Chapter Seven
Valerie
I was so devastated. After school, I ran home and collapsed on my bed. I couldn’t believe what had happened. I was completely dumbfounded. There was absolutely nothing that I could do.
I had tried to reach out to him and have a nice conversation with him, but he turned it into some awful experience. I kept replaying the conversation in my head and I just couldn’t believe what kept bouncing back at me every time he opened his mouth. Even though I knew every word of what he said, I just couldn’t comprehend what he was saying.
“You know, just the fact that he knows it isn’t my fault is bad enough!” I sounded off to Zachary after school, “How could he say that to me? We are supposed to be best friends!” I shrugged my shoulders and narrowed my eyes as I added, “All I really feel like we are now are mortal enemies.” When I turned back to him, I couldn’t hide the tears that were welling up in my eyes. “I just don’t understand.”
Zachary looked upon me with pity. I knew that he had no idea what to say, or he probably would have already said it. I knew he wasn’t great at comforting me; not like the Shawn I grew up with was. He could tell exactly how I felt and then turn it around so that everything seemed brighter in a matter of seconds. Zachary was just awkward, but at least he tried…and so I supposed that was what was important.
Zachary put his arm around me. He shrugged and answered, “I don’t know why Shawn feels that way…”
“I mean, I do get it. My stepfather is pretty unfair to him,” I stared at Zachary, seeking an honest answer that I wasn’t sure he could give. “I just don’t know why that’s my fault!”
I hissed a sigh and shook my head. “I just want to be able to enjoy…having a friend, you know? If he wants to be mad at Paul, then he has every right to be mad at Paul, but it’s not like I did anything to make him be that way towards Shawn.” I shrugged. “That’s just his parenting style, I guess. It is what it is.”
He nodded. “I mean, I understand Shawn being angry, but why he had to go and say those awful things to you, when you were only trying to help is something that I just can’t get a grip on.”
“I know!” I seconded in an aggravated fashion. I sighed and wiped my eyes, sniffling a bit, which caused Zachary to hug me tighter.
“I wish I had an answer for you,” he said carefully. “But I really don’t understand what is going through his head.”
“I mean, I have been in a similar situation with my mother. She has done stuff for Shawn a little differently than she did for me, but that doesn’t mean that I get angry at Shawn. I understand that it’s because he doesn’t have a mother figure, except for my mother, so sometimes she goes the extra mile to give him some motherly attention.”
“But she doesn’t do it all the time. You said she treats you both about the same,” Zachary said, as though asking for a clarification in the tone of his voice.
“Yes…and there is a consistent, almost deliberate way in which Paul treats me as opposed to how he treats Shawn…and I understand that,” I stressed. “But what I don’t understand is why Shawn is taking it out on me. I never asked for this!”
Zachary smiled in a sympathetic way. “Yeah…I know, but I just don’t have an answer for you. I’m sorry.”
Well, you’re no help, I thought angrily, but didn’t say it. Instead, I answered, “So, there’s like…no manly advice or anything that you can shed some light on for me.”
Zachary thought for a minute, as though contemplating whether or not he was going to say something. “I don’t know. To me, it sounds like he is being a little…girly about the whole thing.”
At first, I wanted to come to Shawn’s aid, but I just laughed. “I don’t think it’s that. I see how he is treated at home and while it isn’t bad, his father is hard on him…”
“Yeah, well, I wish I still had a father to be hard on me…To be anything to me,” he hissed, narrowing his eyes. When I looked surprised, he continued. “I’m sorry, but Shawn has both of his parents. Even though he doesn’t have a relationship with his mother and I know that she hurts him more than she actually does much else, she is still there. If he wanted to, he could go visit her, hug her.” He threw his hands up. “Go live with her, but he acts as though the whole world is against him.”
I narrowed my eyes and shook my head. Even though I didn’t understand where Shawn was coming from, I didn’t like what Zachary was saying very much either. “Yeah, well lately, Shawn hasn’t been the only one to act that way.”
Zachary stopped and pulled his head back, as though intensely confused about what I was saying to him. “I’m sorry, what?”
“I asked you for a listening ear and you turn it around to make him out to be a bad guy because he has both of his parents. Well, you know what, if I had his mother as my father, with all of the genuine hurt and disappointment that she has shown him, in place of love, I would rather have my reality. At least I can look at my father’s pictures and see that he loved me with all of his heart.” I shook my head and hissed, “Shawn doesn’t have that. His father is good, but although his mother might be living, she wants nothing to do with him.”
Wounded, Zachary backed up and glowered at me. “Yeah, well, I was under the impression that you wanted my opinion. I didn’t give it at first, but you pressed me for it. You wanted a man’s opinion. You might not like it, but here it is. Shawn needs to stop blaming the world for his problems and man up!” At this, Zachary raised his voice. “It aggravates me that he is blaming you, of all people, for something that really isn’t your fault and I think that he is just trying to find someone to shift the blame toward, because his mother doesn’t care about him and his father doesn’t seem to think much of him either. You and your mother seem to be his only true family and he is outing one of you for something that it is out of your control, so it makes me angry. I’m sorry that I revert back to that, but honestly, that is a big chunk out of my life and so that is what I equate him to.”
Now I was angry with him. “You know that is just as big of a chunk out of my life, that I miss every single day, but I don’t let that define me.”
“Well, I’m glad you were able to figure it all out! I’d appreciate it if you let me in on that secret at some point,” he answered sarcastically. “You know, I could really use it.”
I glowered at him and shook my head. “I can’t talk to you like this. I don’t know why I even bother!” I groaned with frustration before I broke completely free of his grasp and began to walk forward quickly.
I sensed that Zachary had stopped short, but was assured of it when I heard him groan from behind me. “Seriously? This is really how you want this to go?” He waited for me to respond, but I just kept my pace until I heard him shout, “Fine! See ya later, I guess…” His sigh was loud, but I didn’t turn around. I certainly didn’t need to deal with this right now.
I was having a crisis and if Zachary was going to be all super sensitive about the whole thing, then I certainly didn’t need his presence making everything in my life worse. I continued home and straight up to my room, without speaking another word to anyone.