The Wallflower of Parkview High

Chapter Forty Three

I didn't possibly know that staring at a phone screen could make me feel this scared. However, here I was, sitting on my bed and doing that exact thing.

Oh god, why did I have to make this so complicated for myself? After all, I just needed to send her a simple text message.

But what would I say to a person who had been avoiding me for two and a half months? At this point, I didn't even know if we were friends.

Sighing to myself, I set down my phone and proceeded to stare up at the ceiling. Part of me wanted to text Alicia and ask her if we could be friends again but part of me didn't. After all, I couldn't stand the sight of her saying that we couldn't be friends anymore and that was probably what she was going to say. I mean, after I abandoned her that day, I couldn't see why she would still want to be friends with me.

Self consciously, I pulled my knees up to my chest and glanced at my phone out of the corner of my eye. Even though it was laying a few feet away from me, it seemed so far away.

Noah, it's just a simple message, I thought to myself and for some reason that made everything even worse.

"Just a simple message"?! This was far from "just a simple message"! Sending a message to Alicia would either make me or break me. It wasn't as if I was asking her if she wanted to hang out with me. I was literally asking her if we could be friends again after we pretended the other didn't exist for two and a half months!

Why the hell was this so complicated?!

Wanting to make myself feel better, I grabbed the large yellow heart shaped pillow Dad gave me for my birthday and buried my face in it. I then cried and cried. I don't know how long I cried for but I knew that I wanted to get everything out of me; my sadness towards Zander, the worries about my friendship with Alicia, all the harm and teasing that I have been subjected to in multiple different ways, and the anger that radiated off of Damien that day in the bathroom. This all made me so weak and hopeless - or maybe more weak and hopeless than usual since I've probably been weak and hopeless my whole life.

Maybe Elijah was right. Maybe I was an annoying, pathetic sissy who could hardly get a word out without stuttering.

Letting a whine escape my lips, I buried my face deeper into the pillow and cried even harder. I honestly couldn't stop my tears from coming so I just let them fall. Why bother to make everything better when it would only make things worse than they already were?

As I was in the midde of crying my eyes out, I suddenly heard a faint buzzing sound. Lifting my head from my pillow, I turned my head and saw that my phone was vibrating. When I looked at the screen, my eyes almost popped out of my head.

Alicia was calling me.

Sitting there, I instantly had a wave of internal panic. Why was she calling me? Was she telling me that my guesses were right and that we weren't friends anymore? Did she know that I was nervous about this "thing" between us?

Also, should i answer her call? My first answer would have been not to since I couldn't stand the sight of her telling me that we weren't friends anymore. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized...what if she wasn't calling to tell me that we weren't friends? Maybe she was calling to tell me something else that was much better or something that didn't have to do with the situation.

Despite the small reassurances that I made to myself though, I still was a nervous wreck as I pressed the "accept" button.

"H-Hello?" I asked, wanting to rip the non-existant bandaid off as soon as possible. There was silence on the other end for a minute and I internally panicked, however Alicia spoke.

"Hey, Noah."

"Um, uh, hey..." I murmured.

"So I want to ask you something."

Oh god, here it was. Here was where she was going to tell me that we were no longer friends, rendering me friendless once again (and no, I didn't know if Zander and I were friends either).

"W-What is i-it?" I asked, tightening the grip on my phone. Again, there was silence on the other end and I thought Alicia had hung up on me since I was being a stuttering mess. A minute later though, she spoke.

"Why are you ignoring me?" she asked.

Well that was unexpected. Here I was thinking that she was the one who was ignoring me!

"Um..." I said, fiddling with the edge of my fluffy lilac blanket, "I um, I thought you were the one ignoring me."

"What?!" I heard her screech and almost instantly, I wished I could take those words back.

"I wasn't ignoring you! I was trying to get you to talk to me after you ran off to the bathroom like that!" she exclaimed in a lower tone of voice once she had calmed down.

"W-What?" I stuttered.

"When you ran off to the bathroom like that, I wanted to make sure you were okay. But when I came to look for you, you weren't there and for the next few days when I was looking for you, you seemed to be avoiding me. Eventually I just left you to your own devices since I thought you were ignoring me or something."

I was silent for a few minutes before responding and it took everything in me not to cry. After all, Alicia had just told me that I was avoiding her and not the other way around.

"Sorry..." I finally said, "It's just that, um, I thought you were avoiding me so I decided to not talk to you cause I thought you wanted to be alone."

"Oh, I see now." Alicia said and then she laughed.

"This is so stupid, Noah." she said once her laughter had died down. "Why are we even ignoring each other over something that we don't even know is true?"

"Y-Yeah..." I said and I couldn't help the smile forming on my face, "Are we, um, friends again?"

"Of course we are, you fool! What made you think we weren't friends?"

"Um..." I started to say however Alicia cut me off.

"We're going to be friends again, Noah, whether you like it or not. I can't stand to see you moping around school like that, friendless and sad."

"Oh my god!" I gasped, hardly daring to believe it.

"Noah...?" Alicia asked, interrupting my bit of joy. I just bit my lip, wondering if what she was going to say would make things bad again.

"Y-Yes?" I asked.

"So, I heard that Zander was carrying you in PE last week. Any idea what that was about?" she asked and I could just hear the teasing tone in her voice.

"Alicia, that was nothing!" I exclaimed, "He just carried me because I got hurt!"

"It wasn't nothing, Noah. I mean, it's not every day that someone carries you in PE, let alone willingly do it."

"Alicia!" I shrieked.

"Ooo, do you love-"

"Alicia! I said that it was nothing!" I screeched and I heard her laughing on the other end of the phone. Instead of getting more angry though, I laughed along with her.

After all, I had my best friend back.