Although Skylar had made it seem like she didn't care about Jude working at the bar, she was irritated. Why, she wasn't entirely sure. Why was she now annoyed by the girl she had made a massive effort towards making comfortable? Maybe it was because Jude applying-and getting hired-at the bar was Blair's idea. Because now Jude was under Blair's wings, which had been Skylar's home for so long.
All night, Skylar hadn't been able to mitigate her anger. A volcano rising and rising, lava coating her veins. She knew she was close to erupting.
It didn't help that Jude had pulled her hair up and worn a low cut t-shirt. It didn't help that her skin was tan, and the back of her neck freckled like constellations. And on the front of her neck, a single freckle just below her jaw. Like a lost star. Skylar felt a strong-and alien-urge to trace the freckles with her fingertips, to connect the lone one with he rest. She wanted to connect the dots with invisible lines drawn on visible skin; she wanted to paint Jude like a picture.
Skylar squeezed her eyes shut momentarily each time these thoughts surfaced. She didn't want Jude. She didn't even like Jude.
Should have left her on the curb to pick up herself, Skylar thought.
Watching Jude out of the corner of her eye, Skylar was jealous. Jude was a natural. She smiled at everyone, chatted, blushed at the pick-up lines, and deflected the catcalls. Confident and bright. She didn't look like she was heartbroken at all.
So much for a damsel in distress. Not that Skylar wanted to be her knight in shining armour, or anything like that.
-
Skylar heard the staff door open and close in the fraction of a single second. She wished the light steps that skipped down the concrete stairs belonged to Ben, but she knew that the door had only been open long enough for a tiny figure to slide out of it.
"I don't really feel like talking," Skylar said, smoke escaping the corners of her mouth.
She only felt bad when she turned and saw Jude, who had sank down onto the bottom step, her arms wrapped around her knees; the same self-hug that Skylar had seen her do the night they first spoke.
"Sorry," Skylar said, but it was so quiet, she didn't think Jude heard it. The wind carried her voice like it swept away the smoke.
Skylar turned back around, her back sore as she leant against the metal handrail that teetered on the edge of the concrete staircase. She finished off her cigarette in silence.
"You haven't spoken to me at all," said Jude, cutting through the quiet that had fallen between them like a physical barrier: a wall as tough as the concrete that threatened to freeze Jude's skin beneath her denim jeans.
"Sorry." Skylar shrugged, hair moving across her covered shoulders. The snow was gone, but the cold wasn't. She realized that she had said this word twice now, and wasn't sure she had truly meant it either times. "I've been focusing. On my job."
"I don't mean that. I mean in general. Since the night you brought me to Blair's-"
Skylar scoffed. "When you say it like that, it sounds like we hooked up or something."
Jude's expression hardened. She was the type of person who always looked worried; her eyebrows were permanently raised, and often yearned together, as if they were stitched together by a string. All night, Skylar had watched them. When Jude messed up on an order, or spilled a drink, or in some way wasn't perfect-as she usually was-the string seemed to tighten, to pull her eyebrows closer and closer together. Now, it appeared the string that held them together had been cut. They were low, pointing downwards rather than their usual position of halfway up her forehead. She looked angry.
Skylar tightened her jaw, and turned to look down the alley.
"Do you have a problem with me?" Jude asked.
Skylar fought the urge to laugh. Immediately, the answer rushed into her mind. Yes, I do. I'm just not sure why.
But instead of giving Jude this response, Skylar let her words float in the air for several minutes. She watched people pass the alley without a second thought. Not one person turned sideways, turned to look at Jude and herself standing so close together, but feeling so far apart. Skylar suddenly felt like she had known Jude for years, and now they were arguing-now they were splitting up. An image of herself, alone, in the alley passed briefly in her mind. She squeezed her eyes shut, and when she opened them, she found Jude watching her curiously. It occurred to Skylar then that although she saw herself as being alone at that moment, as though she was talking to a ghost, she didn't want to be alone. She wanted Jude there, to be present. She wanted to know every detail about Jude: her history, her present, her future. She didn't want to be talking to a ghost. She wanted to fill the hollow space that sat in front of her with someone she knew. With someone she liked.
"I don't," Skylar finally said. "I don't have a problem with you."
Jude nodded, silent. Skylar knew she didn't believe her.
Skylar moved a wave of her hair to the other side of her head, letting the thick strands brush her cheek. Hesitantly, she took a seat in the small space between Jude and the handrail. Her hands shook as she rested them on her thighs, her jeans cool against her palms.
Third time's a charm.
"I'm sorry," said Skylar. Truthfully. "I don't know what's wrong with me."
"If you didn't want me in your life, you shouldn't have brought me into it." Jude pulled her knees even closer to her chest, and Skylar winced, thinking soon enough Jude would crush her own bones.
"I do, Jude. I do." Again, truthfully. But reluctantly. Skylar felt as though she was standing in a church, confessing something deep and dark about herself, something she would never tell anyone else. "I'm just bad at showing how I feel. I tend to hide a lot of myself. And you're right. I welcomed you into my life and then I ignored you. I'm sorry."
"I don't have any friends," said Jude. Skylar searched her face, yearning for eye contact. Jude wouldn't budge; she kept her blue eyes-sky blue, Skylar thought, and smiled-fixated on the brick wall parallel to the staircase. "I gave everything I had to my boyfriend. All of me. I knew some people back home, and I called them my friends. I was kidding myself." Jude lifted her arms, resting them flat atop her knees. She tilted her head towards the sky, and Skylar noticed the stars reflecting in her pupils. "They weren't my friends. They were people I hung out with because I didn't have anyone else. I've never had anyone other than my parents and my boyfriend. And both are gone now."
Skylar wondered briefly if Jude's parents were dead, like hers, but didn't ask. She kept her mouth shut, even after Jude appeared to be done, because she knew it would encourage her to open up even more. And like always with Blair, this trick worked on Jude.
"Blair's my friend now, I guess. But I just feel so bad. Like I'm a burden. She didn't ask for me to come into her life and her apartment. I just showed up."
Trying to calm the rising water that was piling up on the shore, threatening all the carefully built sand castles. That's what Skylar was doing. Attempting to negotiate with the anger, the jealousy, at the thought of Jude capturing Blair's attention. It was possessive. Selfish. Blair was allowed to have other friends.
"I'm sorry," said Jude, the words that had slipped from Skylar's mouth three times that night. Skylar wasn't sure if this apology was to her, or if it was from Jude to herself.
The smaller girl was crying now. Not nearly as much as she had been the night Skylar had seen her on the curb-the night that everything changed for both of them. Small sobs, mute as they left her hollow lips. Small tears, slow as they fled her idle eyes.
"What for?" Skylar asked.
Jude ran her index finger underneath her nose. "For Blair. That's why you have a problem with me-"
"I don't," Skylar repeated harshly. Her eyelids narrowed, staring at Jude with a stern expression, wanting her to understand that in the past fifteen minutes, she had willingly changed her opinion of Jude, for a reason she couldn't quite discern. Maybe it was because she never liked seeing people cry. Or maybe it was the way the stars were reflected in her sky-blue eyes.
"You do, though." Jude balled her hands into fists and pressed them against her cheeks. "I know there's something between you and Blair. Something..."
"There's nothing." Skylar sighed. Truthfully. Again.
Jude turned to her, the first time throughout the conversation. She managed a meager smile. "You want there to be something. And I'm getting in the way of it."
Skylar almost grinned at her. She almost told her, You're smart, Jude. Smarter than I'd have thought. Certainly smarter than Blair. But she didn't, because she didn't want to confirm that what Jude had said was true. Her confession time was over. This secret was something Skylar would carry inside of her, sealed shut and locked away, and would never speak about again. She realized then that although she did want "something" with Blair so badly, she would never have the courage to initiate it. The secret of it was kept to deep, and feared too much. She'd never let it surface.
"Blair is my best friend. It's disorienting-if that's the right word-to see your best friend spending time with someone else. It's not just you. It was her boyfriend, too. She's my only friend," Skylar smiled briefly at Jude, hoping to provide her comfort that she wasn't the only one with minimal friends. "I get protective. Jealous."
"I think that's normal." Jude kept her mouth open, words on the tip of her tongue. Skylar knew she wanted to ask more, to press on the subject of her wanting "something" with Blair.
Before she could, Skylar glanced at her watch. "Break is over," she said, and before heading back into the bar, she stole one more glance at Jude's bright eyes.