Where We Belong

Sleepless In Seattle

When Skylar gets home from work, she sees that she has a missed call and voicemail from Harper. When she checks it, she finds a very odd message from Harper. Her best friend sounds extremely distraught in her message and it makes her uneasy and worried. She quickly returns Harper's call and within seconds of answering the phone, Skylar finds that Harper is indeed very upset. Barely giving herself the time to even slow down to take a breath, Harper is regurgitating what seems to be a story about Gillian and the bar, but Skylar is not able to understand any of it. "Harper! Calm down, speak slowly, and start again from the beginning. Please, you're giving me whiplash with how fast you are talking right now. I am only getting every other word." She finally says.

Harper audibly takes a deep breath. "Sky, Gillian kissed me."

This stuns Skylar. "Wait, what? When was this?"

"And I'm trying to tell you, I think she regrets doing it." Harper says, her voice cracking.

"Is that what she said?" Skylar asks just because she is thoroughly confused by the fact that Gillian would actually initiate a kiss but then turn around and wish that she had not.

"No, but--" Harper starts.

"Okay, Jace. Hold up. What did Gillian say to you, exactly?" Skylar asks.

Harper takes another deep breath. "She didn't say anything. She kissed me and then she walked away." Harper adds sadly.

"Harper, why didn't you just ask her how she felt about it?" Skylar asks as she is getting more irritated with the story and her friend.

"Because I don't need her to tell me to my face how we should just be friends!" Harper responds angrily and she can feel tears start to sting her eyes so she takes a couple more deep breaths to stop herself from breaking down. "I think that I'm going to come home for awhile."

"What?! Wait a minute, what are you talking about? What do you mean you're coming home?" Skylar feels herself start to get angry with Harper and her obviously horrible and emotional decision-making.

"I need to get away from here for awhile. She keeps calling me and texting me, and asking me if we can talk. I'm pretty sure that I know what she wants to tell me and the thing is, I don't want to just be friends with her, Sky. I don't even think that I can face her right now. Or ever again." Harper says.

Skylar feels her patience dwindling. "No, you can't just do this shit. You are running again and it doesn't even make any sense to come all the way back here when you don't actually know how Gillian feels about what happened. You might think that you do but you haven't even talked to her. And even if she just brushes it off as a one-time deal, you kinda need to know the truth before making any crazy decisions." Skylar tries reasoning with Harper even though she knows that it will more than likely not get her anywhere. She waits for Harper to reply and argue but the line goes quiet. It only takes Skylar a moment to realize that Harper is crying on the other end. "Oh, god. Babe..."

"Skylar, don't." Harper says, all the sadness in her voice replaced by complete seriousness. "I don't need a pep talk right now. I just need to get over this and I need you to understand that I can't do that here. I need to just call Gillian later and tell her that I need some time off." Harper says, her voice breaking in between shallow breaths.

Finally, Skylar just gives in. "Yeah, okay. Babe, come back if you really need to. You can stay with me for as long as you want. I just...you know what, nevermind all of that. You're right, I wasn't being very supportive and I'm sorry." Skylar says as she realizes that if she is to help fix this, she needs to let Harper believe that she is being as supportive as possible. "Go home and pack or do whatever you need to do and just call me when you're on the road, okay?"