My Best Friend’s Brother

Julie walks into the room, and from the look on her face, I know this will not turn out well for me.

”You shouldn’t have done that, Chris. You better apologize this time.”

I stand up and say:

”She doesn’t want to talk to me. And apologize for what? I didn’t do anything!”

”Exactly! Did you know?”

I turn around and sit down on my bed again. What did they want me to do anyway?

I say to Julie:

”I’m sure you have doubted that guy’s attitude, haven’t you?”

She is surprised at what I say, but then she comes and sits down next to me. She then says:

”Maybe.”

Then we are silent. Julie asks:

”That day you came here with the eye hurting, was it, Colin?”

I take a deep breath. I know Molly told her.” Julie continues after my affirmative silence:

” I know it must not have been as she assumed for me. I know you were defending her because I know you.”

She looks at me for a while, and I look down at my hands on my knees. She puts her hand on my shoulder and says:

”I’m going to talk to her. Just give her some time. I know she will understand that none of this was your fault. I don’t want the two people I love most in the world to be mean to each other like this.”

I end up smiling, and Julie leaves me alone after that.

…

A few days later…

I don’t know how Molly is doing, and she would rather see anyone in the world but me. I tried to talk to her the other day when we were getting off in the elevator, but she just asked me not to address her.

…

My phone rings.

”Really? What do you mean? When did this happen?”

…

While I am packing my bags, Julie comes into the room and says:

”How long will you be staying there?”

”I don’t know. Maybe a fortnight.”

My friend Sam was in a car accident, and in the phone call, he said he had broken both his legs, and I needed to go to New York to help him out.

We used to share an apartment in the city, and he is one of my best friends since he doesn’t have any of his family around.

I’m going to stay there for a few days to help out.

Sam has a girlfriend, but she works, so I’m going to take these fifteen days of vacation from my job to travel there.

…

Julie says goodbye to me, and as soon as we arrive at our apartment’s front door, Molly comes out.

Julie says that she forgot something inside. I know she only did this because she knows that Molly needs to solve these problems soon.

Everyone has noticed how dull she is walking around. And the bad thing is that I can’t do anything. She won’t let me do anything.

She looks like she wants to turn around and return to her apartment, but I hold her arm, and she stops there.

I say:ConTEent bel0ngs to Nôv(e)lD/rama(.)Org .

”Look, I know you asked me not to talk to you, and I swear I will respect that. Not least because I’m going away for a while and you won’t have to see me all the time.”

I swear that she didn’t seem to like this idea for a moment, but she quickly tried to disguise her surprise with that bitter look in her eyes.

I see that her cell phone is in her hands, so I pick it up, and she watches me do it and continues as I type my number into it:

”But if you need to talk to someone and decide you want to talk to me, call me anytime.”

She looks at me, still sad, and I hate that she is like this. I smile at her, and she doesn’t smile at me back and head for the elevator when Julie arrives.

She stands there staring at us. And it scares me the way I hate to see her like that.

… Molly…

I wish the ground would open up, fall into a vast hole, bury myself there, and never have to see anyone again.

I know it sounds morbid, but so what? I’ve been feeling this way since I got up today and realized how swollen my eyes are. After all, I cried yesterday.

How could I have been such an idiot? Worst is to imagine that Chris knew all about it and how much fun he must have had with my face. Knowing that, I was deceived by the guy I loved the most. Thinking about it, about everything Colin did, makes me feel even worse, and I think I will cry again.

…

I left Julie’s house yesterday so I wouldn’t have to play the fool anymore, even more, when Chris tried to play nice so that I would fall for him like a fool.

I had a long talk with Colin because even though I didn’t want to hear it, I let him dump that bunch of excuses so that afterward, he wouldn’t come to me to do it anymore.

I pretended to hear everything, but I just wanted to jump on that neck of his and strangle him little by little so that it would hurt the same way it was hurting inside me.

As soon as he seemed to finish his forgiveness speech, I said it was all over, took my wedding ring off my finger, and held out my hand to him.

He gave me a furious look after that and said with a wry laugh:

” I guess this is what you wanted all along. Finally, be free to go running after that piece of shit over there!”

A growing hatred started to take over me after hearing this.