bad timing

thirteen

       "Can you believe it's been two months?" Charlie asks with a huge grin on her face, beside me with her hand in mine as we walked back to my car. "Feels like it's been a week." I smile, and she nods in agreement. "Do you have any other plans for tonight?" She gets into the passengers seat as I get into the drivers side, and I shake my head. "No. Sophie's still in California, so you're really the only person that wants to hang out with me." I say, looking over at her and starting the car. "Also, you act like I wouldn't tell you if I was having a birthday party." I laugh, and she shrugs, "Well, who knows? You could have a whole secret life I don't know about." She teases, and I roll my eyes, "It's just you, Charlie."

"Ooh I like the sound of that." She giggles, leaning over to kiss me before I pulled out of the parking spot. She reaches forward to turn up the radio, and I begin driving. As the volume got louder, I began to recognize the song playing. "Please change it." I mumble when I realized it was 'highway tune'. "I didn't even think they still played this on the radio." I say, and she gives me a frown. "Why don't you hang out with them anymore?" She asks, flipping through the stations. "I don't know. We just got our own lives, I guess. We grew apart." I explain, which wasn't entirely the truth.

After the concert, we had a silent agreement that we shouldn't hang out anymore. Not only Sam and I, but the twins, too. Being around each other only started fights between either me and Sam, or Sam and the twins. Sometimes, even Josh, Jake and I fought. None of us knew how to fix it, so we just distanced ourselves from each other.

"Do you miss them?" Charlie asks, taking my free hand in hers and playing with my fingers. I took a moment to answer, then nodded. "Yeah. I mean, they were all I had growing up. It sucks that I'm never gonna be that close to them again." I pull into the parking lot, getting out of the car and waiting for her to do the same. "Who knows? Maybe one day you will." She shrugs, following me inside.

"Yeah, I'm not too sure about that." I sigh, then notice she was texting someone so she wasn't paying attention to what I'd said. We made our way up the stairs and to my apartment, and I couldn't help but frown a little as I noticed her falling behind, still texting someone. I pushed my key into the lock, turning it before opening the door.

I was greeted with a few people screaming at me, nearly making me jump out of my skin. I put my hand over my heart, trying to calm down as I realized what was happening. It was a surprise party. They had all yelled 'happy birthday'. Charlie runs to the fridge, grabbing a cake and quickly lighting candles on top of it. She walks toward me with it as everyone else sang me happy birthday. It would have been an incredibly nice gesture, that was, if she didn't invite the Kiszkas.

She knew none of us were talking. They knew that every time we saw each other, it ended badly. Why had she invited them? Why had they come? "Are you gonna blow them out?" Charlie asks, furrowing her eyebrows. I stare down at the cake, watching the flames dance on the candles. "I..." I say, frustrated more than anything. I blew them out, and she gave me a worried expression. "Are you okay?" She asks, setting the cake down. "I'm sorry. I don't mean to seem ungrateful." I mumble, which was true, but I couldn't help but feel angry about the fact she invited the only people I didn't want to see. She knew I didn't want to see them. She just wanted me to make up with them.

"Why did you come?" I ask, turning to the boys. "We've never not been with you on your birthday." Josh explains, and I sigh. "Okay, but... I haven't seen you guys in a month. You only show up to my apartment because my girlfriend asks you to? Only to carry on a tradition?" I look at the three of them, annoyed. "Seriously? Can we not go one day without fighting?" Sam asks, and I felt blood rushing to my face. "Oh, yeah, cause I'm picking a fight. I'm sorry that I'm pissed off. You can't just show up here acting like everything's alright." My bottom lip quivers, and Sam rolls his eyes. "Can't you just be grateful?" "Sam, enough." Josh says, and Sam sighs.

I looked at Sam, "This is your problem. You're always thinking about what I'm not doing right, rather than what you aren't doing right. This is why I don't fucking talk to you anymore." I turn away, going to walk to my room. "That's why?" Sam exclaims, like he couldn't believe what he was hearing. "No. That's not why, and you know it. You don't talk to me anymore because you can't accept the fact that..." He yells, and I shake my head, cutting him off before he can finish and Charlie hears what he has to say. "Stop! Just... stop!" I say desperately.

"Oh." Sam nods, glancing at Charlie. "She doesn't know, does she?" He asks, and I wished I could have disappeared. "Know what?" Charlie asks, confused. "You don't need to do that. You don't need to create problems where they don't need to be. Just because you're insecure about your own relationship doesn't mean you have to try and ruin mine." I glare at him, and he shakes his head. "Alex, what's going on?" Charlie asks sadly, and I took a deep breath. "Okay. Fine. You... stay here. I'm not done talking to you." I tell Sam, my voice full of anger.

I pulled Charlie into my room, shutting the door behind me and explaining everything the shortest way I could. How I'd kissed Jake and started the whole thing, to Sam telling me he thought I never loved him. Charlie stood there, processing everything I'd told her. "I knew something was going on with you two. That day we met, the way you looked at him and Lena... Friends don't look at friends like that. I should've known." She says sadly, and I squeeze my eyes shut.

"I... I should've told you sooner. I just didn't think it mattered. I met you and I just forgot about my feelings for him." I explain, and she sighs. "You didn't tell me because you didn't want me to think you're still in love with him." She guesses, and I rub my forehead, "No, I just-" "I love you, Alex." She says, cutting me off. That was the first time she'd said that to me. "I..." I start, but she just takes my hands, pulling me in and kissing me. "Don't say it back. You and I both know I'm not the one you should be saying it to. I'm only telling you I love you because that's why I have to do this." She pulls away, and I shake my head quickly.

"Please, Charlie," I plead, my heart throbbing in my chest. I felt like she was slipping through my fingertips. "I don't want him. I want you. I haven't loved him since I met you." I say quickly, and she only smiles sadly. "I've loved enough to know that's not how it works. You can't love someone for so long and just forget about them when someone new comes into your life. You were just distracting yourself. You wanted to get over him so badly, that you tried forcing yourself to do so by being with me."

I would never have admitted to her, but maybe she was right. "I am really sorry this had to happen on your birthday. And our anniversary." She mumbles, "But I care about you too much to stay with you." Tears fall from my eyes as she walks out of my room. That was it. All because Sam couldn't keep his mouth shut.

I only felt sad for a moment, because the anger came storming in only seconds after she left my apartment. I pushed out of my room, walking back up to Sam. "You just ended the only good relationship I've ever been in. Are you happy? Is that what you wanted?" I scream, so frustrated I could hardly breathe. Tears streamed down my face. "It's not my fault you didn't tell her until now!" He yells back, getting closer to me. "I am not going to let you blame this on me." I exclaim, clenching my fists as he looks down at me.

"I can't do this." I shake my head, putting my face in my hands. "I can't be around you. I can't see you. All you do is ruin everything good in my life." My voice dropped as I spoke, trying to hold back more sobs. "Oh, come on. What are you gonna do? Move across the country to avoid me?" He says sarcastically, which gave me the sudden urge to start crying again. I looked at him, not saying a word for a moment.

"My brother wants me to move in with him." I say flatly, looking to the side. "What?" Sam asks, "In New York?" He sounded surprised, like he was realizing I actually had the opportunity to move. "I only have one brother." I mumble, looking up at him. "You guys don't get along." He said, almost sounding desperate. If he wanted me to stay, if he wanted to try and make things better, he would need to tell me.

"You think I don't know that?" I snap, and he just looks at me. "You're seriously gonna leave everything behind because we can't figure out how to get along?" He asks, his voice low. "It's not worth it anymore. All I want is for everything to be back to normal, but that's never gonna happen. It's so obvious we can never be friends again, and even more obvious that we can't be anything more than that." I explain, avoiding eye contact. "You can't just run away." He says.

I took a breath before responding, trying not to argue. "Just go." I say, glancing towards the door. I had almost completely forgotten the twins were there until I saw them by the door. "Fine." Sam says, annoyed, before walking out of my apartment and slamming the door behind him.