SEVEN || I Lose A Lot Of Things All At Once
It's almost like it used to be.
I'm in the library, explaining some chemistry homework to Maxine. She pretty much gets it already and doesn't need my help anymore, but she says I make it sound clearer every time. Secretly I think she just wants to spend time with me.
My heart's not into it, though, not even enough to make my face turn red or for my head to go up in the clouds, because all day Eden's been ignoring me. He hasn't answered my texts or calls, and I didn't even see him at school outside of classes.
I'll confront him tomorrow. He can't avoid me forever. I'm so caught up in all this that I don't even notice that I've stopped talking, mouth still open, finger hovering over the paper. I blink.
"Christ," Maxine says, "I thought you had an epileptic fit or some shit."
"Aww, you really do care for me." I punch her in the shoulder gently, managing a weak but genuine smile. At least I have something. Someone. "There's just some stuff on my mind right now..."
She raises her eyebrows. "Want to talk about it?" She offers, to my surprise. Maxine's never really been one to talk out emotions. But then again, I've never really been especially sad or angry around her.
"No," I reply instantly, "it'll blow over, don't worry." I squeeze her arm. "How about you? Please tell me you're okay. No more fights?"
Her face turns into an slightly abashed one. "Well..."
"MAXINE!"
She holds her hands out in front of her. "Okay, first of all, he totally deserved it." I laugh at this. "Let me paint you a picture." Chemistry homework forgotten, she scoots closer to me, arm around my shoulder. "You're in the hallway. A guy walks up to you."
I snort out a laugh. She continues, encouraged by my interest in this. "And he walks up to you. What's he going to say?, you ask yourself." She's so witty and funny, it kind of catches me off-guard. "But you already know, don't you?" She jabs a finger into my chest, and I burst into giggles like a child.
"It's coming, you know it. It's coming, and then it comes." Her hand shoots out and she imitates a deep voice. "Hey, girl, can I get your number?"
This is the part where we both laugh, mine noticeably shriller and louder, like she's more self-contained. Or maybe this is just her natural laugh - low and quiet and understated. And kind of hot.
Someone shushes us. This is a library. Whoops.
"It's late," I say, and she calls me a nerd and pokes my cheek. I swat her hand away and she crosses her arms, an amused, lopsided smile on her face. But then the smile disappears.
"Can I sleep over at yours tonight?" She asks, out of the blue, grey eyes peering up at me coolly. This is strange. She never asks. Just says it as an indisputable statement that's always true. I'm not complaining, but this is still unusual.
I tilt my head, eyebrows raised, looking up at her. She shrugs. "There's some stuff happening." When I lean forward, on the edge of my seat (literally), she sighs in exasperation. "You and your nosiness, Gracelynn." As if to make a point, she taps my nose. "Family stuff."
Silence.
"Stop looking at me like that. You're not getting another word out of me."
My mouth creases into a pout. "Awh, okay." I slide my books into my bag, one by one. "You can stay over. Don't worry about it." My face heats up again, as it has been prone to do in the last few months, at the thought of Maxine sleeping over. At my house.
Her lips tilt upwards into a smile. She does that more often now. At first, she was almost hesitant to do it, or she restrained herself. But she smiles all the time now. It's amazing.
I feel like I've mentioned this before.
"Good. You're cool, Angel."
↠↞
"Eden. Eden, wait. Eden!"
He doesn't listen, of course. Just keeps walking, maybe even faster, skirt trailing behind him like a cape. I wonder what part of his brain decided that a plaid skirt, stockings, and high-top floral Converse would make him look good.
I catch up to him in a second, grabbing his shoulder and turning him around. He's carrying a stack of books and looks unimpressed when he looks at me, almost like Maxine.
"Eden. Christ. Why've you been avoiding me?"
"Me? Avoiding you?" He cradles his books to his chest, as if I might slap them to the floor at any moment. "Yeah, right. How many times did I call you? Text you? Invite you to hang out? Only for you to say -" He mimics a high-pitched voice, "- sorry, I'm busy tutoring Maxine!"
The words I don't sound like that bubble up in my throat but I can't find the strength to say them, letting him go on and rant, hands waving as I stand here, catatonic.
"Like, I get it, okay? I know sometimes I'm like that with Dalla, but I've always made time for you. Always. Because you're my best friend. And I thought, maybe you'd do the same thing for me, you know?" His voice sounds thick. "But I guess not."
I wrap my hand around my throat and squeeze. Just say something, Angel, before he leaves and you lose your best friend forever. Say something, this once, and that's enough.
"I'm sorry," I whisper, the ache in my chest tightening, "it's just... it meant a lot to me and I..." Eden's face softens as I swipe my hand past my eye. "It... Jaxon's... um..."
The moment the name leaves my mouth, I regret it, clasping my hand over my mouth. But it's too late. Eden's already heard it and his eyes turn steely, hands curling into fists like he just might turn around, find Jaxon, and challenge him to a fist fight. It's not that unlikely.
"Jaxon? What did that little shit do now?"
I hesitate, but I've said too much already. If this is what it takes to get Eden back, so be it. "It's... he's been... blackmailing me? Kind of. If I don't win the competition, he'll release a video of me vomiting at my birthday party and... frame me for breaking Alena's leg."
Eden's jaw drops open and his books tumble to the floor at his feet. "No way! What an asshole!" He scowls. "No one would believe him. They - they know you're not like that..." He frowns even as he lies. "When... when was this?"
Shit. "Oh, uh. The day the contest started?"
His eyes turn all hard and resolved again, eyebrows furrowing. "Angel. Why didn't you tell me? I could have helped." I mutter something that sounds like I was worried you'd overreact. His eyes darken. Everything's so blurry. Or maybe it's the tears.
We're both silent for a moment. I should really be getting to class, but it doesn't matter now. It drags out. Nothing but silence, and the occassional sound of someone slamming a door down the hallway.
"Of course." Eden seems to be on the verge of tears too now, and it makes me feel like crap. I'm his best friend, and I made him feel like this. "Eden Rivera. So dramatic. Always overreacting."
My heart feels as heavy as an anvil as the tears start sliding down my cheeks, too fast to stop them. "No, Eden, no. I was just worried that you'd... you're so confrontational and all. And I really like that about you, but I -" My eyes widen but the words are already tumbling out of my mouth, "- was worried you'd make things worse -"
I finally stop.
He's shaking now, jaw set, clearly holding back tears. "Great. Lovely." He gathers up his books, wrapping his hands around them. "I'm sorry for caring for you, Angel. Because guess what? I cared about you. A lot. But it's fine. I doubt you'd know."
Without another word, he walks away. And it's all I can do to move to class, tears still clinging to my face, pathetic, half-swallowed gasps for breaths and hiccups erupting from my mouth. Even when I turn around, he's gone.
He's gone.
Classes rush by, and even in the classes we have together, he's nowhere to be found. At dismissal, I find myself doodling back and forth on my notebook until the paper rips. I crumple the page into a ball and toss it into the crowd of people.
"Gracelynn." It's Maxine. We have a tutoring session today, which I completely forgot about. I doubt I would be able to teach her today, because everything hurts and my head is aching and spinning.
Despite that, I say, "can we talk afterwards? On the way to the library."
She walks away. No nod, no words, no nothing. That's weird. But I figure it must be this "family stuff" she's talking about. I bury my face in my hands and try to figure out what it would be like if I didn't mess up, if I wasn't so catastrophically horrible. If I treated my best friend right.
After a few minutes, when the aching starts to calm down, I press my fingers to my eyelids and stand up, hoisting my bag over my shoulder. Ms. Acosta asks me what's wrong, probably because of my shuffling, but I just say it's nothing.
I say it's nothing, like I always do.
Maxine is leaning againts the wall outside the school. Her motorbike helmet is tucked under her arm. This gives my heart a twist. She never brings her motorbike to school. Something's wrong.
I can't handle it. Especially if it's about me. It's just one more thing I lose, one more thing I mess up, one more thing I end up ruining for myself like an idiot. She looks at me. "Let's talk," she says, calmly. Yep, something's definitely wrong.
Everything I care about and love is just taking a dive toward the ground.
"I heard something. Today. From Jaxon Lincoln." She asks, arms crossed. My stomach lurches. Even though her face is as aloof as always, there's something in her eyes. Something sad. I want to cry. I want to hide. I want a the ground to open up and swallow me up. Anything to get me away from here.
"He said... are you... only dating me to win this tutoring competition?"
I freeze up, and my breath catches in my throat. "I - I - of course not. Of course not! I wouldn't - I mean, why would I act all..." Flustered and embarrassing and humiliating? "Like that, with you?"
She slings her helmet over her shoulder and tucks her hands into her pockets. "It's just..." She's clearly struggling with words, which is a surprise. "I know you and Lincoln used to be best friends and everything. He told me how..." Her forehead creases. "You were always talking about how you'd do whatever it take to win a competition. I used to like that in you."
Her voice cracks on the word you and it makes my heart twist. God, this is so wrong. This is all so wrong. Everything is just falling apart and it's all because of Jaxon and this stupid bet. Except... no. A lot of this is because of me.
"And anyway, I was just thinking... whether... this was all kind of a trick? I mean, it'd make sense, wouldn't it? If you made me lo -" She swallows and looks down at her jacket, "- like you this much, it'd be easier. To make me more serious about this... and I was. So I guess it worked, huh?"
"No, no - Maxine. Seriously. I don't - you're - I love you." It's a little overkill, but it doesn't seem to do anything even with that. "Jaxon's just lying, okay? He just wants to win this stupid bet. Competition." I correct myself, slapping my hand over my mouth.
But just like Eden, it's a second too late.
"Bet, huh." She doesn't beat around the bush, like Eden does. "Guess that's all I was to you. I need time to think things out for myself, Gracelynn." She fits her helmet over her head and walks toward her bike. I race after her, the tears I'm holding back stinging my eyes.
"No - no - Maxine, please don't leave." I can't lose this competition. I can't lose this bet. I can't lose another person I care about. I can't lose you. So many things that can't be happening.
Aunt Xena once told me, over cookies, wine, and a depressing conversation, that life's unfair. That's how the cookie crumbles, Angel, she had said sadly, staring into the dark screen of the television. She had seemed so sad and a little disappointed. It caught me off-guard; it still catches me off-guard when I think back to it. I had never seen her like that before.
But now I think I finally understand. Life's unfair. Life's unfair because it's taking not one, but two things I love away from me. Maxine looks at me, and I whisper, "please."
"Maybe you'll have to walk home by yourself today."
She speeds off and I stand there. I'm crying again, with the hiccups and the sobs and the little pathetic whimpers. This can't be happening. This is a nightmare. No one person loses this much in one day. My throat is burning. Everything is horrible and crashing down around me and it feels like the only thing I can do is watch. Just watch as the world burns, until finally it'll get me.
No Eden. No Maxine.
I sit on the steps and cry until my head hurts - cry until my eyes are rimmed with red - cry until the sun sets, not caring where I am or whether anything matters. That's when I begin to walk home, and every step of the way I feel the people missing beside me.