Chapter 18

My hands were a flurry, typing text after text to Nicole. I promised that I would be there for her, and I did not want to betray that promise, especially not after her latest text, simply saying, ‘I’m not okay.’ I paced on Megan’s front porch, sending text after text, getting ready to call if I didn’t hear a response soon. Before I could, the door opened and Megan stepped outside, concern clouding her face.

“Are ... you sure you’re okay?” she asked awkwardly, reading my face.

I sighed. Megan could be trusted. Hell, she already knew that Nicole was self-harming. “Um, so, Nicole isn’t doing so well, and-” I paused. As soon as I said ‘Nicole,’ Megan visibly rolled her eyes. “Hey, this is kind of fucking serious here.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Megan said, her voice only halfway into it. “It’s just ... it’s just so convenient that we’re finally hanging out and she manages to pull you away even now.”

“Megan, she could be having a ... a self-harm thing,” I admitted clumsily, covering the phone, as if Nicole herself could be watching or listening through it. “Come on, you’re an empathetic person. She needs people to care about her right now.”

“Maybe once she starts caring about other people, I’ll consider it,” she bluntly replied, now leaning against the doorframe. “You wanted to know what she and I talked about a few weeks ago, right?”

I paused. Yes. Hell yes, I wanted to know. Now was the worst time to ask, so I had to decide right there and then which person I was going to devote my time to. I gave one last sideways glance to my phone and saw no answer. I sighed, putting my phone away. “I’m listening.”

Megan didn’t even bother to hide her glee from seeing that she, no doubt finally in her mind, won my attention over Nicole. “So, it was exactly what you think. She saw me and ... you know, Zelda. We’ve, uh, kept on doing ... things before school.”

“I’m aware,” I admitted, walking over to the doorframe opposite Megan and leaning against it myself. “Zelda has been super tasteful about it and we’re really careful not to out you to anyone listening, but ... I’ve been in the loop.” I saw Megan’s eyes reflect slight betrayal and hurt, and added preemptively, “We all had sex together, Megan. Literally what is the harm in her telling me more?”

Megan didn’t lose her expression. “ ... You’re sure no one listening in would know?”

I chuckled. “We have a code name for you when we’re around others and everything.”

“Say the code name. Right now.”

“Mark!” I replied instantly, with a serious expression, then softened into a chuckle. “You’re so paranoid.”

“Yeah, I’m straight and I’m...” She looked around the porch, as if the neighbors could be listening or something. “ ... And I’m spending my mornings kissing a girl.” She sighed. “Okay, I believe the code name thing.”

“Do you think I’d lie to you? After all this time?” I got closer to her and grabbed her hand, holding it meaningfully. We both looked at our hands, then into each others’ eyes. “I love you, Megan. You know that.”

She slowly nodded. “Yeah. And I love you too.” She broke her hand away. “I think you could lie to me to, like, spare my feelings or if you thought it was for the greater good or whatever. You do that, a lot.”

“I’d like to think I’m right about what the greater good is a lot,” I countered.

She started pacing around the porch instead of me. “Yeah, but what about the one time you’ll be wrong? What then? Then you’re just making things worse for people, aren’t you?” She stopped. “Was that too harsh?”

I shrugged. “We’re in a weird position and you’re...” I looked back at our house. “Is it fair to say you’re upset at someone else right now?”

She rolled her eyes again, leaning back against the doorframe. “He could at least pretend to want to see us,” she grumbled, then looked down. “I don’t even blame him. I blame Sabrina.”

“You know, for someone who kisses girls, you don’t seem to like them all that much,” I observed lightheartedly.

“What the heck does that mean?”

Uh-oh. H-word. She was serious. I tried to keep my cool and shrugged. “You blame Sabrina for Carson’s own choice to ... well, to ditch us. It is his choice, she’s not holding him at gunpoint. She’s probably pushing him around, but Carson is Carson. He could just tell her no and hang out with us anyway. I’m gonna choose to be pissed at him until he comes to his senses.”

She stared at me as I finished, waiting for me to continue. Finally, she piped up. “That’s only one girl.”

“Okay, fine. You also don’t seem to like Athena that much. She kind of seems lonely in our friend group. I think we should all try to talk to her more.”

“Athena?” she asked. “I mean, Athena only really came along because Carson liked Jason. Now she’s just kind of ... there. Like a ... person who’s just there.”

“Eloquently put,” I teased.

“I just don’t know her. She’s had time to be a part of our group. She’s just the quiet one,” she continued reasoning.

“Well, I think she’d like it if we tried to make her feel more involved,” I told her. “Okay?”

Megan bit her lip. “Yeah, okay,” she conceded. “I mean, for heaven’s sake, our lunch table group is basically gone. I may as well hang on to the friends I do have.” She paused. “So, two girls?”

“Well, there’s Nicole. Speaking of, she talked to you...?”

“Well, okay, that’s because Nicole has a mean streak and you know it,” she reasoned. “She keeps asking me and telling me things in weird ways, like she’s testing me or knows the outcome of everything. Like she’s so much better than me. She just likes having power over me, and I’m a new Megan. It turns out I don’t like getting pushed around anymore.” She started pacing again. “Nicole called me into her office and just said it so factually, that I was kissing Zelda. So I tell her...” Her face scrunched up. “I, uh, tell her ... that I don’t ... like when she...”

“You denied it,” I replied, chuckling, rolling my eyes. “You told her she saw wrong. You tried lying. How’d that go?”

She pouted at me. “Whatever,” she groaned. “I’m allowed to not like her right now.”

“Can I ask something directly? Like, ‘if might offend you’ kind of directly?” I asked gingerly.

“Well, at least you’re asking permission now,” she joked with a halfway annoyed tone. “Go ahead.”

“So, you’re annoyed at Nicole. Carson’s gone, at least for now. If I were you, I’d probably be with Zelda more often, to like, compensate. Maybe you don’t love her as, like, a lover, but there’s clearly something there between you two. Why are you ghosting her?”

Megan stared at me for a bit, then for a bit longer. She walked up to the door, then opened it. “I’m going inside,” she finally told me with a dry voice. “Take as long as you need.”

As she closed the door, my phone finally vibrated in my pocket. Fate was both very much on my side and actively fucking with me.

“She’s honestly full of the most interesting stories,” I gushed further at the lockers. “Seriously. She’s been to, like, so many concerts, and if you like gossip, you’d love hearing what she has to say.”

Zelda paused. “ ... Athena?” she repeated. “But she’s so quiet.”

“Trust me, get her talking,” I pressured. “Next time you’re at the lunch table, of course. Speaking of...?”

She shrugged. “We’ll see,” she admitted with a defeated tone. We both finished at our lockers and went into the aud, where Salvador was waiting for us, along with a bunch of overworked students.

“Good,” Salvador remarked, his eyes surveying the students. “So, we’re only a week into vignettes, but I can already tell a few of you are falling behind. Remember, in drama...”

I couldn’t help but notice Zelda subtly rolling her eyes as Salvador spoke. Whatever their relationship was, at best there was tension below the surface. Not to mention, Salvador was a lot of things but ‘dumb’ wasn’t one of them. If she was still pissed at him, he knew.

“ ... Does everyone understand?” Salvador concluded. “Good. Let’s go ahead with the warmups. Let’s see...” His eyes scanned the students. “Zelda. You’re leading today.”

She was unmoved. “Can I use my own warmups, or only the ones you’ve taught us?”

Salvador hesitated, then his eyes danced. “Do you think they’d serve the class well?”

“I do,” she replied with zero emotion.

“Then yes. I’ll stop you if I disagree, but until then, you have creative control. Go.” He motioned up to the stage, and soon, students were taking off their shoes.

Zelda sure didn’t mind playing with fire sometimes. It was almost odd how she was so defiant with Salvador but submissive to Nicole, but then again, she didn’t exactly have a crush on Salvador. Hell, thanks to his domineering weird daddy energy, she was probably one of the only female students in his classes not to get a crush on him.

Oh God. What if Nicole had a crush on Salvador? Ew. I’d have to ask her later.

Zelda began by walking up to the front of the stage and taking a deep breath in, closing her eyes as she did. “Okay everyone,” she announced, opening her eyes. “I want you to start by getting on your hands and knees.” Her Danish accent was stronger now, but she didn’t look angrier or anything. Hesitantly, the class followed her, mimicking her down to her posture. “Take your arms and bring them above your heads, locking your hands while you breathe in and out. In ... and out...” The students followed. I snuck a peek at Salvador, whose silence rang as an approval for Zelda’s choices.

“Good,” Zelda continued. “Now, on your next exhale, release the arms ... good, like that ... Now I want you to roll forward, onto your hands and knees...” Slowly, she demonstrated, getting up from sitting and moving as she described. “Now extend your arms, put your wrists in front of your shoulders and elbows ... and tuck your toes in, straightening your legs. It will be like trying to stand up except your hands are glued to the floor.”

The students awkwardly tried to follow her. I had to marvel at her effortlessness. She was more nimble than she let on. “This is just yoga,” one heckler pointed out.

“No talking,” Salvador called out. It would be the only thing he’d say until the exercises were over.

I didn’t know when Carson and I locked eyes during business class, but for whatever reason, as soon as we started, neither one of us looked away for a few seconds. My eyes narrowed, and eventually, feeling awkward, I shrugged. He followed suit, shrugging, then looked away. I sighed.

I turned back to Zelda, and she looked back and forth between myself and him. “What was that about? Does he know I was there at lunch?”

“He wouldn’t care even if he knew. Trust me, I know him,” I replied. “He doesn’t dislike you.”

“Oh, so he just calls everyone ‘dykes’ just casually, huh?” she replied bitterly.

“Zelda, obviously that was a dick move, but ... he did only say that the one time,” I gingerly pointed out. Zelda looked at me with one eyebrow lowered, and I just shrugged again. “I know Carson. He gets angry, and he does things he regrets afterwards, but he never will admit that he regrets it. He just lets it pass and allows bygones to be bygones. It’s not like he’s ignoring us intentionally now, it’s ... it’s just the Sabrina thing. She doesn’t want him hanging out with us, and he’s kinda ... mindlessly listening.” I rolled my shoulders in thought, then a thought struck me. I couldn’t help the devilish grin spreading across my face. “And if you don’t like that kind of attitude, maybe you’d like the exact opposite, where you remember everything, never let anything go, and sometimes you get so caught up that you get too hesitant to do or feel anything. You know, like Mark is behaving right now, right after he lost his friend.”

Zelda froze mid-typing, then slowly looked over at me. She flashed a look at Carson, then looked back at me, then cocked her head. “Are you saying...?”

I nodded. “I honestly think that’s the reason.”

Zelda’s expression turned thoughtful. “And if he...?”

I nodded again. “I think there’s a good chance, yeah. Honestly, I just thought of it now, but the more I think about it, the more sure I am.”

Zelda sat silently for a bit, then abruptly got up, walking halfway across the classroom to Carson’s position with purpose. Once she was close enough, she cleared her throat to get his attention, then crossed her arms, her hips cocked, her stylish jacket punctuating her power stance.

“Megan misses you,” she told him, quietly enough to not disturb the class yet loudly enough that I could hear every word. “She’s not herself without you around. The group’s not itself without you, and I think you feel the same way about yourself too. How fun is it to just be around one person all the time? Don’t you miss your friends? I didn’t take you as the type of guy to let one dainty little girl run your social life. Are you an alpha or aren’t you? Come back to the pack. They need you.”

Wow, that was bold. It took all of my willpower to look like I was working and not eavesdropping, let alone preventing my mouth from hanging open at those last few sentences. As if I should have expected anything else, Carson just chuckled.

“That was a nice speech,” he admitted. I wasn’t sure if he was being sarcastic or not. “Megan doesn’t miss me, though. Shouldn’t ... you know that more than anyone else?”

Zelda scoffed. “I don’t believe that that’s the only way someone can matter to someone else and, frankly, neither do you. In fact...” Zelda took a step forward and bent her knees so she could look Carson in the eye, or at least get closer to it, putting her hands on her legs and leaning in towards him. “ ... Do you really think that if someone held Megan at gunpoint and asked her who she loved more, she wouldn’t say you?” She stood back up, folding her arms again.

Carson’s eyes flickered to me. Shit. I turned back to my computer and made it look like I was working, but his telltale chuckle made it obvious I was caught. Either the next thing he said was so quiet I couldn’t hear him, or he didn’t say anything in response. I did, however, hear Zelda say, “So, can I tell Megan she’ll get to see you at the lunch table tomorrow? If me being there would make it weird, I can study in the library again.” I snuck a look at Carson again and saw his face bearing a look of confusion. Zelda shrugged. “She misses her friend. I care about her, and it’s not like I want you to be unhappy. Let’s bury the hatchet. Deal?” She stuck out her hand and waited for Carson to shake it.

Carson looked at the hand. “Do you want to give Megan a message from me?” he asked, not shaking the hand yet.

“Go right ahead,” Zelda told him.

Carson took her hand, then jerked on it lightly, pulling her in. “Tell her to lose my number.”

I practically spun in my chair to face him. Now my mouth was open. Carson looked at me, still holding on to Zelda’s hand, then looked back at her. “Tell her it was fun,” he continued, then released Zelda’s hand. “While it lasted.”

Zelda’s back was to me, but I had to believe she was staring at him in disbelief much like I was. “You can’t be serious,” she told him.

Carson looked at me again, and shrugged. “We had a fun time, buddy. But at some point, you gotta move on,” he addressed me.

I shook my head. “What are you ... why?!”

“This is just my decision, Adam. Now don’t disrupt the class,” Carson replied, turning back to his computer. “Later, lesbo,” he added towards Zelda. “Make her happy. Make her ... fuckin’ happy.”

His tone wasn’t even mean. It was ... neutral. As if this was inevitable or something. I didn’t even pay attention to the way Zelda huffed and walked back to her seat, or the way she scowled at me when she sat back down. I couldn’t not stare at Carson. Hell, I couldn’t focus. Nothing but thoughts, mainly the word ‘Why’ repeated over and over, swirled in my mind. The assignment may as well have not existed.

The bell rang shortly after, and as it did, I saw Carson get up pretty immediately. No. Fucking no. This wasn’t right. This couldn’t just be it. I quickly stood up and marched across the classroom. “Carson,” I called out.

Carson was walking out the door, but stopped, turned on his heels, and ... gave me a knowing smile. Like this was the last shot of some kind of movie. “Buddy,” he began gently. “It’s all good.”

“What’s all good, what are you even talking about?” I asked, flustered.

He paused, and looked back at Zelda. “Y’know, maybe Cleopatra over there is right, it’s kinda clear she took cryptology or cryptography or whatever and you didn’t.” He paused, and looked at me meaningfully. “It’s time for us to just accept we’re going down different paths, man.”

My breathing quickened. There was no reason for any of this. “ ... Why?! Based on what? What are you even-”

“Shh,” he instructed, holding up a finger. “Buddy, I’ve felt kinda disconnected from our little gang for a while. Jason’s gone, Megan ... may as well be gone. You’re, uh ... well, you got bigger problems, lemme just say that. Who the fuck am I staying for, her?” He gestured towards Zelda. “I’ve just been give give giving for so long. I think for once I’m gonna make my own way, and make my own choices.”

“Your own choices? You’re just ditching us because Sabrina is telling you to!” I fumed.

Against my expectations, his smile grew. “Sure, dude,” he told me condescendingly, never losing his calm tone. “Sure. Anyways, what would you rather have? Me just coming to lunch and stuff just to pretend I feel like I belong, or knowing I decided to split off so I can choose my own destiny? You gotta-”

“No, Carson, no, this can’t be-”

“Buddy,” Carson interjected, his smile now faded, his tone now serious. “Listen the fuck up.” He put his palm against my chest, holding it there forcefully. I looked around the classroom – Mr. Keynes had flown the coop, and barely any students were left. Even Zelda was gone. “What the fuck has our friendship even been for the past little bit? I was trying to be nice and letting you down easy, but you had to – well, you know what, you had to be Adam fuckin’ Watson about it, didn’t ya?”

I took a step back. His palm was still against my chest.

“So why not, let’s have a fuckin’ big dramatic chat about it. We can talk about how you kept pestering Sabrina, my fuckin’ girlfriend, about how she was supposed to have feelings for you instead of me.”

“N-no, I never s-”

“Shut it, buddy,” Carson coldly and forcefully told me. “I was gonna be all smiles and tell you that you were cool, but alright, if the gloves are coming off, I don’t even fuckin’ recognize you, man. I stood up for you, so many God damn times, and for what? Who the fuck are you? What the fuck do you even do around here, who are you fightin’ for? Megan goes off and kisses a walking red flag with tits, and I bring her honesty, I bring her the truth. I tell her how she’s going down a bad path – fuck, not even because she’s doing it with a woman or whatever, but because she’s doing it with fuckin’ Zelda. What did you do? Cozy on up to fuckin’ Zelda and all but tell the two of ‘em to get it on at some party.”

My look turned no doubt fearful. Even if Carson didn’t have the full story, I doubt the full story would have made him feel any better.

“Megan – you want honesty? Takes my heart and rips it into a billion fuckin’ little pieces. Lil’ pieces of confetti. They blow around in the wind ‘n shit, they scatter everywhere. Along comes Sabrina, who sees a broken man. That’s what I was, Adam. A broken fuckin’ man. And she takes it upon herself to glue those pieces together, one by one. Fuck, she won’t even have half my heart glued back together by the end of the fuckin’ year, but God damn if she ain’t still trying. And what does your group do?” He stepped back and threw his hands up in the air. “You, Megan, Zelda, hell, probably even fuckin’ Athena, the girl with zero personality, you all just gun for Sabrina. ‘She’s a homewrecker,’ ‘she’s a bitch,’ ‘she’s taking Carson away from us,’ wah wah fuckin’ wah. You all didn’t fuckin’ think for a second to give her the benefit of the doubt, although you sure fuckin’ thought to try to tell her, ‘hey, you don’t want the broken guy. We had something special. Leave his dumb ass and choose me instead, because I don’t have enough deranged bitches by my side. I need to take one more girl and turn her into a fuckin’ nodding bobblehead to affirm my stupid fuckin’ life choices.” He paused, putting a hand on his chin and stroking his barely present beard in thought. “Or whatever. Maybe that’s a little harsh. I don’t fuckin’ know, I’m gonna say a lotta shit right now. Point is...” He waved at me. “Bye-bye, dude. Bye-fuckin’-bye. Don’t make business weird. Tell Megan not to make English weird. Knowing your fucking canary mouth, you’re gonna tell her everything else I said anyways.”

I was frozen in place until Carson started walking. His words hurt – they were like fucking knives – but nothing, nothing Carson could have said could have made me walk away from him. Hell, I heard Nicole during her episodes. Carson thought he could be tough, but he hadn’t seen shit. “Carson!” I called out, following him out of the classroom. “Carson, for fuck’s sake, we can work this out! Carson!!”

Carson kept up a steady pace, weaving in and out of the crowd of schoolkids excited to get home. I did my best to keep up, but kept bumping into kids. Luckily, the crowds quickly dispersed and Carson and I quickly found ourselves in a hallway clearing, presumably near his locker.

At that moment, who else but Nicole was turning a corner. When she saw me, she snapped her fingers, walking towards me. “Yo, VP, perfect timing. I gotta talk to you about something.”

“Sorry, this needs to wait,” I replied with urgency, not bothering to check her reaction or stop walking. Luckily, Carson’s locker was nearby. “Carson, please! Can’t we just talk about this?! Can’t I have a chance to explain my side?!”

Carson turned to me to give me a pissed-off look, but he quickly locked eyes with something behind me instead. I turned around to see Nicole had followed me and he was now looking at her. I looked back and forth between the two of them.

“You know, it’s funny...” Carson began, addressing her. “I don’t think I ever said a word to you before.”

Nicole’s expression turned confused. “Uh, yeah, that’s hilarious.”

Carson ignored her. “You’ve been nothin’ but trouble for Adam, you know that?”

Despite her lack of context, Nicole was Nicole. She could sense the tension, and could probably piece together the general situation. “Oh, I do,” she told him seriously. “I tell him that pretty much every time we hang out. And whatever’s going on, he probably fucked up in the same way I tend to. He does that, a lot.” She turned to me. “No offense, squirt.” She turned back. “You’re probably right to be angry at him. Maybe you even need space from him for a while. But if you’re going to just conclude that he’s a bad friend based on the wrongest choices he made and cut him of all people off forever, then you’re every bit as stupid as your sister says you are.”

Carson’s eyebrows slowly raised. That clearly got under his skin. He pursed his lips and quickly got something out of his locker, thinking to himself. “She talked about you too,” he eventually said with a small, dry voice. “She’s worried. She thinks you want to kill yourself.”

Nicole raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything.

“You fuckin’ should.”

He slammed his locker shut and walked away with his signature confident swagger, never looking back. Neither Nicole nor I said anything. My feet were made of clay. Something in me made it impossible to chase after him, not this time. I just stood there, watching him walking away, disappearing into the crowd of students.

I felt a hand gently touch, then grab, my shoulder. I looked back and saw Nicole looking at me with a serious expression. “Whatever happened, I’m sorry,” she told me. “If you wanna talk about it, I’m here. If not, I understand.”

I just looked at her, then looked back at where Carson disappeared. I didn’t even feel sad. I still just felt ... shocked. Bewildered. It was like it wasn’t real, like it was just a thing that could be easily rewound. And I was just waiting for it to reverse course and un-happen. Any second. Any second.

“That thing I was talking about can wait,” Nicole continued. “Obviously. I’m not you, but, uh, you should probably text Megan.”

Oh fuck. She was totally right. Dreading every second of this, I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone, getting ready for the point when my little canary mouth had to sing its worst song.

“Pick up, pick up,” Megan screamed, holding the phone to her ear and pacing back and forth across Room 203. Nicole and I sat at one of the tables, watching her.

“And what he said about what you said to Sab ... I can only guess it was somewhat true, right? I know you and her had a bit of a thing going. It always seemed like it could have been more than just sex,” Nicole gingerly asked me, quietly enough so that Megan couldn’t hear.

I shook my head. “I don’t want to talk about it,” I honestly replied.

“Yeah, fair enough,” Nicole sighed, watching Megan pace. She watched Megan lower the phone to her hand, looking at it. Megan breathed a few times, looking at her phone, her chest beginning to rise and fall. Nicole’s eyes widened like a cat and she quickly removed her hoodie, getting up with lightning speed and stretching her hoodie out in the middle of the room like it was a flag being dangled in front of a bull.

At the same time, in a fit of pure rage, Megan threw her phone at the wall. Nicole moved her hands, barely breaking the phone’s throw with the hoodie. She angled her hands to move with the motion of the phone, catching the phone in the cloth between her hands like she was a world-class baseball catcher. Megan didn’t notice, and collapsed into a chair, bawling her eyes out.

“Gotcha,” Nicole softly declared, fishing out the phone. “Not a scratch. I think I’ll hold onto this until Megalosau- until Megan calms down.” She cleared her throat. “Sorry,” she directed at Megan. Megan was too busy crying to respond, possibly to even notice.

We all remained like that for a bit. Even after she stopped crying, it was clear Megan didn’t want to speak to anyone. Eventually, Nicole glanced up at the clock. “I’m gonna suggest we do one of two things,” Nicole eventually softly piped up. “Number one, I drive you both – fuck.” She furrowed her brow, then her eyes lit up with a thought. “Number one, I call in a favor Allistair owes me, and he drives you both home. Number two, I get us a pizza. I feel like it’ll be easier for you two to get through this tough time with some food in your systems. Believe me. I understand this is really hard for you both, so I wan – I wanna help.”

I glanced at Megan, who still had her head down and hadn’t said anything. I looked back at Nicole. Nicole slowly got up and walked over to Megan, gently touching her shoulder. “Megan, didja hear me?”

“Fuck you,” Megan spat angrily, not even looking up.

Nicole’s hand jumped off of Megan’s shoulder like it was a hot stove. Her expression darkened and darkened, until she looked away. “Okay,” she eventually said in a small, weak voice. “I’m going to go call Allistair then. He’ll be here, uh, soonish.”

I heard the door close behind me, and just stared at the back of Megan’s head. “She’s just trying to help, you know,” I told her, my voice barely above a gravelly croak. Megan didn’t reply.

“Roight, heah we ah,” Allistair announced awkwardly as we pulled into Megan’s driveway.

Megan silently opened the door right as Nicole snapped her fingers. “Oh, hey,” she piped up. “I still have your phone. Sorry about that.” She pulled Megan’s phone out of her pocket and offered it to her. Megan looked at Nicole, and Nicole smiled. “Gotta have your phone, right?”

Megan looked at Nicole as if she could see right through her, like a ghost. Without a word, she took her phone, undid her seatbelt, and hopped out of the car, closing the door behind her. Allistair thought better than to say anything else, and put the car into reverse. I heard Nicole sigh next to me.

I put my hand on hers. “You’re doing a lot for us,” I told her supportively. “I see that. There’s no way Megan doesn’t see that. She’s just upset. I appreciate you a lot.”

“It’s all good, dude,” Nicole replied dismissively, looking out the window, then looked back at me with a slight smile. “I’d be the biggest hypocrite in the world to expect her to be kind to me when she’s upset, wouldn’t I?”

I smiled back. “Yeah,” I admitted.

I let go of her hand and she immediately leaned forward to supportively rub Allistair’s shoulder. “Alright, good news is, you only need to make one more stop. Adam lives two houses down from me.”

“F’real?” Allistair asked. “Int’restin’. Izzat how ya two know each otha’?”

Today of all days was not the day to make another enemy, so I humored Allistair and made light conversation with him across the whole drive home. Eventually, we arrived at Nicole’s place, And the two of us thanked Allistair for his help and got out. It was going to take a long time before I would be able to get past what he did at the party, but I had to admit, he sure seemed to be a good friend for Nicole to have.