Sᴇᴘᴛᴇᴍʙᴇʀ 16. 2024.
"How was school today?" Petro asks lightly over the phone. He wants to hear about what happened directly from Alessia after reading the E-mail sent to his Gmail from the principal.
"Shit." She says dryly on the other line.
He leans back in his black, leather, office chair with his feet crossed at the ankles on his cluttered desk. He decides that depending on how she responds, he'll either make time to visit the school personally (as asked in the email) or reply honestly that he's extremely busy. "Tell me what happened."
And that she does.
Later, Alexa goes out into her backyard to enjoy the cool evening air, spreading out an exercising mat she had wrapped up and tossed aside. On that mat, she stands, stretching and taking deep breaths to find her sense of peace. She needs to find that sense of wholeness she had had before. Before her conversation with Vincent this morning. Way before her graduation. That 'whatever happens happens' sense she had about her before Phillip, Katya and Ryan. Before Petro, Mateo and Sebastian...
Before her life reached the point where it has to be written on the pages of a purple Mead, wide ruled composition notebook, then uploaded to the internet for the pleasures of out-worldly beings.
It's a unique peace that many struggles to find and she has lost it. Something so precious. Piece by piece it was being chipped away. A huge chunk fell with Phillipeño. And, the last piece snapped on half this morning after it was worn down by a simple one-sided conversation.
While doing the cat-cow yoga pose to get her blood flowing and relaxation going, her phone buzzes on the fridge top, then rings out in the silence of the house. Sighing, she sits back on her heels and turn on the Bluetooth device that's already in her ear.
Katya's cheerful voice connects and she squeals, "Heya girl!"
Alessia leans forward on her palms, lowering herself. "What's up?"
"I'm coming over on the weekend!" She beams, "And, I'm bringing someone that you know. You'll never guess who."
There are only a few souls out there that Alessia knows and fewer of them are still alive. Lifting a straightened leg into the air behind her, her chest presses into the mat and her forearms are flat, grounding her posture. She grunts, "Who?"
"Now, it wouldn't be a surprise if I told you, would it?"
"I hate surprises." She states blandly, then adds. "I don't do friends either."
Katya pauses for a second, then says, "I'm your friend..." Am I not? She stops herself from asking the last part.
"You're an exception."
The lack of liveliness in Alessia's voice become overbearing and Katya drops the reason she called to ask her friend if she is okay. "You sound pretty tired..."
"I am." She tells her truthfully. "I'm really tired, Kat."
"You're not planning to go all blank and empty on me again, are you?"
Again? "What are you talking about? I didn't know you when I was like that."
Katya huffs, "I knew you. I saw you, Lexy. I watched you grow with Philli—"
"And, where is he now?" Alessia drops her ass on the mat, staring at the grass. Lowly, she questions her only friend...her annoying friend, again, "Where is he, Kat?"
"Who?"
Is she this slow? Alessia bites down on her bottom lip shaking her head roughly. "It's fucking hard."
"What's hard? What's wrong, Lexy?!" Her friend asks furiously now, wondering why she isn't explaining. Kat is left discombobulated as she spaces out, watching the grass with the sunlight dimming gradually around her.
"I hurt."
"Where?!"
She goes quiet.
"Alexa, what's going on? Talk to me, please?"
She doesn't want to. Katya wouldn't understand anyway. She turns off the device in her ear and Katya's voice fill the kitchen in a frantic search for her friend's. Alessia rolls into the grass on her back to stare at the darkening sky.