The First to Fall ⚢

𝐭𝐰𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐲-𝐨𝐧𝐞 • 𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐚

I know Aspen should be the least of my worries while I'm getting ready for a date with someone who can actually tell me she likes me with a straight face, especially since the night has passed and Aspen seems to be doing fine now. But I can't stop thinking about how hurt she looked.

I know it was presumptuous of me to ask her what was wrong, seeing as we've never exactly been best buds, but what else was I supposed to do? Just sit there and watch her suffer?

The Aspen I saw last night was the most unfamiliar version to me. I'd never seen her so dejected—so separated from herself. She's always been Aspen Greenwood: the golden girl with the kind of charisma people go their entire lives trying to replicate. She's always been cool and confident, never a fracture in her smile as she stood on the podium, never a break in her demeanor when someone tried to challenge her. She was insufferably perfect. She always had been.

So what happened? What could have possibly been the straw that broke the camel's back?

And why does it bother me so much that I don't know?

"I'll be there in about ten minutes," Sasha tells me over the phone as I'm trying to do my hair. The pigtails I've done could work but it might be a bad sign if I can't tell whether I look like an adorable six-year-old or a morally corrupt librarian in a porno. Even making that comparison feels disgusting to me.

"Okay!" I tell her excitedly, though I can't shake the thought of Aspen no matter how hard I try.

She hasn't spoken to me all day—mainly because she's been out most of the day—but I haven't tried starting any conversations with her either. I guess I feel like I'm being intrusive if I try to talk to her but we're friends now, right? Or at least we're trying to be. Trying to find my place in Aspen's life is turning out to be an impossible task.

I end up pulling my hair back into an "effortless" ponytail, despite it taking a lot of effort, and in my full-length mirror, I analyze my outfit one more time. It's still quite basic, as all of my outfits seem to be, but I think it works. The jeans I chose are my favorite—super comfortable and flattering—and even though I'm wearing a t-shirt, it's cropped and fitted, so it still looks like I put in effort, but not too much.

I bet Sasha has never been so worked up over an outfit like this before. She doesn't seem to have one anxious bone in her body.

"Oh, that's a cute shirt," I hear a familiar voice coming from behind me. Aspen is leaning her head against the doorframe, glancing at my outfit. "Don't you think you'll get cold, though?"

"Thanks," I respond to her first comment quickly, turning to hide my confused face. "And no, I should be okay. It's not very cold outside today—plus, I don't really have any jackets that would go with this."

Aspen scoffs, sounding like her normal self. I don't get it. "Yeah, right. It'll be, like, fifty degrees tonight."

"That's not true," I tell her, trying to stay as normal as possible. I'm scared that her entire demeanor will change if I try bringing up last night again.