Good Enough |✅|

Raul

   Unfortunately, I had to wait till late in the evening to get a chance and crash at Pam's to tell her all about my confrontation with Jeremiah. And yet, that evening was a turbulent one.

Raul : Dude, dude. Listen!

Pam : Yeah what?!

Raul : I actually asked Jere—

   And my phone was ringing.
   What awesome timing!
   It was Kaedan. Impatiently, I put it to my ear, raising an eyebrow.

Raul : Hey! Oh yeah, okay. . . Wait, Jeremiah had tried out for basketball? How did I not— and he got in?! . . . Oh . . . I see . . . Okay, then. Yeah. . . . . Wait, what?! . . . No way! Shit, man . . . Damn. Yeah, okay . . . . bye.

   I almost threw my phone back in my bag.

Pam : What? What happened? Who was that? You look like you just recieved bad news.

Raul : Well, no kidding, I did. That was Kaedan right now. He had actually called to tell me the time of the next club meet, but also told me a lot of other things.

   A lot of other things that were devastating yet confusing at the same time.

Raul : He told me about Jeremiah making it to the team and . . . and . . . Oh Pam—

   I stared at her with panic rising in my head.

Pam : What?!

Raul : Jeremiah . . . His mom's dead.

She stiffened.

Pam : Whaaaaat?!

Raul : It's true! Daniel got to know about it when he called Jeremiah not hours ago. Daniel told Kaedan and . . . Kaedan told me now.

Pam : Dude . . .

   Like Pam, I was out of breath too. Even though it was completely Jeremiah's loss and neither of us could understand his feelings, it still meant that all of us would get affected by it. In some way or the other. Daniel definitely would. And if he did, I couldn't possibly remain meditated. I couldn't imagine Pam being calm either. And as for the other kids at school . . . I couldn't guess right then.

In all the frenzy, I suddenly realized how worthless I was gonna sound before Kaedan's phone call had disrupted the conversation. Such little things were definitely not gonna matter for Jeremiah anymore.
Even though it was true that I hadn't liked him since the beginning of time, I couldn't help feeling the tiniest bit of sadness for the poor kid.
School next day was tumultuous.
Or maybe it was just my head.
(And later, I realized it indeed was just me.)

Pam : Hey, what were you gonna tell me yesterday? You never mentioned it anyway.

Raul : Oh . . . well, nothing really.
I couldn't blame her when she raised an eyebrow.

Pam : But you were so excited about it.

Raul : Well now I'm not, okay! It's all already very weird. But if you still want to know then Jeremiah rejected Daniel. You were right! And that's all!

Pam : Alright! You don't have to shout! You were the one who wanted to tell me all about it anyway!

   For a second, we stared at each other. Then Pam walked away.

I was confused for a second. But then on recollecting the priorities, I walked my way too.

The worst part of the day was when we all met up and realized that Jeremiah was missing.
We being me, Daniel, Kaedan, Pam and Tara.
And if it wasn't already cynical enough, Susan passed us by at that exact revolting moment, catching our depressed eyes. She stared at us confoundedly for a whole timespan of twenty five seconds before turning and continuing on her path. But an uncannily precarious voice sounded abruptly to stop her dead in her tracks.

Daniel : In case you're wondering why Jeremiah did not show up today, you can come along with me and find out.

   Susan turned to face us again.

Susan : Come with you? Where?

I couldn't really blame the skepticism etched across her face as the other four of us threw questioning glances toward Daniel too.

Pam : Yeah, what the heck do you mean?

Daniel : Sigh . . . I don't know. It's all your choice actually but I am going to visit Jeremiah now and even though he might prefer solitude over us and could actually chuck us out which is completely his thing but—

He looked at Susan like she was an alien from Jupiter.

Daniel : —I don't think he'll say anything if it were you.

The next second, it seemed like Daniel had torn bits of paper and showered it all over the other four of us. However blank her face was, we all had noticed Susan go rigid at his statement.
And as we all followed him out the school gates without a word on our tongues and Susan tottering behind us, I was able to capture a view of Daniel's face. Painstakingly, it was exactly how I'd feared it'd be. I had no doubt nobody else had remembered to notice it.

The expression on his face was such a strikingly grimy mixture of hopelessness, heartbreak and hate, I tasted sand in my mouth.
And the worse part?

There was nothing I could do about.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So who's enjoying this story?!
Is it you?
Yes or no?!
If yes, keep reading, voting, commenting and smiling! ;)
Thanks book lovers!
- Mallina