God, and I can’t fucking believe Leif had the balls to talk to her like that. I can handle pokes at my own shortcomings, but when the girl I love is under fire, all signs of mercy get thumbed over.
I haven’t spoken to Staten since last night. Even now, as I walk across the quad, I pray I don’t run into her. Nausea coils in my belly, turning the breakfast sandwich I snatched from the McDonald’s drive-thru against me.
Leif is echoing what my dad has always said: that I’m never going to be enough. My father has always tried sculpting me to his liking, molding me into an impossible shape—one that doesn’t have the stability to withstand the kiln. One that breaks and shatters the second measly pressure is applied. And that’swhere I’ve lived for the past fourteen hours: vacuum-sealed in doubt and self-loathing.
I wish I could just shut it all out. Why do I care so much about what Leif thinks of me? Why do I even listen to him? He’s destroying my relationship with Staten. Or maybeI’mthe one destroying it. Staten had a good thing going before I became involved in her life.
The five unread text messages from my girlfriend sit in my phone, waiting, haunting me the longer I inflict this unwarranted distance.
She’s all I can think about. She’s the only person who makes life worth living, and I don’t want to be the person I was before her. The egotistical, shallow, careless asshole who thought that intimacy was a joke and commitment was beneath him. She’s shown me quiet mercy when the sounds of war rumbled around me. I should’ve known that my fairy-tale ending with her was never promised. Leif may be the perpetuator, but I hold the executioner’s sword in one hand.
Pigeon-toed, my gait is sluggish as I drag myself to my next class, and the overcast sky camouflages itself into an unwelcome eventide, dark clouds collecting overhead with the announcement of a brontide that sounds far too close for comfort. I can feel threaded strings of raindrops plunk onto my head—can see the damp impressions they leave behind on cold concrete. The weather is trying to warn me of something, but I don’t heed it.
When I round the bend—expecting the familiar corner of the science building that I’ve acquainted myself with for two semesters—something else catches me off guard entirely, and I do a double take. While I fight emotional whiplash, the world seems to hold its breath as it waits for me to register the image wobbling in my strained vision.
Staten—unmistakable with her cascade of black hair—and Leif hug each other out in the open.
I feel a muscle in my jaw feather, and although I’m not surprised when envy comes out swinging, I definitely don’t expect a spate of undeniable sadness to find me first.
I didn’t know they were on speaking terms again. She looks so…happy. I guess it never dawned on me that I pushed one of her best friends out of the picture because I was being a selfish bastard.
Leif’s qualms revisit me in my moment of weakness—which are far more frequent, unfortunately—and my voice feels two sizes too small for the words I want to say. Do I call out to her? Do I interrupt them?
My confidence has been plucked like flower petals, and every sensation in the prison of my body amplifies without my permission—my ragged breathing, the heartbeat that threatens to punch in my rib cage, the cursed sickness that plays with my gag reflex. I can’t move despite my nervous system racing at the speed of light. I’m caught in the in-between where the past and future disappear, and my brain makes sure to smear over Staten’s ghostly presence. For a terrifying second, she doesn’t exist in either realm.
Would she really be happier with Leif? I bet she’d inherit less familial drama if she were with him. No fighting, no stress, just the happily ever after that she deserves. Leif is her best friend; he can take care of her in ways I don’t think I can.
I’m fucked up. My family is fucked up. My dad may have apologized for the trauma he caused me, but I still have years of therapy to work through.
God, I can’t think straight. I feel like I’m trying to steel myself on a waterbed, but I can’t gain any traction amongst the constantly moving waves. And things only get worse when I unintentionally eavesdrop on their conversation.
“I’m ready now. I want to be your boyfriend,” Leif says plainly, with no room for mistranslation.
He…what? Oh my God. I should’ve seen this coming. Ofcourse he wants back in her life just as I’ve fucked up enough to let him squeeze through the cracks. He’s painting himself to be the hero, and it’s somehow worse than making me the villain. This is what Staten wanted from the very beginning.
“I—this is all a lot for me to process. I can’t give you the answer you’re looking for right now,” Staten replies.
Before they catch on to my nonconsensual stalking, I dip back behind the corner and flatten myself against the brick wall of the building, searching for a truce that I’ll never find. When the first wet casualties slip down my face, I’m not sure whether it’s rain or tears.
Why didn’t she tell him no?
She deserves so much better than you. If you really loved her, you’d let her go.
How can I? How can I when she’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me?
Look at you, being selfish again. If the positions were switched, what do you think she’d do? She’d put your happiness above her own.
I can do better. I canbebetter. I can apply myself and work harder and?—
Face it, Knox. You’re damaged goods. She didn’t sign up to be your therapist. You’re a liability. A loud, energy-draining, worthless liability. You’re too much. You always have been. That’s what happens when Mommy and Daddy don’t give you enough attention.
Stop it. Stop saying those things.
Why? They’re certainly true. I’m just trying to help you.
No, you’re trying to ruin everything.
You’ve done a hell of a job of that already.
