What Goes Around

Crusts

I'm sad to say that the first thing in my mind was, "God damn it, he's drinking the apple juice."

My mom threw me a nervous smile and went back to the salad she was making. I stood with my backpack in my hand, frozen.

Aaron was watching me warily, waiting to see what my first move would be. I'm sure he expected violence. To be honest, so did I. I wanted to stride across the room and backhand him across the face. He deserved it.

Still, my inner childhood Natalie was telling me to run across the room and throw my arms around his neck. I ignored that feeling. I wanted to hug him, yeah. I wanted to hug him with my hands. Around his neck. Tightly.

I let out a long sigh, dropped my backpack in the living room, and walked to the kitchen. Opening the fridge, I refused to make eye contact with the all-too-familiar intruder. I grabbed a pre-made peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and walked to my room.

Being the steryotipical protective suburban mother, I was sure my mom wouldn't let him come up to my room.

Of course, I can never expect anything from my mom.

I was tearing the crusts off of my meal, tossing them on the small table by my bed. I had never liked crusts. Ever.

Aaron used to eat the crusts.

Again, those gods I keep mentioning wanted to punish me for thinking about him, apparently. I heard a knock at my door.

Looking back, I know I shouldn't have opened it. No one in my family respected my privacy enough to knock before entering my room. I had gotten used to it.

Still, I walked over and opened the door. Aaron stood there, looking at his toes as if they were suddenly the most fascinating thing to ever exist in our pathetic little world. It was silent for a few seconds, albeight the loudest silence I had ever head. I hated it. It was like our minds were having a conversation neither of us could hear.

He slowly looked up, his face angled slightly to the left of me. He didn't look into my eyes.

The silence held.

"I wrote to you," he said, almost so quietly that I didn't hear him.

I heard him, alright, but I didn't answer.

Slightly offended, I answered to the space slightly to the right of his body. "You can't think I'm stupid, right? I think I know what a letter from my EX-best friend would look like. I was looking for it for four years."

He pulled out a package from behind his back. It was a bunch of envelopes -- four years worth, I guess -- crudely tied together with large rubber bands.

"Your mom gave me this."

My toungue had lost the ability to form anything that resembled a word, allowing me to make a strange drawn out gurgling noise of disbelief.

"She told me that she had hidden the letter from you."

Suddenly, my tongue decided to work again.

"And why would she do that? She saw how much it crushed me that you hadn't written a single word to me, and she hid them? Like some five-year-old child? You really do think I'm stupid, don't you?"

"She said... she said that she didn't want you clinging onto me. She wanted you to forget about me, hate me, so that you could move on in your life.

My brain whirled around and around, trying to comprehend the last ten minutes. I couldn't handle this.

"Go home, Aaron."

I shut my door.

God. Damn. It.