Better late than never.
We haven’t spoken much since he offered me money to help with my career. Even when BuzzFeed first got hold of the nude picture story, he kept his distance. So it kind of feels like this is too little, too late, but I figure he deserves the chance to make it right again. We’ve been friends for too long not to give him that. He’s practically family, and he’s going through a hard time too.
“Oh, you know, I’m all right. It sucks a bit. But you know. Fine.” This is an understatement on a par with “the political landscape in the Middle East is a little tense”, but I’m not in the mood to go into specifics.
Honestly, he looks terrible. His skin is all flaky like a dry bit of pastry, and his eyes are red-rimmed. I thought I had trademarked this esthetic last year when Ajita went away to teach textiles at a summer camp and I missed her so much I couldn’t sleep, so it’s strange to see it on Danny for a change.
After shuffling awkwardly for a few more seconds and absent-mindedly brushing toast crumbs off our counter [Dumbledore nearly has a seizure with excitement and immediately begins vacuuming them up], he says, “Good. I’m glad. I just . . . um, I just wanted you to know that . . . well, I forgive you, Iz.”
I was not even a little bit expecting him to say this. As far as I can remember, I have not wronged him in any way, other than maybe kissing him when I didn’t intend for the kissing to be a recurring event. Last time I checked, this was a thing I am entitled to do, and something menfolk do all the time. Maybe not great to do it to your best pal, but still.
“I . . . what?” For once I am actually quite speechless.
“I forgive you. Really. I do.”
“But . . . why?”
“Because I don’t want there to be any bad blood between us. And I want to make things work between . . .” He trails off at the sight of my furious expression.
Exasperated, I clarify. “No, I mean what exactly are you forgiving?”
He peers at me questioningly through his glasses, which desperately need cleaning. “Everything.”
Maybe I’m just exhausted, or hormonal, or my bullshit tolerance levels are out of whack, but I am ready to cut him at this stage.
“Define ‘everything’, Danny. I dare you.”
Wringing his hands together, he says, “Well, you know. Acting up. The whole sleeping around thing. Leading me on. Spending time with Ajita without me. Sending that nude. Rubbing you and Carson in my face. Crushing my flowers. Treating me like shit for offering you money. Do you really want me to make a list?”
“Sounds like you already have,” I snap.
“What’s up with you? I’m trying to be nice here.”
“Right. You ‘forgive’ me for acting how every guy in high school acts. Because you’re just such a Nice Guy.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Did you ever think maybe I don’t want your forgiveness for those things?” I say. “We’re not together, Danny. I can date whoever I like. I can make decisions about my own body without your approval. So shove your forgiveness up your ass.”
Part of me expects him to just crumple – head in hands, dissolve into tears, the whole shebang – but he’s obviously in fighting mood too, because he just snarls like Remus Lupin at a full moon and says, “You know, after everything I’ve done for you, you should be grateful to have people like me in your life. Not every guy would put up with this shit, let alone still want to be with you. And the others? Well, where are they now? On CNN talking about what a waste of space you are?”
ARE YOUUUUU KIDDDDIIIINGG MEEEEEEEEEEE???????
“I should be grateful?” I yell. “To be treated with basic fucking respect? Get the fuck out of my house, Danny. Right now.”
I swear I hear Betty whisper, “Oh snap,” through the wall at this point, but I could be hallucinating through sheer tiredness and frustration.
To his credit, he leaves.
So now I’m sitting in the cafeteria giving Ajita the full debrief, and she’s just as mad at him as I am due to her pit-bullish tendencies, and in real genuine danger of giving him a rectal exam using a bottle of ketchup, when her phone bleeps. She looks down, instantly horrified.
“What? What’s wrong?” I ask.
“Don’t freak out . . .” she says slowly.
“Always a great start.”
She chews her bottom lip, eyes scanning something on her screen. Then, without even looking at me, she shakes her head in disbelief and says:
“Carson Manning sold his story.”
The bottom falls out of my gut like a trapdoor opening. “Sold his story? What story?”
Then the worst moment of my life takes place.
Her face crumples. “You told him I was gay?”
4.44 p.m.
Carson spoke to one of the regional newspapers. They asked him for his side, since he’s been mentioned a ton of times on the World Class Whore site, and I guess he needed the money, or has no soul, because he did it. He told them everything.
And I mean everything. Not just his opinion on all the shit that’s already been covered, like that fateful night at the party [funnily enough, he doesn’t mention the fact he lasted less than forty-five seconds] and my nude pictures, but stuff that’s happened between the two of us since. Me texting him to apologize for everything, and thus admitting sole responsibility, according to the article. Meeting him at the basketball courts. Telling tasteless jokes about the Fritzl family.
There’s a direct quote too. Calling me a whore.
There are screenshots of our text conversations in an image gallery attached to the article.
Hey, is your friend Ajita single? One of my firm-penised teammates wants to ask her out.
She is indeed single! However, I am not sure firm penises are her jam. I mean, neither are flaccid ones. Like, I just don’t think penises are her preferred genitalia.
I doubt the reporter particularly cared about Ajita or the guy who wanted to ask her out. The piece is entirely focused on my disgusting manner in general, and the way teenage girls as a whole have lost all class, all self-respect and dignity – basically supporting everything the Vaughan family has been spouting ever since this atomic bomb of horse shit exploded all over my life. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Vaughans paid this reporter to write such a tacky feature, to be honest.
But Ajita was collateral damage. And for that I will never forgive myself.
Carson texted me as soon as the news hit. Insisting it wasn’t him, insisting we’d both been screwed over, insisting he’s not that kind of guy. Insisting he’d had his phone hacked, and that everything in the paper could’ve been gleaned from his text messages. It’s true, I guess. Maybe he was hacked. Then again, maybe he wasn’t.
I don’t know what to believe anymore. I don’t even think I care about Carson right now. All I know is how terrible I feel about what I’ve done to my best friend.
Why did I think it was okay to joke about it when Ajita herself has never addressed it? Why did I have a lapse in judgment so sudden and severe that I threw my best friend under the bus for the sake of a punchline?
All this time, the media have been talking about my string of hideous mistakes, about how I don’t think through my actions, about how I’m so shortsighted and irresponsible that I can’t see how disastrous the consequences of the things I do can be.
Until now I’ve resisted that line of thinking. Until now I’ve tried to own my actions, dismissing the idea that they were mistakes at all. So I had sex. So I drank beer. So I sent a nude. Those are things millions of other people, teenagers and adults alike, are doing every single minute of every single day. Knowing deep down I’m not a bad person is all I had left to cling onto, like a life raft when I’m drowning.
But this? Ajita? This was a mistake. This was a lapse in judgment.
This does make me a bad person.