On The Plus Side

23// death via falafel

"Want to go out on Saturday? As friends."

I mulled Victor's words over in my head and groan, flicking open the bottle of olive oil and drizzling it over the cut up potatoes. He was going to drive me insane at this rate. It was like everything he did suggested he liked me back, but I knew he didn't. How had he been so impossibly calm about asking me "out", when I had butterflies shooting guns in my stomach?

It sucked. I felt like I was standing in the middle of a blizzard, but I still felt so impossibly warm, which was disturbing. After all, you don't realize you have a fever until you're burning in the snow.

"Damn it." I hiss, quickly placing the bottle of olive oil down. The potatoes were swimming in oil due to my lost train of thought. I ruined dinner, how wonderful.

But on the bright side, he had opened up to me. There was a small part of me that wished I was still in the dark about everything he had went through as a child. It was probably out of fear that when the time came, I wouldn't be able to help him. Fear of abandoning him and making him suffer the same fate he had suffered once before.

"No." I angrily shove the potatoes in the oven after thoroughly seasoning them with an army of seasoning. "I promise I won't let him down. I promise I will be there no matter what."

I scoff, shaking my head. Look at me, talking to myself in the kitchen. To anyone I would probably seem crazy. Just me, myself, and my oily potatoes.

Somewhere, my phone rings. I follow the sound and find it lying on the table surrounded by my calculus homework and Connect Four markers. The screen reads Cass, and I immediately answer.

"Hey." I greet my big sister.

"Hi Eva!" She sounds abnormally cheerful. "Where's Mom? I've been trying to contact her all day to ask her about the flower arrangements for the wedding."

"Haven't seen her." I respond, tucking the phone between my shoulder and ear while checking on the chicken on the stove. "I'll let her know you called when I see her."

"Thanks, little sis." Something bangs in the background, and there's the sound of a dog barking. "Have you started working on your maid of honor speech?"

"Wha- of course!" I bluff, leaning against the counter, glad she couldn't see my face or else she'd see right through my lie. Cass asks me about school, life, and hobbies. I respond to each question, grinning like a fool at the sound of my older sisters voice. "Hey, can I ask you something?"

"You just did." She replies. I roll my eyes even though she can't see me.

"What... what is love?"

There's a long silence on her end of the line. "Is this about your boyfriend?" She asks, enunciating the B word. I cringe at the word, still guilty for lying to my family and still embarrassed at the prospect if Victor knowing about it.

"No, I just... want to know what you feel when you spend time with Leo. It's for an English essay." I lie smoothly. Cass sighs on the other end.

"Well, love is a lot of things. It's not about kissing someone and being kissed back, per say. To me it's the flow of electricity going through your body when you so much as think about them. It's the person you look at and know you want them in every one of your memories." Cass breathes in deeply. "To me, Leo is the love of my life because I know I want to spend every day waking up besides him. It means companionship and it will show you pain, but it's the touch of color in a grey world."

"Damn Cass, ever thought of becoming a poet?" I breathe in at her words.

She laughs. "No, they don't make good bank. Anyway, I'm not like, Rupi Kaur or anything."