Say Anything

“Hi.” Ryan said and waved slightly. I stood there with my mouth agape. Why wasn’t he as surprised as I was that he could possibly be my new stepbrother!? Why wasn’t he mentally freaking out like I am right now!? Two seconds ago I thought I would never talk to Ryan again, and now he could be my future... sibling?!

“We’ll let you two talk.” Barbara said, obviously noticing the tension. She grabbed my father’s hand and they both walked into the living room while I continued to stand where I was, watching Ryan casually lean against the counter with a water cup in his hand.

“Did you know about this?!” I asked in a hushed whisper. He just looked at me and nodded. “How long?”

“Before I met you.” He replied. My mouth dropped even further and my headache felt like it was going to explode out of my right temple.

“You jerk!” I replied angrily. He just scrunched up his mouth and tried to disguise a smile.

“Listen, Baylin, I was just as surprised as you are when my mom told me that her boyfriend had a teenage daughter, who goes to my school. She told me your name, and I found out who you were, which was extremely hard by the way.” He explained. “Anyways, I saw you around school for a bit, and when I saw you at the park, I couldn’t help but say hello.”

I crossed my arms in front of my chest and rose by eyebrows at him, urging him to continue. He sighed and ran his fingers through his short tousled hair.

“Alright, when I asked you out, it, well, it was kind of a dare from my friends.” He replied. “I’m kind of known for taking crazy dares. Last year I snuck into the community pool at two in the morning and drained all the water from it.”

“You did that?” I asked.

“Yes. I never got caught.” He replied, obviously looking somewhat proud of himself. “Anyways, all my friends know that you could be my potential, well, step sister, and they knew you didn’t know yet, so they thought it would be funny if I asked you out, to see what you’d say.”

“And you agreed to that!?” I responded furiously, yet was still somewhat whispering. “How could you agree to that?”

“I told you, I don’t back down from dares.” He whispered harshly back. “And I wanted to see what you thought of me,” He added innocently and shrugged. “And apparently you didn’t think much of me since you turned me down.”

“I didn’t turn you down,” I replied. “I just kind of, stood there.”

“Which could be a different way of turning me down,” He responded. “But anyways, after you did, I felt kind of bad that I asked you out like that and made you feel all uncomfortable, so I stopped talking to you. I couldn’t talk to you after that. I felt horrible."

“Yeah well I even felt worse because you completely ignored that I ever existed.” I said softly and looked down at my feet. I suddenly saw Ryan’s feet right in front of mine and I looked up to see him staring at me. I just stared at his nose, which had a slight bump on the ridge of it.

“I’m sorry. I just felt so bad for doing what I did,” He whispered. He then stepped back and extended his arms out to his sides. “Possible future brother sister... friend, hug?” He asked. I smiled, shook my head and stepped forward to hug him. He embraced me and let out a loud sigh. I’ve never really hugged another guy besides Derek. It felt uncomfortable but oddly okay at the same time. We pulled apart and Ryan smiled. "Let’s get back to my mom and your dad.”

-x-

I lay on my bed that night and thought about the day. Usually my birthdays weren’t so eventful. They used to be when I was younger, Derek used to always come over and we’d always do something weird and funny. On my twelfth birthday, after a dare, he obliged to dance around with a boa around his neck singing along to the Spice Girls. I wanted to video tape it soo bad, but he wouldn’t let me. He laughed and warned me that if I ever told anyone that he did, he’d disown me. Too bad he already did disown without me even having to leak out an embarrassing video.

I rolled over on my side and sighed. I’ve had so many good times with Derek to the point where I can’t even count. He was always there for me, all up until High School. Why had he changed? Why did he suddenly want nothing to do with me? I remember he told me we’d be best friends forever and that nothing could change that. Little did I know, he was basically lying to my face.

It just made me think that maybe Heather was right. Derek treated me like scum throughout most of my whole high school career, and for him to suddenly want to become friends with me again wasn’t just a change of heart. He was planning something. He was planning something big to sabotage me.

I closed my eyes and a lone tear fell down my face. Part of me wants to deny the thoughts of Derek planning on betraying me and pin them all on weird coincidences, but the other part is screaming “Baylin! Watch what you’re doing with him! He’s going to hurt you just like he did before!”

I stopped and grabbed the locket he had given me earlier today and opened it. I remember that day clearly. His mom was begging us to take a picture together, telling us that it would be a ‘memory to cherish forever’. Derek’s hair was spiky then, because it was in and he still hadn’t grown into his odd nose. It wasn’t huge or anything, it just wasn’t, right, with his face. He had his arm around my shoulder and we were both grinning like mad. Probably just excited to be finally entering high school.

It’s pretty insane that it only took one summer for Derek to grow his hair out, to grow into his nose and to change his style into a ‘cooler one’. He soon was being swooned over by girls and I was completely forgotten. He began to wear a bit tighter pants and suddenly all the guys started to. Him and Alex were just the ‘go-to’ guys at school when it came to being ‘cool’ and ‘hot’. And personally it just disgusted me. I never despised and mistrusted people as much as I did after Derek proved to me that every human could easily disappoint me. He made me feel socially retarded to the point where I could barely even converse with anyone. He made me this way.

Before I could think any longer, there was a light tapping on my window. I jumped out of my thoughts and walked over to it, opened it and looked down to see a dark figure standing there.

“No, I’m not robbing you,” The figure said. “It’s Derek, come down, I need to talk to you.”

“I don’t really-“

“Come on, Baylin!’ He replied while looking up at me. “Like old times.”

I sighed and nodded, mentally slapping myself for giving in once again to his stupid charm. I walked over to my closet and pulled on one of my old baggy sweatshirts, not even caring anymore whether or not he found me physically attractive.

I slowly and carefully climbed down the large drain pipe that extended from the roof to the ground. It always scared me climbing down this thing, it was way too risky.

And just then, as if God knew I was freaking out, my footing slipped and I started sliding down the pipe and was soon falling off of it completely. I closed my eyes, dreading the hard hit to the ground, but I ended up being caught in Derek’s arms.

“You’re so clumsy.” He stated and smiled a bit. I breathed in and out and tried my best to regain my regular heartbeat. “You okay?” He asked and let out a small laugh at my composure. I nodded and he slowly let me down on my feet.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“Tree house, duh.” He replied and grabbed my hand. I blushed a little and pulled the hood of my large jacket up on my head with one hand.

“You do realize that it’s twelve o’clock in the morning, we have school tomorrow, AND it’s like pitch dark outside.” I stated and Derek just shrugged and continued to lead me down the street where his house was located.

“I’ve got a flashlight in my pocket,” He replied. “I don’t care about school because I already got accepted into Freemont, and I’m not tired.” He added. “Sorry I didn’t say that in the correct descending order.” I laughed and he nudged me with his shoulder.

We finally got to his house and were now trudging through his backyard towards the tree house. Personally, I was mentally flipping out because I felt like I was in some scary movie. Boy and girl venture into scary dark woods. Boy and girl get killed by some crazy axe murderer. Boy and girl-

“We’re herrre!” Derek said in a sing-song voice. I just rolled my eyes and let him climb up the ladder first. Once he was halfway up, I began to climb up behind him. “I know you’re checking out my ass.” He stated and I scoffed.

“Why do you think I’m always checking out your ass?” I asked. We both finally made it in the tree house and Derek turned on a small lantern.

“Because it’s so hot, of course.” He remarked and leaned his back against the wall. I crawled forward and sat down by him.

“Conceited.” I replied and smiled. He turned to me and flashed me a grin before closing his eyes and drumming his fingers on his knees. “You have a song in your head.” I stated.

“How did you know?” He asked.

“Well, whenever you have a song in your head, you drum your fingers on your legs and mouth the song with your lips.” I remarked and shrugged. Derek grinned and continued to look straight forward. We just sat there in comfortable silence for a while. I closed my eyes and yawned. “What did you want to talk to me about? You might want to hurry up with it because I’m about to fall asleep here.” I stated and Derek sighed.

“I’m worried about you.” He said after a bit of silence. I perked up and looked at him, but he refused to look in my direction.

“Why are you worried about me?” I asked and tucked my hands into my sleeves.

“Because ever since we stopped being, well, friends, you completely shut down yourself from everyone else. I know you used to be shy, but you... you didn’t talk to anyone. I would see you walk the halls with your head down making sure you weren’t noticed by anyone, and it just worried me.” He said quietly. I balled my hands into fists and tried to fight the urge to punch him right then and there.

“And do you realize that I became that way because of you, Derek?” I spat. He finally turned to face me with a saddened expression on his face.

“I’m so sorry.” He said softly and lifted his hand to wipe away a tear from my cheek.

“Do you realize how many nights I’d lay awake wondering what I did wrong? How I felt so confused about how you would pass by me in a hall without even the slightest hello? How your friends would write me those mean notes, and you would just go right along with them and laugh about it? Did you ever come to think about how much it killed me?!”

Derek’s face completely went blank. He just stared at me while I sat there and cried lamely. He suddenly leaned forward and hugged me tightly while I cried in his shoulder.

“You weren’t there when I needed you.” I muffled into his shoulder. “Why are you here now?” He pulled away, looked me in the eyes and pulled a strand of hair from my face just like he did before.

“Because I’ve realized how amazingly stupid I was for doing the things that I did to you.” He replied. “And I know that that isn’t enough reason, but I just can’t explain how much I’ve missed you. You were the only one who ever understood me, Baylin, like to a tee. I needed you back. I don’t care what anyone says, I need you more than anything. And I was stupid for thinking I didn’t.”

His face was so sincere and honest and all of those thoughts that once filled my head about him pretending to be my friend again were thrown out the window.

I merely just nodded and gave him another hug. The right corner of his mouth tilted upward a little and we both lay down by one another, staring out of the window at the gorgeous stars. Right then and there I knew that Derek wasn’t lying to me, that he really wanted to be my friend again, that he was really someone I could trust.

But part of me still felt that I was making a huge mistake.