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I’ll just tell Elliot, and then he can’t get weird about it.
“I’ll wait out here,” he replies as if I was ever going to invite him in.
I quickly text Elliot and grab my bag.
Abigail: Ethan asked me if I want to get breakfast on the way to class. I can tell him no but he’s being pretty insistent about it.
Elliot: It’s fine. Ethan is a good guy. You should go
Abigail: You’re sure? I don’t have to if you don’t want me to.
Elliot: It’s just breakfast, Abi. Make sure you eat something.
Disappointment wells in my chest. I guess deep down, I hoped for a different reply.
“Abi, let’s go. I’m starving,” Ethan calls.
I pocket my phone and head for the door, joining him in the hallway.
“So how was your weekend?”
“My weekend?”
“Why do you always do that?” he chuckles, and I frown.
“Do what?”
“Answer with a question.”
“I… I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” he says. “It’s cute. But you also sound so unsure of yourself, Abi. Like you can’t actually believe I’d want to be your friend.”
“Why do you want to be my friend? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Like I said before, I know what it’s like to lose your family. I didn’t really have anyone to help me when… Well, you know?”
“You’ve got tons of friends Ethan.”
“You can be surrounded by people but still be lonely, Abi.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Again with the sorrys, Bancroft.” He grins down at me as we leave my dorm building and cut across the lawn toward sixth form. “You seem a bit better,” he remarks. “Lighter somehow. That’s good. I was worried there for a second.”
“Really?”
I still find it odd that he cares. But I guess that’s what years of being the odd girl out will do to you.
“Really.” He rolls his eyes as he pulls open the door for me to enter the building.
There are a few students milling around but the morning rush hasn’t arrived yet, which I’m grateful for.
“Something smells good,” Ethan says as we reach the cafeteria.
I still don’t feel entirely comfortable being here with him but that empty, lonely part of me is grateful for a friend. Especially when so many students cast their sympathetic, pitiful gazes towards me.
But it isn’t really Ethan I want to be here with. It’s Elliot. And that can’t happen. Not today. Not tomorrow.
