Hidden Feelings and Hesitations

[10] Haylie

"You'll never guess who's coming over after dinner," Jules told us as soon as we were up in her room. It was Sunday afternoon and we were spending the night because we didn't have school the next day. We were planning on doing something fun with our day off, but we hadn't decided what.

"Who?" Annie asked with much less excitement in her voice than Jules probably wanted.

"Claire," she announced. "Frankie's going to have a girl over for the first time ever."

"Are you serious? She finally asked her to hang out?"

"Yeah, I guess. She said she was freaking out. Can you believe that? My sister got nervous over a girl."

"Aw, that's cute. Having a guy you like come over for the first time is always so scary. I can't imagine what she must be feeling," Carolina mused.

"Well, she's been in a horrible mood all day. She got into, like, three fights with Reed. It was honestly a welcome change to not be at that kid's throat. And this morning, she broke something and I swear to God, I have never heard more cuss words come out of her mouth. She was pissed until Dad finally told her to go for a run until she'd calmed down. It was hilarious."

The second Claire's named had been mentioned, a bitter feeling bubbled up inside of me. I hated that Frankie was spending time with her, hated that Frankie was kissing her, hated that Frankie liked her. What I especially hated was that I couldn't have any of those things, even though I desperately wanted them. I hated that staying with Logan was the only way everything would be okay.

For a while, we scrolled through our phones, talking occasionally, but mostly staying wrapped up in our own little worlds. I must have went back to the eleven pictures on Frankie's Instagram page five or six times before we went downstairs to eat the barbecue chicken wings that Kyle and Cindy made for dinner. Stalking her on social media—though admittedly pretty creepy and a bit overboard—had become my only way to see her for longer than mere seconds at a time. Unfortunately, she only posted pictures with her friends and her teammates, which made it really hard to actually see her.

I'd been thinking a lot lately about why I was so drawn to her, comparing every detail of her body and her personality to Quinn's. There wasn't much of a connection between the two, but one was definitely there. They were rough around the edges, but Frankie used that part of her to make everyone laugh. Quinn's reserved persona put her at odds with the people around her, making her seem standoffish and much harder to approach. Frankie saved her self-contained demeanor for when kids at school tried to get close to her and get her to tell them things they had no business knowing. Though that only ever seemed to make them try harder.

My old feelings had died out completely with my best friend's visit. She was no longer something I was curious about and pining over. I had started saving those things for someone else as soon as I'd moved here. In all honesty, she was right about breaking up with Logan. But hearing about Claire and how lucky she was to get to be with Frankie left me horribly jealous. I would take any chance I had to push those feelings onto my current crush, as awful as that sounded. All I knew was that whenever this whole mess ended, I would owe my boyfriend a giant apology for wasting so much of his time.

Once we were downstairs and sitting around the table, I found myself unable to ignore the way my friend's sister fidgeted with her utensils. She was incredibly on edge, which made me feel even worse. It was obvious that she really was anxious about Claire coming.

"Frankie, if you don't stop tapping your fork against the table, I—" Jules started to warn, annoyance written all over her.

"Shut up. I'll tap it if I want to tap it," her sister snapped back. "You're not in charge of me, so fuck off."