When she comes for you

TEN YEARS AGO. Our lives were supposed to change forever. But not like this. Not at all like this. Not with the person I thought was going to spend forever walking by my side, smiling at her, looking at her like he looked at me right before the break. “Mark… can I talk to you for a second?” I feel the bile rush to the back of my throat, but I hold it in, for myself, for him, for us. Mark’s gaze, the very one I had fallen in love with, I imagined would only ever find me, slowly looked away from her, and when he looked at me, his eyes flashed, like I was bothering him. Like we weren’t together for four months. Like we weren’t Mark and Ella forever. “Can’t you see I’m busy??” his lips actually curled in disdain, the same ones that whispered sweet nothings to me the night before he went on that trip with his parents. “Oh my sweet Ella, I can’t wait for a future with you.” he had murmured, I blink furiously, keeping the tears at bay. I refuse to cry, refuse to lose, crying means I lose, and I won’t lose. Not to her. “You stopped answering my calls or texts,” I say through the thick lump that had lodged itself in my throat, the words hurt trying to speak past it. Mark had a texting problem even before camp, it was one of our issues. We couldn’t ever agree on the fact that texting was a huge deal in relationships, or at least he didn’t seem to think so. But he always answered my calls. Until he went away to the cabin. Then it was hopefully he answers this time. Please call me back as soon as you see my calls. That’s why I never got the chance to tell him about… Crossing my hand protectively in front of my belly, I keep my breathing steady, knowing that a crowd have started to gather. Of course it would, she was standing right here. “Oh my god. You can’t actually be that dense.” Matilda speaks, the girl attached to the arm of my boyfriend. My stomach twists. Blinking the tears away, keeping my voice from shaking, I can’t look her in the eye. I have always had an issue with looking people in the eye, ducking away the last second, before our eyes met. Mark was the only person who I could look in the eye. Because I love him. And when I told him this the night before he left, we had s*x. That was not an answer, but I had taken it. “Please, stay out of it. This is between Mark and I..” “Mark broke up with you dummy.” she laughs. My ears ring, the floor feels shaky under my feet and I can’t breathe. I find Mark’s eyes, only to find the bright blue eyes I had sketched over and over again until I could do it blinded folded, look away from me. No. No. I refuse to believe it. We were good together. The shy girl and the football girlfriend, last year of high school, heading off to college together. We even put in the same schools for crying out loud. He couldn’t possibly… “Mark.. that’s not true. Tell her it isn’t true.” I find myself whispering, the tears streaming down my face before I could stop them, I don’t care to stop them anymore, I don’t care who was watching. He couldn’t just walk out of my life, not when he was my entire life. I hold his hand with both of mine, struggling to find his eyes. Hoping he would see the laughs we shared in class, in my room, in his, when I snuck in. The way he would flick my forehead before a game, his good luck charm, he called it. “Ella.. Ella! Stop this nonsense.” He snatches his hand from my grasp, his voice laced with annoyance. “Mark please… what about college?? How am I supposed to live without you??” “This is what happens when you date them out of pity.” Matilda sighs. But I wish I could slap her, shut her up, but I can’t bring myself to care about anything else. We built everything together. I love him. “Mark, I love you. You know that…” “For the love of god, Mark, I told you to deal with this mess. What if it affects me??” Matilda shrieks. “If I did anything wrong, I’ll do better. I promise. Just tell me what it is, I’ll fix it, I’ll do better. Hmm? Mark?” I plead, the tears falling faster than I can keep track of them, my words tumble out of me. I have no idea what I am saying, I just know I can’t live without him. “Goodness gracious, I hope you guys know not to date the weird ones. They don’t know when to stop,” Matilda says with an annoyed huff, like she was the one getting broken up with in the hall. “You know where to find me. I can’t deal with this,” she says through gritted teeth. She pushes me as she walks away, stumbling backwards, I fall on my butt. Mark pauses for a second to look at me, and in that split second, I see regret in his eyes. I know I do. But he chases after her. “Mark…” my voice comes out hoarse. He doesn’t turn around, or stop. That’s when I see the surrounding crowd have their phones out, the cameras pointed in my face, all of them recording the most humiliating moment of my life. Saved by the bell, literally. When the last of them had taken enough videos of me, I was left alone, in the hallways of my high school. I was alone, but not really. My hand falls to my stomach, as if on command, my stomach lurches and I rush to the bathroom. When I thought of Mark and I during our college days, I assumed this would happen, but during our final year or something, and that he would hold the hair away from my face, like he did when I had the flu just before I became his girlfriend. I thought I was gross, he nursed me back to health. And now, our future… Collapsing on the dirty bathroom floor, I feel the tears stream down my face. He doesn’t know that we are joined in more ways than one now. He has no idea, if he knew about the life growing inside me, maybe, he would come back to me. Picking myself up from the dirty floors, I wash my face and head to class. He wasn’t in. Neither was Matilda. But people were whispering, they were pointing. I thought if I rest my head and kept a low profile, nobody would harass me. But they did. “Desperate Ella.” They called me. “Mark will set the record straight.” I reassured myself. But he never showed up to school the next day, or the day after, or the entire week. And when I went to his house. His mom, who I never met before that day, told me he went out of town with his girlfriend. But his girlfriend was right here. I am right here. He was with Matilda. And was with her for the next week. While people shoved me into lockers, shouted obscene things to me as I walked past, threw something at my head, or tripped me. Hiding the pregnancy from my dad was easy. I would have to be a gambling sport or an alcohol bottle before he paid any attention to me. And when they got back from their trip I knew because I kept walking past his house after school. His truck pulled in, and I rushed to meet him, halting when the scene before me starts like every American high school movie. He wasn’t alone. She hung from his arm. Matilda. Her laugh is the first thing that greets me, halting me right by the front door. The feeling of being in the hallway rushes back to me. Air leaves my lungs, only when I take a step back that I can breathe again. I can’t do it. I can’t face him. Not with her there. So I do the next best thing. On a piece of paper, I scribble the words. “I’m pregnant, call me. Ella.” hesitating twice, the paper is rumpled from how many times I squeezed it, and before I lose my nerve, I slip it into his car, and with one last look at the house, I leave. That had been my second mistake. The first was being weak. A mistake I will not be making again.