Severed Feelings

“Use a coaster please,” I hear Joslyn warn. Her tone is serious, and I know she’s nearing a complete snap of her sanity.

We’re at her and Kennedy’s house for a late night barbeque and a couple of drinks - though most of us won’t end up drinking anyway - and she’s trying to keep the bunch of boys in line as much as she possibly can because they’ve just invested in new furniture. Her brown eyes widen at me in frustration, and we have a mental conversation about how ridiculous it is to have to scold these adult boys as we would children before she walks over with an empty, stained-glass bottle.

Together, after glancing over the mess of people in the living room one last time for good measure, we walk into the kitchen. Joslyn disposes the bottle beneath the sink, huffing. “I swear, they’ve never heard of the damn things.”

I only shrug as I lean wearily against the counter because we both know that they’ve heard of coasters, they’ve just decided that they weren’t of great importance.

Joslyn sighs one last time, pulling her long, dark hair over her shoulder to fiddle with her spilt ends. A comfortable silence settles over the two of us before the question arises – the question that seems to be on people’s tongue more and more often around me as each day passes. “So, how have things been?” she asks.

I look up from my invisible figure eight drawings on the countertop to meet those prodding dark eyes. I can tell she doesn’t want to drag up a dark topic, but she’s concerned and she wants to help in any which way she can if things haven’t been well.

“Fine,” I state. The word seems to echo in the room, and another silence assumes.

I don’t think she believes me, but she doesn’t know what else to say to drudge the topic up, and I really don’t want to discuss the mess that has turned into my life, so I say nothing more.

Dinner is over, I could just go home, but John drove and he wants to “socialize” when in reality he’s just drinking a beer, watching television and only inputting in conversations when they only require one word answers.

“Good,” she settles with, her voice going up an octave to try to make up for her lie. She sounds happy with my answer, but I know that she knows I’m lying.

We change topics. “I have some leftover cherry cheesecake from the other night… Want to split a piece?”

I nod. I don’t really want to eat it, but I have nothing else to do other than coaxing John into believing that it’s time to go home. And even then, the probability of me succeeding with him is slim to none.

We split the piece, and I hear her make little noises of pleasure at just how good it tastes with every forkful she takes. I really can't taste it though. Everything seems flat. Nothing ever quenches my appetite anymore, but I force a smile and compliment her cooking in the best way I can.

A silence sets in as she places the dish in the sink, leaving it for the morning. It's awkward and tense all over again, and I can do nothing but to resume drawing figure eights on the countertop.

"I wish Imilee was here," Joslyn says.

It's so sudden, so abrupt, that it catches me off guard.

A breath catches in my throat, and as the milliseconds tick by, I realize that it’s quickly turning into a sob. It’s dying to come out, to escape the confines of my trachea, but I refuse, and the refusal alone makes everything almost unbearably painful.

Tears prick at the back of my eyes.

I close them for a second, grasping at all ends to compose myself.

“I know,” I say. The words come out wavering and hoarse.

It seems like the world in the next room has burst into absolute chaos. The boys all make obnoxious sounds of happiness and they chortle with laughter.

“-Savannah…” Joslyn trails off. She suddenly has a look in her eyes that says she regrets saying what she said. The glassiness I see crossing over her brown irises reads, “I’m sorry,” painfully obvious.

“Savannah?”

I whirl around to stare at John. He’s leaning in the doorway, half-finished beer in his grip. He looks so tired, and yet the second he takes in the scene, he’s concerned. “Is everything okay here?”

I nod quickly, crossing my arms over my stomach and blinking back the tears as inconspicuously as I can. “Yeah. Why wouldn’t it be?”

He shrugs and takes one last gulp of his drink before setting it aside. “Ready to go?” he asks, pulling his keys out from his pocket and dangling them from his thumb and forefinger.

I nod, brush my hair back and step forward, taking them. “Yeah.”

Feeling ashamed for nearly breaking down, I only can meekly look back to Joslyn. She has this look in her eyes. It’s a mix of desperation, apologetic, regret and, most prominently, sadness. She wants to say something, but she can’t because nothing will fix the situation.

Imilee won’t come to anymore of our parties no matter how much we wanted her there, and John gets mad every time we bring the subject of his baby sister up.

“I’ll see you later,” escapes my lips in a mumbled rush. I’m jumpy because I don’t want John to even guess we were talking about her.

She nods once, solemnly.

We mentally agree to call each other the next time we have the chance, even despite her upsetting me because Joslyn, to me, seems like she’s the only one who I can actually talk to.

I need her as a friend, as a confidant, since Imilee stepped down from the position.

With one wave, I walk out to John’s truck with as little eye contact with anyone else as I can possibly manage.

The drive is quiet aside from the hum of some sort of metal music playing over the stereo system. John smells lightly of tobacco and alcohol, and it’s only then that I realize I’m not as repulsed by the smell of booze as I used to be.

As I pull into a parking spot beneath our apartment complex and tug the keys from the ignition, John reaches over and sets his hand on my knee.

We both sit in silence, him staring out the windshield at the spray-painted number marking our spot, 821, and me staring at him in confusion.

“I know I don’t always show you, or tell you…” he pauses, blinks his green eyes and focuses on me. “But I love you, Savannah. You know that right?”

I tuck a choppy piece of my brown hair behind my ear and let the words settle over my brain.

Hesitantly, I nod.

It doesn’t feel like it anymore. It feels like most days we don’t share that feeling.

“Of course. I love you too,” I murmur back, clenching the keys in my fist and averting my attention there.

He leans over, presses a light kiss to my temple, and then climbs out of the vehicle. He waits for me to follow his lead, and together, hand-in-hand, we walk up to our apartment.