Only Frankie Knows

ii. frankie kept a secret

dedicated to khlairiosity
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thank u a looot ╥﹏╥ ♡

ii.
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Frankie and I often share secrets, the way other teenage girls do. It mostly happens whenever she sleeps over, or sometimes by the bridge at sunsets. We share secrets through quiet whispers, in between laughter (sometimes tears) while making sure nobody else can hear.

My secrets are not worth mentioning, but Frankie's secrets . . . well, they started off from something playful and innocent to something that is just worrying and scary; something she hid from me through the years of our friendship. I remember being offended. I thought we were best friends.

When she told me one of her scary secrets, we were sitting at the bridge railing and the moon was showing up, the stars were appearing like faint freckles on the skies. It was cold. We were thirteen. Slowly, Frankie rolled up her pants to show her upper thighs, with tons of bruises and cigarette burns.

A small gasp left my mouth.

I looked up at her with my eyes widening, waiting for her to explain.

"Mom," was all she said.

It felt like something was stuck on my throat I couldn't even speak a word, let alone her name. Frankie. My trembling hands reached for hers as my eyes hovered her scarred thighs.

Why didn't she tell me?

"Don't tell anyone else," said Frankie, her dark eyes underneath her heavy eyelids looking straight at mine.

That time I thought it would be a good idea to take Frankie away and leave the town together. I had money. We were capable. As a thirteen year old I thought I was being rational and I was using logic when all along I was wrong -- we were just children, we weren't capable of anything that involves running away.

After that confession at the bridge, Frankie stopped talking about her mother, and she would always refuse to answer my question that is about her. I think I was worried, but if she stopped talking about it then I thought there is a reason why. Maybe I don't have to know everything.

Am I a bad friend?

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It's the first time in years I'd ever seen Frankie happy by herself. Not because of me, not because of her favorite celebrity -- she was happy by herself. Something about that irks my gut, like I'm being stabbed multiple times, like there is puke threatening to come out my mouth anytime. Seeing Frankie happy makes me so angry I can't find the right words to explain it.

I had to take Seth away from her.

"Frankie is not all that, believe me," I told Seth when I found him alone in an empty classroom after classes. I was wearing lipstick -- my Mom once said that red is my color. She told me to wear something red if I want to have an upper hand in men. "She's not funny--"

"Why do you even talk about her like that?" Seth asked, his brows furrowed, his voice a little louder. My chest tightened -- Mom's advice wasn't working. "Aren't you guys friends?"

Friends? "I-I'm just saying that Frankie is a little bit unstable, and, well, you don't understand her, and she might--"

"I chose her. I like Frankie. I don't want you or anyone else--"

I gasped and said, "what?"

"--so please leave me alone. I'll be kind enough to not let Frankie know about what you're saying behind her back, so I hope this is the last time you interfere between us."

He looked at me gravely for the last time before turning his back to walk away. I was left dumbfounded at that empty classroom, breathing heavily. I remember brushing the red lipstick off my lips using my thumb, and its smell did not leave my skin until a few hours later.

Seth was not making any sense. I was convinced he was too stupid to even understand where I was really coming from. Immediately, I walked out from the classroom and told myself I had to see Frankie or else I would explode but that day, when I thought I couldn't be angrier, I saw Frankie and Seth together, kissing like slugs behind an old truck, Seth's fingers wrapped around Frankie's dark, vanilla scented hair.

I threw up.

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You can call it jealousy. Anger. I don't care. I don't regret anything. A week after I saw them making out behind that truck, everyone at school began talking about Frankie being impregnated by an old, rich man downtown. Of course that isn't true; I just made it up. See . . . if Seth wouldn't listen to me, then perhaps he would listen to what everybody else around him says.

I was a bit successful because Frankie came to our house, crying.

She rarely does that.

"I don't care what everybody else thinks of me," said Frankie, kneeling on my bed. "Just not Seth . . . what if he leaves me?"

She's all about Seth Seth Seth Seth -- she is being a rumored pregnant teen at the whole school and all she talks about is still Seth.

"How about what I think of you?"

She wiped her tears and pushed away some strands of her hair from her eyes. There were glistening tears on them. "You're my best friend, Rowan. You know those rumors aren't true, right?"

I smiled. "I trust you, Frankie."

Do I, really?

The rumors began growing, some didn't even come from me anymore. There are rumors of her being a young prostitute, of her being a murderer, and it just got worse every day. I no longer had control on anything.

One time, I heard Frankie's body was poured with stinking vinegar, and her hair during class was cut while she was unaware. They hide her things, destroy them, one time they even threw her phone on the toilet. She was called a slut, a bitch; people also take photos of her so they can make fun of her on the internet. Eventually, all these got way too unbearable that she just approached me one day and said, "Rowan, I'm quitting school."

She came over our house with her bloodshot eyes and sunken cheeks and said that. It had only been a couple of weeks ever since the rumors and the bullying began and it had given Frankie ridiculous changes on her face.

I was in no position to stop her.

"If that would be for the better," I said.

Frankie left school the day after that.

It's like everybody lost their play toy when Frankie left. There was no one else to bully and to make fun of, so the school went back to normal. However, the worst part is, even after all through those rumors and bullying, Seth did not leave Frankie. They were still together so I felt as if everything I did was for nothing.

By this time I was just too tired to even take Seth away. I ruined Frankie's life enough, it will completely fall apart soon.

I was right.

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