You Can Run To Me

Twenty-One

She carried on walking, her mind entirely focused on him and that moment, straight into Penryn Hamilton. She almost walked right on past her old friend, and indeed she would have, had Pen not grabbed her arm and started forcibly dragging her down a quiet corridor and into an even quieter class room. Natalie was completely disoriented, confused by the sudden change of scenery, and it was only when Penryn shook her by the shoulders that she began to have some idea of what was going on. They were alone together. A sense of intense dread made Natalie's legs tremble slightly, and she wanted to sit down. She glanced around, but there were no chairs close enough to grab onto, so she was left standing shakily.

"What the hell, Pen?" she managed, though the shake in her voice was undeniable. Penryn gave her the classic don't be stupid look.

"You know exactly what the hell. Otherwise you wouldn't have been avoiding me and I wouldn't have had to drag you in here. For God's sake, Nat, why couldn't we just talk about this like normal civilized people? You should have talked to me. We're supposed to be best friends or something, right?"

"I-I... I'm sorry, Pen. I just didn't want to interrogated and-"

"Interrogated? You think that's what this is? I just don't like you keeping this stuff from me. I don't care about the others, but you haven't spoken to me about any of this. I knew you were acting a bit weird, but now you're lying to me?" she seethed. "And the others," she added as an afterthought.

"What makes you think I'm lying about anything? What would I even be lying to you about?"

"Don't be ridiculous. Ephren. You're not over him. You said you were. So yeah, you lied. You might as well start telling the truth now, huh?"

"I told you all the other day – I'm done with it. He's an a-hole and I don't know why I even mentioned it in the first place. I-"

"You're lying. Again. How can you stand yourself right now? I bet you're even lying to yourself."

"I'm not lying."

"For Christ's sake! I don't even get why you're so afraid to tell the truth. It's nothing shameful."

"It is." Penryn moved to disagree with her, but Natalie stopped her with a sharp hand. "I tried to tell them before, and... Well, you saw what happened."

"Yeah, you blew up at them."

"What was I supposed to do? They thought I was some kind of obsessive stalker."

Penryn tried to speak, but all that came out was a strangled sort of sound. Natalie, who'd been having her argument with the floor the whole time too nervous to look Pen in the eye, slowly brought her gaze up. She wasn't sure what she was expecting to see (Penryn suffocating from anaphylactic shock, perhaps, or crying from desperation), but what she did see wasn't it at all. Penryn was laughing. After a couple of choking coughs it turned into a proper laugh, and Natalie couldn't help but join in when she saw the almost hysterical amusement in her friend's eyes. And so their argument degraded into a shared fit of giggles. The argument was just too ludicrous.

After a good few minutes of laughing, they were both able to breathe again. Yet for a while, neither of them spoke, reluctant to ruin the moment. After all, what would they talk about but the very thing that had had them shouting at each other with the rage of a hundred warring nations? But they couldn't just stay in silence all this time. Someone had to bring it back up again. And maybe this time it would be alright.

"So what's really going on with you?" asked Penryn softly.

Natalie was silent for a while, drawing the moment out until she absolutely had to fill the silence with an answer. "I don't know."