Changes

Chapter Thirty-Two

Amity

Change, it's what I wanted, it's what I needed, and in a lot of ways it's what I had been getting. Who am I kidding? That statement doesn't even begin to cover this. It had come in many forms; big or small, good or bad, and it felt as if this was only the beginning of it all. The position I was in was far different from the ones I found myself in before. Because now, I had been a little braver and a little stronger, enough so that I believed I could get it.

And I've learned a lot during this pursuit, like things about my sister. She may seem to have more freedom, but she is just as stuck as I am or, as I was, for the most part now anyways. The pressure was still there, but the control my parents had over me, the control I believed they had, was no longer something I couldn't fight against.

And the change I'd desperately wished for had not been entirely what I expected. Coping with some of the hardest ones, with my parents now and Luz, were far more difficult than I could have ever imagined. I came further along than I ever planned I would be able to. So here I sat under my lunch tree as Hunter spoke in a soft tone about things going on at home because he was going through things too. This time, I had someone to go through things with. That was different. That was a change.

My mind had been distracted lately, overworking itself, overwhelming me an overabundant amount. I had been busying myself with Press Club, school work, and theater. I wanted to get my mind off of everything that happened with Luz and what was happening with my parents so I decided to give my mind no choice but to focus on everything else.

The last conversation I had with Luz was still fresh in my mind and her absence in my life had been painfully noticeable. I never realize how much time she spends in my life until we grow distant and I am reminded of it. They made everything feel different, but I couldn't help to think that she had been right about the time and distance I needed from her. We had always ended up hurting each other and I knew we would have if our old habits hadn't been stopped.

And even though things had been changing between us, that didn't stop the way we could still hurt each other. We had good moments that ended in tragic sadness before. And now that we cared more than we used to it would only hurt worse. This was a change, right? Things had changed between us, right? That is what change felt like, though there are different types of change, and this one felt just as different as the other changes I had been experiencing. But then what made it so different? Was it simply different because it was with her?

I shook the thoughts away. I had been thinking of her again, and had started to miss her again. But I knew I was far from ready for that at this moment. My chest tightened the further I thought of her and I tried to take a deep breath in before I let it out as my eyes fell back on Hunter. I watched him furrow his brows as he unwrapped his sandwich. "I've been waiting for lunch all day. I forgot to eat breakfast this morning." Hunter told me while flashing me a small smile.

I felt a vibration in my pocket and pulled my phone out to see it was from my school email. I opened the email from our school paper publisher hoping for some good news finally only to be disappointed. Though that disappointment soon turned into anger as I held my phone in my hand tightly. With everything going on right now I had very little patience and the publisher had been testing it for a long time now. "What's wrong?" Hunter asked me, stopping from taking a bite of his lunch and placing it down to look at me instead.

Though he was extremely hungry he still chose to see if I was okay. This is something that would warm my heart usually if I hadn't been so angry at this moment. Even with the edits and revisions I'd made based off their notes they still won't allow me to publish my article. Something I've been fighting for weeks now. "We have to fix something." I say grabbing his wrist and bringing him from the ground before dragging him with me. He only had a moment to grab his lunch before we'd taken off.