Eighteen With A Chalkboard

Chapter 19: Tangled confessions

After a few minutes of standing in the garden, lost in thought and gazing at the sky, I hear a soft thud from the garden door. I turn my head and see Millie standing there, staring at me. She sighs deeply, rubbing a hand over her head, and walks over to stand by the porch, her hands shoved into the pockets of her blue jacket as she looks up at the night sky.

I quickly look away, retreating into my thoughts. Out of the corner of my eye, I see her glance at me before she starts walking toward me. Before I know it, she's standing just inches away.

"You must hate me," she says quietly. "And I'd understand if you did."

"Maybe it's the other way around," I reply almost immediately. "Why do you hate me?" It's a question that's haunted me for a long time—does she truly hate me, or is there something else?

Millie exhales slowly and looks at me, but hesitates to answer. "I don't have an answer for that."

"You don't have to answer it anyway," I say, feeling a lump forming in my throat. "Are you mad because I found out you're Joyce?"

She shakes her head, rolling her eyes. "I'm not Joyce. I'm Millie. Joyce is dead to me. Get that through your head, Nathan."

I bite my lip, blinking twice to hold back my emotions. I turn to face her fully. "I know you hate me. The way you look at me says it all. You've never liked me, anyway. I'm just the fool who never stopped having feelings for you." I shake my head, looking away as I try to blink back a tear.

Millie sighs again, this time more frustrated. She rubs her hand over her head, clearly wrestling with something. "You'll never understand anything about love, do you know why?" she snaps suddenly. "It's because you're insecure! You've always been insecure. That's why you never believed I had felt something for you!"

I whip my head to face her, disbelief washing over me. "You never liked me, Joyce. I know it, you know it, we both know it."

"Do you know what?" she says, her voice softer.

I clench my jaw, my heart racing. "I don't want to know."

"Yes, I was mean to you when we were kids. I bullied you, pushed you away... but I didn't hate you. I never did."

Her voice is like music to my ears, each word pulling me in, even as my mind reels. Why do I still like her? Wait—did she just say she didn't hate me?

"Maybe you won't believe me," she continues, her tone gentler now, "but I always wanted you to be my best friend. You were smart, reserved and mature. I just couldn't admit it back then. I was a kid, scared of losing my other friends. But the truth is, I've always had feelings for you."

I stare at her, my mind struggling to process what she's saying. All those years, she had feelings for me, and I never knew? Why do I find this so hard to believe?

She takes a step closer, standing just a foot away now. I remain silent, my thoughts tangled in the unexpected confession spilling from her lips.

"Yes, I called you names—ugly geek, bookhead, all of it," Millie continues, her voice wavering slightly. "But when that cooking oil burnt my face, I hated myself. I thought no one would ever talk to me again. But you... you proved me wrong. You still saw me as beautiful. That moment has stayed with me, Nathan. So tell me, why would I ever hate you?"

I can see the sadness in her eyes as she looks up at me, and it's like a punch to the gut. "When my parents told me we were moving to Scotland for surgery, I knew I might never see you again. I wanted to tell you how I felt, but we were just kids. I thought our feelings were just... fleeting crushes, not meant to be real."