Second Lanark

Moving On - Part 40

          Tricia was out for the day with Josh. It seemed they'd decided to make the most of whatever time they had together if the football program actually ended up cancelled.

I'd stopped keeping tabs on Lark and instead was counting down the days until she moved out. We were down to less than forty-eight hours.

Rob was in class and I was trying to get some work done before swim practice. My meet tomorrow was a big one. If the team didn't end up suspended for the rest of the season, I could qualify for the university's national level swim competition. Just the thought of it made my palms start to sweat and I pushed them against my thighs before picking my pen up again.

The knock on the bathroom door made me pause. If that was Lark, I might commit murder.

"Who is it?" I called, hoping to avoid disaster and jail time.

"It's Jill." Her high-pitched voice pierced the bathroom door.

I stared at the door for a few minutes. If Lark was leaving, we were stuck with Jill which meant that at some point, I had to face the inevitable.

"Come in," I called back, picking my pen up and pretending to be absorbed in my work.

I heard the door open, but she stood in the doorway. I glanced over and put my pen back down. I sat looking at her, waiting for her to start.

"Do you have a minute?" she asked, joining her hands together and then separating them over and over.

I gestured towards Lark's lawn chair. "I said come in, didn't I?" I asked, vaguely annoyed.

She straightened her spine, walked stiffly over to the chair and perched on the edge. "I wanted to apologize to you about the way I've acted the last few weeks," she said, taking a deep breath. "Actually, I want to apologize for the way I've been with you pretty much since I moved in."

I raised my eyebrows and sat back in my chair. I was really done with playing nice with people who were just going to screw me over later. I didn't say anything.

She laughed a little self-consciously. "I guess you're waiting for an explanation..." she trailed off and looked everywhere but at me. "At first, you kinda reminded me of the mean girls at my high school. You know, the ones who come across as super confident and don't care what anyone else thinks. But, behind people's backs they're spreading rumors and scheming. You were quiet, but intense." She still couldn't meet my eyes. She paused for a minute to collect her thoughts.

"But, Tricia and Lark? I knew those girls or I thought I did. They were the fun ones at parties always doing outrageous things and saying what they thought and not caring how other people felt about it. I thought, with them, what you saw was them. And, I think, maybe with Tricia that's true, but it wasn't true with Lark."

"At first it was subtle things like she'd use the last of my toothpaste and then pretend she didn't. Or she'd get my milk out of the fridge and leave it on the counter so it went off. The times when I didn't say anything, she didn't do anything else for a while. But if I tried to call her out? She just did something worse, but more underhanded." Finally, she looked at me and I could see the regret in her eyes.

"She came back from her parent's friend's place one night with these brownies. This was before things got really bad between us, but after I'd told her I thought she should break up with Cal rather than cheating on him all the time." She rolled her eyes and then I watched as they filled with tears. "She set these brownie muffins on the counter and when Tom came in, she said that we should take a couple muffins for later. And I thought, wow, we're turning a corner, she's being so nice." She paused and tried to collect herself as a couple of tears slid down her cheeks.