CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
LINA
A midst all of the chaos that is constantly surrounding our apartment, sometimes there’s calm in the midst of the storm. It’s one we’ve been finding more and more often in the recent weeks.
Since everything happened with Eden and Jack, and then Kara, and then Meredith, it almost makes me feel as though something is looming in the distance, and I’ve been holding my breath waiting for it.
“Have you been using your key?” Kara asks when I sit on the swing beside her.
I don’t know how none of us have noticed before, but last week sometime, Eden and Meredith found a park along the walking trail behind our apartment complex. It has since piqued all of our interests, and we’ve spent quite a bit of time here after class and in whatever spare time we've had.
It was when we were here sometime the other week that I told them about how Grant gave me a key to his place.
“I don’t even have to because he never locks his door.”
While I haven’t technically used it, I have taken the key as a rite of passage to enter his apartment whenever I want.
“So what did he give it to you for then?” Meredith asks from the other swing.
“I think it was more him trying to prove that he trusts me.”
Eden is spinning on the merry-go-round a few feet away. I’ve watched her almost slingshot herself off it at least a dozen times, but she still seems to be having fun. “ I think it was a romantic gesture.”
“Well, he does love me .” It’s been a running joke between us ever since Grant said “I love you” in front of everyone while he was leaving our apartment last week.
Except it’s not a joke. Grant does love me.
Really, they want a reason to tease me about something .
“Yeah, he’s made that fairly obvious.” Meredith rolls her eyes. She pretends to hate it all. She scoffs every time Grant brings us ice cream or cleans the snow off my car for me early in the morning.
But I see the way she glances at us on the couch, or how she lingers in my bedroom doorway a little longer whenever he’s over.
I think it’s because she misses Braxton.
Recently a lot of topics have become off-limits in the house.
After my birthday party, I didn’t talk to Kara for a week, but she broke down in my bedroom one day, crying like I’ve never seen before. It was impossible to continue ignoring her.
It was hard for me to explain to her that I wasn’t mad.
I just didn’t know where to stand. On one hand, I have my best friend, whose life I’d rather not dictate, even though I’m worried for her well-being.
But on the other hand, I have Grant, who thinks it’s his responsibility to not let what happened to his mom repeat itself.
The tension hasn’t fully gone away since then. There’s still this quiet unease, like we’re all pretending not to notice the fracture in the center of the group. Like if we don’t speak it out loud, maybe it’ll heal on its own.
But I know better. Cracks don’t fix themselves. We just like to pretend they will.
For now, though, I draw the attention elsewhere. “What’s going on with you and Braxton?” I ask Meredith.
“Nothing,” she’s quick to reply. Almost too quick, but her casual demeanor covers it up well.
“So, why haven’t you seen him?”
It’s been a month since the fashion show, but I’m not sure how long it’s been since she’s stopped talking to him. A couple weeks, maybe.
“I’m sick,” she says flatly, looking down at her feet while she kicks up patches of mulch. “He doesn’t deserve that. I can’t have him constantly worrying about me. Whether I’m losing weight. Whether I’m eating.”
I don’t want to lecture her, so all I say is, “I think you know him better than that.”
She doesn’t respond because her phone begins buzzing. She ignores it at first. Until it buzzes again. And again.
“Someone’s popular,” Kara teases.
Meredith grabs it, barely glancing at the screen before her expression turns stiff.
“What?” I ask.
Not answering, she squints down at the screen like she’s not sure if what she’s seeing is real.
“What’s wrong?” Eden asks, sitting up straighter now.
Meredith looks at me. I know that look. It’s been passed around enough the past few weeks for me to recognize it. It’s the look she gives when there’s something on the tip of her tongue that she really doesn’t want to say out loud.
She hands me the phone without saying a word.
It’s a screenshot. From Notes of New Haven. A post that already has hundreds of likes and comments. It was posted minutes ago.
APPARENTLY GRANT VANDENBERG ISN’T AS PERFECT AS EVERYONE THINKS.
SOURCES SAY HE’S BACK TO HOOKING UP WITH SAVANNAH SINCLAIR, BUT IN SECRET THIS TIME.
I WONDER IF ANYONE HAS TOLD EVANGELINA…
My heart drops.
Kara leans over to read it, then recoils like she’s touched fire. “What the hell is this?”
Eden grabs the phone from my hands before I can even process the caption, scanning it with a sharp glare. “That’s fake. Right? It has to be.”
Meredith is still quiet. Watching me. Waiting for my reaction.
My throat feels like it’s closing in.
Does she know something? Does Braxton?
For once in my life, I don’t know what the logical response to this situation is. Not when it feels as though my chest is caving in on itself.
“Have they ever posted anything that’s one hundred percent fake?” I counter, my voice sounding completely void.
“You think it’s true?” Kara asks, stunned.
“I don’t know what to think.” I feel my voice cracking. This situation is unraveling in front of me like a ball of yarn rolling down a hill. And I can’t catch up.
“He wouldn’t,” Eden insists, standing like the ground under her is suddenly too unstable. “Grant wouldn’t cheat. Not on you.”
Everything comes rushing back to me, and all my brain can manage to conjure up is not again. Please, not again.
But the post is still there. And now, so is the doubt.
I stare at the swing set. The trees. Anything but them. Anything but the way they’re all looking at me now—careful, uncertain, heartbroken on my behalf. All while I’m trying to convince myself that my reaction isn’t irrational.
Doubt is a normal feeling to have when your boyfriend is accused of cheating on you. It’s not a logical thought process, but it is the brain’s reasonable defense mechanism. It’s how I justify it.
“I have to go,” I tell the girls, standing from the swing and rushing toward the trail leading back to our apartment.
My legs move before my mind catches up to me, and I know the girls are following behind me, but I don’t care. My vision is blurred as the outlines of trees stretch tall and pass quickly.
I should have known better. I should have asked more questions. Trusted less blindly. Not let myself get blindsided like this.
But I didn’t. I let myself come to know love. I grew comfortable with the softness. I let it consume me.
All the while, he made me feel safe just long enough that I would forget to prepare for the fall.