Page 88 of Hitting the Goal Line
If it was any other time, and I was at a game and she wasn’t, she would have demanded that I switch her over to FaceTime so that she could experience every single second of the game too. Even if it was through a screen. I guess times change.
“Yeah, I will,” I say, sounding defeated and feeling like, not only did I let the girl of my dream slip through my fingers, but feeling as if I’m losing my best friend. “Thanks for calling, Soph.”
“Of course. It wouldn’t be Christmas without at least talking to you,” she says after a few seconds of silence. Is it just me or does she sound sad?
“Right,” I say, because I can’t come up with anything else.
“I have to go,” she says again, this time in a lot more of a hurry. “Merry Christmas, Blakie.”
“Merry Christmas, Soph,” I say into the phone and not even a second later, the call ends and I’m left feeling all type of ways.
The call and hearing her voice were supposed to help me get over my mood and start enjoying myself, but instead, my mood just got worse.
As I pocket my phone, my knuckles grace the small cardboard box that I’ve been carrying around since yesterday in hopes that my best friend would show up out of nowhere, and I’d be able to give it to her.
Taking the box out, I look down at it for a second before opening it.
Inside, are two small pictures of the two of us, cut up into little circles so that they would fit perfectly into the locket I gave her all those years ago.
The pictures have never been changed, so I thought this would be the year that she could do that.
I look down at the two little pictures, seeing us wearing smiles and embracing each other like we never wanted to let go and feel a sharp ping in my chest.
This is it. My worst nightmares are finally coming true.
For years, I was afraid of telling Sophia of how I felt about her because I didn’t want to lose her. Yet, here I am, not having said a single word to her about my feelings, and it feels like I’ve lost her anyway.
I’m losing my best friend.
And I fucking hate it.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
SOPHIA
A tear rolls downat my face as I look at the screen of my phone go black, after ending the call with Blake a lot faster than I wanted to.
For a while now, I’ve been feeling like a part of me has been missing. Like a giant hole opened up in the ground, sucked me in and I lost everything that made memeand I’ve been trying to find myself ever since. That feeling intensified yesterday morning, and it went from something being missing to something being ripped away from me.
And that feeling intensified as I talked to Blake.
Especially with all the lies that I told him.
A few weeks ago, Elijah told me that what we were doing for Christmas. Told, not asked.
It didn’t matter that I already had plans to fly to San Francisco with Blake and his family, to spend Christmas with them and attend Hunter’s game. It didn’t matter that my parents already had plans to go visit my grandparents in Boston and had asked me to go with them before flying to California. He didn’tcare. Elijah just made plans for the both of us and expected me to go along with them.
I wasn’t going to at first, but then I thought about it.
I thought about what would happen if I made him angry again. For the last two months, I’ve been doing everything that he has wanted, everything that he has asked of me, all so that he won’t get mad and do to me what he did back in October.
So far, it has worked, he hasn’t put his hands on me again. Not like he did that night.
Part of me thinks that it’s because he really meant his apology and meant when he said it was never going to happen again. The other part of me is saying it’s because of how I’ve been acting around him, and for all I know, one wrong move and his apology and his promise is in the trash.
Everything in me wants it to be the former, but deep down, I know what the truth is, even if I can’t admit it to myself.
So I said yes to spending the holidays with his parents, while Blake went to California with his family and my parents went to Boston. I lied to Blake about my parents being here and I told my parents that I was having the time of my life. When in reality, this is probably one of the worst Christmas that I have ever had.
