Priceless

I didn’t move from where I was standing. I just watched as the person opened the car’s door, and got out of it, and looked at me, forehead creased.

Why her, of all people? Why Serena? Why someone who disliked me? Was I really out of luck? Well it could have been my parents, that could have been worse...but it was Serena, and it was almost as bad as my parents.

“Bailey? What happened?”

Why would she care? Why would Serena Hastings care? She disliked me, she wanted my life, she wasn’t my friend. Well maybe she just wanted to know what happened, maybe she was just prying. I for sure didn’t know what her purpose was but I knew it wasn’t genuine concern.

She approached me and as she was about to touch my arm, I recoiled and looked down. “Nothing, I’m fine,” I said in a low voice. I was so used to lying about how I felt anyway.

“You’ve been crying,” she pointed out the obvious. I was surprised at her sort of gentle tone, though. I wasn’t used to encounters like this with Serena.

I backed up a little, swallowing hard. “I said I’m fine,” I said.

She scoffed, “That’s the most basic lie of humankind, Bailey. I know something’s up with you. What is it?”

A nerve snapped. “Geez, why the twenty questions? It’s not as if you care, so fuck off!” I exclaimed and turned around quickly, ready to walk away but then she grabbed me by the wrist and swiftly turned me around.

“Because I know how’s it like when everything’s falling apart, Bailey,” she said. “And it looks like you’re going through that right now. I know we’re not exactly friends, but I just can’t ignore someone who’s so broken she might jump off a cliff if she had the chance.”

I glared at her and snatched my arm away. She did not have the right to say that. I was definitely not contemplating jumping off a cliff. Well I might have wished I got bumped by her car, but still suicide was different from accident.

“Fine, if you don’t wanna talk about it, I’m not gonna push you to do it. But let me at least drive you somewhere safe, that way I wouldn’t feel guilty in case you die later on.”

It was a bitchy thing to say, but it was Serena, so I didn’t get hurt. At first I didn’t want to let her drive me somewhere, let alone get into her car but I figured, it would be worse if someone else saw me like this. I would be in so much trouble.

But where was I to go? It wasn’t like I could go back to our house already. And it wasn’t like I could go back to Erin’s. Nor could I go back to the playground or anywhere near Stephen Gomez.

Then suddenly a thought entered my head. One I knew was against my will, if I was in my right mind, but right now it seemed like the best thing to do.

“Can you just...” I swallowed, kinda nervous, knowing she would just turn it down. “Can we just...can we just drive around, I kinda don’t wanna go home yet.”

She looked at me. I couldn’t read her expression, to be honest. But it seemed like she didn’t want to drive around with me. It was expected, though, since we weren’t really friends anyway.

“It’s okay, you can just drive me to—”

“Okay, let’s have a short road trip.”

I was almost positive I heard her wrong. So I didn’t move. I just watched as she got into the driver’s seat and rolled the window down.

“What are you waiting for? C’mon, you know how to walk, Bailey,” she said.

Serena sure had a way with words. I sighed as I walked to the passenger’s seat and got in. Once I buckled up, she started the engine and drove away.

I didn’t know what I was in for. It was Serena Hastings. I didn’t know what to expect, I didn’t know if I should worry, I didn’t know if I should tell her what was up with me.

I didn’t know the route she was taking, but of course I didn’t question her about it. I just decided to trust her—a decision I thought I would never have to make, even in a million years.

I stared outside the window, looking past the surroundings and just zoning out. I was one confused girl at the moment. I felt like with all the happenings in my life, I was somewhere in the middle of them all, trying to escape, trying to push all the bad events away.

As if my family issue wasn’t enough, there came the Alex and Stephen thing, and now my best friend was mad at me as well. I was aware that those last two things were due to my own fault, but what can I say? I’m not perfect. I do things I regret, sometimes I’m fucked up, but everyone does too, right?

I didn’t know how long I had been zoning out, but maybe it was a while because suddenly Serena had stopped driving. The sound of her seatbelt unbuckling made me look at her; and then look around.

We were in an unfamiliar place. Well, unfamiliar to me.

It was a house, actually, but I was pretty sure this wasn’t where she lived with her parents because I had been to the Hastingses’ more than once, and this was not it.

“Uhh...where are we?” I asked, my forehead crumpled as I slowly unbuckled my seatbelt.

“My house,” she replied casually as she got off the car. I followed her until we got inside, but I was confused with her answer.

“But this is not...I mean, I’ve been to your house a few times before...it’s...”

She gave me a look which made me shut up. Then she gave me a tight smile. “Have you ever felt like running away, Bailey?” she asked, but didn’t wait for an answer. “Does that ever happen to you? Do you ever think of that?” Again, she didn’t let me answer. “When nothing seems to go right with your life. Your parents don’t really love each other, they argue everyday, and they both actually have love affairs.”

I was shocked, to be honest. I didn’t expect her to suddenly say something like that. She seemed...she seemed like the kind of girl who didn’t get family problems, or at least didn’t care.

“They’re always more important than me. Work is always more important than me. They don’t care about me, Bailey. So I just decided to live separately from them, and they agreed, because like I said, they don’t care about me,” she said. I was too shocked to react. “I’m jealous of you, Bailey. Because you have the perfect life, your parents love each other, you love them, you never disappoint them, and you have their full attention while I never get that from my parents.”

That was, again, another shocker. She was blinded by that lie. My whole family was a lie.

“Serena...” I started, and then sighed as my heart softened. “I...my family is a lie,” I said in a low voice. “My parents are getting divorced, and I cheated on Alex, and...and I ran away from the guy I love, and now my best friend’s mad at me.”

I bowed my head and bit my lip to try to stop the tears that were coming. I didn’t want to have another breakdown, I was tired of it.

Suddenly, I felt myself being engulfed in a hug. That was when the tears started to flow out continuously.

And that was also the time I realized, I finally found a friend in Serena.