Page 24 of Falling for my First Crush

“We should go see who it is,” I suggest.

“Yeah, we definitely should,” Jackie says, but not before tilting her head and looking at me for a moment with a gentle thoughtful smile, like she’s considering something in her head; like she wants to say something to me. But then she comes back to the present moment and quickly sets her paintbrush down in a jar of water, standing up. I do the same and follow her out of the family room.

I can already hear the crying as I step into the hallway. I’m not sure that I should get involved in this, but I’ve already come this far. I can’t turn back now. When we get to the entryway, I’m surprised to see that it’s Maia. Jackie seems surprised, too, but she doesn’t hesitate to cross the small space and pull her older sister into a close hug.

“Maia, what’s wrong?” Jackie asks.

Maia tries to control her sobbing but can’t, so we wait in awkward silence while she gulps and hiccups. I feel like I should comfort her, too, but I don’t know how she’d feel about that. I definitely don’t want to overstep my bounds.

“Julius and I…we broke up,” Maia says between sobs.

“Oh no,” Jackie says, though I don’t think she means it. She’s alluded to the fact that she doesn’t think that Julius is such a great guy. “What happened?”

Maia sniffles again. “He just wasn’t who I thought he was. I caught him in a lie, and instead of telling me the truth, he doubled down on the lie. You know how I hate being lied to.”

“That sucks,” Jackie says, rubbing Maia’s back. “Is it a final kind of break-up, or do you think you might get back together?”

“What does that matter?” Maia asks.

“Well, it’ll tell me how much I can drag down Julius. If you aren’t getting back together, I can go full-on scorched Earth; but if you might get back together, I’ll soften my approach,” Jackie says. Maia laughs a little, but the next moment another sob comes out. “Do you want to come paint with me and Joe? It’s very therapeutic.”

“No, thanks,” Maia says. “I’m just going to go out back to get some fresh air.”

Jackie and I are silent as we watch her go. I bite my lower lip. This is my chance. I can feel it in my bones. If I go comfort Maia now, I have a shot at changing her feelings for me. She might start to see me as more than a friend. I can’t let that go to waste.

“Do you think I should go see if Maia is okay?” I ask.

When I glance over at her, I see Jackie’s jaw hanging open in apparent disbelief. “Are you kidding me?” Jackie asks.

I’m confused. “So you don’t think that I should go check on her?” I ask.

This is one of those moments where I feel like I am in a lose-lose situation with Jackie, no matter what I choose. It isn’t like when we were kids, and I could make her laugh to get her out of a bad mood. Now, there doesn’t seem to be anything that I can do. I opened my mouth, and now I must proceed. Unfortunately, I have a feeling it’s not going to end well with Jackie.

“Joe, seriously?” Jackie says.

“What’s wrong? Don’t you want to make sure Maia is okay?” I ask.

“Wow, Joe, that’s a low blow. Of course I want to make sure Maia is okay, but she literally just said that she wanted to get some fresh air. I know she needs a little space,” Jackie says. “She’ll come back in if- and when- she wants to talk.”

“I don’t know,” I say. “Don’t people who have gone through a break-up actually want comfort?”

“And space,” Jackie says.

We lapse into an intense silence, and I feel like I’m in some kind of stand-off. Finally, Jackie takes a step back, and looks at me like she’s challenging me. I’ve seen this look before. When we were younger, the two of us could be incredibly competitive.

“Are we still painting?” she asks.

I don’t know what to say. On one hand, I do want to go back to what we were doing. I was having fun, and something was definitely happening between me and Jackie. I didn’t have time to process the spark, but maybe if we went back, I would. On the other hand, I’ve been in love with Maia my whole life. This might be my only chance to prove it to her. And those old sparks will never go away, I’m convinced, if I don’t see if there’s even a slight possibility that they could ignite into something with Maia.

“Can we postpone it?” I ask, figuring this is a good compromise. We’ll still do the painting, but I can go comfort Maia now.

Jackie stares at me like I’ve lost my mind.

“Just forget it, Joe.”

Then she turns on her heel and stomps down the hall back to the family room. I don’t understand why she’s so mad. We’ll still do the painting. Just, later. And now she doesn’t have to be the only one to comfort Maia. It seems like a win-win to me. I shake my head to clear my thoughts as I head out to the back porch.

Fifteen

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