No Regrets (No Regrets #1)

by Aimee Noalane

  “That’s not what it is…”

  “Right.” She pushed herself off me, and I suddenly felt cold and empty without her.

  “Abs, can we–can’t we talk about this?”

  “No. We can’t.” She backed away from me and walked out from the locker room without looking back.

  “Abbygail,” I yelled opening the door.

  She stopped and turned around, and in the moment of silence, I pleaded her with my eyes to listen to the song. Her face was wet with tears.

  “Have a nice fucking life in B.C., Oliver.”

  Saying Nothing

  Oliver

  I was shooting hoops in my front yard using my basketball as a magic eight ball when I felt her walking behind me. It was a pretty stupid game. I’d ask a question, if I got it in, the answer would be a yes. If I missed, then the answer was no. I knew that relying on a ball and basket for my answers was ridiculous, but I always experienced a sense of relief when I scored and got the answer I wanted. And at that exact moment, I needed the reassurance that everything was going to be okay.

  I still couldn’t believe that my mother agreed to our moving. It took her three days to decide, but I managed to convince her. When we spoke a few days after our first talk, she admitted to her struggling with my father’s death. She confessed that just like me, she’d had a hard time with living in our family home, and that a change of scenery could be beneficial for the both of us. I was officially moving to B.C.

  I just wasn’t expecting for things to move on as fast as they did.

  My Uncle Jerry was a real estate agent, and my mother contacted him as soon as she gave me the news. In less than a week they had everything planned out, and I was told to pack my bags. While my mother was to stay behind and put everything in order, I was expected at Clover High, my new school, as of the following Monday.

  Truthfully, with everything being so precipitated, I was starting to question my mother’s motives. Obviously I wouldn’t ask; the last thing I needed was for her to change her mind or question mine, but in truth it was going way too fast and I hated it. What happened between Abby and me at homecoming was confusing me about B.C., and I was starting to regret my decision to move away, completely.

  Will Abby ever forgive me for not telling her I was leaving? Nah, scratch that. Will Abby ever forgive me?

  “It’s going to be a no.” I heard her voice from behind.

  I turned. She was standing in my driveway in her tight ripped jeans, and her god-forsaken Rolling Stones tank top that made me lust after her body every time she wore it. She had it on so often it was all worn out.

  Does she not know that I can totally see her bra through her shirt right now?

  I spun around to face the basket and groaned. “You don’t even know what I asked.”

  “Doesn’t matter. I know you’ll miss.”

  I did a jump shot and waited for the ‘swish’ sound, but it never came. The ball bounced back so hard on the backboard, it flew right into her hands.

  “Told you,” she replied. She held the ball on her hip as if she owned the game. “And I’m ready to talk now.”

  “There’s nothing to talk about, Abby. The decision’s been made already.” I extended my hand for her to give it back to me, but she just glared at me like she didn’t give a shit about what I wanted. “Could you just give me the ball back, please?”

  “This one?” she asked, and threw it all the way across the street. How she could always find the easiest way to annoy me was beyond me.

  “Really? What the hell was that for?”

  “You promised you wouldn’t leave me.”

  “I never promised anything,” I stated. “You asked me to never disappear on you. I never replied.”

  “So you knew you were leaving two weeks ago and didn’t tell me?”

  “I had just spoken with my mom two weeks ago. She gave me her answer a few days later.”

  “I can’t believe you. So that’s it? You’re just giving up?”

  “Giving up? Abby, I lost my dad. You can’t possibly know how this feels.”

  “News flash, Oliver, I lost my dad, too.”

  “Abs, your dad picked up and left on his own accord. Your situation is completely different than mine. So don’t even try to compare.”

  “I loved your dad just as much as you did,” she responded angrily.

  “Maybe, but he was my dad.”

  Talk about being possessive.

  “It’s my fault he died, and unlike yours, there is absolutely no chance for me to see him, ever again.”

  “First off, my dad’s a dick. I don’t want to see him again. And secondly, how can his death possibly be your fault? You were at school when it happened, Oliver. What did you do? Call upon the car gods and pay them off so that your dad would get into an accident?”

  “Stop being stupid, Abby.”

  “You’re the one who’s being stupid, Oliver. But just for the hell of it, humor me. Please explain. How can you possibly be responsible for a car accident that you were not a part of?”

  “He was late, Abby. He was late because of me. I kissed you, and I was worried that I had screwed up everything between us.”

  “If you’re going to blame his death on kissing me, then I should be just as guilty as you are, because I kissed you back.”

  So you did kiss me back… Wait no. Why do I even care about this now?

  I shook my head at how easily I could lose my focus when Abby was around.

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” I growled.

  “You’re the one that’s being ridiculous. Your dad’s death was an accident, Oliver. It had nothing to do with our kissing.” Tears were forming in her crystal blue eyes. “Don’t taint our kiss with your stupidity.”

  “Taint?”

  “Yes taint. Taint as in ruin something that felt–” She closed her lips into a thin line.

  “That felt what?”

  She furrowed her brow as if she was looking for an appropriate answer. “Why did you kiss me?”

  “What do you mean why?”

  “It’s not a college level question, Ol. You said you thought you screwed up our relationship after kissing me. Why did you do it if you were so afraid of my reaction?”

  “I wasn’t afraid of your reaction. I did it to piss you off, to get a rise out of you, and it worked.”

  “Did it?”

  “Of course it did. Don’t you remember what happened when I picked you up for school the next morning?”

  “Fine,” she growled. If we weren’t in the middle of a life changing fight, I probably would have been gloating. Abby finally conceding and letting me winning an argument was as rare as unicorn shit. She rubbed her temples. “What about yesterday?”

  “What about yesterday?”

  “You kissed me for like an hour in the locker room.”

  “Well you didn’t exactly pull away now, did you?”

  “I never said I did… but I’m trying to figure you out, Oliver. Did you smoke so much weed last night that you lost your line of judgement?”

  I glared at her. It bugged me that she thought so little of me or us for that matter. “I wasn't high last night, Abby.”

  “Well, then tell me, why did we kiss yesterday?

  “What do you want me to say?”

  “Say something. ANYTHING.”

  “I don’t know ,Abby. I can’t tell you what you want to know because I don’t know. I wanted to know what it would feel like to–DAMN IT. I don’t know. But it doesn’t change anything.”

  “You’re wrong. Our kissing; it changed everything. If you want to know something, then ask me. If you want to tell me something, then tell me.”

  “What’s done is done, Abby. Just let it be.”

  “I CAN’T. That’s what you don’t get, Oliver. I’m losing you…I already lost you. I’m trying to wrap my head around what the hell is going on between us, but I can’t because you won’t talk to me. It’s as if all of a sudden, you don’t care
about me–about us–anymore”

  I looked away. If she wasn’t going to stop asking questions, I was going to break and I didn’t want her to find out how I felt about her because it would make leaving her even more difficult than it already was.

  “Do not look away from me, Oliver Langton. I’m talking to you. I want you to feel exactly what I’m feeling.”

  Trust me, I am, and more.

  “I want you to know how much you’re hurting me, because all you’ve been doing for weeks is avoiding me. But mostly I want you to know how much I love you, and how much you mean to me. I can’t not have you in my life, Oliver. You and I, we’re supposed to be a team. I need you to… I need you to breathe. My last month has been hell without you. Nothing makes sense if you’re not here with me.”

  “You’ll figure it out.”

  “I don’t want to figure it out.”

  I let my head drop in defeat and looked at the fading daisy flowerbed Abby was standing by. The one she planted with my father for my mother’s birthday last summer. The one she was digging into when I realized I was in love with her. It seemed like ages ago.

  What happened?

  “What happened to us, Oliver?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “What happened at the hospital? What have I done, to make you hate me so much?”

  “I don’t hate you,” I vindicated.

  “Then tell me what I did wrong. I must be pretty stupid because I can’t seem to figure it out.”

  “Abby, you are not stupid. I don’t hate you, and you did nothing wrong. I–” I stopped myself from talking. I couldn’t go there. Not now, not ever.

  She looked at me expectantly. “You what?”

  “Nothing.” I snarled.

  “You gave me a week. One teeny weenie week of a somewhat friendship since you shut me out at the hospital a month and a half ago. What have I done that’s so horrible? But most of all, what can I do to fix it?

  “There’s nothing to fix, Abby.”

  “Then tell me what to do, Oliver. I want you to stay. I need you.”

  “I want to leave, Abs. Everything here–everything I look at, it hurts. I miss him.”

  “So your solution is to just leave? Why?”

  “Yes. Because it’s just better this way.”

  “Better for whom? You?”

  “YES, ME. My mom, me… it’s better for you, Abby.”

  “This isn’t better for me. I need you, Oliver. You’re all I have left.”

  “Abbygail, I want you to listen to me.” I took her face in my hands, bored her clear blue eyes into mine and lied. “You need to understand that I am not going to change my mind about this. I don’t care what you say, or what you think you can say in hopes of changing my mind; it’s not going to work. I want you to stop. And if you have ever cared for me, ever, you’ll just let me go.”

  “Oliver I–” She frowned. “I just…”

  She looked at the ground, then up to me, studying my face as she searched for, or tried to figure out what she could say next. Tears clouded her beautiful face with every step she took away from me. She backed away until she reached the dying flowerbed, and when she did, she crumbled to the ground. I watched her gasp with pain, barely able to breathe. Her world was shattering, and I did nothing but watch her fall to pieces.

  “Oliver, please.” She wasn’t looking at me, she was staring at the dead flowers before her. “You can’t leave. I don’t want you to go.”

  Maintaining silence was hard, and when she realized that I wouldn’t respond to her pleas she looked up to me, and I shook my head. The loud cry she let out wrecked me. I was coming to terms with leaving the girl I loved behind, but abandoning and purposefully hurting my best friend was an entirely different story. Even if it was for her own good, my heart was breaking right along with Abbygail’s.

  I wasn’t even gone and I already missed her.

  She picked herself up from the ground before I shut the door. I watched her stand, in hopes of seeing her walk away from us. If it was easy for her to get up and leave, then it would be easier for me to say goodbye.

  But I was wrong.

  When I saw her rise unsteadily, I realized that her pain was sufficient enough for me to change my mind.

  The second she looked up at me, I begged her with my eyes. It was as if everything had been forgotten, and that all I wanted was for her to say something, to ask me to stay one last time. If she did, I would ask my mom to call everything off. I knew that I was being selfish, but I didn’t want to be without Abby anymore. She was right, she and I, we were a team.

  “Oliver,” she blubbered.

  I held her gaze, showing her that I was there, that I needed her just as much as she needed me, that all she had to do was ask me to stay home, and I would.

  But there was something wrong.

  Something in her dark eyes told me that it was too late; they were void of tears but filled with pain.

  “I hate you.”

  And the worst part of her words; what had siphoned the last light of my broken soul was that for the first time in our lives, she meant it.

  Locked out

  Oliver

  “Seems to me like you’re in need of a talk with our next door neighbor,” my mother said taking me out of my slumber. I looked up to her standing in the doorway. The hallway light was illuminating her from my dark room.

  After my argument with Abby I called Damian, got my fix and came back home to an empty house.

  “What time is it?” I asked with my eyes still adjusting to the light.

  “Almost eight p.m.”

  Great. So I managed to sleep all day. Damian Bushmans you’re a fucking genius.

  “I’m hungry. Did you prepare anything for dinner?”

  She narrowed her eyes at me. “There’s some left over roast-beef from yesterday in the fridge. You can make yourself a sandwich. We were supposed to have dinner with the Evens’ tonight. Remember?”

  I racked my brain, trying to recall when I had agreed to have dinner at Abbygail’s house, but couldn’t figure it out.

  “She wasn't up for it either. So don’t feel bad.”

  “Trust me, I don’t.”

  “Okay...” She frowned. “So now I’m really curious. What happened between the both of you today?”

  “She found out I was leaving tomorrow.”

  “Just now?” my mother shouted. Her harsh voice made me flinch, although it might also have been the fact that she was just very loud, and I wasn’t quite awake yet. “How could you keep information like this from your best friend, Oliver? What the hell is the matter with you?”

  Nope, that was her being mad, after all.

  “I kept it from everyone, not just her, and she found out yesterday. Today we just had a really bad fight about it.”

  “I doubt an extra fifteen hours makes much of a difference in her opinion.” She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at me. “And honestly, I’m going to side with her on this one.”

  I rose from my bed and flattened my disheveled hair by putting my Volcom cap on. “I don’t see what the problem is.”

  “How about trying to reverse the roles, and stand in her shoes for a sec?”

  Okay, let me rephrase: You don’t see what the problem is.

  “How would you feel if your best friend upped and left within hours of notifying you?”

  How would you feel if you needed to stand in front of your best friend, with whom you are also in love, and tell her that you want to change your entire life because you’re not worthy of her or anything else in life?

  “You don’t get it.”

  “You’re right. I don’t. She’s your best friend, Oliver. She’s our family.”

  “Mom, I made this decision for myself. It was just better for me this way. If you wanted her to know before now, you should have just told her yourself two weeks ago, when you told me.”

  “Trust me, I wanted to, but her mom and I agreed that th
e news should come from you, seeing as you’re the one who made the request to move in the first place.”

  “I bet you were just hoping I’d change my mind.”

  Her lips pursed and that’s when I understood why she’d planned my departure as quickly as she did.

  I slipped on my sweatshirt and crossed my arms over my chest. “Well, I’m not. Your plan backfired, Mom. We’re leaving. Living here, with Dad gone, it’s too much to handle.”

  “And what about, Abby?”

  “What about her?” I slipped passed my mother, and went down the steps.

  “You two have been inseparable for sixteen years.”

  “She’ll figure it out,” I retorted as I stepped inside the kitchen. I reached inside the fridge, and looked for the ingredients to make myself a sandwich.

  I would have preferred pizza, but whatever.

  “Will she? And what about you? How will you deal with your feelings for her?”

  I dropped a lump of mayo on my bread and looked up to my mother. I studied her face and tried to figure out if she really knew that I was in love with my best friend, or if she was just insinuating. I opted for number two, and returned to my sandwich making.

  “I have no feelings for Abbygail.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yes, Mom, seriously. Now could you please just butt out? I’m tired of talking about this.”

  “You can’t leave her like this, Oliver. If you do, it will destroy her. It will destroy you.”

  “Fine.” I muttered with my mouth full. “I’ll finish this and then I’ll go see her.”

  ***

  My mother had all but kicked me out of the house, complaining about my procrastination and delaying the inevitable. She understood nothing. It took me a little over two hours to summon up my courage to go see my best friend. I kept trying to decide if leaving while Abby was mad at me was better than us making peace. If she was mad at me, then maybe she would miss me less, and if she missed me less, then maybe I could pretend like I didn’t care… but the truth was, I did care, I would always care.

  It was cold when I stepped outside. The dark sky was filled with imposing clouds, and I shivered under their darkness. There was something about the light of the moon and the stars hiding behind their shadows that felt unsettling.