Page 34 of Next Time Will Be Our Turn
“You’re a million miles away. What’s going on?”
“Nothing.”
“Are you anxious about Berkeley again? I told you, it’ll be fine. You’re gonna rule the place. They’re not even gonna know what hit them.”
“I have literally never ruled any place in my life.”
Ellery’s eyes softened in that way that made everything inside me ache. “What’s wrong, Tulip?”
“Um…” Was there ever a chance that I wasn’t going to grab hold of what I saw and tell Ellery? No, of course not. I was too selfish, too wrapped up in my own feelings for Ellery and what this might mean for me, for us, to ever let that slip out of my hands. When it comes to love, we can’t help but be self-serving. “So…I saw Trish today.”
“Yeah?” Her grip on the wheel shifted, but otherwise, Ellery showed no reaction.
“Um, she was…with someone else?” I braced myself for the inevitable reaction—shock, sadness, anger. Belatedly, I realized that I probably shouldn’t have broken the news while she was driving.
But there was nothing. I stole a glance. She wasn’t crying or gnashing her teeth or even frowning. “Yeah,” she said after a while. Ellery had a way of saying “Yeah.” The way she said it was always so full of surrender and acceptance. It always made me want to squeeze her. “I…we broke up.”
“What?” I cried. “When?”
She shrugged, her eyes still on the road. “I don’t know, it’s not like I memorize the dates of my breakups. Duh, Tulip.”
“Yesterday? A week ago?”
“Longer than that. Maybe last semester.”
“What? And you didn’t tell me?”
“Not much to tell.”
Never mind my heart, all of my organs were spinning. All this time, Ellery was single? Then a horrifying thought struck me. “Are you seeing someone else?”
“Nope.”
Phew.
“You’re gaping,” she said with a small smile.
I closed my mouth. Opened it again. “I can’t believe you never said anything.”
“Eh. I mean, there really isn’t much to say about it.”
“What happened? Sorry, you don’t have to tell me.”Tell meee!
“What usually happens to relationships, I don’t know. It wasn’t working out, Tulip.”
“Okay.” I had to physically fight my own face to keep the smile from taking over. Oh my god. She was single. She’d been single for a while. At least six months? Then the hateful voice again.She’s been single this whole time and she never made a move on you. She’s not into you.But for the first time, I slapped down the voice. This whole time, I’d kept my feelings locked up because I thought she had a girlfriend. I thought I didn’t have a chance with her because of it. And now, I wasn’t going to let my dumb, self-sabotaging thoughts get in the way. I was going to tell her.
“Ellery—”
“Hey, so…I have something to tell you.”
“Yeah?” My heart was hammering so hard in my chest I thought it might actually crash its way out of there like the Kool-Aid Man. Oh god. This is it. She’s going to tell me that she has feelings for me, and then I’ll yell,Me too!and we’ll kiss, and…
“So…I’m not going to Irvine.”
It was so far off from what I was expecting that she might as well have said it in a foreign language.
“Tulip? Did you hear me?”
