Sick of losing soulmates (Cheryl Blossom & Toni Topaz)

8

The next day, everything is different. It's subtle, but Cheryl notices. She's good at these sorts of things; she needs to be, because it's the subtle hints that let Cheryl know whether her mom is going to slap her across the face if she even looks at her the wrong way.

Heather isn't there during biology or free period. Cheryl doesn't see her until she walks into the locker room and Heather is sitting on the bench, rummaging through her bag.

"Hey." Cheryl sits on the bench next to her and Heather shoots straight up, standing close to her locker. Like Cheryl's sick or contagious, or something.

"So, listen, uhm," Heather looks anywhere but at Cheryl, face oddly pale, "we can't do this anymore."

Cheryl feels a stab to her stomach and she stands up, too, so confused and so scared and so–

"What do you mean?"

"We can't do this anymore, Cheryl," Heather crosses her arms, "whatever we're doing. It needs to stop."

"I don't understand. I don't– why? Did I do something wrong?"

She did. Cheryl always does something and she always messes everything up. Her mother tells her so. She ruined the Blossom lineage by being born, she ruined Penelope and Clifford's marriage, she ruined this too. Someone saw them at Pop's, maybe. Or in the lockers. They needed to be more careful –

"No, you didn't–"

"Then I don't understand why you're doing this to–" me. Why are you doing this to me?

"Stop it, Cheryl! Stop!" Heather shouts, face going red when she notices how Cheryl flinches, how she steps back, "Stop asking so many questions! I met my soulmate, okay? I met my soulmate, and we're meant to be together. He's nice and he'll love me and I'll love him and we're soulmates, okay? Not like you and I. You and I were nothing," Heather's eyes are red, like she's been crying; there's a pause and Cheryl gears herself for the final nail on the coffin: "You are nothing."

Cheryl's crying and she hadn't even realized. There's wetness on her cheeks and dribbling down her chin but she doesn't wipe them away. Her chest is heaving and she's seeing red, she's seeing red and blue and Heather's blonde and the pink of her lips.

"You don't mean that." Cheryl says, voice so faraway and small and fragile. She's never cried in front of anyone and she's never been this vulnerable in front of anyone. Except for Jason.

"I do. So stay away from me already," Heather turns to her locker, shoving stuff around with unnecessary force. She's obviously not going to talk to Cheryl anymore so she starts shuffling away, towards her own locker, but Heather's voice stops her. "I won't tell anyone you're a lesbian."

Well, Cheryl presses her forehead against her locker, crying as quietly as humanely possible, at least there's that.