Just Roll With It: a Just Us novel (28 page)

"Maybe you would," he says gently to me. Too gently.

"So when am I going to—" I get cut off.

"Damn it. I don't know yet, Rigbee. I have to go, though."

"I love you, Roman."

"You shouldn't." Then I hear the click, indicating the end of the call, and the end of so much more.

"Thomas was there," Willow tells me.

"Thomas was where?"

After an entire day of lying in bed crying, I decided it was time to do something to take my mind off things. In hindsight, having lunch with Willow was not the best way to do so.

"At the accident. He was driving about a mile back. They were leaving from the same party."

"Oh. Shit."

"Oh, shit, is right," she says while fiddling with her silverware and napkin. "He was first to see the crash and was the one who called the police. He found her under her car. He's so messed up right now. Malik told me he won’t even talk. Like, to anyone."

"I also heard at the party she had just got done telling Thomas how happy she was for Roman. You know, because she heard how he is finally happy and doing good. An amends of sorts."

"Well, he's not doing so good anymore. He's talking, but not to me. He said he needed space," I tell her, as I fight the bubble forming in my throat.

"Ouch."

"Yeah." I sigh. "Did you know him back then? When they were dating?"

"I knew him, but not very well. Just in passing at paintball events and stuff. I did hear about the mess that went down with them in high school though."

"What do you mean? What sort of mess?" I ask, having never heard the story before.

"When they broke up. I'm sure you know." She shrugs it off casually.

"Actually, I don't know much about what happened. He doesn't like to talk about it. All he said was it was mutual. They both decided to …”

"Hold up." She puts her hand up, stopping me right there. "Um, no. It was not mutual. She broke his heart. I might not have known him well, but I do know he was crushed by the whole thing. So much so he almost got kicked off the team."

"Why would he have got kicked off the team?" I wonder to her, confused by what one has to do with the other.

"From what I heard, he didn't care about anything anymore. He stopped performing, they started losing. Simple."

"Huh. I wonder why he didn't want me to know?"

"Maybe he was embarrassed a girl had so much of an effect on him."

"Yeah, maybe. Even now," I admit.

Sympathy falls over her face as she echoes, "Yeah, even now."

When I get home from lunch, I decide to try talking to Enzo about the whole thing. He is in a similar situation with Marty so I thought maybe he would have some solid advice. He thought it would be a good idea to go to a small party Lawrence was having Willow had told me about. He thought I could do some beerboarding, which he told me means getting some info on Roman from his friends while they are sufficiently intoxicated. We knew Roman and Thomas wouldn't be there, due to the circumstances, so I agreed.

I knew everyone there and would go as far as to consider them my friends, so I was caught completely off-guard when I started to feel the attack coming on.

I was sitting down by Lawrence and he asked me what I wanted to drink. I panicked. I don't know why, it just happened. I looked around the room, paralyzed with the fear of not being in my comfort zone. I had no control of the situation. I couldn't breathe. Lawrence asked me if I was okay. Enzo heard him from across the room and knew exactly what was happening. He got me up and out of there before the hyperventilating began. He told everyone I had gotten a migraine. It's second nature for him, but he hasn't had to in a while. I haven't had an attack in almost seven months. Not since Roman.

"Here, take them and drink it." Enzo hands me the glass of water he must've poured while I was changing into my yoga pants. He walked in my room without knocking, a worried expression written on his face. One I used to see all the time. In one hand is my bottle of meds. I used to keep them in my purse at all times, but lately I haven't needed them so they were in the medicine cabinet with everything else.

"Thanks," I mutter as I take my bottle.

I open the lid and tilt the container. Two little blue pills slide into my hand. It's something I've done many times. A trivial movement that muscle memory won't let me forget. It's funny how an inconsiderable gesture can have such an impact on your frame of mind. It's as if I've been taken back. Back to the broken girl who panics when people talk to her. Back to square one. I was getting better and now I'm not.

The pills taste bitter on my tongue as they dissolve. The progress I've made throughout the year disintegrates with the pills, and I shatter. Despite the many times I've denied it, I am glass.

Enzo crawls into my bed and wraps his arms around me, like he's done many times. This time, however, he is unaware of the significance those tiny pills carry. Two pills and ten giant steps backward on the crooked path I was formerly moving forward on.

The blissful wave of my meds kick in, and my eyes fall heavy. I drift to sleep with the wrong guy holding me. The wrong guy trying to save me. Then again, if the right guy was here, I wouldn't need saving in the first place. 

Timing is a bitch. Too bad timing is the only other factor that really matters when you're in love. It's been a week and a half now, and I haven't heard from him. Not once. If it weren't for Willow, I wouldn't be holding up so well. I am not holding up so well now, but if it weren't for her I would be much worse.

We have hung out almost every day this week. She comes over to my apartment; I never go to her house. I don't know what's going on, but I get the feeling she likes getting away from her house at night. She's keeping me updated on certain things. For example, Roman going out last weekend. She wasn't there, but she hears things. She told me if she would have been there, Roman would have lost at least one of his balls. Turns out he's been hanging around with a girl nobody knows. If what we're doing truly is just space, then I'm not okay with his behavior.

When I call him to ask about it, he doesn't answer. I'm being told she is a study buddy or lab partner for his chem class, so I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt, for now. Willow, however, says she heard they were looking awfully chummy.
Thank you, Malik. Good looking out.
It really helps when Malik goes to every party and then goes home to the same place Willow lives. He can't keep much from her, especially when she bombards him the next morning.

No one seems to think Malik is much of a threat. Everyone trusts him. They talk and do stuff around him with little to no regard of the possibility Willow could find out. I heard someone make a joke once about him being able to keep a secret. Maybe it's because they all think they know his big secret and have something on him. A secret for a secret, I guess. Funny thing about secrets, they are not secrets anymore if more than one person knows about it. Or if you are shamelessly flaunting it all around the goddamn city. 

It's hard to admit a girl fucked me so bad. Amy did, though. I was young, and I held her on a pedestal. I didn't listen to anyone when they told me she was conceited or selfish. Or cheating on me. I knew her better. Better than anyone. I thought.

I started slacking off a little when we were dating, but I got my game back. Until I found out for myself when I found her with another guy. I didn't care about anything afterward. My grades which were already suffering from my hectic paintball schedule, and balancing paintball with a girlfriend, completely tanked. Who the fuck cared? I sure as hell didn't.

It wasn't until I was told I was getting kicked off the team for good and I wasn't going to graduate for me to snap out of it. I turned it around. I started to care again. I found focus in other things. My mom had always told me Amy wasn't good for me, but I thought it was a
Waterboy
moment, like when the mom tells Adam Sandler girls are the devil.

Turns out she wasn't the devil; she was just a girl. A girl who is now gone. It happened in an instant. One moment she's talking to my brother, the next she's dead. I can't wrap my head around the idea of being with Rigbee and then suddenly not. I'm being ripped apart just thinking about her. It would be too much. It would break me from the inside out, destroying the last part of me not already tainted. It's better to cut my emotions off now than it is to lose her later. Because you always lose. One way or another, at some point you will lose.

I didn't know the Shana chick I'm studying with right now knew Rigbee, or how they have a history. I wouldn't have agreed to partner if I had. I may be an asshole, but I am not cruel. Shana was picked as my lab partner on a day I skipped.
Yeah, you heard me right, I skipped.
Shocking, huh? I preach the importance of getting good grades and yet, it is what it is.

I couldn't go to class the day after I told Rigbee I needed space. After working with Shana for a couple of days, I had decided on a plan. I figured I could use this, use
her
, to push Rigbee further. Bug loved me too much to let me go easy. As vain as I sound, it's the truth.