Page 57 of Falling Backwards
Well, she’s never mentioned it.
But neither have I, and….
She turns away and starts walking again.I shake off that last thought and join her, more ready than ever to get into a drink and my gummy worms.And some bar food later, too, if Maggie is interested.
We both love eggs Benedict, right?Maybe we can agree on something else as well.
M A G G I E
After another hour, I still can’t quite believe we’re going along with Joy’s idea.
I spent a good couple minutes resisting in the bathroom.Scared though I was, the fact remained that Luke isn’t my favorite person, plus I was very sure there was no way he’d agree to help me even if I did ask.However, Joy held fast to our ibuprofen encounter; she swore it was proof we could get along if we had a mind to.She had real faith that there was a chance the plan could work—after all, we’d only need it to work for a little while.So I decided to trust her.Emma and Paxton did, too, after the former leveled serious brown eyes on me and made sure it was the option I wanted to explore.
All I needed was Luke.
I was so nervous to talk to him.So upset that I even felt like I had to.
Him not shutting me down was as much an insane relief as it was a surprise.
In the little phone booth area, I genuinely thought for a second that he was being a jerk about the whole thing, that he was going to dismiss my fear of Kyle and say I was overreacting.I would’ve loved to be overreacting, but I couldn’t shake my sharp unease, and because I couldn’t shake it, I didn’t want Luke to roll his eyes at me and tell me to quit being a drama queen.‘The dude’s not following you, Magnolia,’I didn’t want him to say.‘The world doesn’t revolve around you.He’s just innocently living his life.’
But he hadn’t been responding that way at all.In my stressed state, I read him wrong.
Although I didn’t dwell on it, a small part of me wondered how many times I might have read him wrong in the past and just never got around to noticing.
In any case, I’m glad my desperation for a solution yielded some kind of result, because Kyle is still here.He hasn’t tried to talk to me again, but I swear I can feel his eyes burning holes in the back of my head every now and then.
My group has moved to one of the rounded corner booths; it’s bigger than the regular booth we were in, which allows all of us to sit together.I’m between Luke and Emma, who is next to Paxton, who would be next to Joy if she weren’t off doing some flirting of her own with a guy who sent a paid-for birthday drink to our table a little while ago.
So, lingering shock and nervousness aside, I’m slightly more comfortable than before.It helps to be this much farther from Kyle and instead be near Luke, whose presence is as weirdly reassuring as intended, even if it does make that half of my body feel extremely warm.
Things with us are still on the…inelegant…side.There’s no way for them not to be.This isn’t anything we dreamed we’d do together.We haven’t even sat this close to each other in forever.But we’re trying not to be obvious about it, and we’re helped along by things like drinks and friends who are supportive of our temporary truce.
In fact, it was oddly easy for the two of us to talk about the entire Kyle story.
I really can’t put into words how it has felt for Luke to take me seriously about this.
I was able to clarify that although I technically have seen Kyle five times in less than a week, the Mellow Burger one wasn’t his fault.The way he acted that day was what prickled at me: him knowing my name without me offering it, and him mentioning my spilled drink from the night before when I didn’t know he saw that, and then him grabbing my hand.Plus, of course, how I later found out he knew I was eating spicy fries and that he eavesdropped on us girls.
Luke was patient while I explained that and everything else.He said he thinks I should call the police once I’m home safe and see what they have to say.He doesn’t imagine there could be a downside to that since Kyle knows so many of the places I frequent—especially since I recalled him leaving Lucent the other day with,‘I’ll see you soon, Maggie,’and then last night happened, and now here he is tonight.
Every now and again, the way Luke is supporting me almost reminds me of how we used to—
“All right,” he says measuredly, turning to me, “is there any way you couldnotchew on your straw like that?Watching you do it is making my fucking teeth hurt.”
I pause mid-chew and cut a sharp look at him.
He raises an eyebrow at me, then cuts his own pointed look at my margarita.
The niceties had to weaken at some point, I guess.
And I guess I’d been chewing the straw out of distracted nervousness.It wasn’t intentional, unlike….
I take it out of my mouth.“Well, guess what?Myteeth hurt earlier when I sat here and watched you devour that entire bag of gummy worms.”
“That’s not really the same thing.”
