Three reads later, I would like to plead for insanity, but I guess I've been a little insane—this insane—my entire life. So me being me wouldn't exactly hold up in court. I rested against the end of my bed, slumped on the floor, staring at the letter Daniella wrote...

I have been fighting with Daniella for the last three years and yet, when I read this letter, I couldn't hear her voice. I couldn't imagine her admitting any of it. This wasn't a voice I recognized at all. A totally different girl.

On my computer screen, the 2020 movie Emma played, and I listened with my air pods. The light in the room only came from the computer. Full screen was great because I couldn't see the time. This movie gave me pause. It had been so long since I watched any period piece outside of class, but the movie was beautiful. All the colors. The people. Especially the girls.

My eyes found their way back to the letter. The editing was super weak. More like she wrote it all in one sitting, her stream of consciousness spilling out from the ink onto the page. It made me wonder if she even went back to read through it.

Thinking back, I could see Daniella again, waiting for soccer practice to be over, sitting as far away as he could from other people, reading her book. Daniella traipsing through the halls of our school, avoiding people like they were going to kill her. Was... was Daniella James shy?

Dropping my face into my hands, I rubbed at the itchy fatigue trapped in my eyes. Why do I have to stay up thinking about Daniella?

With a sigh, the Emma movie graced me with the credits, and I finally crawled into bed, face down in my pillow, drowning in my exhaustion, and hoping to get swallowed up whole by the darkness. My mind was still so awake. I tossed and turned, plagued by old conversations and all the choices I've made without thinking. Why was existence so humiliating?

My bedroom door swung opened, cutting the darkness with a knife. Peeking past my pillow, my mom was at the door. "Hey, baby, are you still up for a morning jog?"

Turning back into my pillow, I asked, "What time is it?"

"About five am."

"Um..."

"You know, if you don't stay consistent, you're more likely to feel a tightness in your muscles and you're likely to fatigue."

"Mm hm, right. Okay. Um, hold on."

Taking a deep breath, I forced my arms straight, and I pushed myself up. I somehow managed into my workout clothes, and I was running across the pavement of our neighborhood while my mother asked about the standard stuff: grades, upcoming tests, and projects. She mentioned my Uncle Eugene's birthday dinner coming up.

"Is it at grandma's house?" I asked.

"I don't know," she said, but she obviously did. My mom was about as good of a liar as me, which was terrible. My mom and my grandmother have had issues the last year since Jess dropped out of college and left our house. It came to light my grandmother housed her secretly for about a month before my mom found out... however, Jess was already gone by the time my mother pulled up to drag her back.

I had never heard my grandmother shout before that fight. Didn't think that old people could scream, or they'd explode into powder. She visited me afterwards and handed me a small tear of notebook paper with an address. Jess's house. If I ever wanted to go visit. I hadn't.

Too many nights listening to my mother say to my father, "that girl doesn't realize how much money we spent for her to go to that college. She thinks she knows what she wants. She doesn't. She's twenty. You don't know anything at twenty."

"She'll come back," my dad said. "Her money will dry out and she'll come right back."

"Twenty years and she just leaves? Doesn't discuss it with us. Like it's our fault."

"She'll regret it."

"Zoey, you don't have to worry. Jessica can ruin her life all on her own."

Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath of the cold air until my lungs burned. My mom said, checking our time, "We might do something at our house to celebrate."

"Okay, cool," I said, and we ran back home. I stumbled inside, holding onto my side as my mother had already disappeared with the promise of smoothies. My dad called out, asking if I wanted coffee, to which I replied, "make it sludge please!"

"Always!" My dad laughed.

Glancing around the threshold, I let out another sigh. Jess was nowhere left in this house to the untrained eye. No more pictures. Her bedroom emptied. Not even her name was uttered... but Jessica Luanne Summers was everywhere, laying across every square inch of this house, every piece of furniture like layers of dust. Try to wipe her clean and she'd just come back.

#

Checking my phone, I wondered if I could work in a nap inside my car before soccer practice. Sighing, I rested my hand on my cheek and tried to focus on the textbook work in front of me. Elena glanced at me with a small laugh. "Big yawn."

"Yeah," I said, and it was like she compelled another yawn out of me. "I couldn't sleep last night." We sat together in chemistry and today, like always, Elena looked immaculate with her spindles of curls laid against her heart-shaped face. She had dozens of pink fake freckles and the biggest, fluffiest pink cardigan I had ever seen. She looked downright huggable today. Like the gayest Care Bear ever.

"I don't mean this to sound mean," Elena started, and I braced myself for all insults. She said, "You don't look like you feel good, Zoey."

"Well, you are what you look like."

Elena's brow scrunched. "That's not a saying."

"I'm not trying to say anything. I don't know what I'm saying."

Elena rubbed my back before reaching into her purse. She gave me a little candy like she was an adorable old woman, and I immediately popped it into my mouth like it was Advil. The taste of lemon coated my tongue and tickled my senses. Elena was magic.

She asked, "Can you tell me what's going on with you?"

"In general, or today?"

She shrugged a little. "Whatever you'd like to tell me."

"No, thanks. I'm not in the mood to disappoint you."

"I'm not your mother," she said as a joke, but it ended up hitting a little too close to home. That one hurt. "Well..." She went on, a little eye roll and a smile, and I wanted to curl up against her shoulder and cry a little. "Let me give you some general advice, then. Raw eggs are a cure for hangovers. It's a myth that you get only one phone call after you're arrested..."

Turning to look at her, some of the wright lifted from my shoulders and I smiled easier than I've been able to lately. And Elena wasn't done there. She kept going, "If you're gonna bleach your hair, don't start at the roots. Crushed walnut shells in face exfoliants can cause small micro-tears in your face. And remember, you can't possibly make everyone happy."

"Where is this coming from?" I asked.

"If you won't tell me what's wrong, I still want to help you, so I have to guess. You're my friend, or have I not made that clear?"

"It's clear."

I nudged my pinky with hers and her smile reminded my cold heart of what warmth felt like. Stuffing my work in the back of the textbook, I took out my notebook and flipped until I found an empty page.

Thinking about Daniella walking up to that locker with no reply sounded horrible. No reply seemed meaner than no one saying anything back. It would be like ignoring her. And even someone like Daniella needed to be acknowledged. I understood what it meant to be standing in this school of hundreds and feeling like the only one there.

I wrote a reply, sealed it shut, and slipped it into the empty locker.

Ripping another notebook piece of paper, I borrowed tape from the nearest classroom and wrote:

DANIELLA. OPEN ME.

Glancing around, I checked to see if anyone gave a crap about what I was doing, but it seemed like nobody cared. It was humbling to be reminded I was not the main character of anyone else's world. Fixing my bag back over my shoulder, I walked to my next class and thought of nothing but that note sitting in that locker.

Unable to take it, I ran right back when AP history was done and found that the locker was empty. Drop a match at my feet and I would go up in flames. It had not registered to me until that very moment that Daniella James was now going to read a super personal letter from me. Daniella James. My mortal enemy would have all the ammunition to murder me in cold blood.

Thank God I didn't say it was me.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Happy Taylor Swift weekend! I hope everyone has enjoyed the Midnight's release. As I have been nonstop listening, here is the songs I think match up to characters (these might change depending on how many times I've listened to this album. lol):

Zoey: Anti-Hero

Daniella:  You're On Your Own, Kid

Mona: Lavender Haze

Allison: Mastermind

Elena: Karma

Skipper: Question...? 

Loman:  Sweet Nothing

All comments are appreciated! I hope you enjoyed the chapter and this is a double update!! Of course, we're going to read Zoey's reply ;)