Love, Hart [Discontinued]

twenty four

TW

RUBY

-

We had been sitting there, on the floor of his pantry, for approximately seventeen minutes. I had been counting the seconds.

Aspen told me to take my time at thirty seconds. Then went on to tell me at ten minutes that I didn't have to say anything if I wasn't comfortable. Two minutes later he called my name. "Ruby." He whispered. A second later, he sighed.

I stayed quiet every time.

"Alice Crawford." I started, gazing at the door, longing for its release. "Does that name mean anything to you?"

Of course it would. I knew it would. If it didn't at least mean something to someone that attended Lake Forest, then they at least knew the name. Everyone knew her. She was a ball of sunshine, minus the blonde hair.

Aspen thought for a second, then nodded, "Yeah. Redhead, Felix's ex-girlfriend. She moved a few months ago. You two were friends, weren't you?

That caught my undivided attention, "How did you know?"

He blinked, then blinked again with a shrug, "After you left that day at the library when Felix came, he told us you were her best friend-practically sisters. He said you never liked him when they dated, and when she moved, you cut all ties with him. Not that you were obligated not to, or anything. I wouldn't stick around for a guy like Felix either. He's..."

"A piece of work." I finished for him. A real messed up piece of work.

"Something like that, yeah..." He trailed, like he was aware of who Felix was-who he really was. I doubted that. Aspen snapped out of his nanosecond long reverie. "What about her?"

"Were you guys friends?" I asked, and then paraphrased my question, "Did you guys ever become close? Like, friendly conversation kind of close?"

He swayed his head from side-to-side like, so-so, "We had a few classes together-now that I actually think about it, you'd always come in the middle of our classes and make up some bullshit excuse to get Alice out of class." He laughed, his eyes alight like the thought of him knowing me before was an epiphany he'd never seen coming.

"Yeah. You'd walk in, tell the teacher something like, I don't know, you needed assistance in making posters for the student government projects. And you'd walk out together. I knew for a fact that you weren't going to make projects."

I laughed, "I remember doing that, holy hell. She'd always text me when she was bored, and I'd ask to use the bathroom just to go get Alice then we'd hang out in the courtyard for the rest of the day."

Looking down at me, he said, "Didn't peg you for delinquency, Hart."

"Presumptuous, per usual, Aspen." I rolled my eyes. "Anyway, yeah. I wasn't too fond of Felix when they dated. At first I didn't mind him, but then he-" I stopped myself. Well, I wouldn't say I stopped myself, but that thick little ball rising up my throat did. How was I crying already?