⚙︎ Falling Apart ⚙︎

⚙︎ Trapped ⚙︎

I woke up staring at the ceiling. 

Gentle rainfall was thumping against the windowpanes in a rhythm as I lay on the couch, Lyn still asleep on the other side of it. 

I shivered. What was the time? 

I glanced around, looking for a clock. The room was dark. I finally looked over at the stove clock, the bold red numbers proclaiming it to be half past five in the morning. 

I sighed, slumping back to my original position, listening to the rain. It didn't sound like it was letting up anytime soon.

My thoughts circled back to the PE fiasco, the thing that started all of this. I felt dread splash itself over my stomach when I finally registered what Brie had said.

"Dyke."

Just the one word. Filled with so much hatred. So much malice. 

Where on earth had she gotten that idea from? 

The more I thought about it, the more I realised it didn't fit. I thought back to the note. It seemed like that was the only way Brie could've known; the Gang had never talked about what gender we liked. I guess nobody thought it was important. Which obviously it wasn't, since it wouldn't've changed anything between us.

But the explanation still didn't quite work. Even if Brie did find out through the note, she had gotten it mixed up. But the most obvious question was how she read the note, how she knew what it said. Hell, how she even knew it existed. Argh, too many questions and no answers!

These thoughts were making me dizzy. I sighed, the noise barely audible over the rain slamming against the windows. 

"Everything alright?" Lyn asked from the other side of the couch, hugging her blankets.

A sudden rush of guilt pulsed dully through me.
Evelyn doesn't like girls. I do.
Brie should've hurt me, not Lyn.

I must've been quiet for too long, because the girl in question shrugged the blankets off and leant forward. "Gyps?"

I switched my gaze to her and took in her features. Her messy chestnut bed-hair that would go back to normal with the swipe of a brush; the light blue eyes that seemed to glow even in the dark of the early morning; the genuine concern on her face.

She looked closer to sixteen than fourteen. Then again, her birthday was coming up in a couple months.

I smiled. "Yeah, just thinking," I replied, and I wasn't lying. 

As I continued my train of thought, I came to a decision: the gang were my best friends. I could trust them with anything.

"So I've been thinking, and something doesn't fit," I started.

"What?" Evelyn asked, and I sat up so we were closer.

"When Brie hit you, she called you a dyke."

Lyn nodded. "That isn't news, though. I remember it."

"Yeah but, why? Who ever said you liked girls? And besides, I'm the dyke here."

I stopped, waiting for her to connect the dots.

But she remained perplexed. "So?"

It suddenly occurred to me that nobody told her about the note.
"Oh, damn," I muttered. "You've got some catching up to do."

I launched into the quick rehash of my state in English, the note Grace slipped me, getting into trouble over it and that's when she got it.

"The note said you liked me, which makes you a... well... I don't want to say that word. And when Brie slammed me with the ball, she called me that word. So unless that wasn't related to the note at all, how on earth did she know about it?" Evelyn guessed.