We've Met Before

18 - June Ninth

GABBY

    "Gale, I'm sure she'll be fine."
    He smiles towards her, suddenly flustered at my objection. "No, it's no problem really. I love seashells."
    I watch with the utmost patience and tolerance as Gale kneels beside Kaia, picking up seashells and throwing them inside her blue bucket. They both look like fucking children.
    If I could have been born as someone else, it would've surely been Kaia Turner.
    Everything I've ever wanted, and everything I've ever owned, I've had to work for it.
    I met Jane and Jennifer in sixth grade, all three of us bonding over a stray dog we found in the streets at our joint bus stop. I had to force myself to feel empathetic. To want to touch the mutt with my clean hands.
    We became inseparable from that day on.
    I'm not the nicest person in the world, probably not nice at all, but I'm loyal. This is what I liked so much about the twins.
    Most especially Jane.
    Jane and Jennifer hold each other with a strengthening grip, where if one falls, the other is there to surely pick her up.
    My parents used to cheat on each other all the time, so loyalty wasn't something that was very common for me growing up, but I suppose it felt right when I saw it in the twins.
    Sure, they fought, and made fun of each other, but that's what they were there for. They were sisters through and through.
    I melted into their group, finding the same loyalty they professed to each other, but as hard as I worked to achieve it, it was easy to take it all away from me.
    Kaia Turner didn't need to try. She sat with us for two weeks before the twins decided they loved her. Elliot began approaching our table more, which Jennifer was plenty happy about. Too bad it was for Kaia, and not her.
    They began seeing me as a cynic from that point onward, scrunching their noses at my remarks, and gleefully agreeing with whatever Kaia Turner had to say.
    It was so easy for her to steal what I had earned.
    I cant say I didn't appreciate what she did for me earlier this week though. We exchanged our company for a couple moments of peace, so I don't think it was all out of the goodness of her heart.
    That doesn't exist.
    Kaia smiles every few seconds, aweing at whatever piece of crustacean she finds beneath the sand. She finds such delight in smaller things, it's a bit ridiculous if you ask me.
    She turns to look at me as I stand above them.
    "Do you want to help? You and Gale can walk around finding some on the other side," She comments, shoving Gale towards me.
    I don't need her help in regaining my boyfriend.
    "No, it's okay. I'll go back inside." I half hope Gale will start chasing after me, begging me to return back and venture for ducking seashells with him.
    He doesn't.
——
    Gale is loyal, upstanding, maybe even noble. His floppy light brown hair makes him seem youthful, lively —but I didn't guess that it'd come with immaturity. I feel so ahead of him sometimes.
    We've been dating for a year and a half now, withstanding every single bout of boredom between each other.
    I hate looking at him sometimes, because I feel this inexplicable desire to mold him to what I want. I want to nitpick at his character, and his face, and him as a whole, but I don't.
    I love Gale, even if it seems like I don't sometimes.
   I'm better when I'm around him. I'm less impulsive. I'm more controlled and passive.
    Things I'm not necessarily known for.
    I take a sip of my tea, looking out beyond the gulf. The liquid burns my tongue, but I continue drinking. I enjoy feeling a bit of pain.
    I wriggle my feet on the sand, slightly digging into the powdered earth for warmth.
    Gale sits in the beach chair beside me, scrolling through his phone idle in distraction.
    "Gale," I say, staring off into space.
    He hums a quick "mhm."
    "I know I'm not the prettiest, or maybe even the smartest, but thank you."
    He stops looking at his phone, staring at me for a few seconds. His eyes ice over me, cooling the slightly burn on my tongue.
    "For what?"
    "Choosing me." I look over to him, reading the expressions on his face. He purses his lips, standing up, and walking back inside the white hotel.
    So much for that.
    I huff upwards, taking my cup of tea with me, the pads of my fingers hovering on the molten glass.
——
    I enter the hotel room, shutting the door quietly behind me. Gale sits on the balcony, doing the exact same thing he was doing out on the beach, except I'm not there.
    I take the other seat beside him, enjoying the refreshing feeling of him beside me. I don't need him to talk, or to say anything at all. After a year together with someone, you get used to their presence, the sound of their breathing, the paddle of their footsteps.
    I hear Gale sigh, finally placing his phone down.
    "I can't do this anymore, Gabby."
    A heat runs through my fingers, my hand letting go of the tea cup. I don't bother looking down. The shattering of cheap hotel porcelain is enough noise to remind me of what I just did.
    "What?" I look at Gale, trying to find a reason in his eyes before he has the ability to tell me himself.
    He can barely look at me. My heart slides to me stomach, sinking and perching itself at the very bottom in hopes that it'll be able to run from embarrassment, and humiliation, and pain.
    "I thought this trip would be good for us. That I'd be able to find the love I had for you in the beginning, but Jesus Christ Gabby! It's been a day and I'm already dreading the rest of the fucking week."  His voice isn't angry, or upset. He sounds tired, exasperated. I'm waiting for him to tell me that it's because he found someone else. That history repeats itself the same way it did with my parents, but the phrase never arrives. It stays docked at the harbor, knowing it will never set sail.
    "Why? What's made you so sick of me?" My voice breaks, but it's still as loud as ever. "I've molded myself into what I needed to be for you!"
    He pinches the bridge of his nose, exhaling and shutting his eyes. "That's the problem. We just aren't compatible. It worked out at first because I myself needed something else at the time, but I'm sick of your nonchalance. You're always fucking tired, and you're always fucking complaining." He tugs at his hair, feigning to have gone insane.
    I'm the weed that keeps growing.
    I'm the pesky vines on your fence that you have to get removed every couple of weeks.
    I grow, and grow, and grow, only to be cut down after spending the entire year growing. I'm trying, but at the end of the day I'm just water spilt. I'm the apartment that you'll continue to sleep in, until you decide you want a family.
    "Fuck you. You know absolutely fucking nothing about me."
    He throws his hands in the air, backing off into the room, grabbing his suit case, and his car keys. "You think I don't? After a year and a half together you think I don't? Tell Kaia it was wonderful to meet her, and I'm glad she enlightened me in what it means to meet an actual woman."
    Kaia?
    This has to do with Kaia?
    I stand as he slams the door shut.
    I walk over to the nightstand, shoving the night lamp and stack of books to the floor. I open my suit case and throw the clothes around the room, watching as each one flails around the air. My teeth are gritted, and my breath is sharp.
    I hate the fact that I'll never be anything more than a tryer.
——
    The sound of the ocean lulls me to lay on my side. I never enjoyed silence that much. Silence felt unresponsive, diligent for people who liked thinking too much.
    The real poison in life is thinking. Your kind rotates between reality and whatever sick, twisted, depressing mentality most people have.
    But this silence is exactly what I need. The sort of silence that forces me to burn.
    The door creaks open. I know by the sound of his footsteps that it's Gale. We're entering the usual routine we follow, all so familiar.
    He'll creep inside my room, mutter a couple sorrys and lay down beside me, molding his body against mine in an attempt to regain whatever closeness he can with me.
    I like the routine. It helps me feel safer.
    I feel his weight beside me, flushing the sheets above his body, and laying underneath our covers. His hand creeps on my waist, his fingers sinking into me.
    I don't like when he does that, but I can't say no because he'll leave.
    "I'm so sorry. I just get so frustrated with you sometimes." His lips peck small kisses from my neck to my ear, traveling back down my arm.
    Chills raise on my body, the hairs on the back of my neck standing up.
    I pretend to stir awake, pressing down slightly on my vocal chords to create grogginess in my voice. "Not today. I'm so tired." I shimmy my shoulders to get the message across, trying to shove him off slightly.
    He doesn't stop.
    "Gale. Gale, I don't want to tonight." I turn around, pushing him off me as his body doesn't budge. "Gale! Gale! Stop!"
    He grabs my wrists, binding them in front of me as he shoves my chin up, groaning into my neck as he smells me.
    "You want me to choose you right? You want me to fuck nobody but you? This is how, Gabby." His nose grazes me in the most uncomfortable way possible, everything feeling disgusting.
    Gale has never done anything like this. He'll call me a bitch from time to time, or he'll tell me how I should dye my hair a beautiful blonde color because that's how he likes it. He'll tell me that I'm boring, and I argue too much. He'll tell me that I overreact to everything, and I'm overly impulsive.
    All things that are true.
   But this isn't him.
   He takes my lips between his, the smell of alcohol simmering in his saliva.
    I stop squirming.
    I stop resisting.
    I let him fondle me, pull my pajama pants down. I let him kiss me, and tell me how good it feels to choose me.
    He's loyal.
    He'll always choose me... right?