“Still feel worse than you look?”
“Jury’s out,” I reply. I sit on my bed and take a makeup wipe to my face. Madison doesn’t respond, and we descend into a silence that’s far from comfortable. Desperate to fill the silence and give my mind something to focus on that isn’t Alex, I mention, “I saw Ellie tonight.”
When I look up and see horror written all over her face, I backtrack. “That’s not why—this is a completely separate—I’m not crying because of Ellie.”
I hear a relieved breath rush out of her even from my spot across the room, and I can’t help but laugh at the misunderstanding. And laughing feels so much better than crying that once I start, it’s hard to stop.
“What the hell is so funny?” she asks, but there’s amusement coloring her tone, like she wants to laugh even if she doesn’t quite get the joke.
“It’s just—” I stop to catch my breath. “It’s just that Ellie asked if I could tell you that he apologized and I forgave him so you might text him back. And instead, I came in as a total hot-mess puddle of tears and made you think Ellie was the reason. Oops.”
“Is that true?” she asks, her words slow and cautious. “Did you forgive him? You don’t have to, you know. I read what he wrote. It was really fucked-up.”
“It was—” I pause, looking for the right word. “Tactless, to be certain. But it was also raw and honest, in the one-sided way honesty often is. I know he didn’t mean any harm by it. So, yeah, I forgave him.”
“Well, that’s good, I guess. For the record, I’m still pissed on your behalf.”
I’m tempted to thank her and leave it at that, but I know there’s morethat needs to be said. “I’m sorry I yelled at you back at Ellie’s place. I was hurt and shocked—but that’s no excuse.”
“You were right.” She shrugs. “I totally broke girl code.”
“No,youwere right. I’ve been MIA all semester, and you barely know me. You didn’t owe me anything, and you didn’t do anything wrong.”
“If that were true, I wouldn’t have felt the need to sneak around. So I’m sorry. And I’m sorry I said we aren’t friends.”
“Are you saying—arewe friends?” I ask, tentative and awkward and completely unashamed about it.
“I mean, Iwantedto be your friend.” She laughs, but her eyes dart around as if she’s not sure how much to say. “I think that’s why I was so upset. I was so nervous about college and scared I’d have one of those nightmare roommates that, like, leaves their dirty underwear lying around or constantly has guys in the room or—I don’t know, any of the million things that can be wrong with a roommate—and instead you were cool, and I thought we were getting close. And then you started ignoring me and hanging out with Helen and Alex all the time, so I—oh God, were you crying because ofAlex?”
“I don’t want to talk about him.” I brush her off, only to catch a flash of hurt in her eyes—or maybe it’s worry; it’s so quick, a blink-and-you-miss-it moment, I can’t quite tell. Things are so new between us, and building this friendship is going to require me to allow myself to be vulnerable.
Despite what Kimiko said about the disconnect of being thirty-something years old and friends with an eighteen-year-old, I realize Idostill value my friendship with Madison.
“Sorry, we just—we got into a big fight, and I’m still processing.”
“Process away,” she says. She stands, walks over to the minifridge, and pulls two pints of ice cream out of the small freezer section. She brings one over to me with a spoon, and I fight a smile when I see that it’sHäagen-Dazs coffee ice cream, both of our favorite and the first thing we bonded over. I had forgotten about that.
“Boys are the literal worst,” Madison comments after we’ve spent a few minutes eating in silence.
“They really are,” I acknowledge around a bite of ice cream. “But—and I promise I’ll let this drop and never mention him again after this if you want—I think Ellie’s a pretty good guy. Maybe you should give him another shot. If you want to. Or there’s always Patrick…”
“We’ll see,” she says, but she wears a small smile that tells me all I need to know.
I have no clue where this will lead. It’s possible that in pushing her back into Ellie’s arms, I’m creating a big mess for her down the line if she wakes up and realizes that Patrick is her perfect match.
Maybe I’m taking the messy, unrequited, pining mess I lived in for fourteen years and pawning that off on Patrick.
Maybe I’m worried over nothing, and everything will work out in the end.
Or maybe life is messy, and nothing ever works out as neatly as we’d like.
Maybe there’s always someone standing on the sidelines, silently suffering through heartbreak, even if you don’t notice them.
I’m almost asleep when my ringtone cuts through the silence and yanks me back to reality. I bolt up at the sight of Kimiko’s name on my screen.
I completely forgot about Kimiko and Helen.
The realization causes a pang of guilt to jolt through me. I left them alone at the party without so much as an explanation.
