The Triangle No One Expected

Chapter 4

"Yeah..." I sigh.

"No way." She whispers in utter disbelief.

"Way."

"You know what you have to do right?"

"No what do I have to do?" I ask genuinely not having one clue what she's talking about

"You have to stop talking to him, out of respect for my brother I mean." Alandra states bluntly.

"Wait what? Why?"

"I mean of course you can talk to him when like we're all hanging out, but other than that no. You'll be like leading him on. You guys can't just go over to each other's house whenever. Your friendship is completely over, he's crossed a line." She explains.

"I can't do that. You don't understand we've been best friends for so long, I can't do that to him," I scoff.

"If you don't I'll tell my brother. Look I'm not trying to be that person but this is my brother we're talking about. You're my best friend but at the end of the day he comes first."

"I-"

"This isn't a discussion, it has to be done. Do you know how much Alex loves you?" At this point I knew she was right. Somehow.

"Okay, you're right."

Suddenly Alex walks in.

"Hey, baby are you coming?" He asks looking slightly concerned by our startled reactions.

"Yes, I'm coming right now Bubba." I say smiling guiltily.

Then he comes in, grabs my hand and walks me out of the room. On the way my hand starts sweating in his and I know he'll be able to tell that there's something up. My hands only ever sweat when I'm nervous. When we get into his room he sits me at the end of his bed and stands between my legs.

"What's going on my love?" He asks in the most gentle voice ever as he cups my face in his hands.

"I just," my eyes start to well with tears, "um I'm just sad about Carter's grandma is all." I lie.

I never, ever, lie to him.

"I'm so sorry, I know that must be so hard for both of you." He pulls me in for a kiss.

"Yeah but I don't wanna think about about it let's just lay down." I say, eager to end the conversation.
                                        ~
Later that night, or you could say early the next morning, I lie in bed awake staring at my phone. Carter has texted and called a couple times, which is huge because he hates talking on the phone. All of which I've ignored trying to take Alandras advice. I hate doing this more than ever. It's just so hard to choose between the two so I pick the safest route that I know of for the moment.

Because I can't sleep I decide to get up and pee since I'm there. But before I do I stare at myself. I do this a lot because I can't really tell whether or not I think I'm pretty. I think my eyes are too big for my face, but on the other hand I like my lips, my nose is an awkward shape but on the other hand I love my curls. My curls. It took my hair a long time to get to this stage. Growing up in a predominantly white neighborhood makes you want to tame and straighten your hair all of the time, and so I did. The heat damage became so bad to I had to cut a lot of my hair off and start over. But it was okay because my mom helped me, and it was worth it, I love my hair.

My mom is pretty amazing, growing up with out a dad was pretty hard, but she did so well on her own. Swearing she'd never go through that again, she never had another kid. It was kind of lonely growing up, but she made up for it by putting me in a lot of extracurriculars like gymnastics and choir. Gymnastics never stuck but choir did, singing is something I just could simply not live without. I think I'm pretty good at it, but my mom is an incredible singer. She'd probably be a star if it weren't for me.

I used to always be so jealous of the perfect families you'd see on tv. The ones that had two parents and always more than one kid with no problems. But then I realized that was just Disney channel and every family has problems even if you do have both parents and siblings.

I've grown to love our little family of three, me, my mom and, and our puppy Silas. Although I often wish I had a sister, it's fine because my mom is like my sister and besides Alandra, she's my best friend.

Later than I'd like to, I fall asleep. Wondering where I went wrong and what I should do next.