“Well, and I didn’t think anyone cared if I came or not,” I mumble, my chest aching.
I can feel Eris’s stare of confusion as I drive. “Bro, and I thoughtIwas stupid.”
Screwing my face up to hide the burning in my eyes, I spit out an offended, “Excuse you?”
“You think I invite anyone over? OrStelladoes? Hell no! Dream likes to host shit, so we end up at her and Adrienne’s house.” Eris pokes the side of my head. “We all want to be your friend, you just have to let us. Show up sometimes. Open up, and talk about yourself more.”
Fighting another apology, I swat zis hand away from my face. “I talk about myself!”
Eris catches my fingers. “Barely. When Dream makes you, you share facts about your life, but you don’t tell us anything real.”
“Oh, likeyou’reany better?” Why is Eris still holding my hand? Why am I letting zim? Why can’t I pull away from the strangely comforting grip?
“Look, I’m emotionally repulsive as a defense mechanism, but I joke about my trauma enough that my friends don’t feel shut out. I open up more about heart-to-heart shit in private, not at brunch.” Eris scoffs, pulling my hand towards zim. “You’re just a pushover who can’t set boundaries, so you tell people the barest facts when they ask, instead of telling them you don’t wanna talk about it. Getting you to share your feelings or opinions about anything is like pulling teeth.”
Zis hand still holds mine, thumb warm against my knuckles and zis grip grounding me. Unwilling to pull away, I keep my eyes firmly on the road. Quietly, I admit, “I don’t know how to make friends. And, well…” I hesitate, but if this is how Eris makes friends, then I can share my real feelings. Ze sees the realme already, and ze still volunteered to accompany me to this impending catastrophe. “No one will like me if I open up. I’m not all that nice.”
My jaw clenches; it sounds so pathetic.
My thoughts must be broadcasting directly to Eris, because ze says, “Do you hear how pathetic that sounds?”
I groan, fighting the urge to bash my forehead into the steering wheel. “Yeah, and I’m not proud of it.”
“No one cares if you’renice.” Derision drips from Eris’s voice at the very idea. “Kelsey is a gossipy ass bitch, Stella is a complete brat, Adrienne can be manipulative as hell, and Dream is so damn pushy! None of them are ‘nice’ either, why do you think you have to be?”
“Don’t forget yourself! You’re an asshole,” I add, hoping to redirect the conversation to a subject where Eris isn’t examining my heart under a microscope.
Eris chuckles half-heartedly. “Look, Bambi, I’m warning you now that I’m about to drag your ass everywhere. This whole time, everyone thought you were just shy and shit, or they told me I hurt your feelings because you’re sensitive. But no, you’re just fucking clueless.”
I tsk, fighting a smile, my chest tight and warm in a way that can’t be explained away by my binder. Chicago is nothing like Solberg. I thought Adrienne was just being nice because I didn’t have any friends. But maybe I could have friends; I just have to trust that they’ll still like me if I drop my facade.
Starting with Eris, who is still holding my hand, which is weird, but nice. I should get used to it. Over the next two days, I’m going to have to hold zis hand a lot. That ze wants to be my friend, wants to be my fake date for this wedding, still seems irrational; Eris has seen through my forced politeness from the start.
“You know, it’s a miracle you came out, considering what a weak ass bitch you are,” Eris scoffs. “Seriously, you don’t let yourself take up any space unless someone invites you in like a damn vampire, and yet you’re out of the closet?”
I shrug, because I see zis point. “I told you, in my town, I’m the rebel.”
“Nah.” Eris shakes zis head. “There’s no way they’re worse than you.”
I shrug again, and to my shame, my shoulders get caught around my ears. “Small town mentality.”
“I grew up in a small town too, and no way was itthatbad.”
I bite back my skepticism. Eris seems so at home in the city, our definition of a small town must be different. “Your town must not have been ninety percent Norwegian Lutherans,” I retort instead, softened by zis thumb rubbing across my knuckles.
Out of the corner of my eye, Eris turns toward me, adding zis other hand to clasp mine completely between zis. The knuckles reading “amor” and “odio” interlace between my fingers. Ze inhales, as if ze’s about to say something else. But I spot my first landmark in the distance.
“Look.” Eager to change the subject, I point with the hand ze holds, half-hoping ze lets go. Eris doesn’t, and the other half of me doesn’t mind. “See that ridge?”
Eris hums in assent, looking out the window at the small hills stretching into the distance.
“That’s a glacial moraine. That’s where the glaciers left all the dirt and rocks that got ground up during the ice age.”
Eris lets me change the subject. “So the part we just left wasn’t under the glaciers?”
“It was, just a different ice age. We started in the Lake Michigan lobe, and now we’re in the Green Bay lobe.”
“Such a nerd, Bambi,” Eris says, so softly it sounds like a compliment.
