Glass Flowers

I realized something important the day I ran into Harry at the park. As the two of us bonded over ice cream (if one could even call it ‘bonding’), it became clear to me that Harry was actually a pretty nice guy. Chloe had confided in me that he had a reputation of being a player and a flirt, but as I was talking with him, he didn’t strike me as the type to play around with girls’ hearts.

But then again, what did I know? I didn’t know the first thing about guys.

It turns out that Harry was ‘in the area to visit a friend’, and I had a sneaking suspicion that his original intention was to see Chloe. The two of us lived next door to each other, after all. Of course he would end up in my neighborhood if he had been looking for Chloe.

He assured me that it wasn’t urgent, though, and he seemed happy enough to be able to get to know me better. I was surprised by how natural the conversation seemed to flow. Who would have guessed that I was capable of talking to a guy?

“So you never did tell me what you were doing at the park.” Harry grinned at me behind his ice cream.

“Oh. Umm.” I thought about it for a little bit. I wasn’t about to tell him the truth—that his girlfriend and I were best friends, and we had our first fight (or disagreement, or whatever people called it—a spat?), and that I was just jealous because she was perfect in every way and I was doomed to be in her shadow for the rest of my days. The poor guy didn’t need to know about my issues.

So I settled for a simple, “I just wanted to clear my head.”

Harry nodded, studying me. I shifted uncomfortably under his scrutiny, hoping that the hurt wasn’t evident on my face.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Cringing, I mentally slapped myself. I guess I really was transparent; people could read me too easily. And here was Harry, who was still pretty much a stranger to me, and he was able to tell that something was bothering me.

I shook my head, giving him a sheepish smile. “It’s stupid,” I began. “Just girl stuff.”

He nodded again, more than happy to leave it at that.

So all in all, getting ice cream with Harry didn’t turn out nearly as awkward as I thought it would. It was actually a pretty nice experience; I had a good time getting to know him. We even exchanged numbers and agreed to keep in touch (something I was very proud of myself for).

I was pretty content for the next few days. I hadn’t bothered to talk to Chloe, despite her numerous attempts to get a hold of me. It was strangely liberating to not be hanging around Chloe all the time. I felt truly myself.

Which sounds terrible, since the two of us are best friends, but I needed some time to myself. I needed to think things over, because my time away from Chloe made me realize something—it was really, really nice to be by myself, for a change.

I hadn’t noticed it before, but I felt a whole lot less confident when I was around Chloe. It wasn’t because she made me feel bad on purpose; despite what had happened the day I went to the park, Chloe was a really nice person and a great friend. But nice person or not, it was hard to have my own identity when all I did was hang around Chloe and inevitably fade into the background. Like I said, people always noticed Chloe, and by default, that meant they failed to see me as well.

Chloe had one of those magnetic personalities. Once you were placed in her gravitational pull, she had you under her spell. No one could possibly hope to stand out whenever Chloe was in the same room.

Because of that, I developed a bit of an inferiority complex over the years, and it wasn’t until I spent time away from Chloe that I really noticed it.

I would have been content to avoid contact with Chloe for as long as I could, but a confrontation was pretty much inevitable. We had to talk about what happened that day sometime.

This made me realize that agreeing to get an ice cream with Harry turned out to be the worst idea I had in a long while. It was possibly even worse than my thoughts of revenge on Chloe. Why, you ask?

Because the whole incident was going to come back to bite me in the ass, and that day happened to be today. Yep, some higher power decided that today seemed like a good day for a confrontation.

I had still been holding onto the small bit of hope that maybe the whole incident from a few days ago would blow over, and Chloe wouldn’t even remember it.

Unfortunately, Chloe had shown up on my doorstep early this morning, so I put on my Big Girl Pants and decided to face the music. Might as well get it all over with, right? I mentally prepared myself as I opened the front door for her.

“What’s this?” Chloe shoved the gossip rag in my face before I could so much as manage a ‘hello’.

Taking a few steps back so I could take a better look, my heart dropped to my stomach when I took in the large red letters, “Harry Styles Ice Cream Date with Mystery Girl”. Below that was a picture of Harry and me smiling at each other, each of us holding an ice cream cone.

“Ummm.”

Okay, so I expected a confrontation and all, but I wasn’t expecting this. The look that Chloe was giving me would have made a lesser person pee their pants. I had forgotten how scary she was when she was pissed.

“Harry and I decided to go out for some ice cream?” I hated how my statement came out sounding like a question. Chloe huffed and crossed her arms, still clutching the magazine in one hand. “Yeah, I gathered that. When was this?”

I paused before answering. “… remember the day I flipped out on you?”

I wasn’t sure if Chloe heard me or not, because she immediately shot another question at me. “WHY didn’t you tell me you hung out with Harry?!” She was looking more and more angry, and I found my own temper flaring in response.

“Since when do I have to report everything I do to you?” It was probably the wrong thing to say, but I didn’t really care. I had been prepared for the two of us to talk this out like mature adults, but apparently it wasn’t going to happen.

“Since you agreed to get close to my boyfriend! He’s my BOYFRIEND, April. Whatever the two of you do together is my business too!”

“I was kind of under the impression that we WEREN’T SPEAKING to each other!” I couldn’t believe how unreasonable she was being at the moment. Really? Couldn’t a guy and a girl just hang out and be friends without having the guy’s girlfriend flip out like this?

Chloe gaped at me, like what I had just said was the most ridiculous thing she had ever heard. “Wait, so you’re STILL upset about what happened the other day? I told you I didn’t mean it!”

“Of course I’m upset! You basically said that I’m UNLIKEABLE.” Seriously, Chloe of all people should know that the whole “Plain-Jane” Lin thing was a sensitive subject for me.

Maybe I was being a little unreasonable in that respect, but she should have known better than to throw it in my face that people never noticed me; they always noticed Chloe.

“Whatever, I don’t know how to get through to you. I. Didn’t. Mean. It!” Chloe emphasized each syllable, as if spelling out a simple concept to a child. “And besides, why the hell were you hanging out with my boyfriend? I thought you weren’t going to go along with my ‘stupid’ plan anymore!” She sneered at me, and I found that it made her awfully ugly in that moment.

“What, so I’m not allowed to make friends now? Guess I’m not so unlikeable, huh? Harry seemed eager enough to invite me to get some ice cream with him,” I stated, emphasizing the fact that he was the one who invited me. He likes me well enough, contrary to whatever you believe.”

It was sort of a low blow. I could tell as soon as the words left my mouth that they held a sort of bitchiness to them, but my body was too busy pulsing with adrenaline for my brain to notice. This was honestly the first time I had argued with Chloe like this. The two of us never fought. Was it sad that I got a sick satisfaction from watching her jaw hit the ground?

It looked like I wasn’t the docile, demur April Lin she thought she had all figured out.

“So this is how it’s going to be?” Chloe’s voice came out in a whisper now, her face crumpling into a look of utter betrayal. She didn’t say anything else, but her eyes spoke volumes. They practically screamed ‘I don’t know you anymore’.

I didn’t respond. Chloe took my silence to be an affirmation. She mumbled a “Fine” before turning on her heel and storming away from me, not bothering to look back as she made the short walk to her house. I stared after her, my body still buzzing from the experience of arguing with Chloe and standing up for myself.

The thoughts of revenge came back again, but this time, I didn’t do anything to squash them.

The truth was, I wasn’t sorry for the things I had said to Chloe. If she thought I was just going to roll over and do whatever she told me to, and then expect me to let her abuse my fragile self-confidence like that, she had another thing coming.

This meant war. Poor Harry Styles had become the main playing piece in my game.