Page 60 of Betting on the Best Friend
A group of five college students steps from the bridge onto the netting. I accept Charlie’s help up, not in the mood for their friendly noise.
As he pulls me to my feet, a dude who looks like he wrestles heavyweight bounds onto the mesh. It’s not springy like a trampoline, but the force of his landing tips me off-balance, and I fall backward, yanking Charlie with me.
As The Rock’s friends laugh and protest his antics, Charlie lands over me, pressing me into the net. I’m not hurt, but he immediately leverages himself to his elbows, his bangs falling into his anxious eyes as he looks down at me.
“Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”
I feel him everywhere around me, his breath brushing against my cheeks, his elevated heart rate from being startled. His warmth feels strange to me now when it was familiar to me not even an hour ago as I’d tucked into his side when we got here. Iwant to get away from it because I don’t understand how it could change so fast.
Realizing he has me trapped, he sucks in a sharp breath and pushes away from me.
I scramble to my feet and look down at him, unable to name the feelings tumbling noisily inside me. “I’ll walk myself home.”
I don’t like being alone, but I’ve found something I dislike more: feeling alone when I’m with Charlie.
Chapter Twenty
Charlie
Ruby is mad atme.
Somehow this is the one outcome I didn’t expect.
Maybe the best-case scenario I’d imagined was her sayingI love you but not like that, and this doesn’t change anything about our friendship.Instead, she couldn’t get away from me fast enough. Watching her walk away with her arms wrapped around herself, head bent, not looking back . . .
A dull headache builds behind my eyes as I leave the Treehouse, turning the opposite way into the park, giving Ruby enough time to get home without our paths crossing. I wander for twenty minutes, stuck on the same question. Is this a moment? Or the end of an era? Did I truly ruin the friendship?
It’s such a big thing to consider that it makes me queasy, the misery deepening as I walk. When I find myself near the giant troll sculpture at the north end of the park, I give up. Her name is Malin, and she’s eighteen feet tall. Ruby and I visit her on our way out of the park every time we come, and Ruby leaves an offering in the plate Malin holds. A pretty rock. An interestingleaf. A flower petal. Tiny Ruby’s absence would far outweigh the giant troll’s presence.
I can’t stay in the park. I can’t go home to stare at my own four walls and replay our conversation until I lose my mind. I can’t stand this.
I text Oliver.
You around?
Yeah. Need something?
Advice.
Come over.
Anyone else there?
Madison. Okay or not okay?
. . .
. . .
Okay
I can ask her to give us privacy
She should stay. Be there shortly.
Ten minutes later, Oliver opens his door before I can even knock.
“You okay, man?” he asks, stepping aside to wave me in.
