After the party Harper, Sadie, and I went to Dennys and settled in a back booth. Sadie and Harper were basically sitting in eachother's laps while I sat across from them eating my pancakes and enjoying the beauty of Harper paying for my food. I could've really set it off and got another order of pancakes and Harper probably wouldn't have noticed, but I barely ended up finishing my three pancakes. I thought at the diner that would be the time I could tell Harper about my first kiss, but it was really Sadie's one-woman show. I didn't mind though, I got to learn more about her. I learned she had one little sister, she got her first vape when she was in 8th grade, she shopped at Brandy mellville, and her most listened to artist on spotify was Olivia Rodrigo. The only thing we seemed to have in common was that she also spent her middle school years watching lifestyle youtube videoes like Mylifeaseva and Meredith Foster. To the waiter with the sleeve of tattoos or the elderly couple sitting next to us drinking coffee, I wasn't the introverted girl thirdwheeling her bestfriend's situationship, I was just apart of a friend group eating Denny's late at night.
After Harper dropped me off I came home to a quiet apartment and collapsed on my bed. This was where I stayed most of the weekend, recovering from a night of people, recharging my social battery. If I wasn't watching youtube video essays on tiktok drama or playing hide and seek with Sawyer I was texting Vince who didn't respond to my messages as quickly as I would've liked. When he did respond we were playing a game of phone tag. He would call me when I was english. I would call him back at lunch when he was at practice. He would call me when he was in the dining hall and when I was trying not to fall asleep in detention. We didn't get on the same page until afterschool when I was watching the last bit of kids with Sarai. As Sarai surprised the kids with her glueless wig, lifting up and placing it back on her head, I looked down at my phone to see Vince's contact.
I looked over at Astrid who was sitting in a bean bag chair typing on her phone. I slipped out of the bungalow put the phone to my ear.
"Fianlly I was debating leaving a voice message," Vince answered. His voice was neutral, it didn't sound sad or confused, and this was relieving.
"So how is school going?" I asked this hoping he would have so much to say about school we wouldn't have to talk about any of the elephants going on. I did want to ease his mind about Vicki, but I also wanted to know everything about college, and what I had to expect in two years.
Vince signed and I could see his shrug. "Fine, classes are cool, roommates white but you don't get everything you want in life, the dining hall food isn't that bad, and my proffessors are whatever." Just like with Harper I wanted every detail but I wasn't going to push for him to tell me anything.
"Cool," was all I could say. I wanted to say more, to ramble, to tell him about the party and my whole weekend doing nothing, but I felt we had lost are spark and it was only his first week at college. I needed to talk to him in person and see his shrug and all the facial features we shared. I searched for more words. "You know what you and Vicki had was beautiful and just because it ended that doesn't make it any less beautiful."
Vince signed again, exccept this one was longer. "Yeah I guess, but I just miss her, you know." I was going to automatically respond with "yeah I know," but the truth was I didn't know. I never had a boyfriend of two years who was first my bestifriend break up with me. I never really felt viscreal longing for someone I thought would be with me forever, but I guess I knew second hand. When mom and dad divorced when I was 9 I thought my world was torn apart but after years of thinking, and seeing my dad finding happiness I realized that the end of their relationship wasn't a failure. It was a relationship that created two kids, and it ended. But still coming to terms with my parents divorce wasn't the same as experiencing a breakup or heartbreak of my own.
