excerpts

5.4

We used to talk. But not anymore. It's weird going to school and sitting in the desk next to you- because of alphabetical order- and not being able to make eye contact. I avoid you in the halls. You do too. It's like we were never friends, like that entire year didn't happen, we never shared late night texts and school stress, hopes and fears, like our brief friendship just vanished into thin air, leaving behind awkward gaps and stolen side glances. Sometimes I see you looking at me from the corner of my eye, and I wonder what you're thinking. I wonder what it would be like if we were still friends. If you never said what you did. If you'd said 'just kidding!' and we laughed it off. But you didn't. You weren't kidding. What you said was what you felt. You're still hung up on it. That makes me feel guilty, like I'm somehow a villain in your story, the person who changed everything, but that's not who I want to be. I was your friend. The worst feeling the world is losing one. Am I to blame? Are you to blame? It was what you said that ended us, but was it my actions that lead you to say so? I don't think we'll ever know. Because we don't talk anymore.