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08: Two and a Half Men

08: Two and a Half Men

            “So I heard you went to Charlie’s house last night.” I don’t know how to feel about the fact that the first thing Caggie even has to say to me is about Charlie. The last time we even made eye contact was on Friday night, where I sat in the back of James-Bond-Taxi-Man’s car, the two of watching her climb up the tree which was right next to the first floor hallway window. Years prior, her brother had already dug out foot holes because everyone knew he was not a sporty person in the slightest and his upper body strength was almost as laughable as his sisters. When I’d watched the window close behind her, and turned back to see the back of Taxi-Man’s head, tousled brown hair tucked beneath a beanie that had been the last time I’d laid my eyes on her for an entire weekend. It wasn’t uncommon in the slightest for Caggie to just kind of drop off the face of the earth, but even then, it had never been over something as trivial as a boyfriend, even if he did potentially cheat on her.

            “Yeah,” I say, setting my skateboard on the floor and keeping up with her pace of walking which isn’t exactly fast nor slow, Caggie likes to stroll when the weathers nice. “My Mom needed some help with the dance-a-thon.” This is the first time I’ve outright lied to my best friend, and I definitely don’t like the way it makes me feel, like someone has put a knife through my chest and watched me bleed out shame and guilt all over the upholstery and marring the surroundings. It’s not like I can just tell her the truth, not because I don’t trust her, because I do with my own life, but I wouldn’t dream of burdening her with the weight that Charlie and I have weighing down on our shoulders. I struggle to keep my voice light so I don’t worry her at all.

            “Have you got a dress for it? I need to go shopping and get one.” She’s smiling and has done ever since she walked into school this morning, even though news had already travelled that her boyfriend had cheated on her at Idris’ party, which is probably why she took yesterday off. There are many different versions which all get more stupid and outrageous every time it’s repeated to another person who has not yet heard. I don’t get how she’s coped having so many eyes on her all day, the weight of their expectations for her to just break down and mourn a relationship she hadn’t been that emotionally invested in.

            “I’ve got a dress.” I tell her, not choosing to disclose any further information that Marie personally sought out getting one made for me. There’s bad blood between Caggie’s Mom, and Marie own and I hate rubbing in that Marie looks at me like a daughter, yet struggles to keep a smile on her face whenever she has to look Caggie in the eye, which is rarely as she’s done her best to avoid even getting into a ten foot radius of her. “I haven’t got a date yet.”

            Caggie rolls her eyes when I jump down some stairs still managing to stay on the board, I still say she’s jealous that I picked up skateboarding and her biggest talent is yet to be found. “Can’t we go stag?” She whimpers slightly, probably at the fought of having to take a date as she’d been planning with Neeco for quite a while that they’d be partners and group together all their sponsor money at the end of it. Her dependency on her boyfriend’s sometimes scares me, it’s so heavy and thick and full throttle but when things get called off, it’s like she’d never known them at all.

            “They’re not really dates,” I say in some effort to console her. “It’s just a dance partner.”

            “You should ask Charlie.”

            “That’d be awkward.”

            “Why would it? I thought you both did dancing lessons together when his Aunt got married.” It’d be awkward because we were dating then, and the kind of dance we’d been taught had been incredibly intimate and purely for couples who were in some kind of love, and now we aren’t and having to do a routine with him would be uncomfortable for me, I have no idea what he’d say about it with his mood swings.