Trauma

09 | Trust

"Maybe you should invite Timothée over tonight," Evelyn's mother says as they enter the apartment. "I'm sure that'll help boost your relationship-"

"Mom, I already said that I have no chance with him-"

"I meant your friendship."

"Oh."

"Yeah," she smirks. "But think about it, okay? It'll help you get to know each other."

"Okay."

Evelyn heads to her room and closes the door behind her, plopping down on her bed. Maybe her mother is right. Maybe she should invite Timothée over. Surely watching a movie wouldn't do any harm, right?

Evelyn

hi timothée

i was wondering if u would like to come over tonight for a movie?

Timothée

yeah sure! 

what time?

Evelyn

7:00?

Timothée

yup that works for me

Evelyn

great! i'll text u my address

see u soon

Timothée

I can't wait!

Fast forward a few hours, there is a knock on the door. Evelyn rushes to answer it. "Hey," Timothée greets. 

"Hi there," she smiles and motions for him to come in. He looks around in awe, staring at the Oscar trophies on a shelf. "Nice apartment."

"Thanks."

"Is that Timothée?" she hears her mother call, footsteps approaching them. Her mother rounds the corner and gives Timothée a warm hug. "Hi! I'm Evelyn's mom."

"It's nice to meet you, Ms. Thomas."

"Oh please, just call me Alisha."

He smiles and nods, "Okay, thank you Alisha."

Evelyn grabs his hand and pulls him to her room, "Thanks mom but we really gotta start the movie now."

"Have fun! But not too much-"

"Mom!" 

Evelyn closes the door and sighs, "Sorry about her-"

"No, no, she seems nice," he says grinning. "So, what movie are we watching?"

"Uhhh," she sits down on her bed, patting the spot beside her but Timothée is too busy exploring her room to notice. "I don't know, do you have any ideas?"

"What's this award for?" he says, distracted from answering her question. Evelyn gets up to see which award he is talking about. 

"Oh, that one," she says, "I won that one with Lily. We were voted the best actor duo at our school."

He frowns, "You still haven't told me about this Lily girl." Evelyn reclaims her seat on the bed and continues to scroll through Netflix.

"Are you into Marvel movies? How about Iron Man-"

"Please answer me," he says, sitting next to her and looking straight into her eyes. Evelyn breaks the eye contact. 

"Timothée-"

"I know it's painful, but we're friends now. You know I'll always be here when you need me." Evelyn just stays silent, debating if she's ready to tell him or not. She trusts him with her whole heart but a part of her still wants to wait until the right moment comes. Perhaps it was a mistake inviting him over. "Does Lily somehow bring back bad memories about acting?"

"Look," Evelyn sighs, pausing again. She realizes that he won't be letting this go any time soon so she might as well just tell him. "Lily was my best friend ever since kindergarten. We grew up together and never left each others sides. We had each other's back for everything and we both loved acting. We would act in plays together, take drama lessons together, go to movie sets my parents were working on together, all of that. But one day . . . " she pauses, trying her best not to tear up. He rubs her back soothingly, letting her know that she can take all the time she wants.

Evelyn recalls the rest of the story, telling every bit of detail she can remember. It is the first time she has ever told anyone this much of what happened, but she feels this strange feeling of safety she's only ever felt with Timothée. He reminds her so much of Lily that it's hard not to. But there is also something different between the two of them that she has never felt before. She wants to believe it's just part of their friendship, but deep down she knows that it's really the butterflies in her stomach when he hugs her, laughs at her jokes; just any time they're with each other. However, she decides to bury and forget about those feelings before it affects their friendship.

"Wow," he is in shock by the end of it all. "Now that you mention it, I think I did hear about a shooting at your old school."

"Yeah, it was on all the news channels all over the country. The president even spoke about it. Luckily, no one outside of my school knew that I was the witness or else everything would have been so much worse. But you can't tell anyone about this, alright?"

"I would never."

A/N

Ooh, so Evelyn told him. What do you think will happen next? 

Sorry that this chapter stopped so abruptly, I just thought it was a good place to leave it and it's currently 12:50 A.M. as I'm writing this, so I need to go sleep. I hope you enjoyed reading, and feel free to leave a comment about anything! I'll try my best to respond to you (I say that a lot don't I?).

- M