"I'll see you later then?" Sophie inquired, slightly concernedly.
"Yeah." I uttered, distracted, almost breathless. I glanced up at the block of apartments before me, reaching high up into the sky like much Halapatovian architecture and slightly gleaming in the morning rays. Shaking my head to regain my senses, I turned to look directly at Sophie and nodded my head in determination. "See you later." I said firmly.
She patted my arm in support and flashed me a grin. "I'll be off then. Enjoy your reunion!"
"Bye!" I said and waved as she started to move off down the street. She looked back at me and then waved as she turned the corner, off to do.... whatever it was she was planning on doing. I didn't really know. She might've mentioned it but I probably wasn't paying attention. I'd been so fixated on today, on coming here, seeing Leila, that I'd hardly been able to think of anything else all morning.
Well, now I was here, and I drew in a deep breath as I turned over the postcard with her address on it in my hands, nervously. It was so weird to have missed Leila so much and to now be scared to be here seeing her. It's not hard for people to tell I am socially awkward in most situations (for instance, look at the last ten years of my life) and this was freaking me out. It hadn't really been all that long since I'd seen her but I couldn't help worrying that something would go wrong.
You're letting the Personal Flaw take over again, I chided myself. Leila was your best friend for the majority of your life. Think of all the things you did together! All the conversations you had. Of course she'll be happy to see you! Don't worry about it you numbskull.
I nodded absently in response to my own thoughts, and steeled myself to enter. As I passed through the entrance of the building my shoulders relaxed and a smile alighted my face as my words started to ring true and excitement flooded me. I was going to see Leila! This was awesome!
I climbed swiftly through the building, until I found the floor Leila and her family lived on, and surveyed all of the few door numbers to find the one I was looking for. I checked the address once more with the postcard before shoving it away, something I really didn't even need to do because I'd looked at it so many times already I had it memorized. Well, here I was.
Gently, I reached out and pressed the button beside the door, nerves thrilling through me. I couldn't hear the repercussions inside the house, but was sure that the bell was sounding loud and clear. As I waited for someone to come answer the door I did a mental checklist.It wasn't a school day, so Leila definitely wouldn't be there. I'd come in the morning, increasing my chances that she would be here, as on Halapatov those who weren't working tended to be out later in the day. So, all things going well, I was going to see Leila within barely a minute! Nerves and excitement seemed to be reenacting an battle scene within my stomach, but I utilized all of my self control to push down my emotions and focus. I had missed her so much, but now I was here, and that's what mattered.
I had to stop myself from holding my breath as I heard the locks turning on the other side of the door and it started to creak open. Behind it appeared Leila's mother, and as she caught a glimpse of me her face lit up in shock. A grin split my features as she opened the door wide and just stared at me in surprise. I could tell she was happy to see me, yet as I searched her face I sensed something darker, like worry. Why would Leila's mum be worried about seeing me?
Before I had time to contemplate this further, the expression disappeared and she moved forwards to wrap me in a hug. "Abigail! Welcome! It's so good to see you again! I have so many questions. How are you on Halapatov? Why didn't you call in advance?"
I pulled back and smiled. "I wanted it to be a surprise. I came here with a friend. It's really amazing here!"
Her smile became half a smirk. "Is this the human girl? The one you were with on the news? You'll have to tell me all about that of course. I can't believe what you two did there!" she gushed at me.
"Yes, Sophie's the one that brought me here and she's human." I replied, and then, distracted, peered inside the apartment. "Uh. is Leila here?"
"Oh yes of course." Leila's mother waved her hands about. "She's in her room doing schoolwork, I'll just go fetch her. You come in and sit down."
She led me into the main room, which was part kitchen part sitting room. In the sitting room section was a couch, which I lowered myself onto as Leila's mother disappeared into a hallway to go find her daughter. There was a low table in front of this, with bits and pieces of paperwork and implements scattered across it. Their computer module sat on a desk in the corner, next to a bookshelf absolutely crammed with literature of all kinds. I surveyed the room, a fond smile curving my lips at the sight of anything I recognized, and then the sound of feet crossing the hallway hit my ears and I stood up, the excitement from before returning, as the door opened and Leila entered.
When she caught sight of me, she just sort of mildly gaped at me, her face clouded with emotion. She seemed almost in shock.
Trying to break the moment, and barely thinking in my own ecstasy in seeing her, I bounded forwards and embraced her. She didn't really react, just stood there limply while I squeezed her tightly, and when I stepped back she fixed her gaze on me with her eyebrows furrowed now.
Her face contorted in an attempt to speak, and then she composed herself, breathed in and said, "Wh- What are you doing here?"
I beamed at her. "Seeing you of course."
"But... why? How?"
My face fell a bit. I was confused by her reaction. Why didn't she seem happy to see me? I knew my appearance was shocking, as people don't normally just pop up on other planets like this, but still, surely there should be some excitement involved. Or maybe I just didn't understand people as well as I thought.
Finally a smile appeared on her face as she looked at my concern, but there was something wrong about it, something forced. Despite the Personal Flaw causing a ringing in my head as I tried to work it out, I felt my heart sinking deeper and deeper into my chest until I was worried I'd never find it again. What had I done wrong? Why was Leila not happy? Was there something I'd missed?
"Abigail!" she interrupted my thoughts with a false cheery tone and pulled me to sit down on the couch, where I landed with a thump. If I hadn't been on full alert, searching her features for some explanation, I wouldn't have noticed with a dull ache that her eye twitched slightly, as if in irritation. "You have to tell me all about everything! How long have you been here? Come on, answer me."
I struggled to find my voice, my throat felt almost strangled with the wrongness of it all. "I've been on Halapatov for about two weeks. I came here with my human friend Sophie. It's so wonderful here!"
"Please excuse me." Leila's mother said at this point and I glanced over as she disappeared into the hallway.
"Yeah, it truly is." Leila replied, fixing me with an interested look but there was a bite to her words that I couldn't ignore. "So you've been here for two weeks with a human and decided to come see me now then?"
"Well, yes, of course!" I tried my best to grin at her. "I couldn't go home without seeing you. Surely you understand that."
Leila made a low humming noise in her throat in a kind of half-hearted response. "Well, yeah, that's nice of you. Um, it's good seeing you again, but I do have like homework and stuff to do so..."
I couldn't help the slackening of my face at this moment as I stared at her, my eyes wide in shock. "What? Leila, I came here to see you, you can't expect me to just go now."
"Yeah, you've seen me now haven't you? You didn't really give me any warning; you can't expect me to drop my life for you all of a sudden." She snapped at me and the warning bells that had been ringing in my head suddenly intensified until I felt like screaming. I didn't understand, and that terrified me. What was going on?
"I'm not expecting that, why would I? But I've come all the way to Halapatov to see you, and you're just giving me a 'hello, goodbye'. Surely-"
Leila interjected, her tone rising by the minute. "Came all the way to Halapatov to see me? From the way you talked about your first two weeks with Sophie it sounds as if I'm just a sideline from the main events of your life, like an idle thought. 'Oh you know what? Isn't there some girl I used to hang out with that lives on Halapatov Sophie? Well, because all of my other plans fell through, I guess I could go see her, maybe, if nothing more exciting comes up.'" She finished in a mocking imitation of me.
As her words processed in my head, the penny dropped.
"Yo- you think you're a last resort, that I didn't want to come see you? Leila, you've been my best friend for years. I love you. I would never think of you like that." I said softly, feeling a lump of guilt building in my throat.
Leila just fixed me with a glare, and I felt as if my heart was snapping in two. Yet, no matter how hurt I was, my paladanian mind kept searching, searching her expression to discern what possible concern lay behind all this, and I realized that there was something more.
Something darker.
My teeth clenched down on my inner cheek uncomfortably, but I didn't have the heart to stop until it started to bleed just a little. I averted my eyes to the floor and asked mournfully, "Do you really want me to leave?"
I heard Leila exhale sadly, and chanced a glance upwards, to be hit with the full force of her conflicted emotions.
"I- I know it's a horrible thing to say..." Leila trailed off and I understood that she was now being perfectly honest with me in a way she never had been before. "But I don't think I ever wanted to see you again in the first place."
I am not even sure if I could effectively describe my emotions at this point. If my heart hadn't already been breaking by this point, just those words alone could have shattered it. My mind seemed to retreat back into itself as I stared blankly at Leila, a pale expression adorning my features that spoke measures of the emptiness I felt in full force. In the few moments of respite I had inside my own brain I sifted through memories in almost a rage, pulling things apart, analyzing everything. I needed to know where I had gone wrong. I felt compelled to find some way to fix this....
Yet I came up with nothing, and simply stared at Leila's set features until I could hardly stand it and I averted my eyes to the floor, squeezing my eyes shut.
"I- I don't understand." I admitted brokenly and made the mistake of looking up at Leila again. She was wearing this horrible twisted smirk that made me wonder if I'd ever known her at all.
"Well that's new." she replied coolly, unperturbed by the horror present on my face. "You're usually able to understand everything aren't you? How does it feel to be like the rest of us for once? To not know everything in a person's brain? To have to talk to them to know what's going on in their lives?" With her words something in my brain clicked, something terror filled and concerning, but nonetheless something, and then Leila sighed, and her features softened. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to hurt you, I don't want to. I just, I feel like I've been harbouring this stuff for too long."
"What stuff?" I pressed, anxious. "I thought we told each other everything."
"Oh Abigail, you're so clever. I never had to, did I? We rarely talked about how we felt, did we? It was always, let's watch the stars, or let's go for a walk, or lets analyze this, or let's do this work. Whenever I brought up anything personal, you'd say 'I already knew that'. It was unbearably hard for me. I could tell you didn't even realize you were doing anything wrong, and that somehow made it worse. I-" she broke off at this point because she was shaking with emotion, and that broke my heart even further, if that was even possible. Waves of unrelenting guilt rolled over me, and I felt almost sick at the stomach to think of myself treating Leila like this. Had I? I must have, or why would she feel like this. I pushed the thoughts away; they were selfish, and attempting to comfort me rather than her.
"I'm sorry." I told her, pouring all the emotion I had into my words. "I'm so so sorry."
She buried her face in her hands and breathed deep. When she reemerged, she started babbling as if she couldn't stop now that this outpour had started. "I don't know why I even bothered, you know? Jayne and Sierra and everyone seemed to avoid you, I don't know why but I should have heeded their concern. Being around someone like you is poisonous. I barely even realized it at the time, but then when my mum said she'd been offered a job in Halapatov and my heart leapt at the thought of being away from here, away from you, I understood something was wrong. And I've been here for two months now and you know what? I've been happy! It's laughable to think of the amount of time I wasted with you."
I knew there was no way to repair the brokenness, the hopelessness, that had swelled inside me at Leila's words, and I stood there, eyes riveted on her, face downcast. I didn't know what to do. I wanted to comfort the distress she's clearly been feeling but I couldn't, because I was the cause of it. Nothing in my life had ever hurt more than that. Then Leila continued.
"Look at you now! Just standing there, unable to argue. You did know, you've never cared!"
I thought this was unfair and started to speak up in defense but she continued, louder and angrier than she had been before.
"Don't even try to deny it! I mean, look how long it took you to replace me after I got out of there. A week! And now you and Sophie are all buddy buddy in Halapatov because you saved the world together and it's such a perfect friendship and what do you think is the perfect end to your little adventure here? Seeing me? You have no idea do you, how you make people feel? I don't know how Sophie puts up with you, to be honest. Well, from the footage I've seen, she seems crazy enough I guess..." Finally she trailed off.
I was earnestly fighting tears now. I felt so stupid, so cruel, so selfish, to know that I had caused Leila to feel this way. How could I? And she was right, how dare I come back now? What had I been thinking?
"What do you want me to do?" I asked Leila solemnly, scrabbling for some way to make up for this.
"You've done enough." she shook her head sadly. "You've let me vent at you, to let this all out, and I think that's the best thing you could've done. Like I said, I don't want to upset you, but I think it's best.... for both of us.... if this friendship ends."
I'd known this was coming, of course I had, since the warning bells in my mind had started blaring. I knew, and agreed with her at the heart of it all, that although we had been friends before, we were both different people now, and the way we had operated just wouldn't cut it. I wished I had seen this clearer before; even better, to have realized the friction between us years ago, so I could have worked to prevent it. Alas, life and time had not given us that privilege, and here we were now, and no matter how much I knew in my mind and soul that parting ways was the best thing to do, my heart didn't want to let go.
Somehow, finally, I mustered up the will to answer in the only way I could. "Okay."
She gave me a bit of a sad smile, and it hit me again that she was as hurt by this as I was, and then I extended my arms for one final hug, which she gladly gave me. I wanted to hold on to that embrace forever, stop time in that moment and just be with Leila forever, never have to change and move on, and yet I could not, and even if I could, what kind of life would that be? So the hug ended, and I stood up to leave.
For some reason, this weighed more on my heart than it should have, and crossing to the door felt like torture, as if my soul was being pulled in two directions. When faced with the door, I could barely stand this separation, despite the fact that deep down I knew it was for the best, and I glanced back at Leila. She stood, watching me, looking a little lost but firm in her decision. I somehow was brave enough to speak up.
"We'll still write to each other though? Once a month, once a year? Every now and then?"
Leila chewed her lip, but her eyes softened and she nodded. "That would be good."
But we can't be this anymore. I acknowledged silently in my mind.
I kind of stared at her for a very long pause, a very major part of me terrified to leave, yet I knew that that was what I had to do. Hand gripping the door handle, I spoke my last words to her through a tightened throat, "Goodbye Leila."
She lifted a hand in farewell. "Goodbye Abigail."
Then I wrenched open the door, and with an air of surrender, I left everything I'd had with Leila behind, forever.
As I meandered slowly down the building, I was lost. My thoughts swirled with the attack of red-tinted memories, and drowned hopes, and a coldness that tore at my soul like a blizzard. At some point it occurred to me that I was shaking violently, and I sunk to my knees in response. Shock gripped me. My brain couldn't handle this weakness, the torment of losing Leila. Had I really been that bad a friend to her? How could I have not noticed? Had the Paladanian Flaw done this?
I pulled myself off my knees once more and continued through the building, but the thoughts still invaded.
It was only once I was outside that the obvious occurred to me; I had no idea where Sophie was. The plan had been that I would be with Leila for at least an hour or two, and Sophie would check up on me after that. Obviously, though, that time had not passed.
And now I was alone.
Even though I knew that this was perfectly reasonable and logical, and all due to circumstance, for some reason it was the last straw. I burst into tears right in the middle of the street, and unlike every other time that I'd lost control there was no one there to help me. no Sophie, no Reeina.
No Leila.
I attempted to pull myself together and pretty much failed. I tried to think logically, to have perspective, to do anything but cry over something I couldn't change, but it wasn't working so I just pulled myself up straight and walked away, away, away, wiping the tears furiously off of my face..
It wasn't hard to entertain myself for a couple of hours, as I was on Halapatov, so I just sort of wandered around, looking at the various people and buildings and sights in the area. Eventually I returned to the street where Leila lived, and there stood Sophie, in the spot we'd arranged to meet, looking dejected and confused.
When I entered her line of vision she straightened up and her eyebrows lifted questioningly. I still had a lump in my throat from the tears, but I managed a smile and wave without too much trouble. Hopefully Sophie wouldn't realize something was wrong.
As I approached, however, her expression went into scolding parent territory. I searched her features and realized she'd been worrying about me. Oh joy.
"Where have you been?" she snapped straight off the bat. "I get back here and go up to say hi to you, and I'm told you left hours ago? I thought you came here to see Leila. What on earth is going on?"
Faced with her concerned eyes and set expression I knew I couldn't hide the truth from her and I let out a sigh. I had to admit I was exhausted - not physically but emotionally - and I had no desire to fight with her. But I didn't want to tell her my sob story either.
"Leila and I... sort of had a fight." I said flatly, sadly. "I haven't been a good friend to her in the past and she thinks it'd be better if we stopped being best friends. We're too different now, she's right, so I left, and that's that."
Sophie's eyes at hearing this took me back to Flauraan, to the human ship all those weeks ago, when we'd been captured and handcuffed in a room, with virtually no chance of escape. I'd given up hope, and she'd fixed me with that very same expression. Yet in this instance that righteousness was misplaced.
"Abi-"
"Look," I interrupted her, because I was tired and couldn't bear to argue with her. "It's okay. It's for the best. Sure, I'm sad, but it'll pass. Everything does, with time."
Her mouth tightened in concern and she regarded me with worried eyes, clearly thinking that my speech was not right in some way. Then she shook her head as if to clear it, and flashed a brilliant smile at me. Miraculously, I felt my heart rise up from its ashes, slowly but surely.
She held out an arm to link with mine. "Let's go do something else then. I know the perfect place."
My heart was still in shreds, despite everything I'd said to Sophie, and as she led me away I couldn't help but glance back at Leila's apartment building, in mourning of a life now lost. But the wheel turns, and I knew everything was in for change.