the nerd and the heartbreaker

racheal - washing away the pain

 "Impossible," Maya snickered.

I felt my chest tighten. I did not know this beautiful monster well, but I knew enough to understand the harm she executed in my life, and my new friend's.

Mika stood up. "Maya, I don't want this right now."

Suddenly, those cruel eyes softened, and that inconsiderate voice became gentle. "Mika, I... I'm sorry. I'm sorry for everything I said earlier. I..." Maya's eyes burst with tears, which streamed down her face and pooled on the floor.

"I'm so sorry!" Her voice echoed around the small cafe, and a few heads turned.

"What are you saying?" Mika demanded. "What do you want from me this time?"

"I don't want anything from you. Just.. Listen."

I gazed at the conversation, whose diplomacy was hanging on a thin string. Amber, hidden shyly behind her cracking partner, was fiddling with a pencil. Mika was watching her ex-friend attentively, but there was a tense caution in her eyes. Harley was not making eye contact. Karla closed her eyes, but she wasn't trying to doze off. I saw her hands twitching as she grabbed the armrests of her chair, and there was still a small slit open between her eyelids and the distinct black marks underneath her eyes.

How have I come this far in observing people? I wondered. I thought this was a talent for the quiet, unspoken sort of girls. Huh...

Could it be that my twisted old romance made me realize just how much people conclude about you, even before you say a word?

I shook off the thought while maintaining my tense congeniality.

"I... I want to be friends with you again," Maya blurted out. "I don't want to watch you from the sidelines. I want to watch you grow, and I want to do it with you as a friend."

She's so... I narrowed her eyes. She was widening her eyes with full consciousness — they looked too luminous to have been a natural movement. Amber was covering her face, which she only did when she was guilty. Yet this was a genuine move.

Unless Maya is lying.

"Uh, sorry," I said abruptly. "We don't give in to liars."

Harley, Kat, Maria, and Mika looked around in confusion, while Karla remained still and silent. She had opened her eyes slightly more, as though paying more attention.

I might as well explain myself.

I turned to Amber. "Hey, friend, are you okay?" I asked gently.

"What?" Amber blinked, startled. "Yeah, I'm fine. Why? I always am."

"No, you are not." I almost began explaining why her girlfriend was toxic in every way imaginable, before considering the probable scenario that she would be punished for listening to "those lies." I took a deep breath.

"It's just that you always cover yourself when you lie, you know."

Amber gasped. Maya whipped around, a deadly rage illuminating her now-dark blue eyes. "What lies are you spitting out this time, Racheal? You don't deserve to live in my timeline if all you're going to do is shatter my life."

"Watch your vocabulary," I cautioned her, standing straight. "You have done enough to 'shatter' Mika. The 'terrified, cracking, desperate' you earlier... Sheesh, I wonder where that side of you went, unless... You were never a real one anyway."

Mika stood up alongside me with a determined fire in her eyes, which gave me a kind of strength to continue resisting Maya's furious gaze.

"Maya, I have found my friends," Mika responded gently, but firmly. "It took me years, but I have found them. I'm sorry to break it to you, but you were never one all along."

"Huh!" Maya snorted. "I don't mind. I'll enjoy watching you struggle. I just..." As if mustering all her effort into a last attempt, she smiled grimly. "I was just content with our friendship before you abandoned it for these fuzzy-minded lovebirds."

This time, Mika's gaze didn't waver.