Girl Crush

Chapter 28

 Dani laid on her bed, in the same spot she'd been for two days now. She had convinced her mom she was sick. It hadn't been hard considering she looked like something a cat might cough up on the carpet. Her hair was a mess, ratted and sticking up every which way, her eyes were swollen and puffy from all the tears she'd cried, and her skin was mottled red. She had probably burst blood vessels in her face between the crying and the vomiting.

She wasn't sure if she had gotten sick from crying or running. Dani had not slowed down Wednesday night until she'd made it to her house. Then, she'd panicked, thinking Eddie might show up there and had turned and ran all the way to the woods. She didn't go to their usual spot, not wanting to be anywhere he might look. That was, if he was even looking. It was there she had gotten violently sick, losing the sandwich she'd eaten at the coffee shop. She'd never been extremely athletic and still had no clue how she'd had the endurance to run for that long. Dani didn't know how long she sat there in the cold. She just knew that by the time she'd thought it was safe to come home, her nose and toes had felt frozen, she could barely feel her fingers, and she couldn't stop shivering.

Her mom had freaked out when she caught sight of her coming in the door. Eddie had shown up, absolutely frantic to know where Dani was but not telling her what had happened, which had made her mom worry. She had yelled at Dani, asking where she'd been and what had happened. She screamed that she'd been on the verge of calling the cops. She'd never seen her mom so crazy. Dani had no words to offer her. She knew her mom deserved an explanation, she knew it was wrong to cause her to worry like that, but she couldn't find the strength to speak. She had burst into tears and her mom instantly softened, pulling her close. Her mom may not have known what had happened but she knew Dani was not okay. She had held Dani, swaying slightly side to side just like she used to do when Dani was a kid, whispering assurances in her ear that everything was okay.

Everything was not okay. Everything was as far from okay as it could ever be. It would never be okay again. Eddie had been there. How had he known to be there? He had heard her song. He had seen into the innermost parts of her, where she kept the dreadful secrets that would destroy them. He knew exactly how she felt about him now, how she felt about him and Chrissy. There was no way she could face him. The problem was, she had convinced her mom to let her stay home these two days but she didn't think she would get her to agree to Monday as well. And how was she going to avoid him all weekend when he didn't have school too?

Dani gripped her pillow, shoving her face against it to muffle her cries. She didn't know why. There was no one here to hear her anyway. Her mom was at work. Everyone else was at school. Her eyes darted to the clock. Shit. No they weren't. It was three, which meant everyone had left school for the day already. She had to come up with a plan, something, anything, that would mean she could avoid seeing him.

Her front door had become a revolving door of people pounding on it yesterday afternoon. There was Eddie first. He screamed her name, begging her to let him in. She ignored him. He decided to try his key but she had thought ahead and slid the chain on so he couldn't get in and shoved a chair under the back door. It had taken forty-five unbearable minutes, as she sobbed into her pillow, listening to him yell for her, before he finally gave up.

After him had been Robin. She pounded on the door for about fifteen minutes before giving up. Then Dustin showed up, screeching her name over and over from her front yard. She assumed Eddie had filled Hellfire in on her humiliation, so that was awesome. Eddie must have told him how she had barricaded herself inside because he didn't even try to knock. Then Steve had come, his knock much more gentle, his pleas much softer, telling her he just wanted to know if she was okay.

She had ignored them all. How was she supposed to show her face to any of them? They all knew the mortification she had subjected herself to. She didn't know what to say to any of them and she knew there was nothing any of them could say that would make her feel better.