Hearing these things chokes me up a little, because who wouldn’t get emotional over their best friend gassing them up like that? I’ve never really considered that Amelia might look at me in any kind of aspirational way, and knowing that she has blows me away.
“Wow…That is maybe the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me, Amelia. And you’ve said tons of nice things to me. But this really means so much.”
“Well, it’s all true.”
“And I never intended to make you feel like I was just one more person pressuring you to, I don’t know, be flawless or whatever. The world is hard enough. You don’t need me adding to it.” I look over at her. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry, too. But you know. Sisters fight. They mess up sometimes. They’re jealous. They want to be more like each other. They just can’t let that become all-consuming.”
I take her hand and give it a squeeze. “You’re absolutely right.”
“And…as your sister, I need to be frank with you. I think you just need to cut yourself some slack,” Amelia explains. “For your own sake. All this Brian shit aside, you have to chill with yourself. Be kinder to you. Let yourself be human. And maybe stop chasing perfection. Because what the fuck is perfection anyway?”
“Wait, can we go back to the part where you’re just complimenting me?”
Amelia smiles. “We can circle back to that, but I’m not off my soapbox yet. I’m just saying that sometimes, maybe, you try so hard to achieve perfection that the bigger picture escapes you. Like, yeah, maybe if you had it your way, Brian never would’ve looked my way. Maybe if you were the author of this story, you’d have written it differently. But this is life and you shouldn’t just throw something away because it didn’t go exactly as you’d hoped it would. I understand why you think him asking me out said something—I promise I get it now. I do. But I need you to know that it doesn’t inherently mean something, because he loves you, not me—you’re the one he pursued, Charlie.” She puts a hand on my shoulder. “But hey, you know what? Forget Brian. You need to believe in your value for you, even if you’re not some flawless ethereal being, even if not everyone will see what makes you special, even if your story is a little chaotic. We’re all messy, Charlie. So when everything’s a mess, it seems to me like you just need to give yourself room to breathe.”
I’m quiet. Amelia has just said so much that my brain is buzzing and I don’t know if I can process everything.
“Can you do that?” Amelia asks. “Can you try being kinder to you?”
She looks so sincere and hopeful.
With a deep breath, I say, “Okay. I can try.”
Amelia scoots closer to me, draping an arm around my shoulders. “That’s all I ask.”
Chapter Forty-Nine
So okay, what do you do when your best friend has totally and completely rattled your mindcage and you’re, like, goddamn it, I can’t even trust my own brain anymore?
That’s where I’m at.
I wrote out a really long thank-you text to Amelia, which I sent when I woke up the next morning, but now I’m supposed to just get up and go to school? Like I don’t have a ton of things to think about? Come on.
My mom doesn’t seem to get that, though, and she opens the door to my room and asks if I plan on getting up and getting dressed.
“I don’t feel well,” I say, meaning it and pulling my blanket over my head.
“Again?” she asks.
“Yeah. My brain has stopped working.”
I hear her footsteps come closer to my bed and then I feel the weight of her body on the corner of my bed. She pulls the blanket off my head and peers at me. “You’ve been sick an awful lot lately,” she says, ignoring my dramatic comment. “Should we take you to the doctor?”
“I think I just need to sleep it off.” I’m trying to look as pathetic as possible, which is not very hard.
“Well, I think we need to go to the doctor,” she says. “You can’t keep missing school.”
“But it’s nothing a doctor can fix.” I roll away from her. “Like I said. Brain. Not working.”
“Hmm,” she says. A pause, then an offer: “You can talk to me, you know.”
I consider this. I could really use someone else’s opinion, and…before I know it, I’ve told her what happened. “I broke up with Brian.”
Her face softens. “Oh. Well, that’ll do it.”
“And I got into a big fight with Amelia. But then we made up. I don’t know; it’s been a lot to process, and now I’m all confused.”
My mom frowns. “What happened?”
“You’ll think it’s stupid.”
“I won’t,” she says. “Tell me.”
I look down at my comforter and twirl it around my fingers so I don’t have to watch her face as I share. “It’s just been…I don’t know. A lot’s been happening. Amelia and I got into a huge fight because I was ignoring her and spending a lot of time with Brian. Which is true. I was. And during that fight, she told me that Brian had asked her out sometime last year. She kind of said it just to hurt me. But I still broke up with him. It just felt like the biggest deal ever that he had liked her first.”
“That wasn’t very nice of Amelia to do,” Mom says.
“No, it wasn’t,” I admit, a little surprised that my mom feels the same way. “But she apologized profusely. And we talked. And it was hard, but I told her that I was hurt and it was really difficult to be around her knowing that everyone, including Brian, prefers her over me.”
My mom furrows her brows. “How do you figure?”
“Oh, come on. Even you prefer Amelia.”
The look on my mom’s face is like I just slapped her.
“Why would you say that?” she asks.
There is an emotion in her voice I can’t quite detect, but it makes me wish I’d never vocalized this, one of my deepest, darkest fears—and certainly not in such a flippant way.
“I shouldn’t have said it like that, Mom. Sorry. But it’s how I feel…more often than I’d care to admit. It’s not just you, but yeah. I do think you prefer her sometimes. For a lot of reasons, I guess. You always encourage her to call you Mom, for one. And I see how you look at her compared to how you look at me, like she’s just everything you wish I could be. It’s like, you always compliment her beauty but keep your compliments for me focused on my smarts or whatever—even at my own birthday party! And you’ve always made sure she was invited to every single thing we did, so that it was never just you and me, but you, me, and Amelia. It always made me feel like you didn’t want to spend time with just me.” A lump in my throat is rising as I talk, but it feels good to get this out. “It sometimes feels like she was the daughter you wished you had. But instead you ended up with me.”
Mom is quiet. When I look up, I see that she’s a little teary, too.
“That is not true, Charlie,” she says. “You are my daughter, my one and only.” One tear escapes and rolls down her cheek. “I have always tried to be welcoming and loving to Amelia because I do love her—she’s my daughter’s best friend. Of course I care about her. And I went out of my way to invite her to things because I thought it would be nice for you to have a companion…especially after your dad…” Her voice catches when she mentions Dad, but she takes a moment to regain her composure. “Maybe I’ve gone a little overboard at times, and maybe I can be a little hard on you. I do see a lot of great qualities in Amelia, but I see wonderful qualities in you. I would never prefer someone else over you. Never. Do you hear me?”
I nod, wiping away some of my own tears.
“And if there is one thing I can tell you, one thing you should learn from me, it’s that you can’t spend your life comparing yourself to other people. Okay?”
“Okay,” I say, realizing that what she’s just said to me is a simpler version of what Amelia said yesterday.
“Okay,” she repeats. Then she pats my leg and says, “Now, go to school.”
Mom leaves my room and I sit there on
my bed.
Maybe the biggest problem in my life wasn’t that the world thought I came in second to Amelia. Maybe it was just that I thought that.
Chapter Fifty
It takes time to process everything.
But I find myself realizing I need to just let it go. All of it. I’ve got to shake these feelings of inferiority. I can’t be Amelia, nor do I want to, at least not anymore. I want to be Charlie—unapologetically Charlie.
Shoulders back. Head held up high. Fat, beautiful body and all.
Shedding those thoughts leaves me feeling lighter than I have ever felt before.
Finally.
The talk Amelia and I had helps restore us to who we were, only better and more honest. It makes it delightfully easy to fall back into the rhythm of our friendship, back to our old ways, and I’m thankful for the normalcy.
Later that week, I invite Amelia over after school and she asks to bring Kira. The three of us settle in the kitchen to work on some homework, which I’ve seriously fallen behind on. We’re steadily working—me on my history homework, Amelia and Kira on math—when my mom walks through the front door. It’s a little earlier than her normal return from work, so I’m surprised to see her.
“Hi, Mom,” I say.
“Hi, girls,” she says.
“This is Kira.” I motion toward her. “Kira, that’s my mom.”
“Oh, so this is Kira,” Mom says with a little grin.
Kira, the most polite person Amelia and I know, rises and extends her hand. “It’s so nice to meet you.”
Mom keeps smiling as they shake hands. “Wonderful to meet you,” she says, and I feel a little twinge of jealousy that she’s so welcoming to Kira but hadn’t been to Brian. I let that go, too.
“What are you doing home so early?” I ask, wishing the three of us had had a little more solo time.
“Oh,” Mom says, looking a little sheepish. “I was going to prepare you some dinner. Rice and beans?”
She meets my eye and I realize she’s trying to do something kind. I soften.
“That would be great, Mom. Thank you.” I give her a smile, and she nods back.
“You girls sticking around for dinner, too?” she asks.
Amelia and Kira exchange a glance before Amelia says, “We’d love to.”
“Great. I’ll get started. Don’t let me interrupt you.” Mom starts to pull ingredients from the cupboard as we get back to our homework.
“I’m struggling with this history question. Amelia, have you worked on number three yet?”
She goes back into her notes and hands her notebook over to me, pointing halfway down the paper. “There you go.”
“We’re not copying homework, are we?” Mom asks.
“No. I’m simply glancing at what Amelia wrote and forming my own opinions based on that,” I say innocently.
“Yeah, exactly,” Amelia says. As I’m reading through her answer about the real Alexander Hamilton, not our dreamy Lin-Manuel Miranda version of Alexander Hamilton, I notice Kira elbow Amelia and they start to whisper, but not loud enough for me to hear.
“It’s not nice to talk about me,” I tease, looking up from Amelia’s notebook.
“Okay, fine,” Amelia says. “Don’t be mad, but I ran into Brian.”
I tense. “What?”
“I’ve been telling her she needed to tell you,” Kira says.
I glare at Amelia. “I can’t believe you weren’t going to tell me.”
“I was going to, just not yet!” She shoots Kira a look. “It was a complete accident. But we both ended up in the art supply closet at the same time. It was nothing, just a simple hello. And I asked him if things were going all right. He said they were okay, but he looked…sad. I don’t know.”
“Amelia,” I groan.
“Well, what was I going to do—not acknowledge him at all?”
I sigh. “No, of course you should acknowledge him. He deserves that. It’s just hard to hear about it.”
“We had a chemistry class together,” Kira offers. “Such a sweet guy.”
I nod, too. “Yeah, he is. Like, the sweetest guy ever. That’s what sucks about having to run into him. Or hear about him. Or think about him.”
Mom sighs from across the room. “Oh, Charlie.”
“What?” I ask.
“Stubborn girl,” she says.
“I am not,” I say.
She smiles as she adds spices to the caldero on the stove. “Okay. Sure. But it sounds to me like you still like the guy.”
Amelia looks at me, trying to gauge my reaction. She knows I still do but would never say it unless I did first.
Kira says tentatively, “It does sort of sound that way, Charlie.”
“Of course I still like him,” I say defensively. “But I broke up with him. There’s no going back.”
“That’s not true,” Amelia says.
“You didn’t hear him that day,” I insist. “He was really, really hurt.”
“But you can’t know anything for sure unless you try,” Mom says.
“We’re not talking about this,” I say. “Can we get back to our homework, please?”
Amelia and Kira look at each other with a smile. “Fine,” they say.
“Fine,” my mom agrees.
It’s not fine, though, because I can’t stop thinking about how they’re right: I just want to be with Brian.
I have been trying not to think about Brian.
I have been failing.
The truth is, life is just a lot lonelier without him in it. I see him sometimes—how can I not?—but it’s not the same, and that’s what hurts the very most.
I’d developed a habit of texting Brian throughout the day and now that’s a habit I have to fight. I hate driving by all of the places where we’ve had dates. I dread going to work and having to avoid him. I loathe going to art class. I don’t even like looking at the stupid bras I bought.
Mostly because there is a nagging thought in the back of New Charlie’s brain. It says that if I’m in the business of letting things go…shouldn’t I let go of my feelings of betrayal, too? Forgive Brian? Say I’m sorry?
But I don’t know.
I prefer to pretend that isn’t an option and instead do my best to smile through everything for New Charlie’s sake. I remind myself of the good things: Amelia and I are not fighting. My mom has been surprisingly kind. I get an email that informs me that my story is one of the finalists in the writing contest I entered. (Ms. Williams nearly flips.) I’ve finally finished my horse painting in art class. I have friends for the first time ever. I’m seeing my cousins again.
But the loneliness really hits me on the weekend when my mom is out, Amelia is with Kira, I fail to make alternative plans, and I find myself home alone.
I fill my night with research on dogs that are up for adoption, because dogs don’t judge you. They just love you, and that’s what I need right now.
By the time my mom gets home, I’ve got at least three dogs picked out, so I bombard her the moment she walks inside.
“Don’t you think we should get a dog?” I ask. I’m holding up my phone and shoving it in her face. “Isn’t this mini-dachshund cute? His name is Tiny! We should adopt him!”
“Give me a second to get inside, will you?” She closes the door behind her and kicks off her shoes. I follow her into the kitchen as she pours herself a glass of water. She takes a long sip. “Okay. What?”
“A dog. We need one! If you don’t like this one, we can get another, but I think Tiny is perfect and exactly what we need.”
My mom waves her hand at me in dismissal. “We’re not getting a dog, Charlie.”
“Please? Pretty please?” I ask. “I’ll walk him. And train him. This site says he was abandoned on the side of the road! How can you say no?”
“Don’t read that to me! It’s a no. No dog.”
I let out a long sigh, and my mom rolls her eyes.
“I guess you just don’t care about my happin
ess.…,” I say.
“Oh my God, Charlie.” She’s smiling as she shakes her head and starts to walk out of the kitchen toward her bedroom. “I swear.…”
I walk behind her down the hall. “If we can’t get a dog, maybe a bunny?”
“Absolutely not. No rodents in this house,” she says. She starts to pull her pajamas out of the drawer and lay them on the bed.
“It’s not a rodent!”
“Why don’t you go hang out with Amelia?” She cups her hand around her ear. “Oh, yes, I think I hear her calling now.”
I scowl at her. “Ha ha. Amelia is on a date with Kira.” I fidget with my phone as she lets her hair down and begins taking off her makeup.
“Well, you need to do something,” she says. “You’re bored.”
“I know. I miss Brian,” I say. She looks over at me and her face says Oh, honey without her actually needing to say Oh, honey. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“Remember that conversation we were having with Amelia and Kira the other day?”
“Can’t recall.”
“Oh, really?” she asks. “I remember it perfectly.…”
I start to back out of her room. “Suddenly I’m feeling very tired.”
“You know what I think!”
I run down the hall. “I’m not listening!” I yell.
“Text your boyfriend!” she calls after me.
I close my bedroom door and pretend I don’t hear. But only because I want to text him so bad that the last thing I need is for someone else to encourage me. I just might do it.
Fat Chance, Charlie Vega Page 29