Late sunday afternoon. Sage has left for work just hours after their confrontation that morning. Naomi is a bundle of nerves and energy, constantly pacing and pulling on her hair. She has to tell Calvin it meant nothing...but what if the kiss already meant nothing to him and she'll just make a fool out of herself? What if she hurts his feelings? What if she tells him that it meant nothing and he agrees, but her mother finds out they kissed anyways? What if her mother doesn't find out but still hates her?
She checks the stove, placing her hand over and over on the cool metal. Maybe subconsciously she's trying to tether herself to reality; the stove is off, it is safe. There is safety somewhere. A possibility that everything won't crash and burn around her.
But the physical assurance does little for her emotions.
Hours pass, Naomi gets dressed and calls Brianne. Brianne is over in a flash. Naomi never invites people over. After her disastrous tea party (which Brianne guiltily remembers being invited to, and then getting grounded on the day of for pelting the neighbor's house with eggs and thus not allowed to attend) she's just talked to Brianne and her other friends in class.
Despite having showered and meticulously braided her hair, Brianne can tell something is off with Naomi almost immediately. She's fidgeting much more than normal, her eyes are wide and despondent, and she won't stop shifting from foot to foot.
"Hey, what's up?" Brianne asks as casually as possible, "Is, uh, something the matter?" Brianne mentally kicks herself for the slip-up. What a stupid thing to say! Of course something's wrong with Naomi.
"Yes," Naomi grumpily snaps, surprising Brianne.
Naomi quickly covers it up.
"Sorry. I'm just a bit...stressed," she smiles.
It's her normal, friendly smile but it was flashed just a bit too quickly. Does she practice that in the mirror or something? The thought depresses Brianne.
"I guess we have something to talk about..."
"...and then he kissed me," Naomi grumbles, a light blush colouring her cheeks.
Brianne sits up straighter.
"Really? And then? Oh I bet he was a total pig about it-,"
"No! No, not at all," Naomi tries to calm her friend down, "It was nice, actually..."
Seeing Naomi smile softly, Brianne suppresses the urge to roll her eyes.
"Well that's great. Uh, good for you...?" Brianne is terrible at pretending she's at all happy about this development, "Did you want to celebrate or something?"
Brianne is alarmed when tears gather in Naomi's eyes, "No..."
She looks at her friend very seriously, "I have to pretend it never happened."
"Why?"
Naomi bites her lip, "I don't want people to gossip about me..."
Brianne snorts, "About you? Naomi, you're so cute... plenty of people at our school are dating! Well, other than you and Don Juan."
"Who?"
"You know, Don Ju-oh whatever," Brianne sighs, "My point is you're single. Calvin is single. Who cares if you two kissed?"
"My mom..."
Brianne's face falls, "Oh, I see. Man, that's shitty. Did you tell her?"
"Oh lord, no!" Naomi quickly replies, a hand over her heart, "She'd hate me even more!"
Brianne looks at Naomi sadly, "I don't think your mom hates you."
Naomi sniffles, "She definitely would if I don't stay away from Calvin... I don't know what to do!"
Brianne's brows knit together. There's no way Naomi would consider sneaking around to see a boy (not that Calvin is really worth the effort) or just saying "fuck it" and dating him openly anyways like Brianne would.
"Do you want to date him?"
"I don't know!"
Brianne squeezes Naomi's hand comfortingly, "Then tell him you don't know what you want and don't want to waste his time."
Naomi looks up, "You think that'll work?"
She shrugs, "It only takes one person to break up, you know. If he's a good guy, he'll understand. If not, then he's an asshole like I thought all along." She internally shudders; when did she start sounding like her mom? Giving all of this sappy "mature" advice?
Naomi hugs Brianne tightly, "Thank you so much! I'm sorry for bothering you with all of this..."
Brianne laughs, "That's what friends are for, right? I'm always here, man."
After a few more hours of talking and Brianne complaining about her "boring, nerdy" mother, Naomi and Brianne have to part ways. Naomi finally heard back from the mausoleum- she's hired!
Her first night is a load of information. Naomi walks out in a daze, wondering if she's messed up enough for her boss to fire her. All she had to do was re-organize some urns and dust off the tomb, but she nearly dropped the urns so many times...and misplaced two of them... did she just desecrate someone's remains?? She looks around nervously; there have been rumors of vengeful spirits lurking during the evening, she'd hate to have incurred some supernatural wrath...or whatever... over this.
"I'm so sorry," she whispers at the mausoleum, "I'll try to find your urns tomorrow!"
With that she nervously scurries off to her bike, more than ready to go home.
She returns home, her mother nowhere in sight. She breathes a sigh of relief and then gets out her cell phone.
Time to rip off the bandaid.
"Hi, Calvin," she greets tensely.
"Oh, hey Naomi," he says absently, sounding like he's in the middle of doing something else. "Shit," he swears under his breath. From the loud noises of cars crashing in the background and the GAME OVER, she guesses that he's playing some kind of video game.
"Are you alone?"
This catches Calvin's attention, "Uh, I will be in a sec... Oh my- No Sadie, it's none of your business!" he hisses. Naomi can hear his younger sister's high pitched protests in the background. She hears some footsteps and the creak of a door closing. "Ok, now I am. What is it?"
"I wanted to talk about that...kiss... we had at prom."
"Oh," Calvin's tone is immediately guarded, "Yeah I guess we should talk about that..."
"Look, it was really nice!" Naomi says truthfully, "But I'm not looking for a relationship..."
Calvin laughs nervously, the sound heavy and dejected, "Yeah... me either... I want to meet other girls and stuff, you know? Everyone in this town marries the first person they hook up with, I kinda want to see some people before anything serious."
Naomi laughs, trying to sound breezy, "Yeah, yeah exactly! We're still in high school, I want to focus on my future before dating. I'm glad you understand."
Calvin sighs, "Yeah..."
Naomi bites her lip, "We can still be friends though. If you want. I-I had fun, that time we went to the movies with your friends..."
"Yeah, sure, whatever," Calvin says non-committally, "We can hang out and stuff."
"Great!" there's a pregnant pause in conversation, "So, see you tomorrow?"
"Yeah, see you tomorrow... bye," he replies quietly. There's some rustling before the line goes silent.
"...bye," Naomi says to the dead air. She puts her phone back into her pocket.
There. Isn't that so much better? Naomi smiles and looks out the window. Glad that's over with.
The tears brimming in her eyes seem to differ.
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AN: Short chapter. Adding anything else felt like ruining the flow and made it way too long.
Brianne has an interesting mix of traits... she's hot-headed, socially awkward, a slob, and nurturing. She later aged up and got perceptive, so writing her has been interesting. A caring, observant, but hot-headed and awkward friend.
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