Look Me in the Eyes, and Promise Me Friendship

After arriving at home, instead of her usual entrance into her house, and the daily drop off in her room, she just headed to the tree house. She climbed up and noticed that it was empty. Joe had not arrived yet, so she had time to make herself comfortable. She sat down, and slid all of her books into an empty corner.

While she was waiting for Joe, she took a look around the tree house and realized that it had seemed much smaller than it appeared when she was younger. All of the toys in the tree house were replaced with sleeping bags and all of her finished composition notebooks. But there was one thing that remained the same; the promise between Joe and Aubrey was still carved into the wood. Aubrey smiled realizing that her friendship with Joe may be fixed.

Aubrey heard noise underneath her and she flinched. She pulled her knees up to her chest and squeezed them tightly. She hoped that it wasn’t her father. If she was lucky, he wouldn’t even be home at the moment. She glanced over at the entrance of the tree house and saw the top of someone’s head. They had dark brown spiked hair that seemed like it had just been cut a day or two before hand. Thank goodness her father didn’t have dark hair. The person climbed up a little more to where their face was visible. It was Joe. Aubrey was relieved but nervous all at the same time. She didn’t know how she was going to tell him. Her heart was racing and her breathing pattern was anything but normal.

“I’m g-glad you ca... showed up,” Aubrey was the first to speak. Her words a little choppy. Joe smiled but it soon faded when he saw the promise still pinned onto the side of the Tree House. He got this distant look in his eyes and he slowly found himself a space to sit on top of the unrolled sleeping bags.

“My brother's don't know i'm here,” he said quickly. “If they knew, they would have wanted to tag along,” he looked over and saw the carved letters still there. “I thought for sure that you would have scribbled that out,” Joe said with an attitude, still looking. He finally glanced over at Aubrey, which caused her heart to skip a beat. He took a good look at her. She was defiantly different than the last time he was able to look at her like this. Her hair was cut in layers and was down, unlike when they used to hang out. She always wore her hair up in a messy bun.

She was also turning into a woman, and Joe surely noticed that. He couldn’t take his eyes off of her chest. She saw him looking. She blushed, but then covered herself a little better with her sweater.

She was a little embarrassed at what had just happened, but she just smiled because she could tell that Joe was pleased. She laughed to herself repeating the scene over and over again in her head. He was just staring, his eyes planted on one ‘area’. It was like his eyes were frozen and they couldn’t move anywhere. He finally shook out of it seconds after Aubrey covered herself up. He blushed in embarrassment.

“So…” they both said at once, and then smirked a little bit afterwards.

“Didn’t you say that you would explain everything?” Joe asked quickly, and quite impatiently. He just sat there waiting for an answer.

Aubrey took a few seconds to think. She had to gather everything up in her mind.

There were things that she didn’t want Joe to know, and there were things that he needed to know. It took her a while to respond. She started to tear up before even starting, and then started to let everything out.

“I didn't want to have to do that. When I said that I didn't want to see or talk to you guys again... I didn't mean it. I didn't mean it at all. My dad made me say it. He was watching from the window,” Aubrey sobbed. The look on Joe’s face would probably be indescribable, but if needed it could probably be defined as confused. He didn’t know why her father would make her tell them that. He listened in closely, and tried to figure out what he could do to comfort her without both of them feeling discomfort.

“My dad is an alcoholic, and he has been controlling my life. I know that’s kind of a parents job, but this is completely different. If I don’t do what he tells me to do, he beats me. I’m scared Joe; i’m so scared,” she started to cry uncontrollably and there was nothing else that Joe could do except hold her. He pulled her close to him and held her as close as he could, rocking back and forth trying to calm her down.

“I’m so sorry Joe. I really am,” Aubrey said hardly audible because her face was shoved into Joe’s chest. Because she was crying, she was leaving tear stains on the front of his shirt, but that was the least of his worries. “I'm sorry.”

“Shhhh," he made the noise between his teeth. "Don’t speak, I know you are sorry. At least now I know that it wasn’t your choice. My heart has been broken since that day, and I now know that yours was too. But we are okay now. Our hearts have been bandaged up. We will get through this together, okay?” Joe spoke to her pushing her chin up to look in her eyes. She looked up at him with tear stricken cheeks and nodded. Joe kissed Aubrey’s forehead, and it was silent afterwards.

Kevin and Nick have been broken too. They have been friends for a long time. She just wanted everything to be better. She wanted to MAKE everything better, but she didn't know if she was going to be forgiven that easily. She wanted her best friends back. Now she knew that she had Joe back, and she was semi-happier with her life.

Aubrey fell asleep in Joe’s arms and he just let her be. He didn’t care how long he had to stay in that tree house, he just wanted to make sure that she was alright. He didn’t want to leave her there alone in this kind of situation. She really needed someone to be there for her, to talk to, and to understand her. Joe knew that he was the person that she needed. He pulled one of the sleeping bags from underneath him and covered both Aubrey and himself with it. In the process of letting Aubrey sleep in his arms, Joe too fell asleep.

Because of Joe falling asleep in the tree house with Aubrey, he never made it home that night. His mother was quite worried about him, and was out back looking to see if he might have been on the porch. She called his name.

“Joe!” she screamed. The whole neighborhood probably heard her. As he slept, his ears started to ring. He knew his mothers call, and her voice broke him out of his deep sleep.

“Oh my goodness, I was up here all night,” he whispered, and tried getting out from underneath Aubrey without waking her up. He was unsuccessful. She woke up and realized that Joe was heading for the exit. She rubbed her eyes quickly.

“Where are you going?” Aubrey freaked. She whined, not wanting Joe to leave her.

“My mom is calling me. I think I’m in trouble. I was up here all night,” Joe explained and started to climb down the steps that were safely screwed onto the tree. He stopped on his way down and looked up at her looking down at him, and smiled.

“You can come too you know,” he added, hoping that she would. She nodded her head and followed him down. She was glad that she wasn’t wearing a skirt that day, knowing how Joe had changed.

Joe on the other hand, was wishing that she had worn a skirt; then quickly changed his mind because of the realization that they were just friends. That’s how he wanted it to stay. Therefore Aubrey felt differently. Before heading over to Joe’s house, Joe stopped Aubrey and asked her a question.

“Are you feeling better today?” he asked her, both hands on her flushed face. Faster and faster her heart began to beat as he stepped closer to give her a friendly hug. Harmless though it may be, it made her heart pound until it felt like her chest should explode from excitement. It was just a hug but it meant much more to her.

On the way over, Aubrey jumped on Joe’s back, and he ran the rest of the way home. Joe was hoping that he wasn’t in too much trouble. He walked through the back door, with Aubrey now off of his back, and his mother ran up to him with the phone up to her ear.

“Thank goodness! Carol, he just walked in; thanks for your help,” she spoke into the receiver and then hung up with her best friend. She stood before him with her hands on her hips waiting for an good explanation.

“Aubrey needed my help. You remember Aubrey, right? Well she needed my help, and I guess I fell asleep in the tree house,” he implied but wasn’t sure if enough was said and if it was believable. It should be believable, it was the truth.

“Aubrey?” she questioned, she pushed her son out of the way to get to her. She hadn’t seen her around for a long time. The boys didn’t even tell their mom about Aubrey ‘never wanting to talk to them again’. They thought that it would stir up a bunch of trouble between the two families, so they just left it alone.

“Yes, Mrs. Jonas?” Aubrey questioned, knowing what was going to come next.

“My have you grown; I haven’t seen you around in the longest time. How have you been?” she walked up and hugged Aubrey, totally forgetting about Joe being out all night. Joe pretended to wipe sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand and smiled innocently.

“I think i’m going to make Pancakes. Aubrey, want to help?” Joe interrupted the two pulling a large pan out of the cabinet, and they both looked over at him. He made an innocent face and held the pan up in humor.