AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She tilted her head to the side, studying me. “I’ve always wanted to ask you why you did that to me though. Why make my birthday so special and kiss me and go along with the idea that we were going to date just to then make me feel stupid? You know that you made me feel stupid, don’t you?”
I closed my eyes and cringed.
“I think it hurt differently because you were my only friend,” she added.
That felt like a knife to the heart.
“No one ever wanted to hang around me, Duke,” she powered on, continuing to twist the knife. “Girls would make plans with me as a placeholder until something else or someoneelse better came around.” She looked away for a second before continuing. “I think I was the only kid who hated weekends. I still do. I like the weekday grind better because I have a purpose and people have to talk to me. On the weekends, I’m untethered, disconnected from everyone else.” She cut herself off and paused, then looked back at me again. “Ya know when you used to have to pick partners in class? And other kids would look around the room and make eye contact with who they wanted to be with? I never had anyone to look at. I was always the one walking up to the teacher because I didn't have a partner. I felt like no one actually wanted to be around me.” She held her hand up and shook her head. “No, don’t feel bad. I don’t want your pity over it… I just wanted to say, I always figured well, they didn’t really know me, so who cares, ya know?”
I was shaking my head no, because she was so incredibly wrong. I always wanted to be around her back then; how could she have missed that?
She gave me a sad smile. “I know. You always paid attention to me. In quiet ways, and that was okay. You saw me. You noticed me. And that was enough. And then on my seventeenth birthday, you were magically choosing me in front of everyone. And it felt so good to be chosen for once…” she trailed off.
I ripped off my hat and rubbed a hand over my forehead. It took all of me to stay sitting, because I didn’t want to relive how I hurt her. The guilt was eating me alive.
“But the next day, I felt like a total idiot. I felt like the butt of a joke that you of all people played on me. Because how important could I really be to you if you didn’t even care to say goodbye? And then my mind spun to an even worse conclusion… Youdidtruly know me, and you still discarded me like I was a piece of trash. That hurt, Duke. You ghosted me before ghosting was even a term. And the whole thing reaffirmed that I wasn’t good enough to ever be anyone's priority. So, I needed to become my own priority. I needed to choose myself, and part of that was doing what I wanted regardless of what anyone else thought.”
I forced myself to swallow and eyed her black hair. I was vibing with it before because it made her colorful eyes pop out even more than they naturally did. But to be honest, I now hated it. She basically just admitted she only changed it because of my dickhead moves.
I shifted in my seat uncomfortably. “Your hair?” I asked.
“Yes, my hair was one of the first things I did. This suits me better. I was never a bubbly blonde.” She shrugged.
I propped my elbows on the table and dropped my head in my hands, feeling disgusted with myself. When I left without saying goodbye, I hadn’t meant to hurt her.
“But you were my kind of blonde,” I mumbled.
“Again, you have no right to say that, Duke,” she said gently.
“I know, I know. I’m sorry. I was a dick, okay? I did think of you though, all the time.” I looked at her desperately, hoping that she believed me. “That’s what's so ironic about it.” I choked back a sick laugh. “I was choosing other people to make myselfstopprioritizing you. I was just a stupid kid.”
She tilted her head to the side. “Why did you want to stop?”
When I didn’t say anything, she started to exit the booth.
“No, stay, please…”
She took a deep breath and slowly sat back down.
“When we were little, I had a short fuse, everyone knew that,” I said.
She nodded.
I kept my eyes on my hands in front of me. “I got teased for liking you and I hated it. You know how that was, it was like the worst thing at the time… The boys would do things just to get under my skin– like Reggie picking you first in kickball. He knew I wanted to pick you. And Tyler scribbling your face out in my yearbook– I didn’t know he did that when I gave it to you by the way,” I quickly added, “and when I saw what happened, I beat his ass.”
She snorted. “ThatI remember.”
“It just felt like I wasn't allowed to like you… but as we got older…” I swallowed hard before choking out the truth: “It's like, I knew you were it for me.”
I finally looked up at her and she looked frozen in place.
“But then I knew I was leaving, and I couldn't leave without trying to kiss you. I couldn't do it. I needed you to know how much I liked you. But I sat there and figured you had your own thing going with skating, and we were so young. I had this weird confidence that we’d make it back together one day after I was in the NHL and you won the Olympics. Then we would get married and make a bunch of babies together. Like that's really what I thought. It was so simple in my mind.” I shrugged. “I’m very sorry.”
11.Claire
Looking across the booth at his sorry self, I deflated a bit… because my young self was finally justified in a way for feeling so hurt. I knew what I felt between us was real, and I knew I couldn't find that with anyone else. I bet he struggled to find a connection with anyone else as well and that’s why he probably stayed single.
But things would’ve been so different if he would’ve just been honest with me back then…
