2 Secrets (GirlxGirl)

Chapter 1

"Gwen?" I lock the front door with my phone pressed between my shoulder and my cheek. I know it's her without having to check the phone number, I know I'm late again, I am a terrible friend and she's anxiously waiting for me. Gwen doesn't answer, instead she sobs into her phone, which is an understandable thing to do right now in her situation.

"Shh Gwen. I'm on my way. I'm sorry you have to wait." I say in the hope that my reassuring tone will somehow calm her down.

"I thought I was ready for this, Kat. But I'm not." Wren manages to say through her tears and constant hiccups. "I mean, I don't even know how I'm gonna live anymore it's just...it's..." She wants to say something but seems like she can't think of a word for how she feels and trails off.

"It's hard for you, yes, it is. I don't know exactly how difficult it must be but I know it's hard." I sigh, trying to sound calm even though hearing my best friend's voice all hoarse and cracked up like this makes me want to cry with her.

"I don't wanna look at this place anymore. You know, it's like, it's like looking at something that you want and you owned but can't reach it, but it's right in front of my eyes." Wren says. "Please, Kat, come quickly. Pick me up, I can't stand this any longer."

"I am on my way, Gwen. And I'll be at your house..." Gwen's sudden loud sobs stop me. I was so stupid to say your house. That place is not her house anymore, it's now for sale and soon someone else will be owning it. I check the time on my watch, which reads 10am sharp."I'll be um, I'll be there in er, fifteen minutes. Okay? I promise you, fifteen minutes." I say, walking down to the garage to get my car started.

"Fifteen minutes. Okay, okay. Thank you Kat, I love you." Gwen says more calmly and hangs up. Gwen always says I love you before she hangs up. I have to tell myself over and over again everyday that she doesn't mean it that way, she's never meant it the way I want her to. I have to constantly remind myself that Gwen's taken, and that she has a boyfriend named Joe, not a girlfriend, so being best friends is as far as our relationship can go.

Dropping myself onto the driver's seat, I realise promising Gwen to arrive in fifteen minutes meaning setting an almost impossible mission for myself. I have no choice now, Gwen's mentally unstable at the moment from the shock of losing her family and her properties, if I can't get there in fifteen minutes, I don't know what might happen.

***

It all occurred too fast for us to do anything.

A few days ago, at around midnight, Gwen was called by a hospital. She was informed about the health condition of her parents and younger brother, who were currently still alive after a serious car accident and have just been sent to emergency wards, but that was all the doctors could tell. The hospital was at least an hour of driving away if the roads were clear, and luckily that night Gwen was staying over at my house so we left in my car immediately after the phone call, still wearing our pyjamas.

I remember feeling as useless as never before. Gwen kept crying and nibbling on her fingernails out of anxiety on her seat next to me in my car but all I could do was telling her it would be fine and driving as fast and irresponsible as possible without being stopped by the police. At one point, I got too stressed out and yelled at Gwen instead of soothing her. Of course she stayed dead silent then, but it made me feel like a total douchebag.

We got there in less than an hour. It was devastating having to listen to the doctors' announcements. The first person Gwen lost was her brother. Then half an hour later, before she got enough time to calm herself, she knew she'd lost her mother. A doctor came when Gwen was sobbing and told us that there might be hope for Gwen's father, and that he thought Gwen's father could make it.