Page 58 of Going the Distance
The day felt endless. Especially when Lee kept a little distance from me, at my own insistence—Rachel was sympathetic about the breakup, but it was clear when she hugged me that she still held it against me that Lee had run out on her on Saturday. I felt shitty enough already without completely destroying their relationship, too. I stuck with Levi as much as I could instead, although that only seemed to make the rumors worse.
It was exhausting.
Now, the glare of the cell phone screen was giving me a headache. I rubbed my eyes again and yawned. It was past twelve, and despite it all, I was still awake.
When I’d climbed into bed over an hour ago, I’d picked up my cell to check my notifications and, like every night, to check my texts from Noah. We never went more than a couple of hours without talking. We always texted each other good night—even if we were in different time zones.
We hadn’t spoken in two days.
Now my eyes were filling with tears again, and I pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes and willed myself not to break down again.
This was my decision. This was my choice,I reminded myself. I mean, I’d been the one getting hurt. I was the one who couldn’t handle him hiding things from me. I was the one who decided we should break up. This was all for the best, ultimately. It had to be.
Somewhere around three a.m., I fell asleep.
• • •
“You look like shit,” Levi told me on the way out of homeroom a couple days later. I’d spent the whole time reading the text for English lit, trying to ignore him and Lee so they wouldn’t ask me how I was doing after the breakup and tell me I looked like shit. (Rachel was still a little cool toward me, and Lisa had clearly picked her side—it was not mine.)
I glared at him. “Don’t. Even. Go there.”
“Sorry. Um…you look…” He bit his lip, trying to think of a different word. Something a little less harsh. And a little less true.
I knew I looked like shit. I had huge bags under my eyes from another night of not being able to sleep, I had some pretty horrendous zits (probably from all the stressing out and getting upset), my hair wasn’t doinganythingright today, and even though I’d put it in a ponytail, there were strands frizzing around my face, and I was pretty sure the scowl on my face was semi-permanent.
“Um…”
“You can stop trying to not offend me,” I told Levi. “IknowI look like shit. I just don’t need you to remind me.”
His expression turned wounded. “I’m sorry.”
I sighed. “Whatever. Look, I’m not in the mood for anything today, okay?”
“Is this to do with Noah?”
“Sort of.”
“Only sort of? What’s up?”
“Will you leave me alone already?” I snapped so loudly that a few heads turned our way. A couple of people started whispering.Great, I bet that’ll set the rumor mill going again…God, why did everything have to be so stressful in high school?
Screw being the best time of our lives.
This was hell.
I tried to ignore it, but it was hard to block the judgy looks and whispered comments out completely. And it was really getting me down. Couldn’t everyone just mind their own goddamn business already? Why did they have to keep talking about mine?
I couldn’t even walk down the corridor with Levi without people looking at us like they were waiting for us to launch into a crazy make-out session right there in the hallway.
It was just making me somad.
And with everyone talking more and more about colleges and asking for second and third and fourth opinions on their application essays, I only seemed to be falling further and further behind. Lee had mentioned Brown a couple more times to me, and I knew I had to work that much harder if I wanted to get in there—but after the events of the weekend, I got the feeling Rachel would never forgive either of us if I rocked up at Brown with the pair of them.
And it wasn’t like I could talk to Lee about it. He was spending all his time with the football team lately, while Rachel was busy with drama club rehearsals, and they were still patching things up. If I asked him about college again, it’d just be another rift in their relationship—because of me.
I knew how much Rachel meant to Lee.
I didn’t want to be a burden.
