An Outlet: Part 7

17 August, 2019.

You won't believe me but I swear I was going to go to the gym after waking up. But Alex has/had my club card that we need to enter and he had already left for college.

A couple of chapters earlier, I had mentioned that Nova's dog was put to sleep. Some of us wanted to visit her but she wanted some time alone. Today, she had kept a memorial for all those who wanted and could attend.

Since Mia was leaving for her college today, she wasn't able to come. I went to Mikayla's house and spent some time with her. After her parents came home, we left. I find myself trying to avoid talking to people incase they ask me about my future plans.

To get to Nova's current residence is a pain so Mikayla decided not to bring her car. After unsuccessfully looking for some specific kind of candy, we caught a rick and left for Nova's.

We were one of the first ones to arrive, even though we were over an hour late than the specified timing. Marissa was already there so we caught up as well. I spoke to Nova, her mom and we waited for everyone else to arrive. The atmosphere wasn't as gloomy as I thought it would be.

Mikayla is someone who doesn't do well with emotional situations so she drove the conversation towards some cringy/disgusting as fuck guys on an app called Tik Tok. I have no idea why we even watched those videos.

Eventually, people started coming in and after an hour, Nova started the memorial. She had made a video reminiscent of all the memories she and the others had shared with her dog. You could see how much her dog meant to her and how devastating his loss was.

She also prepared a small eulogy expressing her feelings right after her dog's death. After a hesitating start, a few others also read out cards/poems that they had made for Nova's dog or just spoke about their memories with him. To be completely honest, me not being an animal person meant that I didn't really have any prominent incidents with the dog. I was mostly there to support Nova. And whatever I did want to say, I told it directly to her.

Nova then gave all of us small thank you cards with a sticker of Marissa's design inspired by Nova's dog.

It was around 8:30PM by the time, we left from Nova's place. We had met after a really long time so Marissa and I made an impromptu decision to go out for dinner. Mikayla couldn't join us because she already had dinner plans with some other friends. She offered to drop us on her way tho.

We caught up a little on each others' life. Mikayla's work life is the same. She's regularly been making video content for her company and I feel so bad that she has had to deal with with so many negative comments. At the same time, I feel proud of her to withstand such negativity and continue to do what she does best.

As for her personal life, she's got a new boyfriend now. I had kinda expected it. She told us that she was more or less caught in the act by her parents and they had a huge discussion about it. She explained to her parents that it's normal in this generation for people her age to indulge in sexual activities and her dad just told her that he doesn't want her to regret anything. Her mom doesn't approve of the guy but Mikayla as it is isn't thinking way too far, they're just enjoying each other for the moment. And that's our wild Mikayla for you.

Mikayla dropped Marissa and me on the way and we walked to a pizzeria I wanted to try out. Oh, I forgot to mention, we decided to go somewhere near my house because Marissa didn't have a deadline and I didn't want to go home late. I had just told mom that I won't be back home for dinner but didn't mention that I'll be going out somewhere else instead.

So we came to the pizzeria but couldn't find an empty table in that small place. After we heard some angry customer blast at the management, we decided to head to some other place. We walked towards the station and chanced upon this cute cafe. I had definitely noticed it before but never had the chance to try it out. The place was on Gold so that was great too!

We ate a pretty budget friendly and delicious pizza and pasta. I especially loved the pasta. Marissa and I spoke at length about our social lives, beginning from our schools days. I narrated main friend-related incidents that I experienced in my junior and senior college days and so did Marissa.

She also told me about how one of her friends started liking her. Marissa has a strict rule of no dating friends so she told me all about the drinks sagas she had to endure and her feelings on the entire situation. One good outcome was that she succeeded in getting the girl to stop serial smoking. Marissa also spoke briefly about her own crush and some weird ass incidents she had to go through.

We got talking about our family situation because I was curious as to why Marissa seemed so hostile when a family related topic came up at we Nova's house. Apparently, her dad has gotten transferred to another city and even though her mom and her sister will living in our city this year, they'll eventually be moving there. So there's a lot of house shifting going on in her family. As for Marissa, she's currently in a college she isn't happy with and is planning to change to another college. Their new flat is actually on the outskirts of that other town and Marissa seems adamant to live separate from them.

Throughout my friendship with Marissa, I never got a feeling that she would have any relationship issues with her family. Turns out, she doesn't really connect with her mom, dad and sister. They have opposing views on several matters and she feels like living separately will be good for all of them. I was really surprised when I heard all this. I couldn't help but compare her situation with me.

My family are the first people I'll share important events and incidents of my life with. I want to share all my mile stones with them and am very happy and content being in this family. Of course, we've all argued quite a bit and even though I wish the relationship between my parents was the bit better, my relationship with them or Alex is perfect.

With that being said, not every household can be the same.

I had a really really amazing time with Marissa. I already miss her so much. To be really fucking honest, I wish I could still talk to Emily this way. I miss her and our school days friendship a bit too much.
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