Chapter Three: Raised voices of confusion
Strickland High school was alive and bustling on the last day before the advent of another weekend. At only seven thirty in the morning, there were already a multitude of teens and some teachers as well in the large structure that was the school.
Even at this very early time... it seemed like quiet a few of the three thousand plus students who attended Strickland was there already. It was as if the whole building knew that two days off were coming.
Abigail reached her locker, after having finished the twenty minute walk to her school. She opened the metal door and started to sort out what she would need for the first two periods of the day. She had English first off with Mrs Parrot and then Algebra with the weasel looking Mr. Goodsmeyer... both of those classes were at the opposite end of the school, third floor, and needed her to carry both classes text books because it was too slow for her to run back for the second one.
As Abigail pulled out what she needed for classes, she noticed a movement down the hall. She could see that the movement was in fact Shannon running down the hall. The light blond headed girl was in full flight and was obviously was headed straight to where she stood at her locker.
" You never phoned me back last night, or even text me??" The girl called out quite loudly, as she neared where Abigail was at the moment. " I wanna talk to you right the fuck now, Abigail Galy!!"
" Hu?" Abigail asked, in shock.
Her friend, Shannon rarely was one to swear, even rarely doing that when they were together and away from school. The fact that she was in the middle of one of the main hallways, cursing away like her father does when he stubs his toe in the middle of the night... told her that the girl might have heard something already..
Shannon stopped right beside her friend and looked at her with a very wild look in her eyes. Abigail waited, as she knew that look. Shannon would be quiet for a second, then whatever it was that was burning her ass right now... would end up catapulting out of her as if a dam had broke.
" Why did you not tell me you were going to do this yesterday, girl?" Shannon uttered frantically. " And I had to hear it like I did??"
" What did you hear..." Abigail said, already having more that a fair guess to what her friend was talking about.
" You know what I am meaning..." Shannon said.
" No.. I don’t..." Said Abigail, but she already had formulated what that was.
Shannon just stood there for a second, and then she started to speak quiet fast.
" I was just told by my sweetheart Max that you and Eddie have broken up over some sort of stuff..." She said with a sternness in her voice. " Now I need to know if that is all true or not, Girl!!"
Abigail sort had thought that Shannon would have heard about the break up this way, but she also had forgotten that it could have been this fast. The reason for that was Max and Eddie had been best friends since they both had been in elementary school... she should have known that right after she had broken up with Eddie, that he would have contacted his best buddy. She was hoping not to be dealing with the fallout from what she had to do so quickly this morning... but school was like living in a soap opera magazine, things true or not do get around very quickly even if you do not want it to.
She sighed, as what she had done with herself in the privacy of her room came back to her, and that thought was triggered by Shannon being there. For that small split second of time, Shannon’s beauty had froze her and she could not eve say one word back to the girl standing there.
" Well? Are you gonna tell me or what..." Shannon asked in frustration, as Abigail stood there and did not even say a word.
" Eddie and I..." Abigail said, coming back to reality.
" Yes... Eddie and you..." She said with a snarkish tone. " What is so damned hard about such a simple question?? Did you or did you not break up with Eddie yesterday afternoon?"
Abigail looked at her best friend while thoughts about everything swirled around in her head. Here was the girl that had made her break up with Eddie possible, so as to figure some things out that inside of herself was not so easily answered, was the one grilling her about it. The irony of it was not lost on her.
" We did break up..." Abigail said, with a tone of finality to it.
Shannon looked at her friend, mouth open as the words that Abigail had uttered seemed to not want to sink in. Abby looked at her shocked friend, seeing that her forced revelation had a unexpected reaction from Shannon. That was her being so damned silent.
" Jesus fucking Christ... you mean that you two breaking up was all true??" Shannon loudly spat. " Max and I thought that Eddie might have been lying or misunderstood some shit when he said that you two had split... but I needed to hear it from you one way or another."
Abigail looked at her friend, seeing those remarkable blue eyes locking onto her while waiting for the answer to come. She knew that she needed to verify it, or else her friend might have her brain melt on the spot
" Yes... we did break up... " The girl said again, this time it was just as hard as the first time.
Shannon shook her head, and looked at Abigail. She seemed to be reading Abby’s mind for a second.
" Why? What happened?" She asked, her questions rattling out of her mouth almost faster than Abigail can understand. " Just yesterday you to went off to be... you know... alone..."
" It is sort of complicated in a way.." She said, knowing that some of it she could not reveal.
" Complicated?"
" Yes.." Abigail said, hoping that she could skirt around actually saying more.
Shannon’s eyes flew wide open and she gasped. It seemed like the girl had thought on something.
" Did that pig go out and cheat on you or something? Is that why you broke up?" The girl asked " If that is why you two have broken up... well, I’m gonna kill that asshole myself an then I know that my Max will kick his ass as well and...."
" No... that is not why..." Abigail quickly answered, stopping the girls tirade with a gentle voice of her own.
Shannon’s brow now was furrowed a little, as she looked at her friend. Her question seemed to have hit a snag, the tone in her best friends voice seemed to be that little sticking point.
" He did not screw around on you?" She asked, stunned by the girl stopping her rambling.
" No..." Plainly answered Abigail, wanting to make sure that was not even going to be a issue. " He did not fool around on me..."
" Then did he flirted? Did he talk to another girl behind your back? Tried to do something too kinky with you?" She said, rattling off scenarios as fast as her mind was picking them out.
" He actually did not do anything wrong..." Answered Abigail, with a shake of her head.
Shannon stopped for a second, by the look that was in her eyes she was pondering all of this over once again. The girl was perplexed.
" I don’t think he had ever hit you or even called you any names.." Thought out loud Shannon.
" He has never hurt me, swore at me or done anything to me other than be a jerk once in awhile.." Said Abigail, assuring her friend of that fact... and whished in some way that was the case.
" They all can be jerks at once time or another..." Agreed Shannon. " So, if not that..."
" The break up was not about anything he had done or even said to me..." Abigail said.
" Then what was it that made you want to all of a sudden break up with him?" Shannon pressed.
Abigail leaned up against her now closed locker and looked at her friend. It was hard to explain, and hide what she was feeling right now. With Shannon only a few feet away with her big blue eyes... it was extremely hard.
" Things had just changed over the last little while...." Sighed Abigail. " And that change was inside me... not him."
" Does that me that it was you that cheat on him then?" Shannon asked.
Abigail looked at her friend with her mouth open wide. She could not believe that Shannon would have even gone to that place, much less actually asking her that question.
" Hell no... I never cheated on him... Shannon, nobody cheated on nobody!" She said, feeling a bit hurt at her friend going there. " That is not even close to the reason why I have broken up with him..."
" Then... why?" Shannon then flatly asked.
Abigail was stuck now, like a fly on flypaper. What could she say to explain things without lying her ass off. She knew that it was not a good idea to explain to her how her feelings have grown past being Shannon’s best friend. She already knew that was not a good thing to do, but she had not really figured out just what to say.
" I just did not feel the same way towards Eddie any longer..." She said, being as truthful as she could be. " What I had felt, I had started to question too... It’s just all really messed up..."
" You don’t love Eddie any more, hu?" Shannon asked, as Sasha came out of a crowd to join them.
" I do love him still, in a way... but not like in love..." Abigail shook her head, she really did not. " That part that is in side of me... has changed."
The newly arrived Sasha seemed to already know what was happening, and what was being talked about already. She nodded, her eyes fixed onto Abigail as Shannon spoke.
" You guys always seemed so overly happy... especially you..." Said the short haired girl, with a little smirk.
" Even when you, Eddie, Max and Me all went to the movies a few weeks back... you seemed so sickeningly happy that I thought I was gonna puke..." Came in Shannon, then she got this look of pure seriousness. "... What happened between then and now?"
Abigail looked at the pretty girl as she asked her question. She saw the concern that was in those amazing eyes for her, and that made Abby tingle. The were deep and full of emotions, that was what she saw, and that look seemed to touch her heart at that moment..
" If she only knew what I was feeling..." Abigail lamented inside of herself for a split second of time.
Abby then made herself stopped her little daydreaming, doing that only confused her more than what she was at the moment. She just answered her friends question... which she already knew was a very honest one to have asked.
" I guess my feelings have changed for Eddie over quite a while, Shannon..." Abby spoke up. " When we double dated to that movie... even then I was having many of these feelings."
" You were thinking about breaking up...even then?" Shannon asked.
" Even then... and it just grew from then..." Nodded Abigail back.
" Happens, ya know..." Came in Sasha, brushing back her light brown hair from her eyes.
" I never even thought that would ever happen to you two..." Shannon mumbled, obviously surprised with the revelation.
" Neither did I..." Admitted Abigail, blushing a little as she found herself staring right into Shannon’s eyes
Shannon seemed not to notice that her friend was staring at her. She only nodded as the bell rang loudly through the hall for school to start. The girl made a little strangled type of sound as she turned on the balls of her feet.
" Well talk more..." She said, hurrying off to her class. " You, me.. At lunch!"
Abigail sighed and turned, as Shannon hurried off to her class..
" I should get up to my class too..." The girl said to her friend Sasha, who had not left yet.
" I guess I need to go to my English class then.. " She sighed back to Abigail, showing that she was not thrilled at the prospect of an hour in class.. " We’ll meet up and talk later?"
" Yeah..." Abigail said, as she walked off to a nearby staircase to get to her first class.
Sasha seemed to linger for a second in the hall, watching as Abby ran off to the stairs. The short dark haired girl just seemed to force herself to walk off in the direction of the English and Linguistic hallway, and letting the girl disappear upstairs.
******
The first two classes went off without a hitch for Abigail... although they were each rather boring being that they were so damned early in the morning. The one was way more boring that the other one.
She had nearly fell asleep more than once while she had been in Algebra class. Mr. Hollander had always had such a monotone voice that it always tended to nearly lull anyone to sleep. Abigail had always thought that the term she could use for that man’s teaching ways was just plain boring people to death. She wondered if that was the main reason to why a quarter of the class was nearly failing the subject, while the other parts were hovering below their school averages.
Third period rolled around, Social Studies was on the table. That was one of the few classes the young Galy girl actually enjoyed going to every day. Even though she was getting high marks in everything she was taking this semester, as usual, it was one of those classes that was more interesting than anything. She knew the fact of that, but she knew that even the ones she really hated, were way too important.
Abigail had already swapped her books for what she needed for the last class before lunchbreak at her locker and was hurrying to the class that was down near the main offices of the school. She was beginning to think that the day was going better than what she had been worried it would be, and that was the exact point when her sort of good day was destined to drop off the cliff of life and into a bottomless chasm of no return.
As she neared the class room of Mrs. Baxter, Abby could see that there was someone outside of the door that she was not really wanting to see at the moment. She sighed and kept going down the hall, there was no way of avoiding this person. It was clearly Eddie standing there in the hallway, and was waiting on her to arrive for class.
" Oh damn shit..." She spat to herself, seeing the tall young man waiting for her near the door. " Why now?"
The lad saw Abigail was nearing where he was. The very broad shouldered lad stood up from leaning on the brickwall of the hallway, and took a step or two to meet with Abigail.
" Hi..." The tall blonde behemoth of a lad said, seeming like he was rather sheepish at the moment.
" Uh... Hi..." Abigail said, knowing that there was no way out of this situation for her.
The two stood for a second in the hallway, the awkwardness of the situation was as thick as pea soup.
" Could we go off and just talk here?" The lad asked.
" I got class right now..." She simply stated.
" C’mon... Skipping one class once won’t hurt..." He said, almost pleading with her. " I wanna understand why you broke up with me, and see what we can do to fix whatever it is... I have not slept all night."
Abigail felt bad that the lad was so hurt by what she had to do for herself. She looked into his broad face, and could see that he was more than just upset. From knowing him for so long, she read that he also had a high level of desperation that was filling his entire being.
" Eddie..." She started, feeling her own guilt now was wrestling with what she knew was right. " I know your hurt and all... but there is nothing that can fix this..."
" You don’t know what I feel, you cant even get that close to knowing!" He growled. This was different than the lad Abby knew for so long. " You just up ‘n’ dump me like that..." He said, getting louder withe every word. " ... it’s bad enough, doing in the middle of having sex, that is so screwed... now you are not going to give me a try for a better explanation?"
Abigail knew that how she had done, she might have done it way different if she had a chance.. Telling him before sex might have been a better way to go, but she also knew how hard she had been fighting, and having sex was just wrong for even herself to do.. No matter how hard she had fought this growing uneasiness that she had whenever she had been with Eddie over months, it was quickly becoming very clear that it was not going to go away, until it had been dealt with
She hated hurting him like she had done that to him, but she was beginning to resent that she was with him, because she was feeling so differently. She had tried to talk to him about it, more than just a few time. The sad truth was that he either did not hear her all of those times... or the lad that had pledged his love had simply chosen not to.
" I tried to talk to you, Eddie... many times." She said, after verifying the fact with herself. " You either dismissed what I had been saying... or you had simply ignored it... I see that now."
" You always were trying to read things into everything... sometimes when nothing was even there... " He said, looking right into Abby’s face. " I knew that you would work it out for yourself, but now I see that I was wrong... now we have to work it out together."
" I did not read things into things, or make snap decisions, you know that!" She snuffed at him. " I was trying to tell you things that I felt, and hoped that you were actually listening to me."
" You were?" He said, his voice telling that he did not totally believe that.
Abigail shook her head. She understood that he might have not picked up n anything she had been trying to say, but her heart and mind were both screaming at her. No matter how this all was playing out... Eddie and her was over, and there was not one shred of evidence that could change her mind.
" I don’t feel the same towards you as I have... talking will only prolong a bad situation and make it worse." She said, trying to be diplomatic as she could be. " I explained that and..."
" How can you love me one minute, and then not the next??" He asked, interrupting her.
" I just said that it was not just like that..." She said. " I was feeling different for a long time an I was not wanting to see it, and not wanting to accept it for the longest of times..."
" Are you fucking someone else? Is that it?" He growled. " If you are, you have the fucking nerve here..."
Abigail was stunned that he went there. For the second time, people went there... although if she would have thought about it then, she might have understood why he had thought that.
" Eddie, you should know me regardless..." She defiantly said. " I am not ‘fucking’ anyone as you put it. You are the only one I have had sex with... ever!!"
" The what in the fuck is wrong??"
Abigail sighed, this was not going well.
" I just said that I was not feeling the same towards you that I had been..." She said.
" so, you are trying to say that you do not love me any more?" He asked, his eyes dropping a little.
Abigail took a breath in, knowing that she had to explain this a little better, even tough she had to hid some facts. She could see the pain this was causing, and new she had to continue in a different way.
" I love you still... but not that way any more." She tried to clarify, hoping that this would clear things up and make their breaking up a little easier. " I care about you still ... who would not, after two years... but not it that way any more."
" Do you still love me though!!" He asked sternly. " That is all you have to say, and that is all what I am wanting to know. Do...you... still... love... me?"
The girl took a pause, checking her heart before she gave the lad an answer back... one that was unwavering in her feelings. Her mind fluttered back to Shannon, and how she had been feeling over the past six months plus that she had been ignoring from herself. It was then that she knew, that she had to be blunt.
" No I don’t... not the way you are wanting me to say..." She said finally.
She watched his face drop, and his shoulder slump forwards. He seemed deflated to her. He looked at her after a moment, then his face changed to a mask of being angered..
" Are you now gonna tell me you’re a dyke or something?" He came out of nowhere with.
" Say what?" Spluttered Abigail in disbelief.
" You heard me... are you a dyke then?" He spat, no hint of being nice was in his words.
Shocked to hear the boy’s accusation, and how sharp and unfeeling it had been thrown at her with made her stop. She knew there was no way that he would know what was going on in herself... she was still in the dark about her own sexuality as it was... but his words of hatred still hit her.
" Your accusing me of being gay because I told you that I did not love you any longer?" She stammered, surprised at what had just come out of this boy that she had loved in some way..
" You dump me right out of the damn blue... just because you had some sort of a so called ‘feeling’?" He snapped so loudly, the he ended up causing some of the other students in the hall to stop and listen to the argument going on. " What other sort of thing can I come up with to explain that?"
" Lower your voice..." She tried to urge, seeing that all eyes were on her.
He continued like a wild man, not caring about anything at the moment other than his fury he was unleashing on to the girl. He stood and looked down on the much smaller girl, not caring if he was intimidating.
Along with the confusion she was having about this very same thing, these words seemed to really hurt Abigail to the very core of her being.
" Eddie..." She stuttered weakly to the lad, feeling the emotional pain overtake her as well as the fear from this boy she once loved..
" Your either really fucking dumb, don’t know what you fucking want or your really are a goddamned dyke..." He spat with great anger. " Pick one so I can be sure of something."
" Stop it... your making a scene here!!" She whispered in fear, as he stood right in front of her, menacingly glowering down at her.
" What is it? Are you just trying to hurt me... or are you wanting to turn into a cunt- licking fuckin’ dyke instead of realizing what I feel and work some shit out?" He said. " We were going along, noting out of the ordinary and then...WHAM... I was blind-sided by this crap!!"
Abigail shook her head, feeling the hate fuelled wrath that was being hammered on to her. She took a deep breath and knew that she had to reason with him in some way, but how was the question.
" You cant accept that I was the one who broke it off..." She said, not wanting to let his words hurt her like this.
" I would, if you were not being a bitch!!" He shouted, not bing very loud.
" Listen to yourself..." She said, seeing that more and more people were crowded around listening. " You are not listening to anything I am trying to say and are just being unreasonable right now."
" Why should I listen to someone who just broke up with me because of a little ‘feeling’??" He shouted back, his low voice exploding throughout the halls.
A teacher came out of one of the classrooms, probably because of the argument that was going on. He marched right up and between the boy and girl, pushing them away from one another with rough force.
" What ever this is all about, doing it with swearing and loud voices in the halls are not going to be tolerated around here." Mr. Hunter said, seemingly very irritated at the two that stood on either side of him. " Do I make myself wholly clear on that point, or do I have to clonk some heads together here?"
" Yes.." Abby said softly, taken aback after having the man suddenly appearing there.
" We are just discussing a few things..." Said the lad, obviously upset at the man’s intrusion into this.
Mr Hunter looked like he was not ever remotely caring what was going on or why, other than the shouting and swearing the two were doing. He seemed determined to break this up at all cost.
" I don’t care what the problem is here Miss Galy and Mr. Houghton.." The man warned, as he glared at the two who had been verbally sparring. " You both do not have to shout it to the world in the halls."
" Yes, Sir..." They both said
" One more word out of either of you, and you will both be going see Mr. Van Dreiser. What ever squabble you two are having can be resolved after school hours or on break." He snuffed and waved them on.. " You two just have to get to class and right now, or else I will drag you both down to the office!!"
At the threat of seeing their beloved yet very stern principal, Eddie shut his mouth and stormed through the crowd of people that had gathered to watch our sceptical. The teacher then stormed off, after giving a angered look right at Abigail as the bell to start class went off and echoed through the school.
The girl could clearly hear the buzzing from the crowd, and just wanted to run away and hide. She just lowered her head and went into class, seeing that many of the people standing around and watching this sight were from her class.