Chocolate Emergency

Twenty-two Slut

            Twenty-two Slut

         The art hall was bustling with activity and never seen before excitement, students laughed together in unions. The usual shunned out artists, wondering in their own nonexistent worlds were now fidgeting with their batches and making last minute amendments to the stands on which their masterpieces lay.

         I stood in the back corner of the hall, the glorious afternoon sun bathing me and my painting in a warm glow. The painting I had picked for the exhibition, against Mrs. Clark's suggestion, was Devlin's eyes. The canvas bare white, only two pair of eyes stared out it.

         Oliver was standing few rows ahead of mine with his painting of a girl sobbing into her hands. I noted, enviously, he was in his best clothes today, unlike me in my usual pair of jeans and hoodie; he was dressed in perfectly ironed white shirt and cream colored trousers. He secretly looked my way.  For a brief second, I saw his lips curl into the faintest of smiles.

        I gave him a menacing glare. If he thinks, he's going to be forgiven for all he said then he has got the wrong idea. I will never forgive him, never. He was my friends, the closest to my heart. There used to be a time when even words weren't needed to convey what the other felt. Now it was like we were on two different planets, where even words can't makes us understand each other.

       A heavy weight dropped to the pit of my stomach. Why? Oliver, why did you do this?

     I looked away and surveyed all the other paintings in hall. Everyone had put up their best sleeve today, hoping to catch the eye of potential buyers. It's been the same every year; all students put their painting and sell them for a fair share of money. I was selling Devlin's painting because I couldn't keep it. It keeps making me love him with a more devastating intensity.

       Sodden sneakers squeaked, breaking my reverie. It was Oliver; there was an abashed expression on his face. The tousled mess of dirty blond hair was combed to one side of his head.

      "Alice," He said in a low voice. His stormy eyes watched me, warmheartedly, the same he used look at me when we used to be friends. Warmed surged through my chest, all of the sudden I felt giddy.

      No, please, don't trust him again. He could hurt you again, Alice.

      I gulped, swallowing the lump of happiness that had just formed in my throat. "What is it?" I snapped.

He winced. "I'm sorry,"

            "You're not," I barked back, curling my hands around my arms. "You think it's my fault. You think I choose to be this miserable brat. My mother died right in front of my eyes, Oliver. Do you seriously think it's my fault I turned out this way?"

            "You're reacting the way I thought you would. That's why I don't talk to you anymore."

            Bitterness entered my mouth. He was expecting this: for me to react negatively.

            "Save yourself the trouble and don't,"

"I want my friend back and you're not stopping me,"

            "You don't want her back. She embarrasses you,"

      "Like I said, I'm sorry for that. I was being a jerk. But for one moment, can you just stop expecting the world to pity you? You have to stand up for yourself, Alice" My name almost sounded like acid on his tongue.

            "Pity?" I felt my eyes widen. "Because I don't laugh as often I used to, doesn't mean I want the world to pity me. People change, Oliver. Sometimes they can't go back to who they were in the past"