Just as I opened my mouth to tell Ben that I’d be right back, he said something first. “Sorry about…everything.”
I stared at him. “What do you mean?” I knew what he was talking about, but I also wanted him to be more specific, to see if he would tell me what had been going on with him.
And maybe hoping that this awkward encounter had helped fix things.
Whatever there was to fix.
If at first he’d met my eyes, now he kept his gaze on his desk. “Just sorry.”
I waited for him to explain why he’d gotten all weird and stopped talking to me. Because what we had before? I wanted that.
So bad.
But that’s not what happened next.
He exhaled. “For leading you on. It was wrong of me.”
What?
Had I heard him right?
I tried to say something, but I sat there, frozen.
Was this really happening right now?
His eyes met mine. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked, looking utterly crushed. “Why didn’t you tell me you moving here was only temporary?”
My mouth fell open, but I quickly recovered. “Because I don’t know yet what we’re going to do,” I said, “but what I did know is that we would at least stay through the school year.”
He looked down for a second.
“What did you think?” I asked, doing my best to keep my voice down. “That I would just pick up and leave from one day to the next without telling you? Is that the kind of person you think I am?”
He met my eyes for a second. “The truth is I hardly know you.”
The way he said it felt like a blow to the center of my chest. “Yeah,” I said, tears welling up in my eyes. “I kinda got that.”
His brow furrowed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
I shrugged. “You could’ve told me the truth about your dad instead of letting me assume he’d died,” I replied.
He leaned in, his voice became low. “What? Did you think I wanted to tell you about the worst part of my life? Do you think that’s easy? That’s already what defines me and my family in this town? ‘They’re goes poor Ben and his brothers. His mom barely makes ends meet. If only their good-for-nothing dad had stuck around,’” he mocked. “You were the one person who didn’t see me that way,” he added, his voice low.
I sat there, saying nothing. Worried that I was seeing him just the way he didn’t want me to.
The truth was I would’ve given anything to wrap my arms around him and pull him close. Never let go.
But it felt like something stood between us now, something that kept me from touching Ben when I needed to.
Ben sighed. “Besides, what was the point of anything if you were just going to leave anyway?” he asked, letting his hands fall at his sides. “Huh?”
I bit the inside of my lip. “Ben, I have no idea if I’ll be here next year. But I do know you’re important to me, okay?” I tried.
He shook his head and turned away. “Like I said, I’m sorry. This is all my fault,” he said, looking anywhere but at me. “I shouldn’t have let things get this far, Scarlett. And that’s on me.”
With that, he got up and went back to his desk.
My neck turned hot, and tears filled my eyes, and they felt searing hot too.
Never had I fought to keep tears back harder than in that moment. Crying would be the cherry on top of this humiliation sundae.
Before I could excuse myself—more like run away—Mrs. Brown told us time was up and to head back to our seats.
I made sure Ben couldn’t see my face and did my best to keep it together.
A couple of minutes later, the end of class bell went off, jerking me out of the state of shock I’d gone into.
I grabbed my bag and made for the door, not looking back and not letting the tears fall until I’d reached the bathroom.
There was no mistake now.
Ben and I were over.
29
For the first time that season, I skipped cheer practice and headed straight home.
I texted Lilly, letting her know that I wasn’t feeling well at all.
Technically, being physically sick was the only reason we could miss practice and I didn’t usually skip out on commitments lightly, but I just couldn’t.
In truth, I was completely heartbroken over a boy who’d never even really been my boyfriend.
How pathetic.
As soon as I got home, I buried myself under the covers and let all the tears come.
The game-winning ball he’d given to me a while back still sat on my shelf. Looking at it and remembering Ben’s sweet gesture that night stung.
In a flash, I was up. I grabbed the ball, stuffed it in the back of my closet, and shut the door before crawling back into bed.
I was angry at Ben, but mostly, I was angry at myself for falling for him.
Falling for him knowing that he didn’t date or have girlfriends.
How else did I expect this to turn out?
Did I really think I was that special, that I was the one girl who would come along and make him realize that I was the exception to his rule?
I was far from special. Why would he change his rules for me?
It was evident that he wasn’t going to.
I was mad at myself for falling for him from the second I’d arrived at Jefferson and locked eyes with his.
It was completely my fault I felt this way. No one else’s.
I should’ve known better.
As I lay there and the tears slowly came to a stop, I stared up at the ceiling and thought about moving back home.
If I’d learned anything it was that sadness existed everywhere.
It existed back home in Massachusetts because of what had happened to Dad. Now it existed here because the sadness for Dad would follow us everywhere. There was nowhere we could go where it wouldn’t come along with us.
And now this town also had the sadness of losing Ben.
Even thinking that felt ridiculous.
Had I ever even “had” Ben?
I was starting to think that the answer to that question was a solid no.
A couple of kisses, some texts. That’s all we had been.
I thought about what he had said earlier.
He shouldn’t have let things get that far.
The tears started rolling down my cheeks again in droves.
At least back in Massachusetts, there was no Ben. I’d get over him eventually.
I curled up into my blankets and let sleep take over.
It was like all the tears and sadness from the past few years had decided to come back too, and I just wanted to not think about it anymore.
At some point, the sound of my bedroom door creaking open jolted me awake.
“It’s just me, honey,” Mom said, walking toward me.
Luckily I’d left the lamp on my nightstand on so it wasn’t completely dark.
She sat on my bed, concern etched on her face. “Are you okay? Did something happen? Are you sick?” she asked, feeling my forehead. I hadn’t seen her this worried in a long time.
“I’m okay,” I said, turning towards her but not meeting her eyes.
Just boys being stupid, I wanted to say.
I hated even thinking that, though, because at the end of the day, it had been my own expectations that had caused all the pain I was now in.
Never had I fallen for a boy like I had with Ben.
The one boy who had decided against dating and all that came with it.
It felt like someone had come along and punched me in the gut. It hurt so much, but instead of getting back up, I just wanted to stay on the ground and continue feeling the pain because getting up felt impossible.
No, I just wanted to stay in this bed and not see anybody, not talk to anybody.
I couldn’t take one more fall.
Mom gave me a kiss on the forehead and left. I fell asleep.
Several hours later, I pulled of
f the covers and sat up. It was almost one in the morning. The hall light was on, and I wondered if Mom was still up.
I walked quietly toward her room, noticing that the door was open and her lamp was on. She lay kinda crooked on her bed.
It looked like Mom had literally lay down for a minute and then fallen asleep immediately.
Her phone was still in her hand and she had her work clothes on.
I couldn’t help but smile at the sight of her.
But then I felt bad because I realized Mom was still mourning in a way.
Except that instead of crying in bed all day and refusing to eat, she had turned to overworking herself.
I could see it now.
Had moving here actually helped us?
It had helped me. A lot.
But maybe it had done the opposite of help Mom. I had no idea.
I didn’t want to keep thinking about it, though.
Instead, I pushed Mom over a little on the bed. Then I grabbed an extra comforter from the hall closet and covered her with it.
As I left, I went to turn off her bedroom lamp, but something made me stop. On her nightstand sat an album.
I recognized it right away, but I hadn’t seen it in a while. I took it back to my room and thumbed through the pages slowly.
My brain ached to go back to sleep, but I didn’t want to yet.
I took my time looking at each of the pictures. This one had baby pictures of me. Mom and Dad looked so young. So happy.
In the back, there were also a few pages of them before they had me.
They’d gone on road trips and taken all kinds of random pictures.
I brushed my finger over this one picture where Dad was hugging mom so tight, and she was in the middle of laughing out loud.
Would I ever see her laugh like that again?
My mind went to the guy she’d pushed away recently. Why hadn’t she just given him a chance, seen where things went?
Just like that, I thought about Ben, and the way he had pushed me away too.
The tears in my eyes appeared so fast that one hit the picture before I could wipe it away. I soaked it up carefully with my t-shirt.
Love could be a scary thing, but it didn’t have to be. That’s what Mom and Ben didn’t get.
I took the picture in my hands, stared at it some more, and put the album away. Then I went back to my room and got under the covers, holding that photo to my chest.
Finally, I let my eyes close, my heart beginning to break in more ways than one.
30
Ben had texted me four words while I’d been asleep.
Ben: I really am sorry.
I didn’t bother responding, not even with an it’s okay.
The truth was I wasn’t okay.
No amount of ice cream or my favorite rom-coms could fix this.
Not yet.
But I didn’t want him to know that. I just wanted to numb out and not think about it anymore.
Even though I’d overslept, I felt terrible inside.
I was about to make the executive decision to skip school altogether, tell Mom that I wasn’t feeling well.
But then I remembered that we had a game that afternoon. We didn’t usually have games on Wednesdays, but that day we did.
I knew what I had to do.
Pick myself back up.
With a loud groan, I rolled out of bed and shuffled around my room, throwing clothes this way and that as I searched for my cheer uniform.
I finally found it under a big pile of dirty laundry.
Oops.
Mom and I scrambled out the door. Things were still a little weird. We hardly talked on the way to school. Instead, I focused on doing my best not to think about Ben. When she ordered her usual large coffee, I asked for one too.
After a late drop-off, I raced to first period.
Just as I rounded the corner, though, I bumped into someone. I stumbled back, a little coffee splashing from my Starbucks cup onto my cheer top.
“Oh, great,” I mumbled.
That’s what I got for walking that fast while half asleep.
I immediately dabbed at it with the napkin that had been around my cup.
This was just super.
“I feel like all I say to you these days is apologies,” I heard and I finally looked up.
It was Ben.
I stopped dabbing at the coffee stain on my uniform and froze.
How was it possible for Ben to look just as tired and sleep deprived as me but still totally handsome? It just didn’t make logical sense to me.
None at all.
I took a couple of steps back, almost on reflex, because we’d been standing kinda close. “It’s okay,” I mumbled. “It wasn’t your fault.”
All of a sudden, it felt like we were talking about so much more than just bumping into each other a minute ago.
I struggled to make eye contact. “I should get to class,” I said. “Sorry for running into you.”
I went to walk around him, but the touch of his hand on my arm stopped me.
“Scarlett,” he said. “Wait.”
Just like that, his touch was gone again.
Slowly, I turned to face him again. We stood there for a second, with swarms of people moving past us on either side, but Ben didn’t say anything else.
Just seeing him, being this close to him, was tough.
“I need to go,” I said, walking off, not making eye contact again.
By the time the football game rolled around, I was exhausted, coffee or no coffee.
I wasn’t even sure I’d head to Bobby’s afterward along with everyone else. After the halftime show, I pulled my phone out of my gym bag and sent Mom a quick text, asking if she could please pick me up after the game instead of at Bobby’s later.
Mom: Will do. Almost done.
We beat the other team by two touchdowns, so after the game was over, everyone was in a great mood. I hung back, letting Rachel know I was getting ready to leave.
She gave me the biggest pout but gave me a big hug goodbye.
As I made my way toward the parking lot, gym bag on my shoulder, I tried to get my mind off of Ben and everything else that had gone wrong.
Dad had left us way too soon.
Mom was still hurting.
And boys…
I wasn’t sure I’d ever understand boys.
31
I was up before the sun the next morning.
Around five in the morning, a bad dream woke me up, and I found it impossible to sleep after that.
So I pulled on a hoodie and walked toward the window.
The sky hadn’t even begun to brighten yet.
Something made me put on some sneakers and head out into the back yard.
The air was crisp and cool. It made my skin prickle. I loved it.
It reminded me of Dad and his early morning runs. I would beg to go with him sometimes, and he would always say yes, even though I always slowed him way down.
After finding a good spot, I lay down carefully on the grass, using my arms to rest my head.
The stars were still out.
I looked up at the glittering pinpoints scattered across the night sky, immediately feeling better about everything. The last couple of days. Ben. My entire life.
There was Orion’s Belt. The stars painted a familiar figure, one I’d gazed at for hours on end as a kid.
Almost as long as I could remember, I’d always looked up to find them.
It hit me then and there, laying down on the cool grass, a cool breeze sweeping over my face, why I loved the stars so much.
Those diamond-like stars had always been up there and would always be up there, at least while I remained on this Earth.
These heavenly bodies were constant. Alive and burning for millions of years.
Ironic how stars were the complete opposite of the life they shone down upon.
Friends changed. Fathers died. The remnants of those families moved.
&nb
sp; But those stars up there?
I could always count on them to be there.
As far away as they were and wherever I ended up in this life, I knew that I could look up at the night sky and find my stars. They’d follow me everywhere.
Not everyone in my life would.
As close as people were in comparison to stars, the thing about people was that they could leave. Or end up gone forever.
But these stars would always be there.
And that’s why I’d always found comfort in them.
I took a deep breath, kept my eyes locked on the constellations above me, and felt my heart lighten.
Because I knew that I would be okay.
32
I apologized to Mom over the weekend.
It was awkward and I still felt terrible about the way I’d talked to her, but she gave me a hug anyway. Told me it was okay. “I know you didn’t mean to be mean,” she said.
I was proud of myself for owning up to what I’d done and saying sorry, but I could tell she still felt bad about the whole thing.
The way she still wouldn’t quite meet my eyes, how she continued to mumble about making sure I had lunch money, and not quite smiling all the way…I knew I’d really hit her where it hurt.
Why had I gone and said all that stuff to her?
I wished I could take it back, but that’s not the way things worked.
On Friday, we had our last home game.
Not only were things awkward at school any time I was around Ben, but things were also awkward at home with Mom.
It was like she’d sunk back into some kind of depression. She hardly ate, hardly talked. She came home and went straight to bed but still had dark circles under her eyes in the morning.
Once we pulled up to the school on Friday morning, I looked at Mom one more time. “Have a good day.”
She nodded, gave me a flicker of a smile. “You too.” For a moment, I thought she might say something else, but then someone honked behind us, and so I got out with one final wave.
Once I got to first period, though, I sent her a simple heart emoji.
The entire day, everyone was more pumped than usual. I wore my cheer top along with the rest of the squad. Since this was the last home football game of the season, it was a pretty big deal.
Falling for Ben & Other Impossible Things (Garcia Brothers Book 1) Page 13