AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I realized I was pacing and I stopped in case he could hear me. “So anyway,” I said, “is your power on over there?”
“Sure. Is yours out?”
“No. Not at all,” I said.
“Are you okay?” he asked me.
“I don’t know. Do you really want me to answer that? I mean, can I really start a conversation like that with you? Don’t you have company?”
“She’s taking a shower,” he said.
“So you have… what… two minutes to talk?” I asked.
“I guess so,” he said.
“Fine. Then I’m just going to tell you what I have to tell you.”
“Okay,” he said.
Why wasn’t he stopping me? Did he really want me to put myself though this? I opened my mouth, but instead of words coming out, there was just a raspy sound catching in the back of my throat. It sounded like paper being torn. I gagged a little and tried again.
“Hello?” asked Pete.
“Yeah, I’m here,” I said.
“What did you need to tell me?”
I tried again, and this time the words came tumbling out. “I want you. I want to be with you.” My words sounded squeaky. Like more of a question than a statement. Not strong and sexy. Not appealing at all. I sounded like a mouse asking for a cheese crumb. I couldn’t believe I was saying it. I waited for him to respond. He said nothi
ng.
“Are you there?” I asked, after he was silent for far too long.
“Yes.”
“Aren’t you going to say anything?”
“I don’t know what to say,” he said.
“If you can’t say it back, then I guess there’s nothing to say.”
“This is very bad timing. I need to go,” he said.
“Okay,” I said. That completely told me where his priorities were. “Bye, Pete.”
“Bye,” he said.
I calmly set my phone on my bed. I felt very… numb. Weightless almost. Instead of being emotional, it was as if my mind and body had shot straight to detached rationalism in an effort to protect myself.
He didn’t like me anymore. Okay. That was that. What could I do about it? Apparently nothing. Apparently it was too late. I had ruined my chances with him. Maybe I had ruined my life.
For once I didn’t start bawling, I just sat there staring at the wall. I was incredibly humiliated. Yet empty. A small part of me wondered if this was a bad dream I might wake up from. The soup, the toast, the bra on the radiator, the meadow painting. They all kept flashing in my mind.
I felt like I was about thirteen years old. That was the last time I’d liked a boy so much and been flat out rejected by him. It was the worst feeling in the world, and now that I was older and there was so much more at stake it was that much worse. It felt like heartbreak and hopelessness and unpopularity all multiplied together infinitely.
“You need to start over with Bellamy,” I told myself. “You need to let go of Pete and try to evaluate Bellamy without comparing him to anyone else. You might as well just like him. Right? You might as well just do this. It’s amazing that he likes you. Really! And if you gave him a real chance, without distractions and backburner boyfriends, you would probably be insanely crazy about him.
“You are the luckiest girl in the world right now. Everyone thinks so. So enough of the Pete Vincent obsession. Seriously! Remember how he liked you forever? Why’d you have to go and like him back? You can never like a guy like that back. They only want the chase and you know it. Quit doing things you know are dumb. You knew he was trouble! You knew he was a player! Let it go! In fact, move away from here. Living near him is half the problem. Marry Bellamy, or Dirk, or whatever his name is. You’ll have a super huge wedding on television, and you’ll be rich, and actually kind of famous. At least for maybe a year or two. In fact, your picture is probably going to be on magazines in grocery stores. How crazy is that? Didn’t you kind of always want something like that to happen to you? Why are you fighting this? This is fun. This is like a totally fun ride. And he’s a totally great guy. Go for it.”
