Impossible

Mixed Signals and Other Things

Exams week was finally there which always put Jessica's anxiety on another level but she felt she was doing great so far. Her relationships with her friends had improved though remembering that they were keeping secrets still bothered her. It left an underlying tension no one wanted to address. Angela tried to fix things by baking more and bringing treats to school. Jessica wasn't sure if it helped but she would never say no to baked goods.

Edward was back in school and she was trying her hardest to ignore him. She tried to forget the past few weeks of him being somewhat nice never happened. Like a weird dream you'd have after eating something before bed and you'd wake up wondering what was wrong with your subconscious. She knew that if she even tried to dwell on her emotions around him that she would punch his stupid face and she did not want to deal with the consequences.

For the most part, he was back to being that impassive loner that talked to no one. Having been burned by him twice, she had no patience to try and decipher what emotions he was refusing to show. Maybe he had no emotions. It would certainly explain how it was so easy for him to treat people like they were nothing.

After their chemistry exam, she did not say one word to him as she left the classroom. She was going to have two weeks free of not seeing his ghostly presence and she was looking forward to it. He could go away back to Alaska or whatever. No one certainly missed him when he was gone after Thanksgiving.

Making her way to the cafeteria, she went in line to buy her lunch as her mom needed to go grocery shopping later and there wasn't enough for even a sandwich in the fridge. The pizza on Wednesdays was hit or miss but she hadn't much choice. She might get Eric to swap with her if she sweet talked him enough. And she had Angela's red velvet cupcakes to look forward to at the least.

"Hey."

She nearly jumped and turned to find Edward behind her in the line. She pretended she never saw him and eyed the back of Ben Chenney's head to move the line faster as if he had control. Edward cleared his throat behind her and she rolled her eyes. No dice. She wasn't going to even consider playing his evil mind games again.

"Jessica," He sighed. "You're really going to keep up with the silent treatment?"

Too bad for him, she could keep up the silent treatment forever. She and Ellie did it all the time when they got on each other's nerves. There were times they did it simultaneously and the Stanley household was filled with silent passive aggression. Their poor mom ate through a lot of silent dinners.

"I realize I may have been insensitive about what happened between us," he started. "I never meant to hurt you."

Oh like that made things better. Tough lucky, buddy. He still hurt her and he could shove it up where the sun didn't shine. Insensitive was an understatement.

"I want to say I'm sorry," he continued. "I never want you to think that I think you're not good enough or that you're nothing. You're...you're far from average, Jessica Stanley."

Far from average? That was almost glowing praise coming from him. It didn't matter. His half-baked apologies were too little too late.

It was finally her turn and the lunch lady handed her the tray of food. Edward continued to follow her. God, he did not want to give up. Why was he even doing this? Did he just want to laugh at her again?

"That is not what I – Jessica," He grabbed her elbow preventing her from moving further and turned her so she could see his frustrated face. "I'm trying to fix this. I want us to be friends."

"You said you didn't want to be friends."

"I said we shouldn't be friends, not that I didn't want us to be."