Emerald Eyes

The next few days flew by. I had a ton of homework most evenings, and I wasn’t able to get to the library to see Zoe until Friday night. She seemed to be in a quiet mood that evening, so I buried myself in a book and waited for her to talk to me. I didn’t want to bother her, and besides, I didn’t have much to say.
After about ten minutes, she broke the silence.
“So, if we’re friends now, I want to know about you. Tell me about yourself.”
“There’s nothing interesting about me. I’m boring.”
She scooted closer to me and her knee bumped against mine. “Can I tell you about me then?” I nodded.
She thought for a minute.
“Let’s see. I love poetry. I have a two-year-old half-brother. I hate smiling for photos. I prefer zombies to vampires, I hate dumb blondes, and…” Her voice trailed off.
“What?”
She shook her head. “Nothing. It’s stupid.”
“What is it?”
“I can’t tell you.”
I sighed. “Why not?”
She looked up at me with frightened eyes. “You’ll hate me. Everyone at this school would hate me if they knew.”
“It can’t be that bad.”
“Oh, yes, it is.” Her voice was trembling.
Whatever her secret was, it was killing her inside.
“How long will it be?”
“I don’t know. I have to know if I can trust you.”
“Zoe, please. You can trust me. I have no friends here anyways. Who would I tell?”
She considered this.
“You swear upon all that is holy- and unholy, for good measure- that you will never tell anyone?” Her tears overflowed.
I nodded. “I swear.”
She dropped her head into her hands, her body trembling.
“I’m… I’m…”
“You’re what? What is it, Zoe?”
She mumbled something unintelligible into her hands.
“I can’t hear you.”
She looked up, looked me straight in the eyes, her own glittering with tears.
“I’m bisexual,” she whispered.
I swear to God, my jaw hit the floor.
I had never met anyone bi before. Or gay. My parents tried to keep me sheltered from that “abominable lifestyle”.
I realized that she was waiting for me to respond, but I couldn’t think of anything to say.
“So… that’s when you like guys and girls, right?” I asked stupidly. She nodded.
“Do you have a… preference or anything?”
“You mean between guys and girls? Girls.”
“Do your parents know?”
She snorted. “If they did, I wouldn’t be here. My mom and stepdad would either kill me or throw me in a mental hospital. My mother once told me, ‘I swear to God, if you end up a dyke, I will have you committed.’ She’s so accepting.”
“Will you ever tell them? Have you told anyone besides me?”
“Maybe someday when I’m feeling especially suicidal. And no. You’re the only person in the world who knows.”
“How long have you known?”
She thought for a minute. “I had my first real crush on a girl when I was twelve, and I’m fourteen now, so… two years?”
“Have you ever done anything with a girl?”
Her cheeks flushed scarlet. “Only in my dreams.”
“Are there any girls here you’re into?”
She nodded. “There’s one, but… I don’t know. I get the feeling she doesn’t feel the same way.”
“Who is she?”
Zoe held my gaze for a moment, then looked away.
“Nobody. You wouldn’t know her.”
The bell shrieked. There was still half an hour until I had to go to study hall, and I could spend that in the library, so I settled back against a shelf. Zoe slid in next to me, so close that I could smell her perfume.
“So where are you supposed to be right now?” she asked, twisting the string of her hoodie around her finger.
“I skipped gym with a ‘stomachache’”, I replied, making air quotes around the word. “So I’m technically supposed to be in the shower right now.”
A strange look crossed her face and then disappeared.
“What classes are you in, anyways? I haven’t seen you anywhere.”
“In order, I have Keelson for math, Kuzinski for English, Lee for history, Brookstill for art, and Dudley for science. What about you?”
She laughed. “You’re in my English, history and science classes. I can’t believe I didn’t know that.”
“Seriously?” I asked. “That’s crazy. I haven’t seen you in any of them.”
She raised her eyebrows. “That’s probably because I usually cut. Maybe I’ll start showing up now that you’re there.”
I grinned. “That’d be awesome, considering the fact that I have literally no friends here.”
She tilted her head to the side. “You’re kidding. You’re too nice to not have friends.”
“Not kidding. You’re the first person to say more than two words to me, besides Dana, and she’s not really my type of friend. She’s too bubbly.”
She smiled and shook her head. “I find that hard to believe, but I’m happy to be your friend if you want me to.”
I looked up at her again. “Thank you,” I whispered.
She smiled and wiped the last few tears out of her eyes. “God, I never thought I’d tell anyone. Ever. Especially not someone at a Catholic school.”
“I’m not here because I want to be. I’m over religion. It doesn’t make sense anymore.” I was whispering now, terrified that someone would overhear and send me to the office.
“Same. We can be atheist buddies.”
I laughed and she grinned. “I could use a rational, reasonable person to discuss things with.”
“Well, I’m not always rational or reasonable, but I do love to have intelligent conversations about life, religion, all kinds of stuff. I like to think. That’s why I read so much.”
“What do you like to read?”
“Books about life. Realistic fiction, but it’s gotta be brutal. Depression, suicide, addiction, eating disorders, self-injury, abuse, all kinds of stuff. It fascinates me. I also really like reading psychiatry texts and learning about mental illnesses. I think I want to be a therapist when I get older, so I’m studying now.”
“That’s really cool. I have no idea what I want to be.”
She studied me carefully. “Brielle, you should be a writer. Or a psychologist. You’re great at listening.”
I smiled. “I try. No one has ever really listened to me, so I’ve gotten good at hearing other people.”
She nodded. “It’s a great trait to have. But you deserve for people to listen to you.”
“Nobody does,” I replied with a shrug. “I’m used to it.”
“Well, that needs to change. Let’s start now. Tell me about your family.”
“They’re pretty boring. Catholic. I live with my parents and my little sister, and I have an older sister who lives about an hour away from me.”
Zoe nodded. “What are your parents like?”
“Typical Catholic conservatives. They’re strict with us.”
“And your sisters?”
“Serena is seven. She’s the athlete in our family. She’s a sweet kid, always running around and making noise. And she loves hugging people. Kaitlyn is twenty-four, and she’s a pediatrician. She’s always been the genius, and my parents definitely prefer her over me. She’s pretty much perfect- she’s pretty and smart, with good values and a huge heart. Everyone who meets her loves her instantly.”
Zoe made a face. “I don’t know. She sounds annoying.”
“She kind of is in that she steals attention without even trying. She doesn’t ask for attention, it just comes to her. And she acts so modest about it, which is even more irritating.”
“See what I mean? Your little sister sounds great though.”
I couldn’t help grinning at the thought of Serena. “She is. She’s really an awesome kid. Everyone loves her too, but she’s pretty outgoing, so she asks for the attention she gets. She’s my dad’s pride and joy and Kaitlyn is my mother’s.”
Zoe shifted her weight so that she was leaning closer to me. “What are you?”
I thought for a moment. I wasn’t especially smart or pretty or skilled in anything. I had no talent in art, music or sports. I was nothing special, just a blank sheet of paper that nobody cared enough to draw on.
I realized then that Zoe was waiting for an answer. I was forced to admit the truth.
“I’m nothing.”
She shook her head. “No, you’re not.”
“Yes, I am. There’s nothing fascinating or unique or special about me. I’m just here existing. I blend in and that’s fine.”
“Then explain to me how, if you just blend in, I noticed you first out of all these other girls at this school.”
I shrugged. “You have poor judgment and low eyesight.”
Zoe burst out laughing. “Maybe so. But still, Brielle. There’s something about you. It’s hard to see at first, but if you look hard enough, it’s there. You’re a diamond in the rough.”
The warmth of her words wrapped around me. Nobody had ever told me something so kind before. And with the warmth came a rush of butterflies in my stomach.
What the hell?
I pushed the feeling away, but I couldn’t erase the odd sensation that I had done something wrong. It was mild, like a tiny flame burning in the pit of my stomach, but it refused to disappear.
I filed the emotion away in my brain to think about later and turned my attention back to Zoe. She had a dazed look in her eyes and she was gazing out the window. While she was distracted, I took my first good look at Zoe Noelle Fabian.
Her facial features were striking. She had high cheekbones, a thin nose and full lips. I noticed for the first time that she had a lip piercing- two, actually. A thin silver ring was poked through each side of her bottom lip. Her eyebrows were slim and delicate, and her glittering eyes were ringed in black. Her hair was long, with lots of choppy layers, and the colors varied from black to red to blonde. They suited her, though, and made her look even more unique.
As I was noting these facts, she twisted her head to look at me. I tore my eyes away before she noticed I was staring at her, but it was too late. A smile quirked on her lips.
“What?”
I swallowed. The butterflies were acting up again. “Nothing. Just looking at your hair.”
She grinned then. “It’s a disaster, isn’t it? My mom was pissed but she didn’t want to spend the money to drag me to her salon and fix it. I love it though. Most of the blonde is natural, believe it or not.”
“No way,” I replied with an incredulous look.
“Yes way. I’m a natural blonde. Nobody believes it until I offer to show them the real proof,” she replied with a wink. It took me a moment to work out the joke, but once I did, I couldn’t stop laughing.
God, it felt good to laugh again. I couldn’t remember the last time I had really cracked up like this, but now that it was happening, it was the best feeling in the world. Zoe grinned at me again.
“You’re pretty cool, Brielle, ya know that?” she asked, leaning back against the bookshelf.
“So are you,” I replied, staring down at the carpet. The butterflies in my stomach refused to go away now, and the flame of shame was growing.
What was happening to me?

An hour passed. It was time for dinner, but I didn’t feel like getting up. My conversation with Zoe had trailed off, and the butterflies had faded. She had dozed off to sleep, and her head was lolled back against the wooden shelf with her eyes closed.
The bell let out a wicked shriek and she jumped about three feet in the air.
“Holy shit,” she muttered, rubbing her eyes. Amazingly, her makeup stayed put. “Is it six?”
I pulled my phone out of my jeans pocket and checked the clock. “Yup. Dinner.”
“Then let’s go.”
We walked to the cafeteria together, and it was only until we had sat down together and she let go to eat that I realized she had been holding my hand the whole time.

That night, I went to team building for the first time in a while. It was fairly boring- they split us into groups and had us make a poster depicting various Christian beliefs. My group got “staying pure until marriage”, so we did a sketch of a newly married couple with big hearts over their heads and then a check mark next to it. We had to present afterwards, which was boring, since there was a girl in my group that hogged the spotlight and talked the whole time.
Free time I was looking forward to. I caught Zoe by the staircase.
“Hey. So what do you want to do? We have two hours.”
An odd look flashed across her face and then faded. “Actually, I was gonna head upstairs and get to bed.”
Disappointment flooded through me like a tidal wave. “Oh. Then I’ll see you in the morning, I guess.”
She nodded. “Definitely. I’ll find you at breakfast, okay?”
“Got it. I’ll look for you. Hey, what room are you in?”
“Building A, Floor 3, Room 321.”
“No way. I’m 325.” I grinned at her. “Guess we’ll be seeing a lot of each other, eh?”
Her smile was filled with glee. “Awesome.” She leaned in and pulled me into a hug. As I went to pull away, I noticed that her arms remained around me for just a split second longer.
“Good night.”
When I reached my room, Dana was sitting on her bed, chatting away into her cell phone. She shot me a quick smile and a little wave as I dug up pajamas and toiletries and headed to the bathroom. I showered, washed my face and brushed my teeth with minty toothpaste. I was in a truly great mood for the first time in a long time.
By the time I arrived back in Room 325, my hair sending icy water down my spine, Dana was off the phone. She was leaning against her pillow, with her blonde hair splayed out across the pink fabric.
“Hey, Brielle. How have you been?” She pulled herself up to a sitting position and met my eyes.
I shrugged. “I’ve been fine.”
“How have your classes been going? God, I remember freshman year. They torture you.” The dramatic tone of her voice made me smile.
“It’s been tough, but not unbearable.”
“What about friends? The girls here can be really bitchy.”
“I haven’t had much luck in that department.”
“Oh, really?” She raised her eyebrows. “Didn’t I see you sitting with that girl at dinner?”
“Well, yeah, but I don’t really know anyone besides her- and you.”
Dana rolled her eyes, but not in a mean way. “Brielle, just take my advice. Stay away from that girl.”
“What are you talking about?”
“She’s a bitch, first off. And she’s kind of a slut.”
“How do you know that?” I felt anger creeping into my voice.
“She never talks to anybody. She just sits there and ignores everybody like she’s better than all of us. And I heard her say once she’s not a virgin.”
I was pissed now. “Maybe she just doesn’t like to talk much. And who cares if she’s not a virgin?”
Dana gasped. “Brielle, that’s disgusting. She’s what, fourteen years old? I could forgive twenty or something like that, but not fourteen! She’s a whore and I know for a fact.”
I dropped my hairbrush and whirled around as my rage boiled over.
“Dana, you’re full of shit! Zoe’s not a whore and even if she isn’t a virgin, who cares? You’re the one making a big deal out of it. It’s not like she goes around bragging about it! Grow up and stop spreading lies about people you don’t even know.”
She fell silent. We sat like that for a few minutes, the tension building thicker and thicker by the second.
Suddenly, she jumped up, grabbed a bag from on top of her dresser, shoved her phone into her pocket and slammed out of the room with a huff. She closed the door with a bang and I fastened the locks, figuring she wouldn’t be back that evening. Guilt seeped into my mixed pool of emotions- I hadn’t meant to snap at Dana, but I was furious that she would say shit like that about a girl she barely knew.
I snapped off the lights and dropped into bed. My joyous demeanor had evaporated into confusion and frustration. Who was Dana to tell me things about Zoe when she didn’t even know her?
Eventually my thoughts faded and I slipped into sleep.

I spent the next day with an overwhelming sensation of guilt. I felt awful about snapping at Dana the night before, but her words had made me furious. I didn’t see Zoe the entire day.
That night, while I was working on math homework, I heard a knock at the door. I figured it was Dana, wanting something, so I yanked it open without checking.
Zoe stood in front of me, twirling her hair around her fingers.
“Hey.”
“Hey. Where were you today?”
“Didn’t feel good.”
“Here, come on in.”
She entered and perched on my bed, keeping her composure. She looked frightened.
“So how have you been?” Her voice was soft and scratchy and it made my stomach twitch with imaginary butterflies. I sat down next to her.
“Okay, I guess. Too much homework.”
She chuckled. “It gets better, trust me. They only do this for the first couple months to scare you into being super-responsible, and then they lighten up between Thanksgiving and Christmas. After that, you only have to worry about finals.”
I breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness.”
She grinned and my stomach did that weird flip again. It was an odd feeling, and I couldn’t figure out what was causing it.
“And how are you?” I asked, trying to ignore the growing flutters.
She cast her eyes down to the floor, letting her hair swing in front of her face. “Fine.”
Her voice said otherwise.
“Really? Or are you just telling me that?”
She looked up at me, brushing her bangs away from her eyes. “Do you really want to know?”
“Yes. I really do want to know.”
“I wasn’t sick today. I was locked in my room. I had a nightmare last night. A really bad one.”
“What was it about?” I asked, trying to keep my voice soothing.
“A flashback from when I was a kid. I thought I had them under control but…” Her hands were shaking and I reached out to take them.
“What happened when you were a kid?”
She shook her head. “A lot of shit. I don’t want to talk about it now.”
“Well, do you want to stay here tonight? I can ask Dana to stay with a friend.”
She looked up into my eyes. “I would really like that. Thank you.” She squeezed my hands tighter and smiled. Her hands were small and cool, with black-lacquered nails bitten down to the quick, and my stomach flickered again. I couldn’t identify the feeling, but I could feel my ears and cheeks turning red.
Around nine, Zoe and I decided to get ready for bed. While she talked to the counselor on our hall, letting Ashley know that she’d be two rooms down from her usual location that night, I unlocked my door, grabbed my pajamas and toiletries, and gave Zoe my key.
After my shower, I headed back to my room and found her sitting on my desk, looking slightly awkward and out of place. She was still wearing her jeans and hoodie, clutching her pajamas tightly in her lap.
“You can change if you want to. I won’t look.”
She laughed brightly. “I’m okay for now.”
“And you don’t have to sit on the desk. My bed doesn’t bite.”
Another laugh, this one more nervous, but she hopped off the desk and sat down cross-legged on my bed. I flopped down next to her just as Dana came in.
“Hey, Brielle,” she greeted me, casting Zoe an odd glance. “Why are you here?”
“She’s staying here tonight. Is that okay?”
She shrugged. “I was going to a friend’s anyways, so whatever. Just let me grab my stuff.” Zoe flipped her off behind her back as she collected toiletries and clothing, then swept out the door. I locked it and returned to the bed, where Zoe was still clutching her pajamas for dear life.

“You need me to leave so you can change?”
“Nah. We’re both girls. It’s fine. Even though I’m an abomination to God cause I like boobies.”
Her serious tone made me burst out laughing. “That’s the best way I’ve ever heard it put.”
She grinned. “I try.”
“So talk to me. What happened?
“Shit.”
“What do you mean?”
She sighed. “My parents are divorced, first of all. My birth parents. They split when I was seven. My mother got remarried when I was ten and they had a baby when I was twelve. My stepdad’s name is Scott and my brother’s name is Johnny. Scott is mega-Catholic and convinced my mother to convert when they started dating seriously. That’s why I’m here. She wasn’t really religious before, but she’s such a fucking pushover when it comes to him. I’ve never seen her disagree with him once in four years.”
I swallowed hard. “That sucks.”
She nodded. “Scott’s nice, and he really loves and cares about my mom, but he’s controlling without even trying to be. He’s a lot better than my… my real dad.”
“Why did your parents get divorced?”
Her eyes filled with tears and I mentally kicked myself.
“I’m sorry. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”
She shook her head. “It’s fine. It’s just… he was abusive. He beat my mom, he beat me. He was abused by his dad when he was a kid and he never got help, so it just built up inside him until he snapped. He didn’t start hitting me until I was two.” A tear slipped out and slid down her cheek, fading into the dark material of her sweatshirt. I reached out and took her hand.
“I’m so sorry, Zoe.”
She squeezed my fingers and took a deep breath. “Even after he left, my mother was terrified. Every time he beat her, he told her, ‘I’ll kill you if you leave me and I’ll kill you if you tell.’ It took her a year to finally get in therapy and on medication, and that’s about the time she met Scott. They got married two years later, had Johnny two years after that, and everyone lived happily ever after. Except me.” Sarcasm crept into her voice, mingling with heartache and anger.
My chest began to ache. “Zoe, that’s horrible.”
She nodded. “I haven’t seen my dad in seven years, and that’s fine with me. Supposedly, he’s married again- he sent my mom a letter about three years ago just telling her apologized for what he had done and he hoped she was happier now. She threw it away, but I dug it up and read it. He said he was married again and had started going to therapy and anger management, since his wife was pregnant. Nice how he was willing to do that for his second wife and child, but not my mom and me.”
“He’s an asshole,” I muttered. “A complete and total jackass.”
She just nodded and gave my fingers another squeeze. “He pretty much ruined my entire childhood. Even after he left, I would still lie there awake every night, listening for his footsteps outside my door. And the really sad thing is he wasn’t even a drunk. He never touched a drop of alcohol. He just hit us because he felt like it.”
I wasn’t sure how to respond to that. But I could feel pure, unabashed rage bubbling up inside me. I wanted to hunt him down and kill him for hurting her. It was hard to see how broken she was until she really showed you, but it was there. The pain, the hatred, and the fear burning inside her were almost tangible. God, I wanted to murder him. How could as parent do that to their child? Their own flesh and blood?
As these thoughts were burning a trail through my mind, Zoe spoke again.
“So if you want to blame my lack of religious beliefs on something or someone specific, there’s your reason.”
“I don’t blame you at all though. Seriously, what kind of god allows that to happen?”
“I don’t know. But I have flashbacks sometimes of being beaten. Being held underwater, being hit, not being fed, all kinds of shit. I started therapy when my mom did and it actually helped me get the flashbacks under control, but every once in a while I still get one.
“I’m sorry, Zoe.” I reached out to hug her and she fell against me, squeezing me around my waist with all her might.
“It’s okay. It felt good to tell someone,” she mumbled into my shoulder. “I think I’m ready to sleep though. If I do wake up freaking out, just ignore me.”
“I’m not doing that. I’ll take care of you. Do you need a blanket?”
“No, I have my sweatshirt. I’ll be fine.”
“You are not sleeping with just a sweatshirt. Here, sleep in my bed. Dana won’t mind if I steal hers for the night.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
She smiled and my stomach fluttered. “Thank you.” She unzipped her sweatshirt and started to unfasten her jeans. I turned around to give her privacy as she changed and then slid under Dana’s blanket, clicking the light off.
“Good night, Zoe,” I whispered into the darkness.
“Good night, Brielle. And thank you.”