The Day You Fell Apart

Jonah slowly traced his fingers along my upper arm. They were rough and calloused from playing the guitar, but it still felt nice against my skin. I shivered slightly and he smiled and moved closer to me.

We were lying down on a blanket in the grass, where most other kids were. Today was the 4th of July. Our town usually had this big shebang where everyone gathered around at Stone Park and watched fireworks. Stone Park had this huge… field, basically, where most families lay out to eat food and of course, see the fireworks. Off to the left side of the field was where most teenagers our age stayed. Dee was with Brad somewhere, and most of Jonah’s friends were out mingling. It was kind of a cool environment. School was over for most of the people around us, or they had one more year to go, like Dee and I. Nobody really cared about who hung out with whom. It was summer, and no one really had to, or wanted to worry about shit like that.

Jonah laid down on his back while looking up at the sky as I flipped over and did the same. It had been two weeks since we both kind of became an official couple. The day that I randomly showed up to his house after basically just leaving. People were pretty surprised when they saw us together, probably because Jonah kind of looked like the type of guy who enjoyed going to metal concerts, rob 7-11’s and smoke all the time and I… well, didn’t. But the only thing that was true about any of those was the fact that he smoked all the time. Jonah actually enjoyed listen to a lot of calm, indie type music, but for some reason definitely looked like he didn’t. And I don’t even know where that 7-11 thing got started.

People were also surprised because I hadn’t even looked at a guy before Jonah, and I think most people were wondering what made him different. What made him able to get me out of my year slump? To this day, I don’t really know how he did, but he did, and that’s all that really matters to me.

“It’s about to start,” Jonah whispered and I eagerly squealed and sat up a little. Although I’ve seen the fireworks almost every year, every time seemed to be more and more spectacular. I saw the first firework explode in the sky with a huge crashing noise, and it slowly disintegrated itself only to have another one take its place. I felt Jonah’s fingers entangle themselves in mine and I leaned my head onto his shoulder in return. This night couldn’t get any more perfect.

But of course, I tend to jinx myself on a regular basis, and that came into fact when I saw a person sit by Jonah.

“Isn’t this amazing!?” Katie yelled over the fireworks. We both stopped and looked at her while Jonah shifted uncomfortably in response to her presence, but he smiled and nodded. I frowned and just stared at her for a few seconds before she made eye contact with me. “Hey, Jill.” She said.

“Hi,” I said back over a firework exploding. Some men gathered on a stage that was set up in the park and began to play reggae music while I smiled and continued to watch the show. I could barely hear anything, but whenever I would look over at Katie, I’d see her talking to Jonah or laughing and smiling. Once again, my body felt like it was going to catch on fire. I hated that she was the only person that could make me feel so angry and so livid. It’s like she didn’t even notice how much I disliked her. She just thought that we were going to be friends again, but in reality, we were never really friends. I still think the only reason she had hung out with Dee and I, was to get closer to Evan and attempt to steal him away from me. And she did, forever.

I continued to glare at her as she mingled with Jonah who was hopefully just talking to her to be polite or something. I was basically to the point where I just couldn’t stand it anymore.

I quickly stood up, which got both Jonah and Katie’s attention.

“Katie, can I talk to you for a second?” I asked through clenched teeth. Katie nodded slowly before standing up and walking with me to where not a lot of people were. Fireworks were still overpowering the sky, and the music was still blaring, so I had to yell my words. “Seriously, what is your problem?” I asked.

“What do you mean?” Katie asked in return. I took a deep breath and bit down on my lip, trying to calm myself down.

“I just want to know why you feel that it’s an obligation to come and try to steal my boyfriends. Like, is it fun to do? Is it something you enjoy? I don’t understand,” I stated. “Why are you even back here anyways? You moved after… everything that happened. Why are you back?”

Katie pushed some of her bangs out of her eyes and shook her head slowly.

“Jonah is just a friend,” She replied, basically answering none of the questions I had asked.

“Was Evan just a friend too?” I asked angrily. “Is that how you treat your friends? By hanging all over them and basically disrupting their love lives? You put me through hell the last 3 months of mine and Evan’s relationship, Katie.”

“I didn’t mean to!” Katie yelled. “I didn’t mean to.”

“How can I even trust whatever you say? If you didn’t mean to have the last words I said to Evan be in the form of yelling, then you wouldn’t be trying to screw up mine and Jonah’s relationship,” I replied. My eyes were watering slowly but I pushed my emotions back and tried my best to contain myself. “Why are you doing this to me?”

By now Katie was crying, which made me feel even more uncomfortable. I didn’t want to make her cry, I just really wanted to know why she was doing all of this to me. Why me? That’s all I wanted to know.

“I came back here to make everything right with you,” Katie said softly. “Every day I would come home from my new school, and I’d cry. I’d cry and think about how much all of this is my fault. Your sadness, Evan’s death… it’s all my fault. When I saw you at the party in the woods, I was excited to finally get the chance to talk to you. To say that I’m sorry. But you clearly didn’t even want to look at me, and as soon as I said hello, you were gone. When I found out about you and Jonah... I, um, I thought that was the only way I could get close to you. Dee respects your wishes and told me that she wouldn’t set up any meeting or anything, so Jonah was the only chance I had. If you ever thought I was trying to flirt with him, I wasn’t. I was just trying to find a way to get to you and be able to talk to you and to apologize for everything I've done. I'm sorry.”

“I don’t care about your apology,” I said bluntly. My voice was shaky and my whole body was shaking along with it. “I just want to know why you couldn’t you just back off? Why did you want to take Evan away from me so badly!? ”

“Because I was in love with him!” Katie yelled. “I was so in love with him since the day I met him and when we became friends with one another, I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to tell him so bad. But I knew that you two were in love and that he’d turn me down. I’d see the way he’d look at you, Jill. He would never look at me like that. I know what I did was wrong. And I know that I was purposely taking him away from you. But I promise that I’m not doing that with Jonah. Please, just, please forgive me. I’ve been going through hell too. I need you to say that everything is okay.”

I took a deep breath before stuffing my hands in my pockets and looking down at the ground. I had to tell her the truth. I had to tell her the way I felt.

“Sometimes, words can’t solve anything, Katie. I’m still just as torn as you are.”

And with that, I walked away.