The Halo Effect

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Time fell away in the small hours of the night.

I returned to Roosevelt Hall intending not to tell Macallan and Kelsey about what had just happened. I didn't want to usurp Macallan's celebration with the news that Trip and I had broken up. It seem selfish of me to do that, and selfish was the very last emotion I wanted weighing me down. 

But when I opened my dorm room to find them awake in their beds, every last one of my best intentions crumbled beneath the weight of my heartache, and so did I.

Words ran away from me like a river, emotions rushing out and wracking my body from head to toe. I made no effort to keep my tears at bay. They leaked from my eyes, and the sobs were thunderous crashes that brought me to my knees before I could reach my bed, my hand sliding down the wooden bedpost.

Macallan and Kelsey joined me on the floor and held me until my tears ran their course. Until all that remained was a shallow grave for what I thought was my forever, where I could bury everything I thought I wanted.

"It's over," I said, breathless and soaked to the bone. "Me and Trip. We're over."

✘ ✘ ✘

No amount of emotional fortification could've prepared me for my AP Government class on Tuesday. I considered it a small miracle that the rotating schedule had dropped the time block in which I had that class on Monday, allowing me to go a full day without seeing Trip McKenna, but I was still far from ready to sit across the room from him today.

I didn't think there was anything in the world that would make me ready, but I knew I had to face Trip. His presence wouldn't deter me from attending class, and that had to count for something.

But still, it took everything in me to walk into class with my head held high, and I met Trip's gaze with magnetic-like precision. He had his notebook open on the desk in front of him, but he seemed to have had his attention fixed on the door as if to ensure he'd witness my entrance. Like I was a disaster only he could recognize with the red-rimmed eyes he'd shielded behind the lenses of his glasses.

I wouldn't pretend that looking at Trip didn't hurt or make me wish his gaze was a lifeline capable of pulling me out of this heartbroken hellscape. But no amount of wishful thinking would alter our circumstances.

It wasn't until someone touched my upper arm as they moved past me that I looked away from Trip. I jolted as I registered who it was.

"Sorry about your knee, England," Grayson said, sounding genuinely sympathetic. "And that the timing is crap."

"Thanks, and I'm aware," I replied and willed myself to my seat.

I could've been snippy and told Grayson there was never a good time to tear your ACL, but I knew what he was getting at.

I'd torn my ACL with just one game remaining in the season, and it was the championship game against Silvermine. Our team had spent the entire season working towards this game, and instead of starting on the draw circle, I would be on the bench.

As I retrieved my notebook from my backpack, I caught myself wondering if Trip had told Grayson about our breakup. I figured he'd told Jameson as he was his roommate, but Grayson was different.

He was the one who talked behind Trip's back to me at Winter Formal.

He was the one who provoked Macallan.

He was the one who told me that I was just the girl.

And while those things had stuck with me, the conversation Grayson had with Trip in the locker room was what haunted me. That was the moment when everything I thought I knew about Trip and I turned on its head.