Rose's Journal

Chapter 18: The Aftermath

FLYNN:
After chasing down Julie down the street, just hoping she'd reconsider, she walked home alone. Every couple of steps, she'd look back, hoping to find Julie there behind her, coming back to make amends or apologize or come scream at her again. She didn't care, she just wanted Julie back. When she got home, she broke down again, coming to the realization that Julie wasn't going to come back to her. She sobbed out on her front porch for a while, just wallowing in her own pity from how things went with Julie. She collected herself to the best of her ability walked inside to see that neither her dad nor her stepmom were home, so she just went up to her room and laid down on her bed staring at the ceiling. How did shit get so messed up? Flynn asked herself as she watched her ceiling fan spin. That usually eased her mind, but tonight, nothing would work. She might've just lost her best friend, the only person in her life she knew she could rely on for anything all because she wanted to help her. She wished she could go back and never join the boys.

She sat up and looked across her room and her eye was immediately drawn to her dream box. Carrie, Julie, and she all made them back when they were friends, and it was their own special thing they always brought to their group meetings when they shared lyrics. She walked over to it and grabbed it. She hadn't looked inside of hers in a while, but she needed that to remember simpler times in that moment. She sat back down on her bed and opened the box and began to look through the lyrics. They were all cheesy and stupid and brought a smile to her face. She saw the ones written by Julie where she put hearts over all the i's and wrote them in glittery ink. She read through most of them, then she found a picture. It was a picture of Julie and her mom and Flynn and her mom when they were in the second grade. It made her remember why she did it: all the secrets and the lies. It was so Julie could have closure, which is something that Flynn was never going to have since her mom ran out on them. She wanted Julie to stop feeling that pain of knowing things would remain unsolved. No matter how far it pushed Julie away, Flynn needed to fix this. Julie may not see it now, but Flynn knew she needed to do this to help her.

JULIE:

Julie got home with tear stains still on her face from the walk home. To find out that four of the people she cared most about in her life lied to her about something this extreme made her feel sick, angry, and devastated all at the same time. She walked into the house to find her dad editing photos at the dining room table.

"Mija, what's wrong?" Ray asked, looking at his daughter in tears. Julie broke into sobs again, and her dad got up and ran over to her, holding her in his arms. "Julie, it's okay. I have you," Ray said, squeezing her tightly. Julie began to quiet down after a few minutes, and Ray let go of her, "Are you ready to tell me what's going on?" Ray asked softly.

"It's just that.. Flynn... my friends..." Julie's voice began to break again, and her dad put his hand on her shoulder, "They're going behind my back and lying to me. And these lies can really hurt people, and they already have."

Ray responded, "I don't know what I can tell you here. All I can say is that you need to talk to them. Try to get to the bottom of whatever happened. You choose good people to keep in your life, and I don't think they would hurt you or other people on purpose. I know Flynn would never."

Julie sighed. Deep down, she knew her dad was right, but right now, she couldn't get past her hurt feelings. "I will talk to them," Julie replied, "I'm just not ready right now."

Ray removed his hand from his daughter's arm, "I understand that. I just hope everything gets fixed, but make sure you're willing to listen." He pulled Julie in for another hug. "Are you okay now?"

"I'm going to be. Thanks." Julie replied, "I think I'm going to just go to the studio for a bit and play. I think that will make me feel better."

"Okay," Ray said, "I'm right here if you need me.