Chapter 12 You Never Really Know Someone Until You Go Bowling Together #2
For the rest of the night, we keep playing and talking and laughing and sharing the deepest parts of ourselves that we’d kept buried until now.
Liam unpacks his own experiences with bullying; Veronica tells us about how, when she still hung out with the “popular girls” at her school, they always pressured her to date people; and Sloane shares some more about what happened last summer.
The stories keep coming and coming and coming until everyone at the table is drunk on emotions. Yasmeen is silently crying, even.
“Sorry,” she says, her voice choked. “I don’t even know why I’m crying anymore.”
“That’s okay,” Liam assures her. “There’s nothing wrong with being emotional, you know. And summer camp is always so intense, so it was only a matter of time before we all became emotional wrecks.” They give her a smile. “I did warn you about the trauma dump on the first day, though.”
She laughs at that, and despite the tears rolling down her cheeks, it’s a happy sound.
“He’s right,” Noah says. “This happens every single year. We’re having fun and then, boom—toward the end of camp, everyone’s trauma dumping.”
“What’s your story, then?” Veronica asks him. “You haven’t revealed any dark parts hiding behind your golden retriever facade yet.”
My brother’s lips part before he presses them together again, seemingly searching for the right words. Eventually he says, “I’ve had a pretty easy life, in all honesty.”
Veronica blinks at him once, twice, thrice. “Are you being sarcastic…?”
Now Noah is the one to frown. “No, I’m serious. Why do you sound surprised?” He turns to Liam. “Why does she sound surprised?”
His best friend gives him a look. “Noah, honey, you must know you don’t exactly give off mentally stable energy.”
“That’s not a bad thing, though. You were definitely written by a woman,” Sloane agrees, nodding as she puts down the can of Coke she was drinking from.
Noah tilts his head to the side. “Now what is that supposed to mean?”
“It’s a compliment. Just take it,” she tells him, a blush coloring her cheeks.
I look around the table, scanning the faces and feeling my heart warm. Eventually I get to the girl who’s been sitting next to me, and I full-on grin.
“Oh no,” she says as she notices the look on my face. “What are you planning?”
“Don’t be dramatic.” I roll my eyes. “I was just thinking that, if Noah doesn’t have anything to share, then I guess it’s your turn to unpack some of your emotional baggage, Sierra.”
Our friends’ heads whip in her direction, looking at her curiously, but all she does is lift an eyebrow at me. “Yeah right,” she says, taking a sip of her iced tea. “Good luck with trying to get me to trauma dump, because there’s no way in hell I’m doing that.”
Later that night, when we’re all back in our own cabins, Sierra is on my bed with me, her head in my lap and her voice choked with emotion as she says quietly, “I thought I got over this a long time ago, to be honest. But I guess I didn’t after all, huh?”
She lets out a short, humorless laugh that sounds more like a covered-up sob, and even though I can’t see her in this dark room, her obvious sadness cuts right to my heart.
Veronica and Sloane went to bed pretty much as soon as we got to our cabins, which was my plan as well, but then I joked about how Sierra’s competitiveness was missing today.
Yasmeen won both our games during bowling, and Sierra didn’t seem to be upset with herself even one little bit, which felt out of character to me given the way she’s normally so hard on herself during our little beach volleyball games.
So I commented on it, my nosiness getting the best of me.
“I’m only that competitive when what I’m doing affects my father’s opinion of me,” she revealed.
“It’s hard not to be when he’s made absolutely everything into a competition all my life.
Sierra, if you win our bet about how this movie ends, you can pick one to watch next time,” she says, attempting to imitate her dad’s voice, which is much lower than her own.
“Or the classic: Sierra, if you lose this game, you’re going to have to deal with my silent treatment.
I think having consequences attached to everything I do is his way of keeping me motivated so I perform at my best, but god, it is so tiring.
I can’t even have a conversation with him without it turning into a competition to see who can provoke the other the fastest.”
After that, the words just sort of kept coming. She talked about all of it: how much her dad’s approval affects her, the homophobia she experienced within her last team, and the constant pressure she feels.
“Here’s the thing,” she whispered, her voice still even at that point.
“When my teammates found out I’m a lesbian a few months ago, they didn’t feel comfortable around me anymore.
They didn’t want to even touch my arm for the briefest moment, and they definitely were not happy to be sharing a locker room and a shower with me.
I’d barely gotten around to feeling comfortable with my identity before they made me feel like something disgusting.
Sometimes they even refused to pass me the ball during a game, even if it meant we lost the point.
I still don’t get that part. I guess they were either scared of being associated with my lesbianism—we already get a lot of gay allegations for being female volleyball players—or maybe they were just so homophobic, they thought it was a disease they could catch or something.
I don’t know, but eventually it got so bad that I had no choice but to leave.
According to many of the parents, I was ‘ruining the team dynamic.’ As if I was the one refusing to be mature.
” She huffed, but I could hear the mix of sadness and anger and hurt she felt.
“They were my only friends, you know. I always thought I didn’t need any friends besides my teammates, but I was alone all of a sudden, and I couldn’t even make my father proud anymore because I didn’t have a team to play games with.
” She swallowed audibly. “He’s barely even looked at me since, like I’m not worth his attention right now.
Like I’ve disappointed him so badly that he’s punishing me with the worst silent treatment ever.
Like I’ve lost the most important one of his games.
I just hope that if we win the competition at the end of camp, he’ll let me play in a team a few towns over.
If I can prove I’m serious about volleyball, he’ll care about what I do again—even if it’s only momentarily. ”
I don’t know how much time passed while she kept telling and telling me things, but it doesn’t matter one bit to me if it’s 3:00 a.m. right now. I’m just glad she trusts me.
“That sounds like a lot,” I tell her eventually, my fingers lightly going through her blond ponytail. I can’t believe this girl doesn’t have a headache 24/7. “I’m here for you, you know. For whatever you need or want. Is there anything you want right now?”
“I want…” she starts immediately, her voice tired, but then she suddenly stops talking altogether. I’m convinced she’s fallen asleep in my lap for just a moment when she lifts her head back up to say, “I think we should go to bed.”
“Oh,” I say, trying not to notice how cold my legs are now that she’s completely pulled away. “Right. Yes. Of course. If that’s what you want, then we’ll go to sleep.”
We try to get off my bunk bed without waking either Sloane or Veronica, then go straight to the bathroom to get ready for bed.
As I’m brushing my teeth and looking into the mirror, I catch a glimpse of Sierra behind me. She reaches up to her ponytail and frees her wavy blond hair. Even though we’ve been sharing this cabin for almost two weeks, I’ve never seen her with her hair down. Not even for five seconds.
But now, she’s just…there. And she’s letting me see it.
It feels weirdly intimate.
“What’s up?” Sierra asks when she catches me staring, her arms wrapped around her body protectively.
I blink a few times before finally recovering.
“Nothing. Don’t worry,” I assure her when I’ve finished brushing my teeth.
“It’s just that…you’re really pretty.” I blush, breaking our eye contact while I search for the right words.
“You’re always pretty, for the record. Seriously, even when you’ve only been awake for five minutes”—I let out a nervous laugh—“but what I mean is…you’re pretty with your hair down, too. ”
“Oh,” Sierra says. She looks at me for a few more seconds, then brushes her hair quickly. “Thanks.”
“You know,” I continue, taking her in again.
She’s in her pajamas—more specifically, short gray sweats and an oversized dark blue crop top—but I still can’t imagine anyone looking at her and not thinking she’s beautiful.
Or stunning. Or whatever. “You could easily be one of the popular girls at school, actually. You’d fit right into Nina’s circle. ”
She tenses. “Oh. Um. I don’t think I want that.”
I frown at her. That doesn’t make sense. “I thought you said you wanted to talk to Nina and get closer to—”
Sierra inhales so sharply, I can’t help but stop my sentence there. “Let’s just go to bed before we wake up Sloane, or worse: Veronica.”
Without another word, she exits the bathroom.
She walks away from our conversation just like that. Clearly she does not want me to know she has a crush on Nina, and, to be honest, I wish I didn’t know, too.
I quickly wipe my mouth, leave the bathroom, and climb back into my bed. “See you tomorrow,” I tell Sierra, after which she wishes me a good night as well, and then I guess it’s done. This day is officially over, leaving us with only two more days to spend at summer camp.
I lie there, my eyes closed as the seconds and minutes pass by. I try to let sleep find me. I really, really do, but for some reason I can’t stop thinking about the way Sierra is lying right there, only a few feet away from me.
Her presence makes me toss and turn and toss and turn until I’m so restless, I can’t even will my eyes to stay closed anymore.
The room is shrouded in darkness, making it hard for me to see more than just vague shapes. Still, I have a feeling her eyes are on me.
“Sierra,” I whisper, my voice soft and yet a little raspy from the late hour. “You’re awake, aren’t you?”
I imagine she smiles at that. A true, genuine, Sierra kind of smile, where her soft pink lips curl up only a little bit but the happiness still reaches her sparkling brown eyes.
I can picture it so vividly that I’m almost tempted to reach out and tuck a strand of blond hair behind her ear. I haven’t had a chance to do that before, as her hair is constantly in a ponytail, but now? Now I could. Our bunk beds aren’t that far apart, so it’s entirely possible for me to—
Wait.
Why would I want to tuck her hair behind her ear?
I push the thought far away along with the picture in my head of Sierra’s smiling face. In reality, I can’t make out anything except for her figure, and that’s only vague.
She props herself up on her elbow. “You know me well,” she says, her voice quiet. Careful.
I smile at the thought. I’m glad. I love knowing you, I want to tell her, but instead I clear my throat and ask, “What were you thinking about?”
It’s silent for a while. Then: “About what you said at the bowling alley. The rules. I just…I wish I’d been there for you. When you were dealing with those bullies.”
Even though I know she can’t see it, I make a skeptical face. “You wanted to be there for me in middle school? Nobody likes middle school kids.”
“Yes. I mean, no,” she says, which certainly doesn’t clear anything up. “I kind of wish I’d been there through all of it, actually. I like…knowing you,” she admits, and my breath catches. “I like you, Ellie, no rules needed.”
Her words wrap around me like a warm blanket, and I let myself drown in them. Let them surround me completely.
“I like you, too, Sierra,” I tell her. “But you’re going to make me cry.”
She laughs for a moment then, and when she’s done, I want to tell her to do it again. To not stop, because the sound is becoming one of the things that brings me the most joy in life. It’s probably way too sappy, but my god-knows-how-late-it-is-brain wants to say it anyway.
I don’t get the chance to, because Sierra swallows. “We should really sleep now, though.”
“But—”
“Go to bed, Eleanore,” she says, aiming for serious, but I can hear the smile softening her voice. A part of me wants to turn on my phone’s flashlight just to see it on her face, too, but I’m not that pathetic. Yet.
“All right,” I tell her. “I’ll be quiet starting now.”
“Thank you.” She lays herself back down, probably closing her eyes and ready to sleep without a single worry inside her head, but I can’t help myself.
I still add, “Good night, Sierra.”
She groans, turning in her bed. “You’re the worst.”
It’s quiet for a long while after that, to the point where I think she’s passed out, but minutes later, she says, “ ’Night, Eleanore.”
I take a deep breath as that unfamiliar feeling fills me again—completely, this time—at the sound of my name leaving her mouth.
It travels from my lungs to my belly to the tips of my toes, then goes back up until it’s finally reached its real destination: my heart.
The feeling is light and overwhelming at once, calm and chaotic, something that makes the world stop spinning and turn faster at the same time.
It’s unlike anything I’ve ever felt before, but I’m too tired to analyze what exactly it is I’m feeling. I imagine this is what it’s like to jump and let yourself fall, though, knowing you’ll land exactly where you need to be.
I’m still not sure where my place in the world will be once this summer is over, and usually that scares me.
But right now, I do know one thing: If I were to jump like that in this moment, I’d land right back here, in this dark room, listening to the way Sierra Levine’s breathing slows down until, finally, my own eyes fall closed, too.