Chapter 36
Wes spins around, ready to fight. “What the hell?”
“Do not touch my friends.” I’m not as tall as him or Anya, but I draw myself up to my full height and put myself between them. Anya and Mari are staring, shocked, but I think I also detect a hint of pride as the faintest of smiles ripples across Anya’s face.
“I barely touched her! She was literally spitting in my face.” Wes is trying to wipe up all the beer with his hand and the dry parts of his shirt. “Can we talk somewhere else, please? Away from them?”
“I think right here is fine.” I refuse to move.
What I have to say I want Anya and Mari to be close enough to hear.
Wes looks annoyed, uncomfortable, like he’s been caught out.
His eyes dart around to identify any exit routes, a hostage plotting his escape.
I take a deep breath and try to summon the courage to get out what I’ve been needing to say for ages now.
“You know, Wes, I really thought we could have had something. A big love. You have a knack for making life so fun, for making the little things feel significant, for making me feel better when I’m down, but I’m not okay with the little things anymore.
I’m not okay with being led on and strung along and placated with maybes and somedays.
I’m not okay with trying so hard to act like I’m cool with it to impress you, make you love me back. ”
“Jesus, Sora, what’s the issue? I thought we were good. You know how I feel about you.” Wes is exasperated, dripping a puddle of beer where he stands.
“Do I?” I cross my arms. “I’m not a mind reader.
All I know is you’ve never acted like I was a priority.
I choose you above everything else, over and over again, and you only choose me when it’s convenient.
When it’s fun. Love isn’t one-sided like this.
Love isn’t just words. Love is making sure someone knows how much you care.
It’s planting ten thousand lemon trees.”
“Lemon trees? What does that even mean?” Wes is annoyed.
“It means I’m done. I don’t want to see you anymore.
Nothing ever changes with you, and the one thing I can count on is how I’m always left feeling like absolute garbage every time I think things are finally happening with us.
I thought I loved you, but I’ve finally gotten to the point where I want to love me more. ”
It’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to say to anyone. Wes is standing there, head hanging, his arms dangling at his sides. He looks almost… dejected. And while I wish I wouldn’t have needed to say all those things, I don’t exactly want to take it back, either.
Anya and Mari rush up and wrap me in a hug. In my periphery, a small group of Wes’s friends are walking up to us. It becomes apparent fairly quickly that they’ve overheard most of my big speech. And it’s also clear that they don’t think very much of it.
“Told you she wasn’t worth wasting any time on, man. Come on, let’s go.” His friend Graham narrows his eyes at me as he slaps a hand on Wes’s shoulder.
Freddy adds his two cents. “You can find a girl who sends actual nudes instead of those tame lingerie photos. Literally a dime a dozen.”
“Shut up, Freddy,” Wes hisses.
But it’s too late. I’ve heard everything. My gut sinks so low inside me.
“Are you serious, Wes?” I flush hot. Wes had shared the private photos I sent him with all his friends? He was making fun of me with them?
Wes doesn’t even have the decency to admit it. He just stares at an imaginary spot on the ground. I’m so furious I’m shaking, and he can’t even look me in the eye. Can’t even apologize.
“You guys are pigs,” Mari spits. Everyone freezes. Sweet, innocent Mari hurling insults is something you don’t see every day. In the moment, I’m so thankful to have my friends here, estranged or not, to defend me.
“Pigs!” Anya seconds her. She grabs an abandoned drink from a nearby table and throws it at Freddy. The liquid hits him right in the face.
Mari, feral, grabs two more drinks, one in each hand, and douses Wes and Graham individually.
“Psycho bitch!” Freddy yells as he shields his face.
“You first!” I scream, then wait until he lowers his arm before dousing him yet again, splat in the face.
After that, things unravel quickly. Four young men overhear us yelling when they pass and assume that we are being terrorized by Wes and his friends.
They leap into action, our knights in soft suede moccassini, as they try to intervene.
We can’t understand what they’re saying, however, and our basic language skills don’t get us very far with them either.
An exchange of Italian is being shouted so loud and so fast that it distracts everyone right as Mari throws another drink.
“God, stop doing that!” Wes yells.
The men do not take kindly to Wes yelling.
Soon one of them has taken a pizza off a nearby table and smashed it into his face.
Then, as if in slow motion, one of the men rips off one of the white tablecloths from the table, flicking his wrist like a magician.
Except instead of the dishes falling to their places unscathed, they all go flying through the air, shattering and smashing to the floor.
Shards of glass ricochet off the ground and the echo reverberates down the cobblestone street.
One of the guys is waving the tablecloth in the air like a lasso before effortlessly looping it around Freddy.
Another joins him, and they attempt to hog-tie Freddy with the tablecloth as he lies on his stomach, writhing wildly around and screaming.
The other two are occupied holding Wes’s and Graham’s arms behind their back, so their friends recruit a couple that is walking by to hold Freddie down while they secure the restraints.
The woman pulls out pepper spray from her purse and sprays Freddy in the face, despite whatever threat he posed having clearly been neutralized.
“Is this real life?” Anya stands there, frozen, as we watch what can only be described as the strangest episode of WWE we’ve ever seen. “Should we do something?”
“I think… we should let them sort this out?” I take a step back but can’t look away. “What are they, professional MMA fighters?” I ask as I watch one of the men craft advanced knots in the tablecloth to make sure Freddy is secured.
A waiter has come outside to inspect all the ruckus, holding a beautifully decorated cassata cake. He screams for them to stop, to no avail. One of the men grabs the cake out of the waiter’s hands and slams it into Wes’s face. The waiter, horrified, runs back inside wailing, away from the carnage.
Wes stands there frozen, scooping marzipan out of his eyes. “WHAT IS HAPPENING!?” he yells up to the sky.
“Oh my God,” Mari says, a hand clasped over her mouth, as one guy body-slams Graham to the ground.
“Why don’t they try to run away?” Anya asks. With Wes’s athleticism, he could easily outrun these men. But I can only assume he and his friends are in some weird state of shock.
“You know… I don’t think Wes has ever been in a fight before,” I murmur.
“Yeah, that tracks,” Anya says.
Freddy is the only one who’s making an effort to escape—he is flailing about, trying to break free of his hog ties. He moves an inch forward at a time, thrashing around like a fish out of water while his eyes glow orange-red and tears stream down his face from the pepper spray.
I can’t help it; I start to laugh. It’s all so ridiculous—Wes picking bits of sponge cake from his hair, Graham and Freddy screaming, and I don’t know, Wes’s shimmer begins to dull before me.
Mari and Anya join in, the three of us almost hysterical.
That is, until the faint sound of sirens starts to get louder and louder and we realize it’s heading straight for us.
All the blood drains from my face.
The police car screeches to a halt. There’s a blur of people coming and going, running away, cursing.
I’m still blinded by the flashing lights on top of the first police car when a second comes to barricade the end of the street.
Wes and Graham sprint over to Freddy and rapidly attempt to untie the very sophisticated knots used to restrain him.
“Should we run?” Mari asks us, her eyes wide.
We don’t get the chance to decide, because the next thing I know, one of those intimidating policemen I saw at the airport, with a large machine gun slung across his chest, places me under arrest.