“Because I’ve noticed that you’ve gone out of your way to be nice tomelately, and I figured it was time to bury the hatchet between us,” I confess with a defeated sigh. “I’ll be honest, I can’t even really remember why we stopped being friends.”
“According to you, we were never friends in the first place, and you said you didn’t need more friends anyway,” he says, throwing my own words back in my face.
How rude of him to use my own words against me. But it’s my turn to turn over a new leaf now.
“I did say that, and it was mean. For what it’s worth, I was wrong,” I admit. “...and I’m sorry.”
To their credit, David and Jack try very hard not to openly eavesdrop when Griffin and I start going back and forth like this. But at my unexpected apology, I find all three of them looking at me, dumbfounded.
After a moment of awkward silence, Griffin breaks into a grin brighter than I’ve seen him wear in months, and the weight of that smile shifts something inside me. I realize not only that I’ve missed seeing it, but that it’s stirring up more than a simple smile should. It brings up a whole lot of warmth andfeelingI didn’t expect.
That’s something for Future Ellie to deal with.
“Why, Eleanor Turner,” he gasps in fake surprise, clutching at pearls that aren’t there like some sort of old granny down at the hair salon. “I didn’t know you knew how to apologize. Is this a first for you?”
Despite my resolution to actively be kinder to Griffin, Ican’t help but roll my eyes at him and let out an impatient huff.
“Don’t push it Griffin Hart, I still have time to take it back.”
This only makes him smile even wider, a dazzling and beautiful thing that reaches every corner of his face, including those warm, chocolate eyes that I realize I’ve never taken the time toactuallylook at.
From this close, I can see flecks of green and gold sprinkled on the inner rim of his irises—more than just brown, and holding something more than I anticipated. They’re a deep well drawing me in, the kind I wouldn’t expect from a boy who seems to revel in finding new ways to bother me on a daily basis.
“Nope, too late now darlin’. I knew I’d get you to warm up to me eventually,” he says with a boyish excitement that has the corners of my own lips twitching upward.
For a split second, I think I see Jack stiffen, and Griffin and David share an undecipherable look before Griffin’s attention is back on me. It’s so quick I think I might have imagined it, and I don’t have the time or care to dwell on it as Señor Flores calls our attention to the front of the room.
With another quick flash of a smile, and a playful flick to my nose, Griffin says matter-of-factly, “I think this is the start of a real fun friendship for you and me, Eleanor.”
I can’t tell if that sounds more threatening or exciting–but an almost imperceptible shiver runs down my spine as I wonder exactly what I’m getting myself into.
***
He was right. Being friends with Griffin Hartisfun. Not just Griffin either - apparently he, David, and Jack are a package deal. Some days it’s like having brothers that I never asked for, but I’m secretly glad to have ended up with anyway.
Others…it’s like those chaotic videos you see of ducklings who imprint on a cat instead of their mom and follow her around everywhere, except the cat is a fifteen year old girl and the ducklings are tornadoes disguised as teenage boys.
At first it was just goofing around before and after class (but not during–I still have grades to maintain, I can’t descend into total anarchy), but over the past month and a half, it’s turned into finding each other in the hallways betweeneveryclass, not just Spanish, which then turned into nightly Skype calls, sometimes lasting for hours, comfortably talking about everything and nothing at all.
Without realizing it, I’m laughing more than I ever have, and the highlight of my day has become the time I spend with them.
I’m not sure when I started taking life so seriously. As a kid, I was all about fairies and pirates andadventures. I reveled in knock-knock jokes and campfire stories and running through the sprinklers. I was a windswept, scraped-kneed, constantly giggling force of nature who left joy (and mess) wherever she went. I would spend hours in the hammock in our back yard, staring up at the clouds, daydreaming big fantastical dreams.
Somewhere along the way my wires must have gotten crossed. Sometimes I don’t recognize the rigid, anxious perfectionist looking back at me in the mirror. I try so badly to cling to the freedom I felt as a kid, but it’s becoming increasingly easier for me to get overwhelmed, and increasingly difficult to talk myself down.
But being around Griffin has started softening edges I didn’t even realize were sharp to begin with. I’ve been so focused on getting out of this town that I haven’t been enjoying the life around me.
It’s not that I don’t love Larkspur, I really do. I can’t pinpoint exactly why I’m so set on leaving, but it’s all I’ve been able to think about since I was twelve years old, head buried in a book about a girl leaving her podunk town for the big city. But now the life around me seems a little sweeter every day–a life that might be harder to leave than I anticipated when the time comes.
***
“I feel like I never see you anymore,” Abby says, popping another fried pickle into her mouth.
Abby Wheeler is my ‘everything’ friend–first, oldest, best, you name it. We attached ourselves at the hip in the two-year-old class at The Learning Tree, and shortly after that our dads followed suit. Abby’s mom left before she reached her first birthday, so it’s been just her and her dad most of her life. There was a brief moment in time where there was an Evil Stepmother involved, but in an ironic (and cruel) twist of fate, wife number twoalsobailed shortly after giving birth to Abby’s brother two years ago. Abby was ready to violate the Geneva conventions to exact her revenge, but Mr. Wheeler insisted that she’s the only girl he could ever need, and that he should never have tried to add another one in the first place.
The rest was history. More often than not, my childhood pictures include a redheaded angel smiling demurely at the camera, offsetting the whirlwind of blonde always too busy to stop for something as silly as a photo.
Swallowing the too-large sip of milkshake I just took, a brain freeze takes over my mental capacity and it takes a huge effort to choke out, “What are you talking about?We’ve had dinner on Fridays and sleepovers on Saturdays since we were three, you see me all the time.”
