The City | GirlxGirl

twenty ➳

As the weather grew warmer, time grew slower. Every day that Jude ticked off of her mental calendar felt like a chore. Ever since Skylar saw the bruises.

They were mostly gone now. Three weeks after they appeared, and all of them had faded to a light yellow. Unless you looked carefully to see them, you wouldn't notice anything had ever happened.

Good, thought Jude. That was exactly what she wanted.

But she couldn't shake the feeling that now haunted her because someone else knew about her deepest, darkest secret. Screw taking a few hits off of one of her high school stoner's joint in ninth grade because she wanted to fit in. Screw breaking one of her mother's favourite vases and blaming it on her father, who gladly took the blame, and never told her mother the truth. This didn't compare to anything else she had done and told no one.

The secret enough was difficult to carry. It sat on her shoulders, sulking, heavy, pressing all of its weight into Jude's skin. She felt its teeth, its claws, sinking slowly into her skin. She felt herself breaking.

And now, with Skylar having uncovered that secret-one person knowing felt like lifting the corner of a piece of paper; it wasn't much, but it was something-Jude felt one hundred pounds heavier.

Working with Skylar was a nightmare. She avoided eye contact, conversation, and tried her best to take her breaks before the other girl. Jude spent most of the shift talking to their other co-worker, Ben, and sometimes Lloyd, if she worked with him. She knew it annoyed Skylar, especially because Skylar never made an effort to talk to Ben or Lloyd while working with them. Jude was popular, and liked, and yet it seemed to everyone that she didn't like Skylar.

That was far from the truth.

Jude wanted nothing more than to tell Skylar who gave her the bruises. She wanted to tell her that she didn't understand why he did it, and probably never would, and that feeling that comes with having no closure feels like every inch of your skin itches so much you wish you could just peel it all off. She wanted to be pulled into Skylar's arms, the ones that seemed so dangerous and yet so enticing, and be told that it would be okay. That she was safe now. But she couldn't let that happen.

She never wanted to talk about the bruises. She never wanted to talk about Thom again. But she was having a hard time forgetting those eight years that had always been so good. Or had they? Jude remembered all the nights they sat in silence, when she tried to make conversation and he gave her one-worded responses. Or times when, like had happened on their first night in Toronto, Jude told him about the things she loved, and he made fun of her, or put her down in some way.

Had she really been so blind to believe that the past eight years with Thom were the best of her life?

She hated the thought that came into her mind so frequently, whenever she touched her torso: it took him beating me to realize what a terrible man he is.

Three weeks from the day that it had happened-the big epiphany, the climax-Jude decided she would never think about it again.

And that meant ignoring Skylar.

Forever.

-

Jude breathed. Inhale, exhale. Her body flat against the door. Looking at her watch, she saw that it had taken her only ten minutes to walk from the bar, now that the sidewalks were clear of snow and ice. There were beads of sweat forming on Jude's forehead, and she wondered if it was from the walk home, or from seeing Skylar right before she left.

"Jude?"

Jumping, Jude held her hand to her chest, feeling the thrum of it against her skin. Blair was never home in the early evenings. Or if she was, she was with her boyfriend, and she'd "warn" Jude before, as she called it. Looking at the neat pile of shoes sitting beside the doorframe, Jude saw that Blair was alone.