❝she was the girl, who bit the horizon, who peeled the stars from the sky and put them on her tongue, the girl who was hungry for the universe, who craved magic and saw the broken boy for who he truly was- a broken boy.❞
Beca...
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Chapter 53
Elasticity of Human Desire
Ellis
The music blasted out of my laptop drowned out most of our talking in the sleepover but not even Adam Levine's ridiculously high voice could tune out the worries that had been a repeating track in my head.
Calista and Astrid were lying down on my bed, fetal position, talking animatedly while I sat in my study chair and stare endlessly in space, being unnervingly quiet- a characteristic that made Calista yelled over the sound:
"Els, why are you so antisocial? It's usually me who sit passively in the corner and hate the world."
"Sorry," I snapped out of my zone. Lately, I've been zoning out so much I just got a lecture from Mr Newman about how just because exams were over and I was perpetually a top student doesn't mean I could daydream and slack. Can you imagine that? Me, being called a slacker by my teacher? It's ludicrous. "I'm just thinking."
I've been doing that a lot- thinking. Tossing and turning memories and anxiety in my mind, because I can't get it out of my head. I can't get him out of my head. I felt as if he had coated me in the stardust that no doubt lingered behind his closed eyelids, and I'm stained all over.
"About Jem again?" sighed Astrid, her exasperation clearly shown: "Look, I love you, Ellis but the boy just lost his Dad....you need to give him some space."
"Yeah...but I'm worried about him. He hasn't shown up in school for the last month, skiving off-"
"That's typical Jem behaviour," Calista rolled her eyes, characteristically unsympathetic. "You're telling me our school's so-called 'bad boy' doesn't skive off school?"
"Yeah, but he was trying to make the effort to participate more and...I'm just wondering if he's okay."
"Ellis, it's been six days," reminded Astrid reasonably. This was weird. I'm usually the voice of reason. What was happening to me? "He's obviously not okay. He needs to be okay on his own before you can come in."
I hated how she was right.
"Anyway," Astrid cleared her throat, rising off the bed, "I'm going to go get some food. Do you want any?"
"Yeah, I'll have whatever."
"Specific," snorted Astrid.
I smiled and shook my head. "I'll have what you're having."
"Calista?"
"Mmm," mumbled Calista, muffled by the bedsheets as her face was planted in between a deep crevice she had created in the bed. She's splayed out like a giant pale white stain in the middle of the bed sheets. "I'll have whatever you're having too."
The absence of Astrid left Calista and I in silence- but a comfortable silence. The sort that didn't feel stifled with a thousand things we were too afraid to say- it was more like we were too tired and beaten to say them.
