You're Not Alone
two.
two.
2011. Present Day.
I am fast asleep, until my iPod makes the notification noise from under my pillow, and I groggily reach for it and look at it. I squint without my contacts in my blind-as-a-bat eyes. Julia Cruz added you as a friend.
Oh. My. God. She has some nerve. Just because she is an over-attentive witch who has her boyfriend whipped and is jealous because I freaking commented on his status gave her no right. I was best friends with him before she even met him. I have every right to comment on his status. And she's the one who took him away from me.
Okay, she may be über overly jealous (and skanky), but I am still overly bitter and hateful; I know her, even though she probably has no recollection of me—I am now just some slut commenting on her boyfriend's status that she has to keep an eye on. The wound still smarts over him, and I don't think I can ever let anyone in that far again, I don't want to care about someone so much ever again, if all it means is this pain.
I push all that aside, because class is about to start, and I still have to get up to the college. I am 20 years old, still living in my mother's house, and working toward my Associates degree at the local junior college. I take most of my classes online, but my mom is forcing me to take a freaking eight o'clock class to “teach me” for when I finally get to go to a university.
I rarely get on Facebook anymore, and I know the only reason she added me is to size me up, and I know I'm going to regret this, but I click Confirm friend request anyway. There is nothing incriminating for her to find on my profile.
I get ready in about two minutes, my contacts actually cooperating for once. I just throw on a shirt that was slung over the back of my chair and rip a pair of jeans off a hanger in my closet, quickly brushing my hair and not bothering to touch up the waves from sleep with my straightener. I'm so lazy I don't feel like bothering with makeup either. I grab my keys and am just about to head out the door when my mom calls out, “I see Ben's girlfriend added you on Facebook.”
I stop in my tracks. She's supposed to be at work right now. Not sitting on Facebook and Pinterest, which is all she ever does when she isn't at work, unlike me, who actually reads or goes on Tumblr, or does something more... productive.
I sigh, consider yelling in reply, “You're gonna make me late to class!” to simply avoid the conversation, think better of it, and walk back to her room.
“And?” I shoot as I make my way down the hall. Even from outside the door I can see my mom is already creeping on Julia Cruz's profile as much as possible with the private setting.
“I can't believe he picked her over you,” she says.
I sigh; we go over this only every other day. “There was no picking her over me. There was never anything between me and Ben. I keep telling you.”
“He liked you. A lot.”
“Even if he did—which he didn't, I don't understand why you can't grasp the concept that maybe he was just a really good friend—we couldn't be together, and obviously he didn't want to wait until we could, so he moved on, as he should have.”
“Still. I never pegged him as the type. To fornicate.” I sigh again. My mom is big on the old Christian values, and she had thought Ben was a fantastic Christian too, so she just about flipped when I dropped the bomb that he dropped out of K-State (we lived in Manhattan, Kansas now, because my mom was under the impression that I would go to K-State too—which shocked me, I thought she'd force me into Bible college—so junior she uprooted us from Wichita to Manhattan, where I attended another private school) and moved out of Kansas (I didn't even know where he'd moved to), all to live with this girlfriend that he had met not 3 months ago at school—and they weren't even married! Or even engaged! I thought she was going to have an aneurism. Kind of like when I first came home with my nose pierced, which branded me a “sinner”, and she threatened to kick me out, but I knew she wouldn't; I was 19 at that time, for God's sakes.
“You never know with people, Mom. I always tell you.” I always tell her a lot of things. Which she never listens to.
Ben had been my mentor; 19 when I was 17. “He has some experience in these things,” was what I was told by the school counselor once she gave into the idea that I'd picked him to be my peer counselor. I actually met him on a campus trip to K-State, and we hit it off, instantaneously friends. So once I found out he was majoring in Counseling and was in a program where he had to be a mentor to someone who was recommended peer counseling, I told my counselor, who had recommended I had peer counseling since I wouldn't talk to her, I would only take him or there was no deal. His “experience” wasn't his own personal self, but that his best friend had blown his brains out right in front of Ben and his ex used to cut herself; but that was experience enough for me. They hated the fact I didn't have a female “peer”, and obviously Ben and I grew very close; not romantically, but, well, kind of romantically, but the fact that he was my peer counselor is what meant we couldn't be together or he could get kicked out of school ...
“You should have given him the time of day,” she says, still scrolling through her profile. As far as she knows, I hadn't. But the past should have warned her that I don't even tell her close to everything. Because as far as I had been concerned when he was around, Ben hung the moon and stars.
We've never really been close, because I've never been able to tell her anything and she's always tried to make me her little clone—“I'm living vicariously through you,” she always says when making me buy girly clothes or getting extra highlights in my hair; early this month I dyed my hair dark brown against her will—I'm naturally not-quite-dirty-but-not-quite-light blonde—but she had to stay tight-lipped since the bleach blonde highlights and lowlights she made me get last month turned my hair orange, which she hates worse than brown—no matter how hard I try to put my foot down.
“Yeah, yeah.” I sigh again. “I'm gonna be late now, thanks. And why aren't you at work?”
She waves me off, looking now through Julia Cruz's old profile pictures. There's one of her and Ben in a bathroom—door closed—with his arms around her middle, and her in a very low cut tank top to show her nonexistant boobs. She also always looks like she has had plastic surgery at least once—and no, I'm not just being mean—and that lip ring that would normally be cute is so not cute on her.
“Whatever,” I say, turning around, figuring showing up to class late is better than not showing at all; this is college, not high school, and you don't really get punished for showing up whenever.
“I wish you had the nerve to text him and tell him how you feel about this,” she calls after me, referring to Julia, I know.
Yeah, well, I'm trying to move on, I think
“Maybe I should just do it for you,” she continues. I don't know why, but a sinking feeling starts in my stomach, and I am compelled to run back into her room.
She's holding my phone, but I don't panic; my phone autolocks after five minutes so she can't get stalk my texts. “How did you get my phone?!” I ask. She's typing on it, and I try grabbing it out of her hand, but she avoids me.
“I lost my charger, and I had to use yours, and your phone was on the charger,” she says calmly.
She finally hands me the phone, and when she does, I see Message Sent on the screen. How did she get it off lock? She didn't really text him, I tell myself. She would never do that to you. She sent it to someone else like herself to make you think she did, she jokes like this all the time...
As fast as I can I go to Sent Messages. And I want to puke. To: Ben. Oh my God. She did not. She did not. How could she do something like this to me? She was my mother for crying out loud. This was no harmless joke. I don't know how on earth she unlocked my phone, but she did, and now everything is wrong. I don't understand how you could throw away your life for her, the message reads. I know you had feelings for me.
Oh. Shi—“HOW COULD YOU DO THIS?” I scream at her. “WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? IS THIS YOUR SICK TWISTED IDEA OF A JOKE?”
And for the first time ever, he texts “me” back almost immediately. Great. This is the last thing I need. 'You're such a child, Arabella,' I can hear him say. He was never mean, but I know he thinks my outspokenness was childish and now he probably sees me as even more of a kid.
And just those words from him send me over the edge. I burst into tears and run off, tearing everything out of my closet and throwing it in a rolling suitcase. I was trying to work things out with her, really, I was, but now I know I can't stay here another second. At this point I have no idea where I'll go; as far away as possible.
I know you probably won't believe me, I text Ben through my tears, I don't blame you if you don't. But that wasn't me, that was my mom, I swear.
“Ari,” my mom walks in.
“I'm leaving,” I choke out. “Don't try to stop me. It's been a long time coming and you know it.”
And now I realize I have to leave not just her but freaking Kansas too, or I'll end up like her, a single parent that has no idea what to do with her troubled child. I mean, the most eventful thing that even happens here is that a couple famous people are from here. But they all had to get out first. And that's what I have to do.
There's no way I can fit all my stuff, but I don't care. I shove every single book from my bookshelf in, all my little necessities that are right on my desk, and save the smaller stuff to fit in my messenger bag. Then I run to her room, rip my phone charger out of her wall and say, loud enough, “Oh, and get your own.”
I don't look back at her as I leave. I don't know what it is, but I feel in my gut I should grab one last thing, something that will help me as I decide where to go now; I steal her address book out of the drawer in the kitchen then slam the garage door shut as my last goodbye. I peel out as fast as possible. I am not overreacting. She has no idea how much he still means to me. How much she's ruined my life now, how, even though we haven't really been speaking, I for sure won't ever be able to face him again now.
He has to believe me. He has to know I never said a single bad thing to his face about his stupid girlfriend and I wouldn't now, no matter how I feel. I was mostly over him.
I drive all the way to the airport, speeding the whole time but not getting caught. I have about 300 dollars to my name, my birthday and Christmas money from last year, and I hope it's enough to get me somewhere.
I have still have no idea where I'll go. I look up at the flights. California, I tell myself. It's far enough from Kansas. Los Angeles, California.
I'll hate it, I think, being completely alone in such a huge city with no one I know and all these famous people around me and all these douchebags trying to get famous. I've been alone since 3rd grade, and I've dealt just fine, but Wichita's not that big, not so intimidating. I know no one in California.
But then I realize I do know someone in California. I know Kendall Schmidt.
2011. Present Day.
I am fast asleep, until my iPod makes the notification noise from under my pillow, and I groggily reach for it and look at it. I squint without my contacts in my blind-as-a-bat eyes. Julia Cruz added you as a friend.
Oh. My. God. She has some nerve. Just because she is an over-attentive witch who has her boyfriend whipped and is jealous because I freaking commented on his status gave her no right. I was best friends with him before she even met him. I have every right to comment on his status. And she's the one who took him away from me.
Okay, she may be über overly jealous (and skanky), but I am still overly bitter and hateful; I know her, even though she probably has no recollection of me—I am now just some slut commenting on her boyfriend's status that she has to keep an eye on. The wound still smarts over him, and I don't think I can ever let anyone in that far again, I don't want to care about someone so much ever again, if all it means is this pain.
I push all that aside, because class is about to start, and I still have to get up to the college. I am 20 years old, still living in my mother's house, and working toward my Associates degree at the local junior college. I take most of my classes online, but my mom is forcing me to take a freaking eight o'clock class to “teach me” for when I finally get to go to a university.
I rarely get on Facebook anymore, and I know the only reason she added me is to size me up, and I know I'm going to regret this, but I click Confirm friend request anyway. There is nothing incriminating for her to find on my profile.
I get ready in about two minutes, my contacts actually cooperating for once. I just throw on a shirt that was slung over the back of my chair and rip a pair of jeans off a hanger in my closet, quickly brushing my hair and not bothering to touch up the waves from sleep with my straightener. I'm so lazy I don't feel like bothering with makeup either. I grab my keys and am just about to head out the door when my mom calls out, “I see Ben's girlfriend added you on Facebook.”
I stop in my tracks. She's supposed to be at work right now. Not sitting on Facebook and Pinterest, which is all she ever does when she isn't at work, unlike me, who actually reads or goes on Tumblr, or does something more... productive.
I sigh, consider yelling in reply, “You're gonna make me late to class!” to simply avoid the conversation, think better of it, and walk back to her room.
“And?” I shoot as I make my way down the hall. Even from outside the door I can see my mom is already creeping on Julia Cruz's profile as much as possible with the private setting.
“I can't believe he picked her over you,” she says.
I sigh; we go over this only every other day. “There was no picking her over me. There was never anything between me and Ben. I keep telling you.”
“He liked you. A lot.”
“Even if he did—which he didn't, I don't understand why you can't grasp the concept that maybe he was just a really good friend—we couldn't be together, and obviously he didn't want to wait until we could, so he moved on, as he should have.”
“Still. I never pegged him as the type. To fornicate.” I sigh again. My mom is big on the old Christian values, and she had thought Ben was a fantastic Christian too, so she just about flipped when I dropped the bomb that he dropped out of K-State (we lived in Manhattan, Kansas now, because my mom was under the impression that I would go to K-State too—which shocked me, I thought she'd force me into Bible college—so junior she uprooted us from Wichita to Manhattan, where I attended another private school) and moved out of Kansas (I didn't even know where he'd moved to), all to live with this girlfriend that he had met not 3 months ago at school—and they weren't even married! Or even engaged! I thought she was going to have an aneurism. Kind of like when I first came home with my nose pierced, which branded me a “sinner”, and she threatened to kick me out, but I knew she wouldn't; I was 19 at that time, for God's sakes.
“You never know with people, Mom. I always tell you.” I always tell her a lot of things. Which she never listens to.
Ben had been my mentor; 19 when I was 17. “He has some experience in these things,” was what I was told by the school counselor once she gave into the idea that I'd picked him to be my peer counselor. I actually met him on a campus trip to K-State, and we hit it off, instantaneously friends. So once I found out he was majoring in Counseling and was in a program where he had to be a mentor to someone who was recommended peer counseling, I told my counselor, who had recommended I had peer counseling since I wouldn't talk to her, I would only take him or there was no deal. His “experience” wasn't his own personal self, but that his best friend had blown his brains out right in front of Ben and his ex used to cut herself; but that was experience enough for me. They hated the fact I didn't have a female “peer”, and obviously Ben and I grew very close; not romantically, but, well, kind of romantically, but the fact that he was my peer counselor is what meant we couldn't be together or he could get kicked out of school ...
“You should have given him the time of day,” she says, still scrolling through her profile. As far as she knows, I hadn't. But the past should have warned her that I don't even tell her close to everything. Because as far as I had been concerned when he was around, Ben hung the moon and stars.
We've never really been close, because I've never been able to tell her anything and she's always tried to make me her little clone—“I'm living vicariously through you,” she always says when making me buy girly clothes or getting extra highlights in my hair; early this month I dyed my hair dark brown against her will—I'm naturally not-quite-dirty-but-not-quite-light blonde—but she had to stay tight-lipped since the bleach blonde highlights and lowlights she made me get last month turned my hair orange, which she hates worse than brown—no matter how hard I try to put my foot down.
“Yeah, yeah.” I sigh again. “I'm gonna be late now, thanks. And why aren't you at work?”
She waves me off, looking now through Julia Cruz's old profile pictures. There's one of her and Ben in a bathroom—door closed—with his arms around her middle, and her in a very low cut tank top to show her nonexistant boobs. She also always looks like she has had plastic surgery at least once—and no, I'm not just being mean—and that lip ring that would normally be cute is so not cute on her.
“Whatever,” I say, turning around, figuring showing up to class late is better than not showing at all; this is college, not high school, and you don't really get punished for showing up whenever.
“I wish you had the nerve to text him and tell him how you feel about this,” she calls after me, referring to Julia, I know.
Yeah, well, I'm trying to move on, I think
“Maybe I should just do it for you,” she continues. I don't know why, but a sinking feeling starts in my stomach, and I am compelled to run back into her room.
She's holding my phone, but I don't panic; my phone autolocks after five minutes so she can't get stalk my texts. “How did you get my phone?!” I ask. She's typing on it, and I try grabbing it out of her hand, but she avoids me.
“I lost my charger, and I had to use yours, and your phone was on the charger,” she says calmly.
She finally hands me the phone, and when she does, I see Message Sent on the screen. How did she get it off lock? She didn't really text him, I tell myself. She would never do that to you. She sent it to someone else like herself to make you think she did, she jokes like this all the time...
As fast as I can I go to Sent Messages. And I want to puke. To: Ben. Oh my God. She did not. She did not. How could she do something like this to me? She was my mother for crying out loud. This was no harmless joke. I don't know how on earth she unlocked my phone, but she did, and now everything is wrong. I don't understand how you could throw away your life for her, the message reads. I know you had feelings for me.
Oh. Shi—“HOW COULD YOU DO THIS?” I scream at her. “WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? IS THIS YOUR SICK TWISTED IDEA OF A JOKE?”
And for the first time ever, he texts “me” back almost immediately. Great. This is the last thing I need. 'You're such a child, Arabella,' I can hear him say. He was never mean, but I know he thinks my outspokenness was childish and now he probably sees me as even more of a kid.
And just those words from him send me over the edge. I burst into tears and run off, tearing everything out of my closet and throwing it in a rolling suitcase. I was trying to work things out with her, really, I was, but now I know I can't stay here another second. At this point I have no idea where I'll go; as far away as possible.
I know you probably won't believe me, I text Ben through my tears, I don't blame you if you don't. But that wasn't me, that was my mom, I swear.
“Ari,” my mom walks in.
“I'm leaving,” I choke out. “Don't try to stop me. It's been a long time coming and you know it.”
And now I realize I have to leave not just her but freaking Kansas too, or I'll end up like her, a single parent that has no idea what to do with her troubled child. I mean, the most eventful thing that even happens here is that a couple famous people are from here. But they all had to get out first. And that's what I have to do.
There's no way I can fit all my stuff, but I don't care. I shove every single book from my bookshelf in, all my little necessities that are right on my desk, and save the smaller stuff to fit in my messenger bag. Then I run to her room, rip my phone charger out of her wall and say, loud enough, “Oh, and get your own.”
I don't look back at her as I leave. I don't know what it is, but I feel in my gut I should grab one last thing, something that will help me as I decide where to go now; I steal her address book out of the drawer in the kitchen then slam the garage door shut as my last goodbye. I peel out as fast as possible. I am not overreacting. She has no idea how much he still means to me. How much she's ruined my life now, how, even though we haven't really been speaking, I for sure won't ever be able to face him again now.
He has to believe me. He has to know I never said a single bad thing to his face about his stupid girlfriend and I wouldn't now, no matter how I feel. I was mostly over him.
I drive all the way to the airport, speeding the whole time but not getting caught. I have about 300 dollars to my name, my birthday and Christmas money from last year, and I hope it's enough to get me somewhere.
I have still have no idea where I'll go. I look up at the flights. California, I tell myself. It's far enough from Kansas. Los Angeles, California.
I'll hate it, I think, being completely alone in such a huge city with no one I know and all these famous people around me and all these douchebags trying to get famous. I've been alone since 3rd grade, and I've dealt just fine, but Wichita's not that big, not so intimidating. I know no one in California.
But then I realize I do know someone in California. I know Kendall Schmidt.