A Little Too Late

I had major butterflies. No, scratch that; I had a tornado whirling around in my stomach. Ever since I woke up I was a cross between excited, nervous and a tiny bit doubtful. The doubtfulness confused me – I already knew how Bryce felt about me – but I guess that came along with the nerves. It usually took me a little while to figure out what to wear on the first day of school but since I didn’t figure it out the day before, I was running late because of the simple fact nothing seemed to look right.

“Brittany Nicole, you better be out that door in ten minutes!” Mom yelled through my door.

“I will, I will!” I promised with a groan. Giving up, while also not wanting to deal with my mom’s fury, I decided on a pair of light jeans and a dark blue floral tank top. I quickly changed into that before brushing through my naturally wavy hair.

“Brittany,” I heard my mom’s warning voice say from through my door.

“I’m coming!” I said as I grabbed my book bag and nearly tripped over myself while trying to put my flip flops on. I said goodbye to my parents before grabbing my keys and getting in my car. Bryce took me to school all last year and insisted that he’d drive me this year as well because I wasn’t the best driver but I figured that wasn’t going to happen at least for today because I hadn’t gotten a text or call from him this morning. I grabbed my phone and quickly typed a text for Bryce. Meet me in front of the school. I have to tell you something. xx I set my phone down, smiling to myself as I thought about how in less than a half hour, I’d have Bryce back in my life. I decided to turn the music up loudly, singing along with every song I knew to drown out any thoughts or doubts about Bryce. I didn’t want to think about all the things that could go wrong and I certainly didn’t want to convince myself that talking to him would be a bad idea.

When I pulled into the half-full parking lot of the school, I scanned the cars to see if I could find his banged up, dark blue car. I let out a sigh – of relief? Disappointment? – and grabbed my bag then got out, saying hello to a few people before I made it to the entrance. I took a seat on the cement bench, waiting for Bryce to show up.

“Hey, where’s your other half?” Tess asked jokingly, taking a seat next to me. I hadn’t told her about what happened between me and Bryce because I didn’t know if he wanted anybody to know what had happened. If he decided he wanted to tell her, that’s fine, but I didn’t want to say anything first.

I shrugged. “That’s who I’m waiting for. He couldn’t give me a ride this morning so I told him to just meet me here,” I explained.

She nodded. “I’ll be surprised if he even shows up, to be honest,” she commented.

“Why?” I asked her.

“Because me, him and Adam all went to the lake yesterday and we ran into Daisy and Sam so we didn’t leave until late and Bryce drove everybody home so I don’t even know what time he got back,” she explained. “It sucks your mom wouldn’t let you come.”

I furrowed my eyebrows. “Bryce said that?” I questioned.

“Yeah, Steven mentioned something about him not inviting you and Bryce said he did but your mom wouldn’t let you come or something like that,” she answered.

Suddenly I had a bad feeling in my stomach. Bryce didn’t invite me anywhere yesterday, so why would he tell them that he did? What if he really wasn’t still over what happened? “Oh,” I said with a nod. “That’s good he told you guys, because I would’ve loved to go.” I pulled out my phone to check if he had texted me back. Nothing.

“Yeah, maybe this weekend we could all go? If you’re allowed to, of course,” Tess suggested.

I gave her a half smile. “Yeah, that’d be cool,” I replied. “Well, he probably isn’t going to come. Leave it to him to miss the first day, right?”

“Isn’t that him?” Tess asked. I followed her gaze to see him leaning into the driver’s side of a silver car, a wide smile on his face. The driver was a dark-haired girl who, while I couldn’t see her that well, didn’t look at all familiar. Maybe I just hadn’t noticed her before? I went to look away when I saw him lean into the window and kiss her, causing my eyes to widen. Who was that? “I didn’t know he had a girlfriend.”

“Me neither,” I mumbled before getting up and walking toward Bryce, who was now walking from the car that was driving off.

Bryce’s gaze landed on me and he gave me a grin. “Hey, I missed you!” he told me, walking up to me and giving me a hug.

I reluctantly hugged him back. “Didn’t really seem like it when you cut me off completely,” I muttered, only half-hoping he didn’t hear me.

I heard him sigh as he pulled away. I watched him look around before his eyes finally settled back onto my face. “Britt, please don’t be like that,” he said in a begging tone.

“Well I don’t think that we should pretend like everything’s fine,” I insisted. I wasn’t planning on this conversation being an argument but I also was planning on him showing up and kissing some girl. “I don’t think that we should pretend we had an entire summer apart by force, not choice.”

“I needed to think about everything,” he replied, running his fingers through his hair. “I tried being able to just talk whenever you called me but all I wanted to do was yell or hang up on you. I was hurt and I spent the beginning of summer blaming you for it.”

I frowned, guilt filling me. “I understand,” I told him quietly. “I don’t blame you for blaming me. I know I should’ve said something when you told me-“

“See, that’s the thing, it isn’t your fault. You can’t control your feelings just like I can’t control mine,” he interrupted me. “And I’m sorry to put you in a position like that and I’m sorry for cutting you out, but I did what I thought I had to do.”

I was quiet for a bit, hearing the 5-minute warning bell but my feet didn’t move and Bryce stayed in place as well, watching me for some sort of reaction. “You said you blamed me the beginning of summer…” I paused, unsure if I wanted to hear his answer or not. “Why didn’t you call once you stopped?”

A grin appeared on his face and his eyes lit up. “Right, that’s the thing I have to tell you,” he said with excitement in his voice. “You remember Isabella Lopez?” Isabelle Lopez graduated last year. She wasn’t the most popular or the most sought after girl in school but plenty of guys thought she was cute, including Bryce. It then dawned on me. Isabella Lopez was the girl that drove him to school. Apparently my answer wasn’t too important because he continued before I could speak. “She was in California with a couple of friends for a few weeks. We ran into each other when I went out to eat with my sister and we kinda just… hit it off.”

I was frozen, letting everything sink in. “That’s who dropped you off earlier.” It was more of a statement rather than a question. Because I already knew.

He nodded. “Yeah, my battery died last night when I got home and Bella just offered to give me a ride and pick me up,” he explained.

Bella. He even has a nickname for her. “Right, you came home from the lake with Tess and Steven. Tess said it was fun and it’s a real bummer I couldn’t go,” I told him pointedly, crossing my arms. It came out with more attitude than I planned but Bryce had a girlfriend.

He sighed. “About that, I just didn’t know how to talk to you about everything and I hadn’t told Tess and Steven and I didn’t know if you had or even wanted to,” he said. “You have every right to be mad about that.”

“I’m not mad about that.” Hurt? Maybe. But I wasn’t mad. I guess I could understand because I don’t know if I would’ve been able to be around him without mentioning my feelings and I didn’t want to have an audience when I told him, so it was probably for the best.

“Really?” he asked doubtfully. “You seemed a little angry.”

“I’m not angry about that it’s just-“ I interrupted myself, scoffing. “How could you just be with Isabella even though you’re in love with me?”

He squinted his eyes, looking at me like he had no idea what he was seeing. “What?” he asked. “You’re mad because I’m seeing Isabella?” I didn’t say anything, only crossing my arms and looking away at his question. “I didn’t realize you had a problem with her but she helped me out a lot over the summer and-“

“What, she helped you get over me?” I retorted.

“What is the big deal?” he asked me exasperatedly, throwing his arms up. “Why am I getting the feeling it has nothing to do with Bella herself but that you’d prefer me moping and being hung up on you?”

“It isn’t like that!” I argued. The late bell finally rung but once again neither of us moved. Part of me was concerned that I was late on the first day and I didn’t even know what class I was late to yet but I couldn’t bring myself to care enough to actually leave.

“Then what is it? Because it sure as hell looks like you just have a bruised ego,” he replied a little calmer, but it didn’t hurt my feelings any less.

“Because I love you!” I blurted out without thinking. My eyes widened in shock – I wasn’t expecting to declare my love for him in an argument – but his eyes were much wider, along with his slack jaw. I closed my mouth, chewing on my bottom lip as I waited for his response but he didn’t say anything or even blink. Hell, I would’ve questioned if he was even breathing.

It took a minute but he finally closed his mouth and blink, scrunching his eyebrows together. “That’s not funny,” he told me seriously, frowning.

I swallowed the nervous lump in my throat. “I wasn’t joking, Bryce,” I whispered out.

“Stop!” he ordered, holding his hand up. “You’re only saying that because you’ve missed me all summer and you’re afraid of losing me because of Bella. You’re not going to lose me because of her, okay? But you don’t love me.”

“Oh, so you’re sure you love me – or you did – but I can’t be sure that I love you?” I asked him.

“My feelings for you haven’t faded, Britt. They’re still there and they’re just as strong as they were two months ago but I’m working on getting over you, for the sake of our friendship. It’s- it isn’t fair to me for you to say this to me now,” he explained, closing his eyes as he dug the heels of his palms into his eyes. He let out a sigh, dropping his arms. “If you had actual feelings for me, you would’ve known it when I told you about mine. But you didn’t. You didn’t say anything and you doubted what I felt because you didn’t want it to be true.”

“Kind of like you doubt me now, right?” I asked him, rolling my eyes.

“That’s different,” he emphasized.

“Not really,” I shot.

He licked his lips, sighing heavily as he looked away. He looked torn between something, as if he was arguing with himself in his head. He scoffed, looking at me briefly before grabbing my head and leaning down to crash his lips against mine. It didn’t take me long to get over the shock and start kissing him back, grabbing the straps of his book bag to pull him closer. He quickly deepened the kiss, causing butterflies to erupt in my stomach in the best way. Only a few moments later, he pulled away, his heavy breathing matching mine as he looked into my eyes. “Did you feel anything?” he asked.

I was speechless and in a much different way than the last time I was speechless because of him. This time I was too busy trying to catch my breath and calm the butterflies and form a coherent thought from that kiss. But this time, he didn’t go anywhere or say anything; he only waited for my response. I opened my mouth to finally try and say something when somebody cut me off.

“Hey! What are you two doing out here?”

I turned around quickly to find a teacher looking at us with a glare. “Um, we’re just-“ I couldn’t get any words out.

“You’re both late, so you’ll get a tardy slip and then I will escort you both to your first classes,” she instructed, pushing open the door and looking at us, waiting for us to come.

Bryce leaned close to my ear. “See? You felt nothing,” he whispered a bit quickly. “And that’s okay. I’ve come to terms with it. But Bella makes me happy and I promise she won’t ruin our friendship nor will my feelings, okay?”

“Come on!” the teacher demanded impatiently.

Bryce grabbed my hand, quickly giving it a squeeze before brushing passed me while I stood there, in shock.

See? You felt nothing.

Bella makes me happy.

She won’t ruin our friendship nor will my feelings.

That’s all the played through my mind while the teacher – whose name I never caught – directed us to the office then gave us our schedules then dropped of Bryce at his classroom then somehow figured out my class and took me there.

She won’t ruin our friendship nor will my feelings.

He was sure that his feelings wouldn’t end our friendship but I wasn’t sure what kind of damage my feelings would do.