CHAPTER TWENTY: STUPID MEANINGLESS THINGS
The sky is still grey, the rain has stopped, and my throat is dry.
My legs wobble a little as I stand up, but I still manage to wipe at my cheeks and grab my backpack. I allow my legs to carry me forward into the building all the while thinking about water and the bathroom. My water bottle and the toilet. The toilet and the sink. The toilet, the sink, and the shower.
"Ay! Look who it is!" Stephanie's greeting usually makes me smile, but I don't even look up.
"Red face, messy hair"âSavannah begins slapping Stephanie's arm repeatedlyâ "they totally did it."
"No way!" Stephanie bellows before they both begin shoving and smacking each other on the bed. Their bickering fills the silence like it always does while I gather up my toiletries.
Megan slowly swivels around in Stephanie's desk chair. I can feel her eyes on me in my peripheral vision, but I still don't look up. Sweatpants, flip flops, face wash. I continue the check list as I continue piling clothes on top of my shower bag.
It's only when I can hear my rainboots clomping against the floor again that I realize silence has taken over the room. I focus on assessing my pile. Towel, hair towel, extra towel.
If only Stephanie and Savannah would start bickering again. If only I remembered to shut my phone off.
But it's too late.
I've finally caught on to the buzzing. It's persistent. It probably hasn't stopped since I walked in.
If only I was the only one listening.
I clomp my way over to my backpack and quickly hold down my phone's power button before I can read just how many missed calls and texts. I whirl back around, but, once again, it's too late. My head lifts for the first time since I walked in.
Stephanie's shoulders sag. "Red rimmed eyes."
****
"I can't believe this. No, screw that! I can't believe him!" Stephanie continues to wave her hands around.
Savannah snorts. "The definition of an ass and a hole."
Megan's hair shakes as she fervently nods along.
I continue to stare up at them as they pace around me. My hair is now wet from my shower, but I don't know about Savannah's. Hers could be wet from the rain, her practice, or her shower after practice. It's the first time I've ever seen her long hair down. Even though she's still wearing her head band.
Stephanie's hair is thrown up in a bun that continues to bounce around with her movements. Her pink toes are poking out of her plaid pajama bottoms, while Savannah and I are wearing socks.
Megan's tan moccasin slippers continue to scrap against the floor as she completes the carousel of pacing and ranting above me. I've almost been tempted to start humming carnival music as I lay on the floor. I've even lifted my arms up a few times in mock conducting before dropping them back down.
I initially came back from my shower to an empty room. Nothing but me and the walls and the chatter down the hall. The laughter echoed every once and a while like firecrackers, and the whispers lingered, swept under the cracks in the doors. I want to say it's because they were all giving me space, but I know better. I know I only have myself to blame.
Stephanie was at her study group. Savannah was at practice. Megan was at some poetry night or club or something. All while I was just laying here. I can't blame them.
All while everyone else was living their lives I got myself wrapped up in a boy. I can't blame myself for that either, even though I want to because eight months ago, that girl standing in the grocery store never would have guessed. I tried not to expect too much from my first year of college, but I know I never expected it to end up like thisâI never expected myself to end up like this, on the floor of my dorm. Sure, we always dream. There's always a little hope in the back of our mindsâeven if we don't want to admit itâof what could beâall the possibilities. That's why we daydream about meeting a cute guy in a grocery store out of all places. But the expectations never exceed beyond logical reachâthat is, they are always far too irrational to be nothing more than daydreams.
The reality is the hardwood underneath my aching shoulder blades. It's my face in the mirror, puffy-eyed and red-rimmed. It's this feeling that after months of daydreaming, I'm finally awake.
"I just don't understand why he would say that." Stephanie continues as she steps over my legs.
"Because he's an a**hole." Savannah has started doing arm stretches as she walks.
"But after all this time . . ." Stephanie trails off.
"Like I said, ass"âSavannah flings her hands to one sideâ "hole. A**hole." She makes the gesture two more times before dropping her arms.
Megan continues to shake her head, showing her disapproval on the subject before they all stop. Their heads become shadows as they bow over me and shield all the light in the room. Stephanie scrunches her nose, Savannah's eyebrows wrinkle, and Megan's lips form a thin line, but all their hair goes falling forward at awkward angles.
I blink up at them for a few seconds before my shoulder blades dig into the floor as I shrug.
"Seriously?" Savannah asks. "That's all you got?"
No! I want to yell, but instead my posture slumps back down.
"No!" I yelled one time when Trent tried to draw a smiley face on my textbook. He did it anyway.
"Stop!" I squealed when he started tickling my sides in between kisses, but he didn't. He just kept wiggling his fingers and covering my cheeks with his lips.
"I really like you." Trent's lips brushed up against my ear when we were watching a movie on his bed underneath all his fuzzy blankets.
I've got a lot of things. A lot of stupid meaningless things.
A few hours ago, I had this whole person.
Now all I have are these stupid meaningless things.
****
"You wear a lot of stripes," Stephanie had commented one day last semester. I didn't believe it until I packed up my trunk, but I only embraced it as the days went on.
Trent doesn't have a similar staple. Him and his sneakers and sweatpants and t-shirts and jeans are everywhere on everyone. It doesn't matter that one of his shoelaces is frayed, or that he more often wears a v-neck than a scoop neck. It's all the same when I'm walking across campus.
All it takes is blonde hair and one of the above items, and my lungs stutter on an inhale or exhale. All it takes is a sneaker to squeak, or a couple guys to laugh, and my stomach detaches itself from my esophagus and goes flapping around against my intestines.
It's never him.
I pray it's not him.
Yet I still hold my breath. I still pass another glance back because ninety-nine percent of me dreads while one percent of me still hopes.
"Who said that was a bad thing?"
"I love it when you talk science to me."
"She's just some girl. She doesn't mean anything to me."
I glance up from the cement pathway and can identify the most prominent trees on campus are white oak. Dogwood trees come in a close second. I know that now because of plant biology. I also know the reason I look up is not to identify the tree, but because Trent happens to be standing there, staring back at me.
The earth's axis is tilted twenty-three-point five degrees, there are four chambers in the heart, and it's been three days since I've seen Trent. Not just his hair, or his shoelace. Or someone who has similar hair or shoelace.
And it only takes him three strides to cover the distance between us, I'm on the cement pathway, while he cuts a corner on the grass. He only has a notebook clutched in one hand and thankfully no snickering friends behind him.
"I'm sorry," he blurts out when he reaches me and startles me enough to stop looking for an escape. "I'm . . . sorry," he breathes as if just noticing the rapid up and down movement of his chest. He's still too saturated. Even when the sun darts behind the clouds, and we're left in a dim shade. His skin looks orange against the white of his shirt, and the lighter strands of his hair could be mistaken for bleach. He scratches red marks into his neck and jaw, but my jaw tightens when he looks up.
He may wear the same sweatpants as everyone else, but no one has his eyes. And in every stupid meaningless thing, in every random recollection, I've blurred them out because they're too vibrant. They're too bright. They don't belong there. They no longer deserve to be there.
Yet here they are staring back at me with the same pain I've been wearing in the mirror. But while my irises are draining, fading into the background, his are dripping and burning into the forefront.
"Lacie, Iâ" he starts. "I know I'm sorry isn't good enough, but I just"âhe stuffs his hand back into his hairâ"I just don't know what else to say." He moves his head back in my line of vision when he catches me breaking eye contact. "That's notâwhat I mean is, nothing else seems good enough."
I find myself only nodding because the one percent that hoped never expected this. The one percent that hoped has finally transferred all its power over to dread, and my tongue just continues to pierce my cheek instead of trying to formulate a proper sentence.
"Look." Trent takes a step forward. "I didn't mean what I said, okay? I mean, you know how guys are."
My spine stiffens. "No, actually." I can practically hear all the gears in my brain clicking back into place. "I don't."
Trent's gaze falls to our feet as he scratches his neck again, but this time I take a step forward.
"Because I thought I knew you." I click my tongue. "But apparently I don't."
The commotion outside seems to have evaporated like the clouds as the sun stretches back out.
The warmth now only feels more like a spotlight as I take a step back. "Then again, I'm just some girl, so what do I know?"
A twig snaps under my foot as I take another step back, and another, and another, before I shrug. My backpack shifts as I lift my shoulders all the way up and hold them there for him to see. I hold them there until his shoulders finally slump in defeat before I turn around and walk away.
It's the first time in days that I don't glance back.