Emptiness

t h i r t y - o n e

We were having an awesome night. Lexie and I gave each other manicures while we talked about our life. I found out a lot about her today, which is nice. Her dad is a surgeon and so is her mom, so that explains why she's so wealthy. She has two brothers, the older one is already married and lives with her wife and child, and the other one is at medical school. She is the younger sibling and has no intention on pursuing medicine like them.

"I don't know," She says applying the top coat to my nails. We are currently giving each other pedicures. "I don't find medicine exciting. Science it's so boring to me." She sighs frowning. "Not like gymnastics, that's constant adrenaline."

"Yeah." I say watching her.

She puts a piece of her blond hair behind her ear and continues painting my nails with the termination. Not wanting to ruin her work. "What about you?" She asks looking up for a moment. "Are you parents forcing you to be something you're not?"

"That's funny." I whisper thinking about my parents. "I wish the would care enough to force me into studying something I don't like." I add taking a huge gulp of my sparkling water with vodka.

She stops what she's doing and turns to look at me concern. "What do you mean?" She asks, I could see she actually cared about what I was about to say.

"My relationship with my mom is complicated." I murmur looking at the floor. "And my dad," I say getting sad just thinking about him. "Well he's in jail." I tell her, worried about what her reaction could be.

She says nothing and grabs my hand, caressing it softly with her thumb. "I'm sorry to hear that." She says sad. "I didn't know that."

"Not a lot of people know that." I shrug with half a smile. "Only Nate, and of course Chris and his Dad. Everyone else believes he left my mom, cause that's the story she's sticking to." I add rolling my eyes. "Oh, and my therapist."

"Therapist?" She asks, going to my next feet to finish with the top coat.

"Last year I went through a rough patch." I whisper a little uncomfortable.

She stays quiet and looks at me again. It's like she wanted to say something but she was afraid to. "What?" I ask frowning.

"Nothing." She replies, realizing she was staring at me. "I heard some things when I came new to practice with coach Harvey." She whispers. "I never took part of the gossiping, but I did hear a few things about you." She adds shrugging.

"What?" I say confused, feeling a little anxious now. "What do you mean?"

"I assume you rough patch was your problems with food and stuff." She sighs not looking at me.

"My eating disorder you mean." I say with a frown. "You can say it, I won't have a breakdown over it." I add. "I'm not really crazy or whatever." I whisper.

"What?" She says closing the nail polish. "Do people actually believe that?" She asks drinking from her cup. She was drinking cranberry and vodka.

"Some people from my school." I whisper remembering things I forgotten. "But I don't want to talk about it." I say chugging what was left in my cup. "I'm going to need a few more drinks if we're going to keep talking about this." I laugh grabbing the bottle and noticing it was almost empty.

"It's okay." She says with a smile. "We don't have to talk about it if makes you feel uncomfortable." She adds grabbing my hand again. "I had a friend," She whispers with a frown. "From where I used to practice prior, and she suffered from anorexia."

"Oh." I say moving closer to her. "Is she better now?" I ask curiously. Wanting to know if there's actually light at the end of the tunnel, if there's people out there that can overcome this disorder.

"They took her away when things got really bad." She says, her voice breaking halfway through the sentence. "They had to intern her cause she got really ill. She had been suffering from it for years." She continues, drying a few tears that made their way through her face. "Way before we even met, since she was thirteen years old."

I nod, putting my arm around her shoulders to comfort her.

"I went to visit her one day and seemed miserable, she wasn't gaining any weight and was trying everything in her power to get out, so she could continue her obsession."

I was starting to get worried, cause it didn't seem like this story had a happy ending. I really didn't want to hear what she had to say next.

"And one day, while she was showering there, she had a heart attack and she was transferred to a hospital but she didn't make it." She cries in despair. "She died on her way there."

I look to the floor, drying the tears that made their way through my face as well. "I'm sorry to hear that." I whisper not knowing what else to say.

"I'm not saying this to you to scare you." She says lifting my face with her fingers. "It's just," she sighs confused. "You remind me of her." She says with a small smile. "And it would suck for something like that to happen to you as well."

I nod and she hugs me. We stay in silent for a moment and she grabs her cup and chugs everything down. She turns to look at the bottle and laughs. "I should have brought more alcohol."

I laugh as well and stand up. "I think my mom won't notice if we take one of her wine bottles." I say grabbing her hand and pulling her up. "Anyways, it's not like my stepfather won't buy her ten more in a few days."

We go out the room and the house was pitched black, considering it was currently two in morning. I walk past Christopher's room and remember he's still not home. So much for coming early, I think rolling my eyes.

We make it to the kitchen and I grab the bottle at the back of the fridge, assuming that is the one no one would notice is missing.

"White zinfandel?" I say turning to look at her.

"White zinfandel it is." She replies grabbing the corkscrew and opening the bottle. She takes a huge gulp and shrugs. "It's good." She adds handing me the bottle. "Too sweet though."

I try and it wasn't bad actually, better than others I had before. "So what now?" I ask handing the bottle back. "Do you want to go to sleep?" I ask even though I was not sleepy whatsoever.

"Not really." She says opening the fridge and staring at it for a while, grabbing a plate of strawberries. "Do you want to watch a movie? We can start a new tv show together." She says excited. "Do you like reality tv shows? They are so cringe but addictive." She says smiling.

I was happy she wasn't crying anymore. It was really heart breaking seeing her like that before. "Okay." I say smiling at her. "And Lex," I say going closer to her. "About before," I whisper with a frown. "I'm doing better now, so you don't have to worry about that."

She puts the strawberries in the sink and hugs me again. We both hear the front door opening and a few seconds after Chris appears at the kitchen entrance.

"What's going on here?" He says with a small smile, going to the fridge and grabbing a bottle of water.

"Nothing." I say pulling away from Lexie.

She was back to her infatuated self.

"Don't you guys plan on sleeping today?" He asks standing between us and grabbing a strawberry from the sink.

"We're about to watch a tv show." Lexie says with a smile. "Want to join us?" She asks getting closer to him.

"Sure." He says putting one arm around my shoulder and the other around Lexie's. "Anything for my Katherine and her friends."

I get away from him and nod, wondering if this was a good idea, but I wanted to make her happy. So we ended up going to my room to watch whatever it was that Lexie wanted.