Colorblind

by Siera Maley

  Eventually, Dad made the mistake of asking Chloe if she had any college plans yet or if she knew what she wanted to do when she got older, and I felt like sinking down into my seat until I disappeared. I didn’t want to hear about Chloe’s hopes and dreams and plans for her life. Not until I could ensure her safety.

  I wasn’t sure exactly what her birth date was, but I assumed it was mid to late August, right around when school started back up. That meant I needed to put everything I had into keeping her safe for two more months. If we could get to her birthday, then maybe things could be different with us.

  To be perfectly honest, I wanted them to be.

  We put on her movie first in my bedroom when we finished dinner (and after I spent quite a while assuring my dad that Chloe and I were just friends), and, after about two hours of watching Arnold shoot his way through just about every obstacle placed in front of him, up to and including a small army of human beings, it was time for my movie.

  I yawned and slid down on my bed once I’d finished setting the movie up. Chloe and I’d sat on my bed for the first movie, popcorn between us and our backs pressed up against my pillows, but now she set the bowl aside and laid down to join me. I wondered, as she moved closer and her hand brushed against mine, if she was confused by my behavior. She had to know that I already liked her, for all her teasing about convincing me to date her in the future. There was really no reason for things not to progress naturally between us; at least, not from her perspective.

  From mine, there was only the escalated emotional involvement that came with dating someone. If I committed, it’d make it harder to lose her. And a large part of me was worried that despite my best efforts to prevent it, I would.

  I glanced over at her to see her watching the movie with rapt attention. She’d moved the popcorn to her other side, and the hand that wasn’t pressing up against mine every few seconds had a fistful of popcorn in it and was currently being raised to her mouth. I smiled as she tried and failed to fit the entire handful.

  “Don’t get popcorn all over my bed, loser.”

  “Don’t stare at me when your favorite movie’s on, Romeo,” she bit back, unfazed. “So desperate. God.”

  I huffed and hid a smile as I shifted my head back toward the television, acutely aware of the position of her hand again. I wanted her to keep touching me. I wanted to forget what I knew about her and just be normal. I didn’t want to have to spend my summer playing God.

  On the screen, Liesl and Rolfe were dancing together to “Sixteen Going on Seventeen”, which was more than a little morbid given the circumstances. Chloe ate another handful of popcorn and murmured, “This asshole. I bet he betrays her. He looks sketchy.”

  I was only half-listening to her. My gaze drifted down to where our hands were nearly touching, and I shifted mine to bring it closer to hers. Heart thudding hard in my chest, I reached out with my pinky to brush it up against hers. She reacted by pushing hers back against mine and then linking our pinkies together, and I heard her swallow another handful of popcorn.

  “Look at his douchebag, dancing around,” she muttered, eyes still on the screen, but her pinky squeezed mine tighter between us.

  “Can I ask you something?” I questioned abruptly.

  She glanced over at me. “Hmm? Yeah, sure. Go ahead.”

  I searched her face for a moment, my eyebrows furrowed. “Why are you so forward with girls? Aren’t you ever afraid of rejection?”

  She laughed and shook her head. “No. I used to get nervous. Then one day I decided that was stupid. So now, whenever I start to hesitate, I just tell myself to not worry about the consequences, push past the nerves, and do whatever it was I almost didn’t.”

  “That seems like a good way to make a lot of mistakes,” I pointed out.

  “Life’s all about mistakes. And it’s way too short to just wait around instead of cutting through the bullshit.”

  I shifted backward to get a better look at her face. “Is that what this is? The bullshit?” I wasn’t angry, and took care not to sound that way. I just genuinely wanted to get inside her head.

  “Of course not. This is… me spending a summer with a pretty girl, who, if she were to decide she maybe did actually wanna act on her urge to kiss me, would be welcome to do so.”

  “You’re waiting,” I restated for her. “You just said life’s too short to wait around.”

  “I make exceptions.” She arched an eyebrow at me. “If you have a problem with it, you could end the waiting. Especially given that I’m not really sure what we’re waiting for. I mean, it’s been like three weeks since we met now. We live in San Francisco so homophobia won’t be a problem. I’m solidly gay, and you’re not exactly waving a rainbow flag but you have claimed to play for my team, so.”

  I didn’t respond. We laid in silence for a moment, facing each other. I watched her lips part as she let out an overdramatic sigh and thought of Robbie and what he’d say about this. He’d probably make extra sure I knew that Chloe was doomed regardless, because fate had already made its decision. He’d also probably say that I was a lost cause. Maybe that was true.

  Chloe chewed on her lip as we broke eye contact and her gaze drifted lower. Her hand came up and touched my cheek, then slid down to my neck and stayed there, her fingers unconsciously urging me forward by putting pressure at the base of my skull.

  I watched her, unmoving, and swallowed hard. She’d stopped biting her lip and was smiling at me now, and I marveled at the fact that a girl like her could ever be interested in a girl like me. She lit up rooms when she walked into them, and I was the epitome of the shy, antisocial kid that sat alone in corners at parties. Yet here we were, her with her hand on my neck as she shifted ever so slightly closer.

  “Why do you like me?” I asked her.

  She looked confused by the question and backed off. “Because you’re cute.”

  “No, seriously.” I sat up, and her hand slid off of my neck as she joined me. I watched her, waiting.

  She took a deep breath and then rolled her eyes. “Because you’re cute.” I opened my mouth to chastise her, but she kept talking. “That was the reason after we talked for the first time, anyway. After that… I don’t know. You were interesting. You have so much going for you: a nice dad, your looks, the dry sense of humor.” She smiled, almost sadly. “But it feels like… everything’s grey to you.”

  “Grey?” I echoed, confused.

  “Like the whole idea of going through life as we know it is just… ‘meh’.” She shrugged her shoulders. “You don’t get excited about much. There’s not a lot you like. Not a lot you do. It’s like you don’t have an enthusiasm for life. Which was interesting to me because I get excited about everything. Maybe I’m too enthusiastic; I don’t know. But I think we could balance each other out. You need a little color in your world, you know? Even most of your movies are in black and white.”

  “So I’m a charity case,” I sighed out, only half-meaning it. “I get it.”

  “No.” She straightened up and, with an air of false pretentiousness, declared, “I find you intriguing.” Then she dropped the act and added, “And once I got vibes that you were a cute girl who could actually be a lesbian, there was no going back.”

  “It doesn’t take much, then?” I joked.

  “Well, who says it should?” She shrugged again. “I like you. It doesn’t have to be complicated, and there doesn’t have to be years of tension and buildup. I just met you and I like you and that’s enough for me.”

  “Things aren’t always that simple,” I shot back, tensing.

  She exhaled audibly, watching me, and then seemed to hesitate before she spoke next. Her tone was gentle, like she wanted to tread carefully. “Harper, I’ve only ever lost one family member, and it was when I was young, so I won’t act like I know what that’s like. But the only person I’ve seen you happy around has been Robbie. This is about your mom, isn’t it?”

  I hesitated. I felt frozen in place as I
tried to come up with a fitting response, but she’d caught me off guard. My silence was a reply in its own right.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” she said, offering me a small smile. “It’s okay to let people in sometimes.”

  “You promise?” I asked, even though I knew it wasn’t fair.”

  “I promise.”

  “I-” I paused, hesitating again. She was so earnest: so sincere. She had no idea she wasn’t telling the truth, and as I studied her, I couldn’t help but think, “What on earth is going to happen to you?”

  “Can I ask you something?” She spoke up suddenly. “Why Robbie? What is it about him that made it okay to keep him around?”

  I shifted my gaze to my lap with a soft sigh. “Well, it helps that I’m not attracted to him. And… his sister died a few years back. He gets it. And… I just have a feeling he’ll be around for a while.”

  “Doesn’t that get exhausting?” she marveled. “Looking at every single person like some sort of risk calculation? Comparing potential enjoyment as a result of being friends versus potential pain as a result of losing the friendship? Or of losing them?”

  “Yes. It’s very exhausting.” I shrugged. “I wish I wasn’t like this, but I can’t change it.”

  “I think you can. Have you ever considered the fact that maybe the goal of life isn’t to get through it as painlessly as possible?” she asked me.

  I raised my head, genuinely caught off guard again. “No, not really.”

  “Well, there you go. There’s your problem. Life isn’t about the pain. It’s about the good parts. Think about it like… laser tag!” She brightened even as I forced a laugh. I could see the cheesy metaphor coming before she even began. “Like, I bet it’d be super easy to go a whole round without getting shot. You’d just have to hide in some corner where no one ever goes and sit there and do nothing. But that makes for a boring game of laser tag, and so no one does that, right? We all run around and put ourselves at risk so that maybe we’ll have some fun! See, life is like laser tag.”

  I stared at her for a moment, trying to keep a straight face. “Uh huh.”

  “That was a fantastic metaphor. I came up with that literally just now; wasn’t that awesome?”

  “For an improvisation,” I humored her. “The thing is, I know what it’s like to get shot, and I’ve learned from it. I’m not letting it happen again. You’ve never been shot, so you don’t know how bad it feels.”

  “I don’t,” she admitted, but she was smiling now. “But I do know how fun it is to not hide in a corner all game.”

  * * *

  Dad was waiting for Chloe and me with breakfast when we came downstairs the next morning. He had enough tact, thankfully, to not ask about our sleepover or about what I’d thought of Deborah while Chloe was with us.

  She left just before noon, and I walked her to the door. “I’ll see you soon,” she promised. “My parents want to see a movie with me tomorrow night, but I’m free every other night this week. I thought of something we might be able to do together next weekend.”

  “Oh no,” I joked.

  “It’ll be fun,” she insisted. “Trust me.”

  We stood together for a moment, face to face, and she looked like she wanted to say more.

  “I’ll see you around, then,” I said.

  She nodded. “Not going anywhere.”

  “I remember,” I assured her. “Just… be careful. No skydiving before I see you again, okay?”

  “I can’t promise that,” she joked. “Text me, alright?”

  “Yep.”

  She leaned in before I could react and kissed me on the cheek, then took a couple steps back, grinning, before she turned away and descended the porch steps. I sighed and leaned against the doorframe, watching her go and, at last, turned to go inside and closed the front door behind me.

  Dad was watching me from the living room, an eyebrow raised. I colored instantaneously and he asked, “Just friends, huh?”

  “That looked worse than it was,” I mumbled.

  “I’ll let you off the hook,” he acquiesced, “if you tell me what you genuinely thought of Deborah last night.”

  I shrugged my shoulders. “Not much to think. She tried kind of hard, didn’t she?”

  “Because it’s important to her that you approve.” He folded his arms across his chest, looking concerned. “It’s important to me, too.”

  “Well… maybe she and I are just meant to coexist,” I suggested, turning away from him. “We don’t have to be best friends.”

  He let out a sigh. “I didn’t say you did, Harper. Just… promise me you’ll give her a chance, alright? You hardly spoke to her last night.”

  “I’ll give her a chance,” I agreed quietly, and then mumbled, “It’s not like I have much of a choice, anyway.”

  * * *

  “Welcome to Daily Fries. What can I get for you?”

  The man in front of me took his time with the menu on the wall. It was Three Burgers again, back for his daily meal with a 45 still on his forehead. I felt physical pain as I watched him speak. “How are you this stupid?” I wanted to ask. “There are people who care about you and you’re literally killing yourself.”

  He stopped speaking. Now he was staring at me. I realized I’d completely spaced out while I was supposed to be taking his order. “I’m sorry, sir, could you repeat that?”

  “I just spent an entire minute giving you my order,” he shot back, appalled. “You didn’t get any of it?”

  I bit my lip to stop myself from being rude. A hand on my shoulder saved me. Robbie, of course. He looked out for me far more than I deserved. “Sorry about that, sir. I’ll take your order and we’ll throw in a free large fry; how does that sound?” He gave me a look that told me to scram, and I rolled my eyes and left to go on break.

  When I was outside alone, I sat down on the ground, my back to the wall that was still covered in cigarette burns, and pulled my knees up to my chest. I rested my forehead on my knees and closed my eyes, willing my shift to be over soon. This was a waste of time. I could’ve been with Chloe all day instead.

  Robbie came around a few minutes later. I heard his footsteps and the click of his lighter before he spoke, but when he did, it was with a sigh. “You could ask George if he’ll give you the rest of the day off,” he suggested.

  I lifted my head to look up at him. “I’m thinking about quitting.”

  “Since when?”

  “Since a few weeks ago,” I admitted. “I hate it here.”

  “Well, no one likes it here.”

  “Yeah, but…” I trailed off and then muttered, “I hate being around people.”

  “Me too,” he agreed quietly. “This job gets morbid sometimes.”

  “I need something where I never see anyone,” I decided. “Like a data entry clerk job or something. With a desk in a back room. And the only person that ever comes in is my boss, who has super healthy eating habits and will live into his hundreds. I’m so sick of being reminded that we’re all going to die one day.”

  “Well, hook me up when you find a job like that.” He exhaled a cloud of smoke and I pressed my nose into my sleeve. “I’ll tell George you aren’t feeling well, okay? Go see Chloe.”

  “What’s the point?” I mumbled, only half meaning it.

  He studied me for a moment. The cigarette between his fingers slipped through them and fell to the ground, where he squashed it with his foot. “I’m a pretty cynical person. Even more cynical than you, which is saying something. So as much as I’m sure you don’t want to hear it, here’s the truth. All of this isn’t going to end well. You fucked up pretty badly by putting yourself in the position you’re in. If you hook up with her and she dies, you’ll be miserable.” He paused, digging the heel of his shoe into the gravel beneath us. “With that said… If you don’t hook up with her and she dies, you’ll be miserable and you’ll regret it.”

  I hid my face against my knees and tried to ignore how low my heart had
sank. “Maybe.”

  “Not ‘maybe’. If I was wrong, you’d just stop spending time with her, because it wouldn’t be worth it. Instead, she’s the only thing that’s been on your mind since you met her. I kind of miss you, actually.”

  I wiped at the corners of my eyes and couldn’t bring myself to look back at him. “This sucks.”

  “I warned you about this happening.” His tone was blunt. Typical tactless Robbie. I tried hard to not get mad at him.

  “I think I’m gonna go. Can you talk to George for me?”

  “Of course.” He stood with me for a moment, and then, awkwardly, said, “I’m here if you want to talk.”

  “I know.”

  He hesitated, lingering for another few seconds before he left. I got to my feet as his footsteps faded, and my stomach twisted into a knot. Before Chloe, Robbie had been the only person who’d understood me.

  Now it felt like no one did.

  Chapter Six

  “Hey, what’s up?”

  I tried to hide a sniffle, hoping Chloe couldn’t hear it through the phone. “Um, are you busy?” I asked her.

  “Just playing a board game with my parents. Why?” I didn’t answer at first, and Chloe sounded concerned the next time she spoke. “Is something wrong?”

  “Not really. I just… thought you might come over?”

  “Sure. Just give me a few minutes and I’ll be right there.” There was a brief pause, and I heard what sounded like two distinct voices in the background. A moment later, Chloe was back on the line. “Hey, um, actually, how do you feel about coming here? If you don’t want to, I can come over, but Dad’s only met you that one time and Mom wants to meet you. We can provide free food…”

  I considered it. Earlier on in my friendship with Chloe, I’d wanted to avoid her parents. But a few weeks had passed and things were different now. Getting to know her parents wouldn’t make things much worse than they already were. It was probably worth it to make Chloe happy. Talking to her alone could wait.