Chapter Twenty-Two

There were a few things that I was expecting when returning to the Jenkins' household after Sabrina and mine's shopping spree. One, Anna trying to steal the shopping bags to take a peek at our prom dresses and two, Sabrina snidely gloating over the pictures she'd sent her sister earlier and Anna pretending to vomit or something in response. Fun and playful things.

But what happened when we walked through the front door was none of those things. As soon as the door shut, Anna jumped down the stairs, barely refraining from toppling down to her doom, her only saving grace being the hand railing and pure dumb luck.

She didn't bother greeting us or acknowledging her sister before leading me up into her bedroom and slamming the door shut.

She put her eye up to the keyhole of the door and when satisfied, turned to me with wild eyes.

Her lack of composure led me to open her closet door and sit inside. She said nothing as I got myself comfortable, getting one of her fluffy sweatshirts to stroke. She couldn't be mad at me again, could she? What could I have had possibly done to disrupt the peace we'd only come back to? Anna knelt in front of me and gripped her phone so tight that her knuckles were white. Oh boy. This was bad.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"Sam, hand me your phone." I did as I was told and placed the device into the palm of her hand. In under thirty seconds she apparently found what she was looking for and tossed it back to me. "The thing is, Sam, don't freak out, but you didn't only send those pictures of you numbnuts kissing and strangling each other to me. You sent it to someone else. Someone else you really shouldn't have."

"Oh shit."

"Yeah. That's an understatement."

"Who?"

"Think of the worst person to tell anything to."

Shit. ". . . Maisie?"

Anna ran a hand through her hair while nodding. "The one and only."

"Well, we're friends, I can loop her in. It's all good. No need to panic."

"It's too late for that, Sam, she's been subtweeting you guys for the last hour. There's a need for panic. Major panic."

"Double shit."

"You should call her to take down the tweets. If anyone thinks about it too much, they'll be able to figure it out. Everyone will know that Sabrina and Parker have been pretending!"

"But why is Maisie subtweeting about it? How does it affect her?"

"I don't know. You're her friend. Call her."

"I hate calling people or getting calls."

"No offence . . ."

"I know, who gives a shit about my comfort when this could ruin Sabrina's campaign."

Anna was right. Somehow, I'd responded to both Anna and Maisie. Whereas Anna responded with barfing emojis, Maisie had left me on read, allowing her receipt to go under the radar.

I reluctantly pressed the dial button and put the phone up to my ear as it rang out. Anna finally settled onto the ground, sitting across the entrance to the closet so that I was trapped inside with no option to escape. With my track record of running, as of late, I didn't blame her one bit for ensuring that my body remained put.

It rang and rang and rang until abruptly ending.

It didn't ring out the second time I dialled.

Damn it.

Without a word, Anna helped me to my feet and reached behind me, pulling down a coat and draped it around my shoulders. She grabbed a set of keys from her desk, slowly as to not let them jangle. She gently jammed them into the pocket of the jacket I was wearing.

Opening her bedroom door, she poked her head and scoped out the area. With a little nod of her head, she gave me the go-ahead to head downstairs.

As I stepped on a creaky step, I realized, without a word exchanged between us, Anna aided and abetted – hell even came up with the idea of stealing or nicely putting it, 'borrowing' Sabrina's car to go and confront Maisie. This was a good plan. What was the point in needlessly worrying Sabrina when I could go ahead and deal with the problem quietly, without her ever knowing there was an issue, to begin with?

I closed the front door behind me, exhaling in relief as I spun around and promptly jumped because of the figure sat casually on the porch with her chin placed on her upright knee, staring out beyond the property.

"Going somewhere, Sam?"

"Home," I lied, shoving my hands into the pockets of the coat as to keep the keys from moving. "Spent too much time with you Jenkins girls today. I desperately need a break — time to destress. Secretly parade in my prom dress. You know, teenage girl things. Normal stuff."

"Come," she said, patting the space next to her on the porch. "Sit with me for a while."

"That's the opposite of a break."

"Alright, Sam, go home then."

". . . Okay." I stepped off the porch and made my way down the driveway, passing by her car in the process.

"You're dragging your feet. You know, you're an awful liar."

My heart stopped at the same time my feet refused to go forward. "Yeah?"

"Come here. I want to see your face." I kept my eyes to the ground as I swiftly turned back around and stood in front of her. She knocked her foot against my leg. "Don't stand there all moodily. Sit down with me for a while. I want to talk."

"Alright, Sabrina," I agreed, waiting to be chewed out about Maisie.

"I had fun today. Real fun today. I know you did too," Sabrina started and nudged her shoulder against mine. "I was thinking . . . maybe we should put an end to this whole light and breezy situation? It's been fun, sneaking around, fooling around, but today was a different kind of fun, wasn't it? It's been different recently. I like that sort of fun with you. We missed out on years of days like today. I don't want to miss any more of those days with you, Sam."

"You want to stop?"

"It was silly, really, to think we could do it. Light and breezy? It's a lie we told ourselves."

She didn't know about Maisie's tweets at all. She wanted to end it. My throat dried and swallowing suddenly felt like the hardest thing to do in the world. "I don't know if it was silly."

"Maybe not for you, but for me, it was." She turned to me, gauging my response. "What do you think?"

"Well . . ." Was I supposed to say, hell no, you have to stick around, continue this secret fling?

"Sam?"

"I think we need some time apart, just to, you know, transition back to normal."

"I don't want to go back to normal, Sam."

"I know, fun, friendship, that's what I meant."

"You want that? A friendship with me?"

"Let's see how it goes, yeah?" I said and stood up. "I really should go home now. See you around, Sabrina."

"No. We're not doing this again." Sabrina caught my arms and pinned them to my sides.

"Doing what?"

"The first time I kissed you, Sam, you left the bed without a word and went home in the middle of the night. Imagine my surprise, when months of silence later, you come out, but you don't say anything to me, to reassure me what we did, what I did was normal."

"Sabrina . . ."

"I kiss you for a second time, and I'm sure of myself. I'm not this insecure girl anymore. I'm me. You run away again. I come chasing you. Light and breezy, Sam! An option there to cut the cords quickly. That's what you agree to. It's what you would only agree to — dipping your toes in. And that's okay, to a point. But here we are. Now, you purposely avoid any talk of something more serious? You revert back to nothing between us? Probably silence? Sit down and talk with me about this. Because if you leave, Sam, this time I'm not chasing you."

"What do you want, Sabrina? What do you want from me?!"

"What I've always wanted, Sam. You. Only you."

"I just . . ." I backed away. "I need to . . ." Stop Maisie. I didn't have time for this conversation right there and then.

"Fine. Go. Think. Do what you have to do." I nodded hastily and turned around, but before I could take a step, she continued, "Remember, I'm not chasing you again, Samantha. Come to me when you're ready to talk."

I sped across the footpath and hopped over the fence back to my property. On my way to the back garden through the side of my house, Anna was waving erratically from her bedroom window and dove backwards like she had a fatal heart attack or something.

But like a Jack in the Box, she sprung back up and had her phone pressed to her ear. It was obvious that she was calling me but . . . no ringtone or vibration came from my jacket. With a roll of her eyes, she went out of view again and came back holding my phone.

She cracked open her window a little and spun around, screaming out her sister's name. Above her head, she whipped her hand back and forth, urging me back around to their house.

I jumped back over the fence and hopped in Sabrina's car and was down the street before processing that I'd stolen Sabrina's car to stop the impending drama that could ruin her chances of the Prom Queen's crown, even if she had finished our casual rendezvous.

She said it herself; she missed how we used to be, missed our friendship - she cared.

So did I.

She wanted everything. Our friendship. What we had now. All of it combined.

She turned away from light and breezy and ending it if complications arose, swiftly and without remorse.

Maisie's house came to view, and there she was, heading to her car parked on the street opposite her house, thumbs rapidly thrumming against the screen of her phone. As she whipped her pink hair out of her face, she noted me pulling to a halt in front of her car. Her steps quickened.

"Maisie! Stop!" I called out, tossing open the car door and hastily unbuckling the seatbelt. "Stop!"

"I have nothing to say to you, Sam."

"You have plenty to say," I reasoned, catching her arm before she got into her car. "Come on, put the phone away, and tell me instead of it, exactly what you're thinking."

"You and Sabrina are making a total mockery of Parker."

"It's not what you think, Maisie."

"Come on, Sam, I'm not stupid." She pulled away from my arm and crossed hers over her stomach. "It makes sense. Sabrina defends you, time and time again. At her party, there she was, all over you!"

"Maisie . . . You kind of encouraged that," I joked.

"One, I was drunk, and two, if she wanted to pursue you, then she should've cut ties with Parker first."

"It's still not what you think. I need to explain."

"Then you went up with her to her bedroom, and no one saw you for the rest of the party. A mysterious hickey appears! Then there's Parker and Sabrina, always together, dancing at the party, walking hand in hand down the hallways. But there you are, in the shadows. Behind her back. You're both making a total fool out of her and Parker's my friend, Sam. I thought she was your friend too. I thought you were both better than this. Look behind you. You're driving Sabrina's freaking car!"

She shoved by me and got into her car, but before she could drive off, I hopped into her passenger seat and ignored her growling. "They're not in a relationship, Maisie!"

Maisie scoffed. "Sam, their relationship is plastered everywhere, even you can't deny it!"

"They're faking it!"

" . . . What?"

"They're faking it," I repeated and swiped the keys from her ignition. "They both want to be Prom Queens. They've teamed up. I'm helping them. It's all fake."

"You're telling me that two girls would go through the trouble of faking a relationship to get some stupid prom crown that no one will remember next year?"

"When you put it like that . . ."

"So Parker and Sabrina are . . ."

"Faking it."

"And you and Sabrina are . . ."

Well that was the question of the day, wasn't it? What were Sabrina and I?

"Nothing," I mumbled and looked out the window. "Friends."

Maisie began thumbing on her phone. "I'm deleting the posts."

I sighed in relief. "Thanks, Maisie."

"Don't thank me yet. Once something's online, it can't be really removed." She locked her phone and gently took her keys back from me. "I had maximum interaction for these tweets — best stuff I've posted in ages, actually. There were guesses. Some wrong, some dangerously close. Do you know what I don't understand? What's your part in this? Other than being Sabrina's booty call, why are you so wrapped up in this? Why are you here fixing this mess instead of Sabrina?"

"I'm on the prom committee," I replied.

"You're saying it's a trade? You help them, and they let you be on the prom committee?"

"Sure. And to spend time with Anna. Win, win."

"Sam, you're such an idiot."

"What?"

"No one would go through all this trouble to put together an event like that. You said it yourself. You probably wouldn't have gone to prom if it wasn't you who's organizing it. You and Anna? You're best friends. You could have found something else to do without all the drama." Maisie ruffled the hair on my head before reaching across my body to open the passenger door. "I'll keep my mouth shut about all this. It's wiped away, for now. But you, with your puppy eyes saying you're friends with Sabrina? It's more, and you know it."

"You don't know what you're talking about."

"Have I been telling you that I'm heartbroken over Parker just to have something dramatic to say?"

"Shit. I'm sorry." I rubbed my face. "I'm sorry."

"I know how friends are, and you two, aren't it. Why are you helping Sabrina win the prom queen's title, Sam?"

"It was a trade, Maisie."

"Why did you, Sam?"

"Maisie."

"Why. Did. You?"

"Fine! For crying out loud, I love her, okay? I'm in love with her! There. Are you happy?"

Maisie nodded. "Then get out of my car and do something about it."