Fourteen

by C. M. Smith

  “Will you come over tonight?” he asked, his eyes trained on the books piled in front of him. “We need to get everything for our project worked out.”

  He was right and I hated it. We still had a lot of work to do and barely any time to do it.

  “I’ll call my dad during lunch,” I said.

  “Thanks.” He played with the edges of his notebook.

  “Will you ever talk to me again?” he whispered.

  I almost faltered, the tone of his voice nearly breaking my heart, but I sucked in a deep breath, staring hard down at my books. “I’m talking to you now.”

  “About anything else but the project?”

  I shrugged, rubbing my thumb on the binding of my textbook. “I don’t know.”

  “Please just let me—”

  “No, Evan.”

  “Anna, please—”

  “Stop it,” I whispered, my eyes watering as I committed the doodles on the cover of my book to memory.

  “That was from a party about three weeks ago—”

  “Stop it, Evan.”

  “I didn’t know you then, Anna. It doesn’t make it right, but—”

  “Evan, stop.”

  Thankfully, the bell rang, and I think I was the first one up and out of my chair, practically running to the door and not caring whom I knocked over on my way there.

  I should’ve stayed home.

  I pulled up behind Evan as he parked in his driveway and placed my hands in my lap.

  It had been one hell of a confusing day, and I just wanted it over with. No one had said a word to me today—aside from Vince and Christina who had told me that they’d left the party almost as soon as they’d arrived—when I’d finally showed up in the cafeteria after calling my father who agreed to let me go because he was all about Evan these days.

  I had never gone through a school day where no one had made any kind of comment to me, and I wasn’t entirely sure what to do about it. There was a lot of staring and a few snickers that only made me speed up my pace as I walked by. I’d managed to avoid Kyle and Ashley, not entirely sure if they’d want to talk to me anyway but wanting to cover all of my bases while I could.

  I was mentally exhausted, and the last thing I really wanted to do was sit in Evan’s house with him as we worked on this stupid science fair project that started this whole damn mess.

  A few more months, Anna, and you’re gone. You won’t see him, and you won’t have to deal with any more of this crap. You can start over and things will be better. You’ll make them better.

  I grabbed my bag and pushed open the door. I got out and met him at the front of my car, and he offered me a weak smile before walking toward the house. I followed behind him, and he held the door open for me. He took off his shoes and hung his keys on a rack by the door. Figuring it was okay, I took off my shoes as well and checked to see if my socks were clean.

  “We can work in the dining room,” he said.

  “Okay.” I hitched my bag up higher on my shoulder as he walked ahead of me and into the living room.

  “Evan? Is that you?”

  “Yeah, Mom,” he called, nervously rubbing the back of his neck. “We’re here.”

  “We?”

  She popped out of some doorway, and I stuffed one hand in my pocket, hooking the other around the strap of my bag. Did she know what happened? Did she know anything about how her son had treated me all these years? Did she think it was justified?

  “Oh, Anna,” she exclaimed, grinning and walking over to me, hugged me and kissed both of my cheeks before stepping back. “Are you staying for dinner?”

  “My dad actually wants me home by six,” I lied, trying to offer her a smile. “He’s got to eat, too.”

  “Oh,” she said, pouting and then smiling reassuringly. “Well, all right, then. Make yourself at home. If either of you need me for anything, I’ll be in my office.”

  “Thanks, Mom.”

  She walked by Evan and squeezed his shoulder. He offered her a pathetic smile, and I wished we’d never been paired up for this stupid science fair.

  After she left, we both shifted awkwardly as we stood in a silence that seemed to drag on forever.

  “Did you want something to drink?” he finally asked.

  “Water, I guess,” I said, looking over in his general direction.

  “Dining room is through there,” he pointed to an archway across the room, “I’ll be there in a second if you want to go sit down.”

  I walked through the pristine living room and through the archway, looking around the equally elegant dining room and plopping down into one of the red and gold cushioned high-back chairs. Unzipping my bag, I pulled out the folders and notebooks and placed them on the table. I searched around in the front pocket for a pen, when I felt the envelope and pulled my hand out.

  I reached back in and pulled it out, running my thumbs across my name as my heart pounded in my chest. I turned it over and flipped it open, greeted with the back of what looked to be photo paper. My hands shaking, I pulled it out and dropped the envelope to the table, seeing that there was more of his handwriting on the back.

  This is what I did all night, Anna.

  I licked my lips and held my breath as I turned it over to find a picture of him wearing a black t-shirt, and a pair of dark blue jeans and white sneakers. He sat in a corner with a beer bottle in his hands. He was staring off in the opposite direction and seemed completely oblivious to whoever was taking the picture. The orange date stamp in the bottom corner of the picture proudly declared last Friday’s date.

  It didn’t make sense.

  I dropped that one to the table and flipped over the other one, my breath whooshing out of my lungs when I saw a very impressive picture of Evan punching Steve in the jaw; Evan’s face was red and his lips were pressed into a tight line. Once again, the date stamp declared it was last Friday.

  What the hell was going on?

  I dropped that one to the table and flipped over the last one, my mouth dropping open when I saw him. He was standing in front of Brittany and Grace. He had one hand in the air and pointed at something with his mouth open in what I assumed was mid-yell. Stupid confusing date stamp was there, too.

  I didn’t understand.

  I dropped that one to the table as well, leaned forward, and cradled my head in my hands. I concentrated on breathing evenly as I tried to sort out the muddled thoughts in my head.

  “Ashley wants to be a photographer.”

  I looked up at him as he carefully set a glass of water on the table, avoiding my gaze as he eased into the chair next to me.

  “She takes that damn camera with her everywhere she goes and always makes sure to document everything that happens.” He looked up at me, and I dropped my hands, letting them fall into my lap. “The video you saw was not from last Friday.”

  I closed my eyes briefly and then opened them, snatching up the picture of him hitting Steve. I held it out to him, shaking it.

  “Good shot, isn’t it?”

  I tilted my head. He sighed and took the picture from me, looking down at it.

  “He said some things”—he set the picture aside—“about you.”

  I looked away, fidgeting.

  “It pissed me off.”

  I pushed the one of him with Brittany and Grace over to him. I watched him from the corner of my eye as he rubbed the back of his neck.

  “I was telling them to go fuck themselves,” he said, craning his neck to look around and make sure that no one heard him, I assumed. “They agreed with what Steve said about you.”

  “What’d he say?”

  “It’s not—”

  “Tell me,” I demanded.

  He flicked the picture away from him, rested his arms on the table, and leaned down to rest his chin on his hands.

  “He said that I must like being the prettier one in the relationship and having the upper hand with you. That he wasn’t sure how I was going to . . .”—he groaned—“. . . how I
was going to sleep with you without getting sick or being crushed.”

  My eyes immediately watered, and I looked away, wanting nothing more than to curl up into a ball and disappear. When my lips began to quiver, I pressed them together and closed my eyes.

  “You hit him,” I whispered.

  “Fractured his jaw.”

  “You hit him for me.”

  “Yes,” he said, his voice strained.

  “Is he pressing charges?”

  “He’d have to tell his parents about what happened while they were away. It’s amazing how many people kept his parties a secret from his parents.”

  “How is he going to explain his jaw, then?”

  “Baseball practice.”

  “I don’t . . .”—I rubbed my eyes—“We have work to do.”

  “Anna, don’t you . . . ?”

  “I have a lot to sort out and I need time to think, so please don’t talk to me about it right now.” With his shoulders hunched in defeat, he looked so pitiful I almost felt bad for him.

  “Okay,” he said. “Can I just say one more thing?”

  I leaned back in the chair and fidgeted.

  “I’ve made a lot of mistakes when it comes to you, and I said a lot of things that were uncalled for and horrible. I thought I knew you then, and that I had a right to judge you, but I was an idiot. You didn’t deserve any of that. I’m sorry, Anna.”

  I stared down at my hands, and then leaned forward and placed my hands on top of my books.

  “Did you want to work on the paper or the board?” I asked.

  “I’ll work on the board,” he said. “Unless you want to.”

  “No, that’s fine. I need your part, though,” I said as I hunted in my bag for a pen.

  “Okay.” He got up. “I left my bag in the kitchen. I’ll be right back.”

  After he walked out, I leaned over my books, tapping my forehead against them and groaning.

  At this stage of the game, I couldn’t not believe him. The proof was sitting right in front of me. I could see that he was sorry about it, and he’d done nothing but apologize to me since. The fact of the matter, though, was that he’d still said those things. He’d been saying them since middle school and realizing that no matter what kind of person he’d recently turned in to, all of the comments and the insults from the past still hurt now. I couldn’t just put those feelings aside when I’d been dealing with them for so long, when I’d been so bitter toward him and his friends for so long. A big part of me didn’t fully understand why he was so willing to turn his back on his friends and his reputation for me.

  I looked up when he walked back into the room, and I stared hard at him as he sat down again.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Why?” I blurted. “Why are you putting so much time and effort into me?”

  “Because you’re worth it,” he said in a soft voice.

  “This is not a L’Oreal commercial, Evan.”

  He slouched back into his chair, crossing his arms over his chest, and stared at the table. “I don’t know what else you want me to say to you,” he said. “I meant everything I’ve said, and you don’t . . .”—he leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table to cradle his head—“I’m not that person anymore, Anna. I know that the video was only three weeks ago, but you know as well as I do; three weeks can change everything. Looking back, I didn’t like the person I was, and I know right now that I’d never go back to that. I need you to trust me on that. If you don’t then I don’t know what else to do. I’ll leave you alone when this is done, and that’ll be it.”

  The ache I’d been feeling for the past three days got worse, and I looked down at my books again.

  “Okay,” I whispered.

  He was quiet and out of curiosity, I looked up at him, my heart beating faster when I saw that his hands were covering his face. I was at a complete loss for words, not knowing what was going on in his head. It was then that I noticed the faint bruising on the knuckles of his right hand, and I glanced over at the pictures still littering the tabletop.

  “What do you want to put on the board?” he asked, his voice strained.

  “Whatever you think is best.”

  He stared out the windows in front of him and crossed his arms on the table, and then he leaned over, unzipped his bag, and pulled out his notebook. He flipped it open and ripped out a few sheets, handing them over to me and snapping it closed again. “I know that you don’t want to be here,” he said. “If you just want to do that at home, you can go.”

  “Are you kicking me out?”

  “No. I’m just giving you a reason to leave like I know you want to. I’m trying to make this as easy as possible for you.”

  “You think this is easy?”

  He shrugged.

  “It’s not . . . I feel like every part of me has just been . . . ripped open. Like everything I’m feeling or thinking is on display and I can’t . . .”—I closed my eyes when they filled again—“I hate feeling that way. I hate that you made me feel that way. I hate that I let you get to me and made me forget about everything you’d ever done . . .”

  “You hate me, I get it.”

  “I don’t!” I exclaimed, opening my eyes to look at him again. “I just need to figure things out.”

  I stared at his profile, and his jaw twitched.

  “You have no intentions of ever trusting me, do you?” he finally asked.

  “I don’t know what to do, Evan.”

  “Are you staying?”

  “Unless you really want me to go.”

  “I don’t ever want you to go,” he whispered before looking away from me and opening his notebook again.

  We spent the rest of the afternoon in silence, only asking questions when necessary. His mother poked her head in at one point, and he offered her that pathetically sad smile; I almost bolted out of the house, but she didn’t seem upset with me at all and actually smiled at me before letting us know she was going to start dinner and disappearing. I packed up my things at quarter to six, and Evan walked me to the door.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said as I slid back into my shoes.

  “Yeah.”

  “Drive safe.”

  “Thanks.”

  I turned from the door and fingered my keys as I walked to my car. I made it home and sluggishly walked into the still-empty house before locking the door behind me and walking up the stairs to my room.

  I still wanted to be mad at him. I wanted to feel justified being mad at him and not talking to him, but the truth was all I felt was a resounding ache. I don’t think I’d ever been more confused than I was right this moment, and I didn’t know what to do about it.

  “You’re in my way.”

  I looked up from my sluggish pace and saw Adam standing in front of me, a twisted smile on his face as he stood in front of me. I stared hard at him, not in the mood for any of this crap today.

  My head was everywhere but where it was supposed to be. I hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before because I was too busy thinking about everything that Evan had said and trying to make sense of it all. I had somehow managed to finish the human physiology paper, although I had no idea how and even managed to have an actual conversation with my father over dinner.

  Human physiology that morning had been pure torture. Evan remained silent throughout the entire class, saying a quick good morning when he’d first walked in before concentrating unnaturally hard on his notes.

  When the bell rang, he told me that his practice Thursday that would be longer than usual because there was a game on Friday, so we wouldn’t be able to get together to work on our project.

  I told him that we’d have to definitely work on it tonight to get all the details down for our presentation, and he’d agreed before telling me that he’d see me later and walking out.

  Part of me was relieved that he hadn’t tried to talk to me more, but there was still a little part of me that felt somewhat disappointed, which aggra
vated me beyond reason, and I’d spent my entire economics class trying not to tear my hair out.

  The entire day was one big mind screw, and I didn’t like it at all. For once in my life, I’d wished that absolutely nothing had changed. I hadn’t exactly enjoyed being picked on and teased by almost everyone, but at least I was used to it.

  “Go around me, Adam,” I said through my teeth.

  “Well, I’d like to”—he tapped his chin—“but your fat ass is taking up the whole hallway.”

  I couldn’t deal with this on top of everything else. Something inside of me just seemed to snap, and I couldn’t control my mouth. “Do you get off on saying things like that?” I snapped, narrowing my eyes at him. “Does it make you feel good about yourself?”

  “I . . .”

  “Do you even realize that when you leave this school and go off to college that you won’t be the badass you seem to think you are? Do you realize that you will get nowhere if you keep acting like this?”

  “Listen, fat ass—”

  “Yeah, go ahead and make fun of the way I look. Make yourself feel better. Just know that next year, I’ll be off to NYU and you’ll be flipping burgers. Get off your high horse, Adam.”

  With that, I shoved by him and stalked into the empty classroom, plopping down into my seat and leaning forward to cradle my head in my hands.

  “You all right, Anna?”

  It was Kyle. My avoidance techniques had clearly failed me today.

  “Fine,” I said, shifting uneasily.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah.” I stared down at my books and licked my lips nervously.

  “I told you to leave her alone, Adam.”

  I heard Evan’s voice out in the hallway, and I cringed, lacing my hands together and squeezing tightly. He was defending me against someone who used to be one of his good friends. Despite the fact that I told him I needed to think and couldn’t talk to him about it while I did it, he was still willing to stand up for me and protect me. It was definitely a step in the right direction, but there was just so much going on in my head right now that trusting him was still one of the very last things I could do right now.

  “You’re still picking the cow over us? What the hell is wrong with you?”