10
Lillian
Emelia texts our band group right before we’re supposed to meet.
I’m sitting at the picnic table across from Cyprus, still hoping Emelia will show up. Even though rehearsal was one of the only places Emelia and I fought. But there was space for it there because it was about sound, not love. Or all our love was aimed at the sound. Those fights didn’t really count. I used to be certain of it. I still believe it enough to think maybe she’ll come to the band meeting and maybe she’ll softly ask to talk to me after.
Instead, this long message appears.
There are no typing bubbles. It has the deliberateness of something written elsewhere and copied in. I can picture how she might have looked looked writing it, leaning against her locker, tired, frowning at her phone. Just thinking about it makes me want to comfort her.
I know if it was just Quinn and Cyprus, she would have talked to them face-to-face. It’s me she’s avoiding. The caution and formality is all for me.
The gutting opposite of everything we were.
Emelia
I still don’t know exactly how to talk about this, but I’m trying to be fair and let you guys know as soon as possible.
I know the band’s really important to all of you. It’s important to me too. We’ve all put a lot of work into it. Right now, though, I need to step away from it. Making music together can be so intense even when there’s nothing else complicating it and we’re all getting along well. I’ve thought about it a lot, and in this moment, it’s not a good idea for me emotionally.
Please please please don’t take this as me stepping away from any of you. If I could have friends or have a band, I’d pick friends every time. I know in this moment it doesn’t work for all four of us to hang out together, but I hope it will again. It’s just going to take some time.
Rock on. Love, Emelia
Quinn joins me and Cyprus as we’re silently reading it. He puts his arm around my shoulder and gives me a quick side hug squeeze. It’s the first time I’ve heard from Emelia in two weeks. I can’t stop myself reading it over again.
The message is very her. I’ve helped her write things like this to other people before, and I always want her to be meaner or show more bite. Sometimes I think she’s being passive-aggressive or unnecessarily gentle when she’s actually being sincere. She says she’s never snapped at someone and had it leave her feeling good. That I just don’t believe. When we broke up, she cried when she said hard things to me. She still said them, though she tried to start out with soft phrases. I wouldn’t let her stay there. I pushed her to her biting words. And it figures — by doing that, I managed to hurt both of us.
At the picnic table, I set down my phone and say.
“Seems a little late for ‘as soon as possible.’”
To which Quinn says nothing and Cyprus keeps looking at her phone. I keep going anyway, picking up momentum.
“And she’s intense about making music too. It’s not like it’s just me. There’s nothing ‘fair’ about this. Do you think it’s fair for her to bail when —”
“Lillian Finley.”
Cyprus cuts me off sharply, with authority. She’s wearing her big sunglasses again, but I can tell she’s looking right at me.
“Don’t think just because I’ve been friends with you longer than I’ve been friends with Emelia that I’ll sit here and let you drag her through the mud. If you think I’m going to take anyone’s side on this, then you clearly haven’t been paying attention to who I am.”
I try to jump in at that, but there’s no interrupting her before she’s finished.
“I know you’re heartbroken. So is she. You were pretty shitty to her. I’m always here if you need to talk about it or eat ice cream and watch Supernatural until four in the morning or even get someone’s number. But I’m gone if you expect me to team up against my friend.”
“Ditto,”
says Quinn.
“Except for the Supernatural. You’ll have to be in way worse shape before I’ll watch Supernatural. If you get cancer, possibly. If it’s one of the really gruesome ones.”
To his perpetual credit, we all laugh. He’s always had a way of taking all the tension out of situations. He told me he only learned to play drums to do the ba-ba-tish at the end of jokes. I once saw him notice his parents fighting, say.
“Watch this,”
and pratfall in the kitchen to defuse the tension. He helps unclench the knot of guilt in my stomach.
I say I understand. I say I’m sorry.
Cyprus says it’s part of the process. That we’re all figuring this out. She says.
“You’ll heal eventually, I’m sure of it.”
Then we talk about the band and make plans to see if we can sneak into the Packing Boxes show at the Mercury this weekend, and I don’t tell Cyprus what I think. That I’m not sure everyone can heal. Some of us may just accumulate scar tissue until we die.