Chapter 14: Regret
I couldn’t sleep that night. I just lay there in bed, staring at the ceiling even though it was too dark to really see anything. My brain wouldn’t shut up. It just kept replaying what Nina had screamed at me in the hallway.
’You’re such a dumbass.’
Yeah, she was right about that. I felt like the biggest idiot in the world. I had been so sure I had it all figured out, that she was just feeling guilty or trying to mess with me. But hearing her cry like that, hearing her say her friends pushed her into dating and that she’d never even kissed anyone... I had gotten it so, so wrong.
’She wasn’t being nice because of guilt, not entirely anyway,’ I thought. ’Or if she was, it turned into something else, and I just stomped all over it.’
I thought about what I’d said to her. How I’d told her I didn’t want rumors, how I’d accused her of not knowing anything about me. It was blunt. Too blunt. That was always my problem. I just said things, and I didn’t think about how they sounded until it was too late. It was probably why I didn’t have many friends. People didn’t usually appreciate being hit with a verbal two-by-four.
’I really hurt her,’ I realized, and my stomach twisted. Making someone cry like that, especially after she’d been nothing but nice to me, felt awful. I had wanted to push her away, to stop things from getting complicated, but I hadn’t meant to completely demolish her.
So, what was I supposed to do now? Go up to her and apologize? ’Yeah, right,’ I thought. ’That’ll make things even weirder.’ She probably hated my guts after what I said. An apology from me would probably just make her angrier, or she’d think I was just trying to fix things for my own sake.
’No,’ I decided, rolling over and punching my pillow, though it didn’t help much. ’I should just give her some space. Let things cool down. Maybe she’ll forget about it, or at least stop being so upset.’ That seemed like the safest option. Less drama for everyone, especially me.
I eventually fell asleep, but it was a crappy, restless kind of sleep.