Spotlight |h.s|

Forty

Aubrey Hart

I nervously fix my hair after sending a text to Jade telling her to come over. Harry left early this morning, today being a big day for him. He hasn't seen his sister in months, and he's going to pick her up in a few hours.

I have to get this Jade thing over with. I tried to avoid it by going shopping for a few last minute things earlier today, but it's time. I'm not one to keep secrets from her, and I feel bad about how easy it's been to do so. I shouldn't be keeping this from her. Once she gets over her initial disappointment in me, this'll all be fine and we can go back to normal. I know it'll make things a bit weird for a while, though. I'm not looking forward to it.

I pace throughout my kitchen, unpacked shopping bags still on my counter when she replies to say she'll be over in five. I know she's not going to take this well in the slightest. I wish I could just never tell her. Even better, I wish it was easy enough to simply stop this thing with Harry altogether and somehow undo my previous actions. It isn't, though. I can't do either of those things.

My hands shake slightly out of pure anxiety. I hate admitting things to people when I know I'm not going to get a good reaction. All it does is make me create a brunch of unrealistic scenarios with my mind, imagining things that would never happen just to create more for me to worry about. What if she stops being my friend? What if she hates me? I know that's so unrealistic since all I've done is slept with him, but it's where my mind goes. I can't help it.

I hate being an anxious person by nature. My life would be so much easier without it. Why does my brain have to be hardwired to attack itself and criticize its every move? I'm not perfect, I'm human. My anxiety likes to forget that, though. To my anxiety, not perfect means bad. Making people upset with me is one of my fears despite my tendency to defend myself. It's complicated, I guess. Making people I care about mad is where the issue appears.

I eat a candy cane off of my Christmas tree to distract myself, sucking on it so the end is pointy enough to probably pierce my skin if I tried hard enough. The strawberry taste covers my tongue and dyes it a deeper pink color than normal while I allow the candy to hang out of my mouth like a cigarette, sucking on what fits inside of it.

Her knock on the door comes more quickly than I expected, my eyes slightly widening as she lets herself in. The knock is just to announce her arrival, she never actually waits for me to answer. It's the same way when I go to her place. We're at that level of comfort in our friendship, I guess.

"Heyyy!" She calls get my attention and figure out where exactly I am.

"Heyyy!" I call back, concealing the wavering tone that attempts to coat my voice. I don't want any uneasy feelings to be obvious enough for her to pick up on.

She then comes into the dining room and meets my eyes. Her blonde hair is pulled back into a ponytail, her face fresh with no trace of makeup on it as she takes off her leather jacket she layered over her plain grey hoodie. With that, she wears black leggings and white tennis shoes. She hangs her jacket on one of the chairs pushed into the table, then pulls it out and sits in it.

"So... what made you miss me so much you had to beg me to come over?" She clasps her hands on the table in front of her.

"I didn't beg," I lightly roll my eyes at her, "And it was nothing in particular." I fib, not wanting to start right off the bat with my reason for asking her to come.

"Okay... Wanna hear about my night, then?" She wiggles her brows.

"Of course I do." I laugh, sitting down in the seat across from her.

I need a good conversation to segway into what I have to say to her. Maybe this can be it. I know Zayn picked her up because she drank too much to drive herself, but that's about it.