stain away and she doesn’t seem to notice me come in until I’m standing directly behind her.

“There,” I say, holding out the shirt, “I hope it fits.”

Emily looks down at the shirt in my outstretched hand, still not sure if she should take and accept my help before her brown eyes meet mine. She bites her lip in thought, hesitating a bit before she finally grabs the shirt. “Thanks,” she says quietly, briefly locking eyes with me before she turns back around and pulls her stained shirt over her head.

I really don’t mean to look at her while she gets undressed, wanting to give her some privacy like a normal person, but as my eyes catch sight of the big, although fading bruise on her back, like someone’s repeatedly whipped her back until it became this nice shade of blue so dark it’s almost black, I can’t bring myself to tear my wide-eyed gaze away. I need to remind myself that staring is rude, but the image is stuck in my brain and I keep seeing it every time I close my eyes. It’s playing on repeat and I can’t seem to stop it.

When Emily finally faces me, I try to cover up my surprise, even if it’s not an easy thing to pull off.

“I’ll give it back to you the moment I wash it. Thank you,” she tells me, sounding sincere as she rubs her upper arms. As much as I hate Emily’s guts for delicately sabotaging my relationship, Brady’s words come back to haunt me as I remember him telling him how tough Emily’s family situation is and how she’s in a funk and I never knew how bad it really was until I saw it with my own eyes. How the hell do you get a bruise with the size of Australia? Who would do such a thing?

“Um,” I clear my throat, trying to untangle my thoughts and speak coherently, “no problem. And I’m sorry for running into you.”

Emily nods at me in understanding and an uncomfortable silence settles over us as we both run out of things to say to each other. I don’t think we’ve ever been alone for so long and I don’t know how to act around my boyfriend’s best friend whom I apparently know nothing about.

“We should probably get to class,” Emily suggests, being the first one to admit that the awkwardness between us is just too much.

I numbly nod my head as I watch her pick up her bag and give me a small, but forced smile.

“Oh, and Emily,” I say to her, suddenly grasping her hand and I don’t miss the way she winces at the contact, as if I’m actually hurting her and causing her physical pain, “I’m sorry for earlier today. I didn’t mean to be a bitch.” I shrug, releasing her hand, much to Emily’s relief. Truthfully, I did mean to a bitch to her, but my apology is as sincere as it can get and maybe Emily can see it too because she smiles for real, or at least she tries to, even if I don’t believe I’ve ever seen her crack a smile before.

As she goes to class and leaves me alone in the bathroom to ponder what just went down, I realize that sometimes how a person seems to you is not how they really are.

A/N: Hey, darlings! I really meant to update sooner, but something came up and when I was finally about to upload this chap, watt was acting weird, so this update took longer than it was supposed to. And I know this chapter was short, but at least we got a bit of an insight into Emily's life. Thanks for reading and voting, guys, I really, really appreaciate it :)

A little spoiler: Chapter 13 (ominous, much? ;)) includes Sydney confronting Noah (or maybe it's the other way around :D)