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I didn’t love her any less, she was just so…far away. In every sense of the term.
It was November now, and I was curled in my dirty bed, skipping class to brood and waiting for my phone to ring and distract me from the awful weight between my ribs. Few things on this planet confused me deeply: other humans, the Celsius scale, and my own body. I never knew it was possible to feel nausea in the chest. I figured a body would have to choose or at least separate a broken heart from a woozy stomach. Somehow, my vessel defied all odds and combined the two into the most horrible concoction of anxiety.
By some small miracle, my phone did ring, and by another, it was Kai’s name on the screen. I fumbled with the device and picked up immediately, jumping out of bed to sit on the wooden chair by my desk and stack her against the books on it. Ignoring my queasiness, I shifted my pitiful desolation to a show of negativity with a dash of indifference. If I was going to be a sad loser, I could at least pretend to be a little mysterious with it.
“Kai,” I said, clearing my throat and pushing away strands of messy hair from my face. I glanced at myself in the small window on the video chat and ripped the elastic band from my low bun, redoing it quickly. I looked like shit.
“Hi, Jojo!” she said happily, lifting the phone to show her surroundings. She sat atop sheets of tropical flowers in her dorm room with her legs crossed and a teddy bear in her lap. Always with that lucky, lucky teddy bear. Her brown hair flowed right out of the camera, and her sticky-sweet gaze threatened to pull me through the screen. “What are you up to today?”
I grunted. “Want to take a wild guess?”
“Hmmm.” She brought a finger to her lips, tapping them lightly. “You’re at a crazy party, surrounded by beautiful models, getting totally blasted without me.”
I lifted my eyebrows once. “You caught me.”
Given we’d been separated for some three months now and we video chatted at least every other day, that would be a minimum of forty-five video calls since she left and I arrived here. Of all those calls, there hadn’t been a single one during which I was not seated in this exact spot, alone and uninterested.
No. False. Sometimes I sat on my bed.
She tilted her head, her cinnamon eyes using their magic powers to try and see through me. “You should really get out and make some friends, Jo.”
She was always making futile suggestions like that. She was happy, curious, and expressive. Everything I wasn’t. While she was sweet springtime, I was wet, gray pavement. A girl of beautiful, golden light and a boy, nothing more than the weight of life incarnate.
I think that’s why we got along so well. We balanced each other out. Either that or because, deep down, we were both entirely consumed by our anxiety about the world, albeit in different ways. It could’ve been either one of those reasons, really.
“I have friends,” I said. “I have you and Oli.”
“Oh, don’t be a dick, Jonah. You’re gonna get so bitter you’ll scare us away too.”
“I’m not bitter. I’m esoteric,” I lied.
“You are pretentious.”
I rolled my eyes, and she gave me a smirk I knew all too well. It was the smirk she offered when she was done being sweet and decided she wanted to tease me instead. I adored Sweet Kai with all my heart, but I’ll admit Snarky Kai was a lot of fun. Somehow, her making fun of the way I was made me hate myself a little less. It took the edge off, and it made her smile, so really it was a win-win.
“And if I told you I was comfortable simply sitting in my room, doing homework and working on music?” Not that I ever did any homework, much less sit comfortably.
“Well, it depends how you say it.” She shifted herself to lie down on her stomach, her teddy bear between her arms. “Are you an anxious hermit or a mysterious musician?”
I watched her socks kick behind her head, and my face threatened me with a smile. “Oh, very mysterious, Kai.” I pulled my hood up over my hair and leaned back in my seat. “I sit here wearing all black, writing lyrics that’ll never see the light of day. My god, are they profound and so very mystifying. Just the other night I wrote a song about the complexity of life. What is real? Are we here or do we exist only within the scope of our imaginations?”
“Mhm, and what’s that one called?”
“Row, row, row your boat.” I hated myself for that one, but if anyone was going to get a glimpse of humor from me, it would be Kai. Maybe one day I’d finally be nice and funny enough for her to fall in love with me. The least I could do was try. “What do you think?”
“I think you’re delusional, Jojo.”
“Life is but a dream, Kai,” I said lazily, my eyes downcast. I reached my arm forward and tapped my pen on the desk in front of me, averting my gaze from the phone. I knew what she was going to say next.
“Really, though. I’m just saying. You might find some people out there who actually get you if you just tried.” Right on cue.
“I can’t” was my simple answer.
“And why is that?” She pouted with those two soft pillows she called lips, that gaze trapping me despite my best efforts.
“Because if I do, you’ll only be jealous in the end.” I cocked my head to let her know I was serious. I wasn’t, of course. I only said it because I hoped she’d say something I wanted to hear.
“That would never happen!” Her body jumped slightly from her relaxed position.
