Now
VIOLET
Silence takes over the kitchen as we finish eating our taco bowls.
Part of me was convinced he was going to wipe the sour cream off my face the same way I wiped barbecue sauce off his when we went to Coastal Shores last weekend.
“I’m going to wash the dishes,” he says.
“Okay. I’ll go set up the movie.”
After Grayson finishes cleaning up from dinner, he walks over and sits down on the sofa. I have the movie paused on the TV.
“Are you ready to watch the movie?” I ask him.
“Mm-hm,” he says without making any eye contact.
“Is everything okay? You seem quieter than usual.”
“Yeah, sorry. Coach Taylor has been on our asses about our first semi-finals game. We’ve been practicing almost every day. I’m exhausted.”
“Oh…we can watch the movie another time.”
“No, I’d love to watch it now, especially with how you reacted earlier.”
“Yes!” I grab the remote and press play.
I find myself struggling to not get closer to him. I can’t do it because I don’t want to make things more awkward than they already are, and we’re just friends.
I keep enough distance between us, but not too much to where he’ll want to ask me why I’m so far away from him.
I hope I’ll be able to make it through this movie without doing something I’ll regret later on.
We’re watching the credits roll on the TV, and I anxiously ask him the question I wanted to ask as we were watching the movie. “So, what did you think? Did you like it? Did you hate it?”
“I loved it. Definitely a new annual rewatch for me.”
Score.
“You’re not just saying that, right? It’s okay if you didn’t like it.”
“I was laughing through most of the movie, Vi. You would’ve known right away if I didn’t like it.”
“True.”
“Look, I know we don’t want to bring up the elephant in the room, but I feel like I have to.”
“Okay…” I trail off, emphasizing the ‘O’ in okay.
“Violet, I need to know what happened on that night six years ago.”
I knew he was going to ask me about this again.
To be honest, if I was in his shoes, I’d do the same. I hate that I have to tell him because I’m scared it’ll ruin the friendship we’ve begun to build. I’m more scared that he’ll hate me and never want to talk to me ever again, but that’s a risk I’m going to have to take.
“You’re going to have to bear with me because this isn’t something I love to talk about.”
“I know. Take your time.”
This is going to take a while.