Ava's Roulette

Chapter 2: Apology Declined

"What!" Rob said. 

Liz looked at me sympathetically. She had always warned me about Ace being oddly vigilant about my contacts. That's actually why he hated Rob he just couldn't accept that he was only a friend. I saw the I told you so in her eyes, but she was too kind to say anything.

"I also punched the –" I stopped myself from saying anything that would allow me to breakdown in anger or tears "– girl he was with."

"Fuck Ava. Was she one of them?" Rob asked. I shrugged; I didn't get a good look at her. I just swung.

"Well, I doubt they'll file charges, they know they'll lose to Ms. Moneybags over here" Liz joked trying to lighten the mood.

"Or they file charges to get a settlement" Rob replied.

I shook my head. "They don't deal with things like that. If she is one of them, she'll just look for a way to corner me and beat me up."

"Oh yeah that's much better." said Rob. 

We argued about what I'd done, what I should have done, and what I should do. Rob was, justly, afraid for me and Liz just tried to steer conversation to the painful part of the story. The cheating bit. She knew I was trying to avoid it, but she also knew that was the root of the problem. Poor Liz, we really drove her to the end of her gentle nature because she ended up yelling at us to shut up. It was something unheard of amongst us. I was immediately ashamed, and I could tell Rob was too, the way he eyed her from his bowed head. He looked like a told off puppy.

"Just tell me you aren't getting back together" she sighed. I stayed silent for one second too long, because she immediately perked up again.

"He's crossed the line, Ava!"

"Once a cheater, always a cheater" Rob added. 

I knew they were right, and I wanted to take their advice. But there was a nagging in my head holding me back. I didn't understand what it was at the time. Maybe I was intrigued by Ace's ambiguity, or maybe I held onto the times that were not shitty, or maybe I was just dumb enough to not care. I think the universe was tired of giving me hints. At the time though, I just agreed with my friends, I promised them.

We discussed it some more, really, I was just lectured by Rob and Liz while I nodded along. Eventually I excused myself and went back to my room. I opened my laptop and decided to keep working on a research assignment for one of my courses. I hadn't started yet.

Ace kept texting and calling. It did not let me focus in the slightest. So, when my phone went off for the hundredth time I finally picked up.

"What do you want?"

"God Ava, I've been calling all day"

"What the fuck do you want?!"

"Jeeesus Christ, fine." There was a slight pause. "Ava, you need to come over to mine. You seriously messed up Ginger's face" I laughed dryly; I couldn't believe what I was hearing. 

"I'm serious Ava, Burt's all wound up because you hit a member."

Suddenly it wasn't so funny. She was part of their gang. Fuck. I guess I could expect getting cornered at some point. This made me laugh again.

"Ava? What the fuck are you on?"

"Ava?"

"Nothing" I waited to see if he had anything else to offer the conversation, but when he started up again about going over to his house I hung up. He tried calling again, so I turned my phone off. I put my hands up to my head trying to fight back a headache, and the tears creeping into my eyes. I took a deep breath and wiped them away.

I tried to keep going with the assignment. Unfortunately, I could not stop thinking about the stupid conversation with Ace. I realized that at no point did he consider apologizing, and it made me feel even dumber for the nagging in my head asking to forgive him. In that moment, I would have told him to fuck off regardless of any apology. I stared at the Google search engine for at least forty minutes before giving up and opening Netflix instead.

I spent the rest of the day binge watching random movies and a couple TV show episodes. I occasionally snuck downstairs to grab food, nothing too elaborate, but no snacks. I may have been sad, but I wasn't going to waste all my athletic hard work on Ace. I was not a professional athlete, but I put hours in the gym and in several different sports over the years. Funny, they were part of the reason I coped with Ace. Sweating is a literal way to blow off steam.

It was a little past midnight that I decided I had to continue my project. I had already asked the professor for an extension, and I was not doing great in his class. I had always been a great student, even in courses he had taught in the past. But this time I had a feeling he was prepared to fail me then and there. There were hundreds of people in the class, but he knew me well. I always emailed him for different reasons, and each time his responses got shorter and shorter. I felt his frustration through the screen. I felt awful for it, but Ace's dumbfuckery left little room for me to focus on anything else.

However, I wanted to at least hand it in on time. I had until Wednesday, right before Thanksgiving break. So, I sat down and bust through the research part of it. I found some papers and links that would be useful later on, but I didn't get past that because the exhaustion of the day finally settled on my back. I would continue tomorrow, at least I had started and had information to work with I thought as I lay in my bed. I quickly succumbed to a deep slumber forgetting all pains of the day.