La Douleur Exquise

Nine

I knew the Carpenter house almost as well as I know my own, which is why I was able to navigate the hallway and find Mia's bedroom quickly. I knocked once on her door and spun the handle before Mia could say anything, entering her bedroom with a bright smile.

"Hey," Mia says, smiling up at me from where she reclines on her bed. She clicks a button on her phone and the screen fades to black before she tosses it aside and sits up. "I was just about to text you. How did therapy go? Was it fun?"

Despite her words, I could sense a slight bitterness in Mia's words and the way her eyes rolled around in their sockets when she uttered the word 'fun' suggested that she was being sarcastic in her question. Mia hated that Darcie and I had to go to therapy together and every Saturday, Mia likes to quiz me about what happened. She would always analyze my words and try to create scenarios in her head that wasn't entirely factual. I guess that's why I was always trying to avoid the whole topic.

Except today, I couldn't ignore what had happened. The guys had given me a pep talk before I came to Mia's house, instructing me on how I should break the news gently to my girlfriend, but now that I was here, I was quickly chickening out of telling Mia anything. 

"Oh, you know," I say dismissively. I walk over to Mia's large bed and throw myself down next to Mia, resting my head on one of the fluffy pillows. Mia stares down at me, her eyes looking at me intensely as she waits for me to elaborate. Eventually, I sigh and rub a hand over my eyes. "It was... informative."

"Informative?"

"I learned something about Darcie," I say, easing myself into a position where I could tell Mia about the whole Rally Girl thing. "She used to be a cheerleader."

"Old news," Mia snorted. "Why did you need to know that about her anyway?"

This was the perfect opportunity for me to tell Mia why this was important information. I would tell her that Darcie was my new Rally Girl. I would tell her that this meant that Darcie and I will have to spend a ridiculous amount of time together. I would tell her that I'd agreed to this madness just so that I didn't have to spend the rest of the year in therapy. 

If I told Mia all this and emphasized that it would make her life better- a boyfriend that was around on Saturdays and a best friend that no longer hated the boyfriend- perhaps Mia would be more receptive. She had a jealous, territorial claim on me and I knew that with Mia, we had to tread carefully, otherwise, she would go totally crazy over the situation.

"So," I begin carefully, unwilling to look up at Mia out of fear. "You know how I currently don't have a Rally Girl?"

Mia nods. "Yeah?"

"Well, now I kinda do have one." I chanced a look towards Mia and saw that she was frowning down at me, a question written in the frown she wore. With a sigh, I decided to just do it. To tell her. "Darcie. Darcie Scott is my new Rally Girl."