Answer To My Life

s i x t e e n

Even after a week, Elliot still hasn't spoken with me. He barely looks at me when we're at school, which isn't all too bad since I can sit next to Marina in class and spend more time with her.

Marina asks why I've distanced myself from him, but I don't feel like getting into all of that awkwardness so I opt to tell her that it's because I spoiled the ending to his favorite TV show. She easily believes it since Elliot is the kind of person that would get angry over something like that.

Without Elliot's chaotically loud presence, I had to admit that my life has been silent. Too silent.

He always had something to say and was never afraid to yell it to the world. Likewise, I always relied on him to listen whenever I ranted about my life or complained about my family.

He had been there for me for almost every major development in my life.

My first boyfriend. When I realized I wasn't straight. When I let go of a toxic friend. When I accepted I was a lesbian. Sea. When I came out to my parents. My first girlfriend.

I try to turn my mind to the topic of Marina. My relationship with her had been growing into something even more special than I ever thought it could be.

Our relationship is new, but I feel as if I've known her for longer. I've confided in her and told her things that I had told no one else, not even Sea.

Over the course of the past few weeks, I've been texting less and less with Sea. I had moved on, I'll admit it. I was still curious about Sea's real identity but that search wasn't dominating my life anymore.

Some might say I gave up, but I just think I moved on and rightfully so.

I've been enjoying Marina's existence, despite not knowing much about her. I had learned a lot about her, but whenever I pushed deeper and asked more about her parents or life before she moved here, she tried to ignore me.

Finding a way to bring that up was my next quest and later that day, I asked her about it at the diner. We were sitting together, and she wasn't supposed to be working, so I figured it would work as she wouldn't have some excuse to leave.

We ordered our food and as she was enjoying her order of chicken wings, I was eating the signature burger. Though Zara and I hadn't worked out as a relationship, her order recommendation of the burger had stuck with me.

We begin to talk about school and how Marina had unfairly been given a C+ on her math test. She has her backpack on the ground so I ask to see it. She pulls it out and places it on the table for me.

I page through it and based on my somewhat extensive math knowledge and all the red marks on her work, I began to wonder how she even managed to get a C+. It seems like some sort of miracle.

Because I don't want to hurt her feelings, I tell her, "that's so unfair."

She studies my face and simply states, "you're lying."

"I'm sorry!" I admit.

She laughs and says, "it's fine. I guess it's good that I want a future in music, rather than math."

The moment she says that, I freeze.

My mind replays a memory from when I was messaging Sea and we were discussing our futures. She had a dream of pursuing a career in music, preferably as a singer.

Marina asks, "what's wrong?"

"Nothing, sorry. I spaced out," I respond.

She doesn't seem to completely believe it, but she doesn't call me out on lying this time. As the conversation continues, we switch gears and start to talk about my parents, specifically my mom, and how they had handled my coming out.

"My mom says she's fine with it, but I don't know. It feels weird being around her and whenever she spots any guy, she immediately tells me that I should go talk to him. My dad on the hand, has been surprisingly great. He's always been unpredictable and at times, horrible, but he doesn't really care that I'm a lesbian," I explain to her.

"I get that," Marina says.

"You experienced that?" I question. "You never really talk about your parents."

She seems uneasy as she tells me, "sort of. My mom was very hesitant to accept me at first. She was convinced that I was going through a phase."

"What about your dad?"

"I haven't come out to him. There's no point honestly," she responds.

"What do you mean?"

"He's not really in my life anymore," she says.

I try to slowly ask, "is he dead?"

"No!" She immediately responds, and she's basically horrified at the question. "My parents are divorced and he's not really around. I haven't come out to him because we don't have much of a father-daughter relationship. It's as if we're strangers."

This time, I'm horrified because everything, except for the coming out part, matches with what Sea has told me about her family life.

"It's not that I'm ashamed of who I am. It's just that I'm not close with him so I never really saw a point in coming out to him," she adds.

"Oh," I say.

I honestly don't know what to say anymore. I try to run through old texts from Sea in my mind, and start to find even more of her stories matching with Sea's messages. As if the puzzle is being put together.

I make eye contact with her and her ocean blue eyes start to remind me of Sea.

It's literally in her name!

Marina continues talking to me and trying to provide me advice for dealing with my mom, so I try to tune in. It's extremely difficult because in the span of seconds, I've somehow built this extravagant new theory.

Despite saying I wasn't going to look for who Sea was anymore, it just happened. This idea fell into my lap like a dog looking for a new home, and I have no choice but to care for it.

Now, I think that Marina could be Sea.