Page 96 of Change My Mind
“Think of how shit I will feel in therapy on Monday when I have to deal with the fact that the love is very much unrequited,” I countered, and Clara frowned.
“I wouldn’t worry about that,” she said.
“You sure about that?”
“I’m not a one hundred per cent certain on much, but I am pretty sure on this.”
I closed my eyes. “Can I worst-case scenario this for a second?” I asked.
“Is it going to help?” Jesse asked. I nodded but didn’t open my eyes. “Then go ahead,” he said.
“We talk and I tell her how I feel, but she doesn’t feel the same way. That then puts a strain on our friendship because I can’t just make the feelings go away overnight, and she can never fully relax around me because she knows I feel more for her than she does for me. That makes living together a nightmare, so I have to try and find somewhere else to live and end up in a house share with four strangers, an hour away from work.
“Which is a job that keeps me close to her, so the bruise of unrequited feelings still doesn’t go anywhere because I’ll see her at Vivi’s. Or I’ll see you and be reminded of her. Or whenever I have to talk to Darren. So I have to find a new job. But the job at Vivi’s is like a unicorn. There is no way that I will find another job that isn’t toxic, so I fall back into that cycle. Only this time, I don’t even have the suggestion of friendsbecause my current friendship group is tied up in Addie, so they will all be gone by that point anyway. Then I guess I’ll just die alone.”
I opened my eyes and looked at them.
“That really made you feel better?” Clara asked.
“No, it makes sense. It’s kind of like when we have to figure out something in the plot. If we talk through all the ways that it can’t happen, then we find the way that it will happen,” Jesse said. His thumbs were sweeping circles over Clara’s thighs in a move so casual that it made my chest ache.
“There is nothing to suggest that my version of events can’t happen,” I said.
“The only way your version of events can happen is if Adrienne lies through her fucking teeth, and there is only so long we would allow that,” Clara said with an authority that left no room for debate. “And anyway, you would at the very least get to keep Jesse.”
“She’s not wrong. Do you feel better now that you’ve got that out of your system?” Jesse asked.
“Yes.”
“Good, she’s at the flat. I dropped her off there myself,” Clara confirmed.
“Guess I better confront this head on then. But before I go, do you two have matching Troy Bolton T-shirts?”
Clara looked down at herself and laughed.
“Yeah, we do. Dad thought they would be good stocking fillers one year as a reminder that one time, that second film had us in a chokehold. He got one for all five of us, and we still have them on a steady indoor clothes rotation.”
“Addie has worn hers outside more than once,” I said, causing Clara to frown, which made me laugh.
“That is…interesting information to have. Thanks for sharing with the class. Now, please go home.”
There wasa stillness to the flat when I got home, suggesting that Addie was in but not awake. It was a stillness I was used to when I woke up early or came home late.
The living room was empty, so I wandered down the hall to her bedroom and knocked softly. When I was greeted by more silence, I opened the door slowly, only to find an empty bed.
There was only one other place that Addie could be. I crossed the hall to my own room and hoped the door wouldn’t creak on the hinges as it opened.
It was thankfully silent on this occasion, and when I looked in, I found her.
Addie was sleeping on her side of my bed. Her braids were fanning out onto my pillow, completely wrapped up in the duvet. Her eyebrows were pinched together over her closed eyes. I wanted to walk over and press the crease out of her forehead, but doing so would probably wake her up, and if she was sleeping in the middle of the day, something that was so unlike Addie, then clearly her body needed the rest.
I thanked the hinge gods for their continued silence as I closed the door behind me.
Then I went to the kitchen and started making another cake.
Fifty-Eight
ADDIE
