On the Outside

by Siera Maley

  “Yeah,” I said at last, my throat feeling a little tighter than usual. It showed in my voice. “Totally freaked.”

  “I know it’s weird. For you, I mean; for me it’s kind of something that only happened in my dreams, but-”

  “Please, no more,” I said weakly, waving my hand at him. “No dreams. No more details.”

  “Okay.” He took a deep breath. “I can do that.”

  I stared at him, feeling sick. “… fifteen minutes?”

  “Yeah,” he breathed out, going somewhere else in his head for a moment. I punched his knee, hard, and he yelped. “Ow!”

  “Why!?” I cried out. “Why would you do this to me? It was the three of us, Evan! The Three Musketeers! The three amigos! The three… freaking Powerpuff Girls; I don’t know! Bubbles and Buttercup didn’t start dating!”

  “Well, they were sisters, and also six years old,” he input quietly, and then, louder, added, “Wait, am I Bubbles?”

  “Yes!” I snapped.

  He frowned, offended. “Look, anyway, I asked you here because I wanted you to help me fix this.”

  “Done,” I agreed. I was already on top of it. “I’ll go to Riley, let her know you’re cool with being just friends, and then hopefully you won’t have ruined our trio and we can put this all behind us and-”

  “Wait, no,” he interrupted. “None of that, Kayla. Didn’t you hear me say that I’ve had a crush on Riley for years? Or that she kissed me back?”

  “I think I repressed all of that about ten seconds ago, actually, but thanks for reminding me.”

  “I need you to talk to her for me and find out if she has feelings for me like I do for her,” Evan pressed. “Or if maybe she thinks that she could. Or even if she just thought she did last night. I know it’s weird because it’s Riley and me, but, I mean… this is the girl of my dreams. She’s everything to me. And you’re right, I want to preserve our friendship if that’s what it comes to, but if there’s even a chance that she could like me back, you have to encourage her, please.” He clasped his hands together and widened his eyes, silently begging me. I felt sick to my stomach again.

  “God. This is… the worst past twelve hours of my life,” I decided. “Yes. I’ll do it.” How could I not? I’d be the worst friend ever if I refused.

  “Thank you,” he sighed, and wrapped me up in a tight hug. I pressed my face into his shoulder, trying to hold back a sob, and very quickly failing. Seconds later, I was soaking his shirt and he was squeaking my name like he wasn’t sure how to react. “I didn’t realize- uh… Kayla?”

  “Josh and I broke up last night,” I sobbed into his neck, and Evan relaxed and rubbed at my back.

  “Oh, man. That’s terrible. I thought you guys were gonna…? And so did Riley.”

  “We were.” I pulled away from him and sniffed, wiping at my eyes. “But he’s leaving for college, and I told him I didn’t want to have sex if we were going to break up anyway, and so we kind of broke up now rather than later.” I shook my head, gesturing toward him. “And then I wake up to this!”

  Evan winced and I moved to sit beside him, then let him wrap an arm around me and pull me close. We sat in silence for some time while I tried, with Evan’s help, to calm myself down. “Riley was real upset at first last night,” Evan finally told me. “After you left. She couldn’t even get into killing zombies, so I turned it off and we talked for a little while.”

  “She was that upset that I didn’t come hang out with you guys?” I asked him. “Why? She doesn’t like Josh, but he was always a good boyfriend.”

  “I don’t know, I guess she just really didn’t like him. That’s all she said, anyway. We kinda stopped talking after that.”

  “Why, what-” I wrinkled my nose. “Ugh! Okay, right.”

  “Yeah…”

  I let out a heavy sigh, and then leaned my head on his shoulder. “I’ll talk to her,” I vowed, and in my head, added, “but I’m not gonna like it.”

  Chapter Three

  Once it sank in that quite possibly my literal worst nightmare had come true, I took an hour to myself in my bedroom to gather my bearings. Riley wasn’t answering my only text to her, which had asked her if I could come over and talk, so she was probably upset. At me for leaving last night or Evan for kissing her or at both of us for the combination of the two, I wasn’t sure.

  Regardless, now that I was stuck in the middle of my literal worst nightmare, I needed a plan of action.

  Firstly, I had to recognize that my literal worst nightmare was probably not Riley’s literal worst nightmare, and that it was Evan’s literal dream come true, so I couldn’t screw it up for them, as much as I would’ve liked to. My job was to be a good best friend, even if that meant proverbially stabbing myself several times in the chest and stomach area with a talking sword that repeatedly shouted “You are the weakest link, goodbye!” while Riley and Evan skipped off into the sunset with their traitorous hands traitorously linked between them.

  “Ugh,” I mumbled aloud at the mental image.

  Secondly, in order to be at my optimal best-friendliness, I had to put aside my break-up with Josh. If I shoved the sad feelings down long enough, they’d probably just go away eventually. That sounded healthy and totally correct.

  At the moment, my focus had to be on the needs of my best friends. Both Riley and Evan, as far as I knew, had never kissed anyone before last night – other than that unfortunate Spin the Bottle incident with Evan and me at age twelve – and so they were both having new and scary experiences, and they’d lost one of the two people they had available to talk to about those experiences. Only I remained.

  Thirdly… I had to be able to hold back my puke.

  “You’ve got this.” I stared at myself in my bedroom mirror, teeth gritted. “You have no emotions. You are a robot. No more tears. No more nausea. No more of that weird chest feeling. It’s all gonna be just fine. They’re definitely not third-wheeling you.” I stood still, breathing hard, then bit back a sob and turned to hastily leave my room.

  If Riley wouldn’t come to me, I’d have to go to Riley.

  ***

  The good thing about living in the same neighborhood as my two best friends was that it was easy to go see each other when we wanted to.

  The bad thing about living in the same neighborhood was that, well, it was easy to go see each other when one of us didn’t want to.

  Normally, this meant that if any of us were fighting, it was an easy fix. Someone just had to crack first and show up at the others’ houses.

  Riley’d outsmarted at me. When I knocked on her front door, her mom answered and told me she was off somewhere in the neighborhood on her skateboard. Given that my house and Evan’s were both down the road in one direction and she was clearly avoiding both of us, it was obvious she’d probably headed in the other. I started walking.

  I thought about what I’d say to Riley when I saw her. I thought about how well I’d be able to bite my tongue and avoid saying what I really thought. I wanted to beg her not to do this to our group.

  Riley dating Evan meant that there was a chance they’d eventually break up, so even if I managed to get past feeling left out while they were dating, I’d eventually have to deal with the fallout of the end of their relationship. I didn’t want to lose either of them.

  But I also didn’t want to be selfish. I’d dated a few guys already, and they’d both listened to all my stories and complaints and saw me through the break-ups. I knew Evan and Riley both deserved a turn now. I just wished it wasn’t with each other.

  I must’ve walked for at least ten minutes before I finally heard the sound of wheels on gravel. I looked up and saw Riley headed down the street toward me, decked out in knee and elbow pads and wearing her trademark Converses. All traces of how I’d altered her appearance last night were gone.

  I stopped and waited for her to reach me, and she pushed off harder as she came closer, like she was trying to pick up speed. “Riley,” I tried, and she
blew right past me.

  “Busy,” she told me shortly, and then she was riding away at a runner’s pace. I sighed and looked down at my shoes. Flats. They’d have to do.

  “Wait up!”

  I took off after Riley, sprinting until my chest hurt. She stayed at a constant speed, just a few feet in front of me.

  “Riley, c’mon! What did I do?”

  She turned around briefly to shoot me a strange look. “Nothing. I just need to practice.”

  I rolled my eyes and slowed down, entirely aware that she was full of it. I watched her head down a small hill, her board tilting left and then right as she swung back and forth to keep her speed down.

  “I know about Evan!” I shouted after her, and she lost her balance, hit the curb on her right side, and went sprawling into the front lawn there. I winced and hurried to catch up to her.

  “Ow. Jeez,” she mumbled, sitting up and examining a small scrape on her right forearm. “Warn me next time.”

  I went to retrieve her board from where it’d flipped over by the curb, then came back to her and offered her my hand. She took it, grimaced, and then let me pull her to her feet. I handed her the board. “Imagine my reaction,” I told her.

  “I should’ve texted you,” she mumbled. “Just kind of panicked. I didn’t want you to be mad.” She nodded toward the street and started to walk, and I fell into step beside her.

  “Why would I be mad?”

  “Because we’re all friends and now we’ve screwed things up.”

  “Do you like him?” I asked her abruptly. I wanted to get it out of the way early. Rip off the bandage, so to speak.

  She was silent for a moment. Then she said, “I don’t know.”

  I scoffed, unwilling to take that for an answer. “You don’t know? How do you not know? Either you like him or you don’t. I mean, you obviously liked him enough to kiss him.”

  “I don’t know…” she repeated, and sounded like she wanted to say more.

  “What?” I asked knowingly. “Was it bad?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Riley. Seriously?”

  “It’s embarrassing!” she shot back. “I don’t want to say it.”

  “How many embarrassing stories about boys have I shared with you?” I reminded her. “Remember the time I was fourteen and Alan Hart sneezed in my face right before we were about to kiss?”

  She hid a smile at that. “Yeah.”

  “Unless Evan sneezed in your face, I don’t want to hear you complain about not wanting to tell me.”

  “It’s not about the kissing. It’s about why I let him kiss me.” She hesitated, and then stopped in her tracks suddenly, offering me her board. Confused, I took it from her. “Just carry it for me. It takes away the temptation to use it to get away from you.”

  “Gotcha.” I tucked the board under my arm awkwardly, unfamiliar with how to carry it. Riley watched the ground as we walked.

  “It’s embarrassing because… I kind of just wanted…” She bit her lip. “Just wanted to be wanted.”

  “Oh.” I furrowed my eyebrows, looking away from her. I didn’t know what to make of that. Riley’d never seemed bothered by not having a boyfriend before. What had changed?

  “And he was there. I’m not, like, blind or anything. I knew he had a crush on me… or at least that he used to. I just thought maybe if I never said anything and he never said anything, it wouldn’t be weird and we could all just pretend we all only liked each other as friends. And now I’ve screwed all of that up over… I don’t know. A dumb feeling, I guess.”

  “You’ve never complained about not dating anyone,” I pointed out. “I thought you liked being single.”

  “I don’t hate it. It’s just…” She reddened visibly now, and finished, “you went off with Josh, and I knew you were going to have this perfect night, and I felt kind of lonely, I guess.” She exhaled sharply. “Told you it was embarrassing.”

  “Well, no need to worry, because my night was worse than yours,” I told her. “Josh and I didn’t have sex. Actually, we kind of did the opposite of that.” She shot me a confused look and I elaborated, “We broke up.”

  “What? Why? You were so into him.”

  “The short version is that he’s leaving and we don’t want to do long distance. The long version is… well, that but with slightly more detail. It was mutual but it doesn’t feel mutual, you know? But I’ll be okay. I came here to talk about you.”

  “You and Josh dated for over a year, Kayla. That’s way more important than a kiss with Evan.”

  “I know it was more than just one kiss,” I corrected her, and she avoided my eyes. “And it’s just as big of a deal, because it’s Evan. He really likes you, and…” I swallowed hard and pushed forward. This was going to be the hardest part. “And if you want to try dating him, maybe you should. If you really like him, I mean.”

  “But what about you?” she asked.

  “What about me?”

  “It wouldn’t be fair to you to make you, like, the third wheel. Especially after what’s happened with you and Josh.” She frowned a little, but it faded, and then she smiled over at me, amused. “Remember when we were twelve and we’d just built our shelter with Evan earlier that week, and we went and hung out in it for the first time together, just the two of us? And we talked about how neither of us would ever date Evan because first of all, we thought the idea was gross – especially you, after what happened at Madison Reed’s party.”

  “Don’t remind me, ugh,” I replied with a shudder.

  “And secondly, we said we didn’t want anyone to be left out. I don’t want to be the one to break that promise.”

  “Well, if one of us has to, it looks like you’re gonna have to step up,” I joked, “because it won’t be me, that’s for sure.” When she didn’t laugh, I glanced to her anxiously, wondering if I’d said the wrong thing. I didn’t want to imply that dating Evan was gross if she was actually into him now. “I mean, not that he isn’t good-looking, and obviously he’s the best guy we know. He’s just not my type. But if he’s yours, that’s okay.”

  “I don’t know,” she said again. “Like I said: I just didn’t want to feel alone.”

  “You’re not alone. You have Evan and me. You always will. Or you’ll always have me, at least. You know that, right?”

  “Yeah, I know. But I wanted more than friendship, and it was easy to just go with it at the time. I thought maybe…” she trailed off, and then seemed to change her mind about continuing. “I don’t know.”

  I let out a sigh. The more I talked to her, the more it sounded like she didn’t feel the same way about Evan that he felt about her. I began to wonder if that was better or worse than her returning his feelings. Evan was going to be crushed if she rejected him. I had to think about his feelings, too. “You know he’s liked you for a really long time.”

  “I know,” she groaned. “What should I do?”

  I bit my lip and resisted the urge to heave another sigh. I’d already promised Evan I’d give it my best shot, and so I did what he’d asked me to. “You should do what you want to, of course, but… maybe you should give it a chance.”

  She arched an eyebrow at me, clearly surprised. “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah,” I insisted, feigning confidence. “I mean, you already love him more than you love any other guy we know, and you’ve kind of already taken the next step, so maybe the best thing to do is to just go with it.”

  “What if it’s not like you or Evan thinks it’ll be?” she asked. “What if… something goes wrong, or I’m not the kind of girlfriend he thought I’d be…” She shook her head. “It feels weird to even say. Evan’s… I mean, he seemed like a brother. How am I supposed to be his girlfriend?”

  “I couldn’t do it,” I agreed, and then winced inwardly at the fact that I’d slipped up yet again. This really wasn’t getting any easier. “But, um, that doesn’t mean you couldn’t.”

  “You really think it’s a goo
d idea?” she pressed, looking over at me.

  I looked back at her, straight into her eyes, and tried my best to be convincing. “Yeah, I really do. Any girl would be lucky to have Evan. And any guy would be lucky to have you. You two deserve each other.”

  “What about you? You wouldn’t feel weird around us? Or get upset? You’re totally fine with this?”

  “Of course it’s fine. You guys are my best friends. It’s, like, my mission to make sure you’re both happy.”

  “But you just broke up with your boyfriend.”

  “So what? I’ll find another. I always do. You shouldn’t not date someone just because I’m single. I will be totally fine.”

  She faced forward again, and I could sense she was turning my words over in her head. “You really think so?” she asked again, and I rolled my eyes and shoved her lightly.

  “Yes! Now stop asking!”

  “Okay, okay.” We slowed down as her house came into view, and I grabbed her hand and linked two of my fingers with two of hers, like we’d used to as kids. She squeezed my fingers and I squeezed back.

  “I guess he loves me more than anyone else ever will,” she mused. “Romantically, anyway.”

  I furrowed my eyebrows, realizing I’d hadn’t thought of it that way until now. Riley and Evan were lifelong friends. If they really did fall in love, there was no beating that kind of history. If they really did fall in love… they were kind of perfect for each other.

  “Probably,” I agreed, and wondered why I had to try so hard not to sound sad about it. Things were going to be fine.

  ***

  “Update: Things are NOT fine.”

  I typed out the message on my laptop and sent it to Vanessa. I could practically hear her laughter on the other end of our chat window as she wrote her reply.