To Our Pinky Promises

Chapter 30

Once we had grabbed my papers from the office, Alex suggested grabbing a meal together, to which I agreed to.

We ended up at good old McDonald's and I was starving.

Every inch of our table ended up being covered with food as Alex and I pigged out together in a corner booth.

"You know, that was fun, I'm glad we got to make all those memories back in middle school." Alex said.

I smiled at him, glad that he was able to remember the good memories from that time of his life.

"Alex.." I trailed off, not knowing if I should bring it up.

"Hm?" He asked, licking the sauce off his fingers.

"I was thinking.." I started to say.

"Yeah?" He prompted.

"I don't know, I just thought that since I felt like you were really struggling with trying to live with the past.." I cut myself off.

"Okay, that didn't sound right." I blew out a breath. "I just don't want you to not be able to cherish those happy memories like the ones we were reminiscing back in the school because of the terrible things that happened during that year."

There. That's what I meant.

Alex looked up at me.

"I was thinking, if you wanted to get some help, some professional help, I can introduce you to my therapist. She's honestly the best, and of course, I can go with you if you'd like to." I rambled.

"Em.." Alex said.

I looked up, hearing him call my name.

"Thanks."

I smiled at him. "No problem."

See, at that time, I thought that his thanks had meant that he was agreeing, that he wanted the help.

So I contacted Susan, my therapist, and made an appointment with her for Alex.

I texted him the time, date and the place, and told him that I'd meet him there.

I went.

I waited.

And I waited some more.

But he never came.

After that day, all my texts were left on delivered, my calls went to his voicemail and he wouldn't even make eye contact with me in school.

But I was Emily Waterhouse.

I wasn't going to act like a sitting duck and wait for him to approach me with an explanation.

I did that 4 years ago and wasted 4 years waiting. 4 years was long enough. I wasn't going to waste another 4 years.

No, if he planned to ignore me, I'd make it impossible for him to.

"Alex?" I called out, my hand reaching out to grab onto him, only to get shoved by another student in the crowd.

If he had heard me, he definitely chose to ignore me. Alex kept walking forward without looking back, leaving me at the mercy of the horde of students that were filtering out of classes for their lunch break.

The space in the sea of people had suddenly felt much denser than it had been a second ago as I felt myself get swept away with the current that was going the opposite way of where Alex was headed to.