“No. This is the opposite of funny. I just thought we were going to part on better terms, and I hate that we won’t.”
“Part?” I ask, shoulder jumping. “What are you talking about? Maisy, I don’t want this to be the end of anything. I’m here because I’m willing to listen.”
“And you’d believe it, wouldn’t you? Or you’d pretend like you did.” She crosses her arms. “If I spun a line about test-driving him for you, then deciding you never needed to know, because he wasn’t good enough for Paige Lancaster, my best friend.”
It would’ve been a good line, too.
“But no,” she says, spine straightening. “This is a thing I did, and now I have to own it, even though I don’t want to.”
This I wasn’t expecting. “Then why did you do it?” I ask.
She scratches her arm. Chews on her lip. She looks so small. Guilty.
“That morning. The morning he called me—tried to call you. I’d been dropped from this one sorority during recruitment and was feeling wounded. It’s not an excuse, but I was in a bad headspace. Somehow, my mom found out—I guess through some parental connection—and reamed me out about performing better. Then shortly after, Liam called me and”—she looks at the ceiling—“I was saying words before I thought them through. This wasn’t Paige, it was Maisy. You had probably assumed he wanted my number. Oh, yes, he’d mentioned me at the time, maybe thatiswhat had happened. Could I give him your number instead? Sorry, but he couldn’t have you; you were already taken. And then I asked Liam to pick me instead.”
“Why, though?” I ask, blinking. “Why?”
“Because I was still a little mad at you for evenbeinghere,” she finally admits. “For not giving either of us any room to breathe. And also because during that particular week, when things weren’t going my way, I needed my life to stay the same as it had always been,” she explains. “I needed you to be the Paige you’d alwaysbeen so I could be the same Maisy. And I know how wrong it was. How unfair, how cruel, how awful. I always knew it, which is why I hoped you’d never find out.”
Her honesty might be the most alarming thing about this entire confession. The meat of it I already knew, on some deep, inherent level. I just never imagined Maisy owning up to it.
“From the bottom of my heart, Paige,” she whispers. “I’m so,sosorry. I know the timing is…convenient, but I’m trying to be different now. And I really am so sorry.”
I stare at her, impressed and livid in equal doses. We’re both quiet as I gather my thoughts, figure out how to forgive her, how to apologize for making it feel like I was suffocating her, how we can put this behind us.
She gathers hers faster.
“I think there’s a chance we’ve been pigeonholing each other for a long time now,” Maisy says.
My head cocks. “What do you mean?”
She sighs, rubbing her lips together. “You as the second. Me as the leader. It isn’t that way with my other friendships, Paige. There’s so much more balance, a give-and-take. You assumed your role and I assumed mine, and that’s how we’ve operated for years.”
She’s saying the same things that Liam and I voiced to each other months back. That certain friendships are defined at the outset and have to be remolded to take a new shape.
I’m willing to remold our friendship.
“You’re right,” I whisper, voice wobbling. “I, for one, am ready to take off this skin now. I’ve outgrown it. I’m over it, Maisy. And I think there’s a chance you’ve outgrown yours, too.”
Her head is shaking. “But we have known each other for so long,” she says, “and we’ve gotten so accustomed to each other’s behavior, that we can’tdowhat we need to do, grow into the people we want to be, and stay best friends.”
My heart is racing, my head heavy enough to topple me. This isn’t what I wanted. I didn’t plan to cut her off, for her to cut me off.
“I’m doing an abroad program this summer,” she admits. “And next fall, I’m transferring to a school in DC. I want to get out of Tennessee, see the world.”
Does she remember? That that’s incredibly close to what my mom allegedly said to my dad before she abandoned our family? Closer still to what Dad said to me before he sold the house I grew up in and got a passport?
The floor is sliding out from under me.
“Is that what you wanted to tell me?” I ask.
Maisy nods. “This was always going to be a goodbye of sorts,” she admits. “I just hoped it’d be less…” She doesn’t finish the sentence, moves on to her next. “We never should’ve gotten to the point where I could sabotage you, and then lie about it foryears,” Maisy whispers. “We never even should’ve gotten to the point where your only option was moving to Knoxville for mine and Zara’s companionship.”
I’m getting punched from all sides, my eyes misting, her resolve a tsunami set to wreck me.
“Are you breaking up with me?” I ask.
Maisy smiles sadly. “I’m taking accountability for my part in the way we built this friendship. And I’m suggesting we get some distance.”
