Trinity (30)

I step outside the front doors after school and spot Pearl. She’s speaking to Henry, their heads bent together.

For a second, I’m struck by how similar this moment is to the time I first saw them speaking. The difference this time, though, is that I’m not surprised. In fact, I’d be more surprised to see them apart. In the last few days, Henry has spent more time with her than with his old friends--his football friends, I mean. I’m not sure if they’re ‘old’ or just ‘not so close right now’.

“Excuse me!”

I startle, and suddenly there’s a girl standing next to me. I think her name is Gina, but I’m not sure because she’s a year younger and I don’t really know any of the eighth graders.

It takes me a second to realize that she’s offering me a flyer, and I take it without looking, and she continues on her way. Glancing around, I notice now that a lot of students have the same red flyer in their hands, Henry included.

I watch as Henry says something to Pearl, then steps away, hesitates, and steps towards her again. Jolting forward, he envelopes her into a hug, and, from my angle, I can see his face. He grimaces, reddens, pulls a strange smile. He withdraws from her quickly, awkwardly, and saunters off.

I look away. His expression, to others, probably passed as nerves or just plain awkwardness. But to me, I read shame. Shame to be so blatantly playing up a lie, I suppose.

Maggie told me exactly what Pearl had told her. Word-for-word, she claims. I don’t understand it all, still, but it seems to me that Pearl would like to convince the school that her and Henry are together--romantically. Which, honestly, is not hard to convince anyone of, because they are together constantly.

In a moment, Pearl is at my side, and I push away those thoughts, because it’s not important. I tell myself that, at least. Of course I’m curious, but I’d rather talk to Pearl about other things. Henry Foley and his problems can wait.

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We walk to the park in silence, for a while. It’s unusually cold today, and overcast, and it had rained this morning so the ground’s littered with puddles. I make sure to step around them all, but Pearl, despite staring at her shoes this whole time, walks straight through them as if they’re not there.

I hug my arms around myself and try not to worry, but I do. Pearl’s quiet, and I’m sure that’s got to be worse than cheery, isn’t it?

As if hearing my thoughts, Pearl turns suddenly to me, the end of her ponytail whipping against her backpack. “You know, Henry and I are helping with the Easter bake sale? I wasn’t even sure we’d have a bake sale this year, after last year.”

Last year Jamie Scott’s mom had made cheesecake bites and they hadn’t been stored right, or cooked right, I don’t know, and a bunch of people had gotten sick. “Maggie mentioned that, yeah,” I say, distracted. She’s just splashed through quite a deep puddle, soaking her white tennis shoes.

“We’re thinking of making carrot cakes, like small, bitesize ones. I’m sure there’s going to be other carrot cakes, too, but we just thought--” Reaching our picnic table, she heaves that black backpack she’s got up onto it, then unzips the bag and digs around inside. “--it’s a good dessert for Easter, since there’s carrots and all--” She’s pulling out a thin pair of sweatpants and a purple-and-pink striped sweatshirt, and pulling them on. “--but we could also do brownies, since everyone likes brownies. Or macarons, Henry suggested, but I think those are hard to make. But apparently Jackson likes to cook, and he can help us.”

Her mom likes to cook too, seeing as she sells her own baked goods, but I know better than to mention this.

I set down my backpack next to hers, and touch the wood of the bench to check if it’s damp. It is, a little, so I sit gingerly on the edge of it, facing out into the park. I’m hunkering down into my school sweater, still gripping my sides, wishing I’d worn tights as a breeze cuts through me and snakes its way over my skin. I shiver.

“Pearl?” I say, still staring at the whispering trees and wet grass and grey wooden benches.

She’s still standing, recklessly shoving bits and pieces of her uniform into her backpack. I stare at the black bag, not liking it. Her old backpack was light blue on the top, navy on the bottom, and had a big pink patch of a horse on it. I’d watched her mom iron it on her backpack in fourth grade one of the times I’d been over at her house. Right now, I missed that horse.

Saying nothing, Pearl sits down heavily across the table from me, and I swing around to face her. She looks pale, and she’s staring at my hands, which are folded on the edge of the table in front of me.

“Are you still mad at me?” I ask. That breeze comes again, blowing against my bare thighs, my skirt doing basically nothing to stop the cold. I pull my hands off the table to secure my skirt around my legs in an attempt to stop the chill. Somehow this movement snaps Pearl out of whatever daze she was in, and she opens her mouth to speak.

“Mad?” she repeats. Her gaze hasn’t left the spot on the table where my hands were. Her eyes are wide, as always, but have a far-off look about them.

If there wasn’t a table in between us, I think I’d have looked into her face closer, maybe tipped her chin up so she’d look at me.

As it is, I sit on my hands.

“You read my letter?” I prompt.

“Yes.”

I wait, and she doesn’t speak, or look at me, or do anything. I shiver again, and this time I’m not sure if it is the cold.

“Pearl, you can tell me anything. If you want to tell me... Anything.” I stumble through the words, but it’s enough. She raises her gaze to mine and sucks on her bottom lip.

Eventually, she puts her head in her hands, her elbows on the table. “I’m not--I--” Her shoulders shake. I can’t see her face. I think for a moment she’s laughing. “Not mad,” she drags out, wiping her face on her sleeve. “The day I was mad at you was the worst day of my life.”

“Day? It’s been over a week.” My words fly out harsher than I’d like, and I think Pearl flinches a little, and I wish I’d said it nicer. But for the first time, I’m realizing that I’m upset about this too. She stopped talking to me, stopped being friends with me, in a way, last Wednesday. That was forever ago.

Her eyes are a little red when she raises her head, and again I’m struck again by how ashen she looks. Her mouth wobbles. I stand.

“Don’t go!” she cries suddenly, bolting to her feet. I freeze as she reaches out to me, her fingers splayed. “I just don’t know what to do, anymore, I just don’t know where to start!” She sways on her feet, her eyes round, the wind thrashing her ponytail across her face. She scrapes at it with her hands, all the while watching me, all the while unblinking.

I slowly step near her. “I’m not going anywhere,” I assure her. “I was just going to sit next to you,” I say. It sounds like a funny idea now, now that she’s thought I was going to walk away. But it’s true.

She blinks at me, and I blink at her. I nod at the bench, and we sit, next to each other this time. She pulls up one of her legs and sits on it, and I sit on my hands again, for warmth.

“First, will--” I begin, at the same time that she says, “I’m sorry. I--” We both stop, and she stares at the grass, and I prompt her to continue.

“I don’t mean to be so dramatic,” she says quietly, her head still bowed. She takes a deep breath, and when she looks up, her eyes are clear. “I’m just tired, probably.” She gives me a weak smile.

Usually when she smiles, I do too. But right now, I frown. “You’re not dramatic.”

She nods calmly, her chest rising and falling evenly in a series of deep breaths, as if she's meditating. “I am, usually. I’m a drama queen, right?” The words ‘drama queen’ drip with disdain. “It’s why I was avoiding you last week. I need attention, and you’d upset me, and I threw a fit, and I’m sorry. That’s what it is.” Her voice sounds strange, like it’s far away--like she’s far away. Like she’s reading a script instead of what’s in her head.

I want to shake her. I want her to tell me something real. I want her to trust me, but I have a sinking feeling that it’s too late. I’ve already lost her trust, and it’s my fault. My fault for not believing her, not taking her seriously, not understanding.

It’s not extraordinarily cold, but I feel a chill deep, deep in my bones. My uniform feels thin, old, insufficient. I tense my muscles, pulling into myself for warmth.

I speak. “Alright. Fine. You don’t have to tell me anything. But I have something to say.” She’s looking at me, and I’m afraid my teeth might be chattering now, or my body shaking, or both, it’s hard to tell. And her eyes have grown wider, if that’s possible, and I think I’ve never seen her look so terrified by anything at all.

“First of all, let’s just… move on, ok? We had a rough week, both of us, but that’s ok. We can go back to being friends, just like before. All forgiven.” I’m biting my lip, waiting for her to answer. I need her to answer so I can move on to the next part. I need to tell her. Go on, Trinity. Now’s the moment, talk to her. Tell her what’s been going on.

“Go… back?”

I pull my hands out from under my legs, and they feel dreadfully cold, and I tuck them into my armpits. “Of course. Just so everything’s normal again.” Now, deep breath. Say it. Pearl, I might be--no, that’s no good! Might. Don’t say that. But I’m not sure. And she might not care anyway, even if I was sure? And now, why bring up my own problems right now? Selfish. Am I selfish?

And why is she staring at me like that?

Pearl’s brow is furrowed, and she begins to grow, it seems. Like me, she’d been hunkered down against the wind, at least a little, but her back gradually straightens. Her white tennis shoes--both of them--hit the ground. She raises her arms on either side of her, stacks a fist on each hip.

“That’s what you want, is it? This whole time. That’s what you wrote in your letter, ‘I hope we can go back to the way things were,’ that’s what this is about, is it? Is that what you’ve been figuring out?” She puts air quotes around the last two words, then pushes herself back onto her feet and paces away for a moment.

“I know,” she says accusingly, spinning back around to face me. My pulse comes quicker at her words. She knows? But then she continues with, “--that you don’t like me like this! Emotional! But some of us just can’t help it, some of us have problems, not just a perfect little life--!” She clamps her mouth shut and whirls away again.

I sit in silence, my heart in my throat. Pound, pound, pounding. I’d been about to tell her about Kelly. I’d been about to ask her advice, be vulnerable. This is unfair. I’d been there for her, however confused I was--and am!--but I don’t yell at her like this, ignore her like she’s been doing to me. Slowly, I stand to face her.

Half of me doesn’t want to do it. Wants to sit back down and stay quiet and bow my head. And the rest of me, well, the rest of me wins out, and I shake my head so hard I feel dizzy. “Oh, perfect, really? No problems? Well--let’s think--lately I’ve been having quite a few! And the first one on the list is you!” I jab a finger in her direction, wishing that raising my voice made me feel better, but it doesn’t. I can feel the wind on the back of my neck, clutching at me like a ghost.

I expect her to scream back at me, or deadpan back a response, or glare, at least. Instead, she puts her face into her hands, and sobs. I can hardly make out what she’s saying, and the sky seems darker and she seems further away than just the couple of feet in between us. “I know it’s me. It’s my fault. My fault,” she says around her tears.

Instantly, I am changed. Not an atom in my body would fight her now, not for any reason. I cross the grass, accidentally hitting a puddle and splashing water into my flats, soaking my socks through. I don’t even notice, not in the moment. I hesitate, but only for a moment, before pulling her into a hug, and her body shakes, and I can hear her still whispering.

“My fault, my fault, my fault.”

“I’m sorry,” I whisper into her shoulder, and I don’t know if she hears me, or if she’s listening at all.

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(first part: https://theprose.com/post/432343/trinity)

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(previous part: https://theprose.com/post/449875/pearl-29)

(next part: https://theprose.com/post/450862/trinity-31)