Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
TOM PETTY, “FREE FALLING”
Gabby
The elephant wasn’t in the corner of the room; the elephant was the entire room. In fact, there wasn’t even a room. Just a big, fat elephant.
As soon as Olivia left for breakfast Sunday morning, I hopped down from my bunk bed and called my sister, Sarah. We weren’t Catholic, so confession wasn’t our thing. Baptism and daily prayer sufficed for our religion. But after the events of the previous two days, I needed to clear my conscience.
“Hello?” Isaac answered.
“I need to talk to Sarah,” I said, while nibbling on my thumbnail and pacing the room as far as the telephone cord would allow.
He chuckled. “Good morning to you, too, Gabby. Just a sec. She’s a little indisposed.”
“Indispo—” I cringed.
They were having sex.
Sarah giggled. “Hey, Gabbs. What’s up?”
“Sorry to interrupt.”
“You’re fine. What’s up?”
I tried to organize my thoughts into a coherent story with the events in order, proper punctuation, and delineated dialogue, but it came out as one big word vomit. “Matt had a party and removed my shirt. Then I worried a kiss might be next. So Ben showed me how to kiss on the mouth, which was really nice of him, but then after discovering I’m the most boring person on the planet and Die Hard has a lot of swear words, Matt leaned forward, and I thought he was going to kiss me, so I turned and pressed my lips to his. But that was all wrong because I don’t think he was planning on that. Then Ben showed up and the next thing I knew he was smearing ice cream on my face with his, and then he licked it off and then we kissed. Like we totally really kissed like licking peanut butter from a spoon. Then the door opened and I ran to my room. But I can’t tell Olivia because she likes Ben. And I like Matt, and I’m sorry if that upsets you, but he was always too good for you anyway, and I’m not trying to be mean. It’s just a fact. At least I thought it was factual, now I don’t know anything because stupid Ben kissed me. And now I don’t know what to say to him because he’s my best friend, but I can’t tell my best friend that I kissed my best friend, and so you need to tell me what to do.”
Silence— such a long pause.
“Sarah?”
She cleared her throat. “Uh, yeah. Sorry. I’m still here. I’m just processing all of that because it was a lot of information.”
“Sorry.” I turned in several circles to unwrap the phone cord from my body.
“Matt as in Isaac’s brother?”
“Duh. Yes.”
“Okay. Wow! Well, this is unexpected. And frankly, I’m not happy to hear that he removed your shirt.”
“If I wanted a lecture, I’d call Mom. You’re not allowed to judge me. It’s in the Bible, and you are far from innocent. Besides, it wasn’t how it sounds. I had beer on my shirt.”
“You’re drinking too?”
“No. It wasn’t my beer,” I said with frustration wrapped around each word.
“How did you and Matt even start hanging out?”
“Stop! This isn’t about Matt. Well, it’s a little about him, but mostly it’s about Ben.”
She chuckled. “Gabby, everyone knew you’d end up with Ben.”
“What?” I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at it for a few seconds.
“Gabby, Ben looks at you like you’re the second coming of Christ.”
“You haven’t seen Ben in forever.”
“Not true. I saw him at your graduation, and I talked to him at your graduation party. I write songs about guys who look at girls like he looks at you.”
“You have no idea how he looks at me.”
“I do because as we speak, a certain guy is giving me the same look.”
They were totally having sex.
“I like Matt. I like him more than you ever did. And I like him more than his ex-girlfriend,” I said like any of that mattered, like it had something to do with Ben. And I knew Sarah wouldn’t argue with me about Matt while Isaac was in the same room.
“Maybe you like him the same. I liked him, too, but fell in love with his brother. You supposedly like him, but kissed Ben. Perhaps there’s something about Matt that’s not quite the right fit for any Jacobson girl.”
“Or I’m just confused because I’ve been saving myself for him, and in the process I missed out on kissing and hand-holding, and all the stuff everyone else does in high school. So I’m making up for lost time, and right now, Ben’s the only one who’s willing to kiss me.”
“Babe, go make coffee,” Sarah said to Isaac.
Then I heard a smack like they were kissing.
“You’re going to fuck this up,” Sarah said.
I bristled at her profanity.
“Excuse my language, but I don’t know how else to say this to you. Ben’s the one.”
“The fact that you think you have to tell me this just proves he’s not the one. Nobody had to tell you that Isaac was the one.”
“Isaac did. He relentlessly told me in a million subtle and a few not-so-subtle ways. But I had it in my head that Matt was the one for me. The whole town thought he was the one for me. But Isaac really saw me. He brought passion to my life. Despite my resistance. Despite my brain telling me he wasn’t the one. He. Was. It.”
I sat in my desk chair on a big sigh. “Well, I’m not you.”
“Then why are you calling me? Are you looking for my blessing to be with Matt? You’ve got it. Good luck with that.”
“I just want someone to be happy for me. I’ve liked Matt for so long. And now, I actually have a chance with him. And Ben’s messing with my head. And you’re on Ben’s side. I need someone to be on my side. Ugh! I should have called Eve.”
Sarah blew out a long breath. “You’re right. I’m sorry. You like Matt. I get it. He’s a nice guy. Smart. Talented. And his brother’s good in bed. There’s really no reason you shouldn’t like him.”
“Stop,” I said, trying not to giggle. “Why must you make everything about you? Everyone knows Isaac is good in bed.” I blushed just talking about sex. “I’ve heard you two when you come home for the holidays.”
“Yeah, well, take notes. If you can’t stop thinking about him, then he might be the one. But if he makes you scream, toes curling, body shaking, mind-blowing ecstasy, then he’s definitely the one. As long as he looks at you like you’re the only girl in the world. Understood?”
“Understood,” I grumbled.
“And just for the record, he wasn’t too good for me. You can like Matt. You may even decide you love him. But he doesn’t belong on a pedestal. He’s not the god you need to worship. And you are not the most boring person on the planet. Now, I gotta go. Don’t you have church?”
I looked at the time. “I suppose.”
“I won that bet,” she said.
“What bet?”
“Isaac said there was no way you were at a public college and still going to church on Sunday since Mom and Dad wouldn’t know if you didn’t go. But I said you were absolutely still going to church.”
“Well, I might not go today because Ben usually goes with me, but now I don’t know if he’ll want to go with me after what happened last night.”
Sarah laughed. “Yes, Gabby, I bet after kissing the girl he’s loved for approximately eternity , he won’t be in the mood to go to church with you.”
It was too confusing to think about Ben loving me like that because I risked a lot to follow the man of my dreams to college, having no idea if he could ever feel the same about me. And Ben was supposed to be my friend, supporting me, not loving me like that or kissing me like he did.
“Thanks for no help.”
“Gabby.” Sarah sighed. “I love you. And I’ll support you no matter what. Just be yourself, and everything will work out how it’s supposed to.”
“And who am I?” It sounded like a dumb question, but after that kiss, I wasn’t sure.
“You’re kind. Everyone knows it. If you’re kind, then you and everyone else will be fine.”
I wasn’t so sure.
“Okay,” I said.
“See you at Thanksgiving. I’m here if you need anything.”
“Thanks. Bye.”
“Bye, Gabbs.”
I hung up the phone, grabbed my toiletry bag, and opened the door to head to the bathroom.
“Oh!” I jumped, not expecting Ben to be on the other side.
“We should talk.”
Pressing my lips together, I nodded several times. “I don’t know why that happened. And I don’t want things to be weird. Do they have to be weird?”
“What do you mean you don’t know why?” He squinted.
“I mean, I know we’re just friends, so maybe it’s because I pushed you to show me how to kiss, or maybe we’re both adjusting to being away from home. So that’s what I mean.”
He studied me for a few seconds. I did not know what I meant because his proximity made me nervous and warm. That kiss ruined us. How would I ever look at him the same way again?
“I need to use the bathroom, wash my face, and get ready for church. Are you going?”
“So that’s it? It happened. It’s no big deal? Unknown cause?”
“Yep,” I murmured.
“Because you like Matt.”
I nodded. “And you like Olivia.”
Ben stared over my head with a faraway gaze toward the window in my dorm room. “Fine,” he whispered.
“Give me fifteen minutes. Have you had breakfast?”
He slowly brought his attention back to me. “Yeah, but I’ll eat again with you.”
I smiled. “Thanks.” On instinct, I reached for his chest to rest my palm on it like I had done so many times before, but it suddenly felt too personal, so I just as quickly returned my hand to my side and brushed past him to the bathroom.
That day, something died between us.