Chapter VIII:
Decisions, Decisions
"I really am getting sick of writing programs at this point."
Sunlight beamed down through the glass balcony door on which Ellie leaned against, hazardous glare bouncing off her laptop in the most inconvenient of ways. Her Ancient and Modern History folders sat on one side of her, freshly written facts stashed away inside their pages alongside other hundreds of study notes that she had already written throughout the first two terms of her school year. Her textbooks sat on the other side of her, along with a rough draft of Rin's new training regime that had been laid on top of them, with Ellie's corrections scribbled along the edges like writing along the walls of a madman's cell.
Rin laughed at Ellie comment from the other side of the room, lying on his bed with one iPod earphone in and To Kill A Mockingbird open in his hands. "I couldn't possibly know what you mean, Khaleesi," he said, dog-earing his page and placing the book down on the ground beside his bed. "It's not as if you've written just about everyone's training programs at this point. That'd just be unfair."
"Oh, ha, ha. Sharkie finally gets a sense of sarcasm." Ellie shook her head and continued to type away on her laptop, the device slowly becoming too hot for her lap. "Get a bookmark, Rin. I refuse to see such a good book suffer such mistreatment."
"What?"
Ellie rolled her eyes and pointed at the book sitting peacefully on the ground a few metres away from her. "'To Kill A Mockingbird', Rin. You don't dog-ear books, you bookmark them. Just like you don't write notes in their pages, you put sticky notes on them. God, if I knew you hated Literature that much, I would have given you the audiobook."
"That'd be a good idea actually. I'm getting bored with it already. There's only so much of Scout I can take in one sitting."
Ellie reacted to the perceived insult with a glare and a pen thrown in Rin's direction. The weapon hit it's target harder than she anticipated, ink blotting itself on Rin's cheek once the pen had sailed through the air and landed on his skin. Upon impact, Rin bolted up from his lying position on his back and smacked his head hard against the bunk above, letting out a large string of loud English curses that sounded even more hilarious than Ellie had expected. She was in stitches while Rin recovered, leaning over her laptop and gasping for air as hysterical laughter racked her body.
Rin glared daggers at her, still muttering curses under his breath as he rubbed the red mark that had formed on one side of his forehead. Ellie was lying on her side at that point, her laptop slammed shut and her notes scattered as she flailed around on top of them in exaggerated amusement. Her ribs ached and there were happy tears leaking from her eyes but Ellie simply couldn't stop laughing. The sight had been too funny for her to ignore.
"That was not funny," Rin said indignantly. "You can stop laughing now."
"No...I...can't!" Ellie hiccuped through her laughter, clutching her stomach in wonderful pain. "That was too fucking funny!"
"It was not, you obnoxious child," Rin exclaimed, pouting like a small child. "It fucking hurt too, Ellie. Jesus, why do you have such good aim?"
"I don't actually. I suck at it." Ellie tugged at her shirt that had risen up her torso just a little too far, exposing her stomach as she curled up into a ball of hysterical giggles. "God, if only I had filmed that."
"You know I would have smashed your phone if you had done that, right?"
"And then you would have paid for a new one. God, why do boys like smashing things so much?"
"Says the girl who got a sick satisfaction out of watching me smack my head against the bottom of Sosuke's bunk."
"I'm so glad you said 'bunk'."
"I hate you sometimes."
"As do I, Sharkie. As do I."
With her study notes successfully scattered and her shirt riding halfway up her stomach, Ellie felt like a proper giddy, little schoolgirl for the first time ever in her lifetime. She never liked to laugh in front of people. Ellie had always thought that she had an ugly laugh and an awkward smile but with Rin, she failed to care about how she looked and simply let herself go, making the notion of giving up a portion of herself just that little bit easier. It was sort of unsettling really, how relaxed she felt around Rin. She didn't like the feeling but she didn't exactly hate it either.
Ellie found that it was becoming easier to open up to Rin as time passed between them. She could talk to him just that little bit more about home and about school but swimming was still very much off limits in certain areas. She still couldn't really handle kissing and it was something she severely dreaded to think about but Ellie also found that minor physical contact hardly bothered her anymore. Mostly, it was just when Rin pulled her out of the pool after almost every training session, which she had managed to become quite used to in her often exhausted state after training.
Rin was silently pushing Ellie's limits more and more every day and she was grateful for it, just as she was grateful for the reserved nature of their relationship. They were friends first of all, elite swimmers second, hard-working students third and then a couple last. It suited Ellie well enough and she knew that it suited Rin as well. He wanted to achieve his dream, whilst Ellie only wanted a break from a life that was inevitable for her. She refused to get in his way on principle, even if she knew what his dream would most likely do to him. She simply couldn't bring herself to stop him, nor warn him of how things actually ran in the sporting world. Ellie liked to think that he would learn on his own.
Sitting up, Ellie felt a slight vibration inside the pocket of her hoodie. Reaching in, she pulled out her phone and flicked through her lock screen, only to find a text message from her father, of all people. And rather unfortunately, the message was all in Norwegian.
"Oh joy," Ellie said with a sigh as she decrypted the message in her mind. "Let's see how much of my unused linguistic skills are still active."
"Hm?"
"My dad sent me a message." Ellie waved her phone in Rin's direction, although she doubted that he could see the altered letters and strange words that lit up the screen in a foreign language. "And of course, he decided to confuse my brain and send it to me in Norwegian. Goddamn it, I can't remember any of this."
"Norwegian?" Rin furrowed his brow, the red mark that once dominated one side of his forehead slowly beginning to fade. "Since when have you known how to speak Norwegian?"
"Since English was banned in my household until I was ten and we moved away from Tweed Heads. Dad's actually not a native Australian. Mum's the Australian out of the two but she can speak Norwegian too. Maybe not as well as Dad or I, but she can speak to my grandparents without making a complete fool of herself."
"Wait, wait, wait-English was banned in your household?"
Ellie nodded, sending her reply to her father in what she hoped was his first language. Trust Dad to send me a text in a European language whilst I'm in Japan. God, fathers are idiots. "Like I said before, yes," Ellie explained, brushing a few stray hairs behind her ear. "It was banned. I spoke English to my mother but whenever Dad was around, Norwegian was dominant. We still speak it a little bit at home now but usually it's only on special occasions, like when my father's parents are there or sometimes at Christmas. It was the first language I learnt to speak, while English was the first language I learnt to write. It's a weird and complicated situation but you know, what you gonna do?"
Rin frowned before switching positions on his bed to lie on his stomach, facing Ellie as she typed away on her phone, grinning like an idiot. She'd forgotten how funny her father actually was, especially when it came to jokes about her mother and her friends. He was always cracking jokes at the worst of times and Ellie found that he was no different on the phone than he was in person.
It didn't surprise Ellie that she missed her father more than her mother. There had always been a special place in her heart for her father, with his horrible aim that was strangely even worse than Ellie's and his cheery smile that never ceased to make Ellie feel just that little bit happier, no matter the situation. He was a person she could always rely on and Ellie appreciated that, even if there still were things that she kept a secret from him. She trusted him and that was all that mattered.
Crazy old man, she thought with a smile. Ellie dropped her phone into her lap and rubbed her eyes as she waited for her father's reply. Rin threw her ballpoint pen back at her, narrowly missing her arm by half an inch. "Damn," he muttered. "So close."
"But obviously not close enough," Ellie said as she opened her laptop once again and clicked into her emails just to double-check her inbox. Her teachers always had a funny way of notifying her of certain things at the weirdest of times, so Ellie wasn't really surprised to see an email from her Japanese teacher, asking about how she was coping in a foreign country. Her mind wandered as she typed up a reply, her fingers working faster with the distraction."Hey, am I in charge of nominations for next weeks prefecturals or is that your job?"
Rin shrugged. "I'll take it. After all, you organised the times for the relay-"
"-Which you didn't actually use anyway."
"Yes but I think we agreed to ignore that. Besides, I think you have enough on your plate as it is with school and whatnot. What are you nominating for, anyway? Might as well start with you considering that you're here."
Ellie rolled her eyes, her phone buzzing in her lap. "You know already know my events, genius."
"Uh, no I don't," Rin replied, wandering over to his desk and opening his horrendously outdated laptop violently as if the device had attacked him. "So, events. Go."
Ellie sighed and rattled off her events as she focused on her phone. "Four hundred individual medley. Four hundred free. Two hundred and one hundred fly. And just for fun, let's throw in a fifty fly because I've always liked those." Ellie looked up from her phone screen, "That just about cover it?"
"Since when do you do four hundred metre I.M?"
"My, my, aren't you just full of questions today?" Ellie gathered up her scattered study notes and packed up her things as she spoke. "If you couldn't already tell, I'm a long distance swimmer. I actually do well in the I.M, despite what others think. I always seem to have enough energy to sprint out the last hundred metres or so. That's why I do four hundred free as well."
Rin nodded with understand and then typed up her events on his laptop as Ellie's phone went off once again. The messages from her dad were still in Norwegian but as she continued to read them, the words were slowly becoming more familiar and less like gibberish scrawled across a digital screen.
Are you ever planning on coming home, Elainya? Ellie cringed at her father's nickname for her, almost laughing at the sentiment.
According to her mother, Ellie's name had been a constant source of debate between her parents when she was born. Ellie's mother had preferred the name Allie, which Ellie had sworn a solemn vow of hatred against at age six. Her father had wanted Ellie to be named Elainya, a strange and foreign name that Ellie found ever so frustrating to pronounce and spell, respectively.
After many hours of supposedly loud arguing, her parents had finally settled on the name 'Ellie', a combination of the two names that they both wanted so badly. Even though her parents had settled on her abbreviated name, Ellie's father still insisted on calling her Elainya as some kind of affectionate nickname. Ellie didn't particularly mind but sometimes, the name simply got on her nerves.
I'm coming home for Christmas, if that makes you feel any better, Papa. Why the big rush anyway?
You don't know?
Ellie raised an eyebrow as she read the text, her pessimistic mind already turning to the worst case scenarios. What don't I know, Papa?
We received a call from Swimming Australia this morning. Their head coach wanted to officially ask you to join his elite squad in preparation for the Olympics in 2024. Your mother's already gone and bloody well accepted for you but that's alright with you, isn't it?
Ellie felt her stomach rise into her throat and her heart abruptly skipped a beat as the words inside her father's message sunk in. Oh no, she thought. Oh no, oh no, oh no. Ellie knew that her mother only thought that she was doing what Ellie would have liked her to do but if only she truly understood how her daughter felt about her swimming career. Then and only then would she know how devastating this news was to Ellie.
Ellie fought hard against the anxiety attack that she felt expanding in her chest through breathlessness and a racing heart. Her hands shook as she replied to her father, gripping her phone hard as her knuckles turned white. Yeah. That's fine. Look, I have to go. Sorry. Love you, Papa.
Without even a single second thought, Ellie texted Carla as she slowly slipped into a unhindered panic. Carla. Carla, pick up the phone. I need to talk to you. Please, just be in the dorm. Something's happened. Something very, very bad. Code fucking Red bad.
Her best friend's reply was almost instantaneous, just as Ellie would have expected from Carla. Of course I'm in the dorm. What happened, Ellie? Are you alright?
Ellie bit her lip, trying her best to hide her inner distress from Rin. Define alright.
Alive, unharmed and emotionally stable.
Well, tick, tick and a 'maybe, sort of, not really' to fill the last box. Can I explain the situation when I get back to the dorm?
Sure. Just get here quickly okay? You'll be alright, I promise.
Ellie breathed in and out through her nose, trying not to panic as she packed up her things with an extra ounce of urgency. It took her approximately two full minutes to have everything gathered up in her arms, her forearms already aching under the weight of all her folders and textbooks. Her hands still remained shaky but Ellie managed to retain some kind of normalcy whilst adrenaline pumped itself through her veins.
Ellie left Rin's dorm with a harsh smile and a muttered excuse, her head throbbing from the sheer amount of horrible thoughts that were being generated inside. She was slowly beginning to crack. The distance between herself and home had once been a comforting and safe factor in her life, like nothing could hurt her as long as she just stayed away, but that feeling had suddenly begun to fade upon reading her father's news. It was her worst nightmare; to be locked into swimming with no easy escape routes.
Ellie had never opened her dorm door as quickly as she had when she made it home that afternoon. Surprisingly, she didn't even feel like crying at all but Ellie did feel like punching something, preferably a wall or inanimate object over an actual person. Carla bolted up from her seat as Ellie stormed in and dumped her things on her desk. Ellie almost felt angry now, her panic transitioning into what felt like white hot rage.
"Ellie, what happened?" Carla asked. She calmly wrapped her arm around Ellie's shoulders, keeping her voice firm but kind. She knew how much Ellie hated to be treated like a frightened child when she was on the verge of a meltdown. Calmness was not always something that should happen before a storm.
Carla shook Ellie gently, repeating her question with a little more urgency. "Ellie, I'm not a creepy mind reader. I can't help you if you don't tell me what's happened."
"I know, I know!" Ellie snapped in reply, burying her face in her hands. "This is just so awful."
"What's so awful?" Carla said, tugging Ellie toward her desk chair and sitting her down gently. Carla yanked her own desk chair over to Ellie's side of the dorm and sat down opposite her, taking both Ellie's hands in hers and continuing on with the interrogation. "Ellie, talk to me. Please, please, just tell me what's wrong. Don't scare me like this if you're not going to tell me what's been happening,"
Ellie found it hard to form the words in her mouth, every working syllable sticking to her cheeks and preventing her from speaking. But in the end, Ellie finally found a way to get her message across, if not a little more slowly than usual. "My mum...my parents-they...they got a call from Swimming Australia the other day. Their head coach wanted to ask me about whether or not I would like to join their elite squad in preparation for the Olympics."
Carla listened intently, her grip on Ellie's hands tightening at the mentioning of the Olympics. "Okay...what did you tell them?"
Ellie's hands slowly began to shake again, her temper flaring high like the flames of a raging bonfire. "I didn't get to say anything. My mum, she...she gave them an answer herself. She told them 'Yes'...without even asking me how I felt about it."
"Oh, no."
"Oh, yes," Ellie whispered, taking long breaths to avoid slipping into yet another panic. "Mum...she went ahead and just...said yes, without even talking to me about it first. She just fucking...threw my life away without even asking me-fuck!"
Ellie whimpered, taking her hands from Carla's and raking them through her loose hair as the tension shook her confidence even more. It took Carla only half a second to realise the severity of Ellie's words and it took even less time for her to wrap her arms around her best friend, pulling her into a tight embrace. Ellie hugged Carla back, even tighter than she ever had before, and buried her face in her best friend's shoulder as she clutched the back of Carla's jumper with unsteady fingers.
There were moments of explanatory speaking, moments of comforting silence and then moments of twisted laughter that passed between them after that. Sitting on a stratigcally assembled mountain of pillows underneath the covers that had been dragged off the pair's bunks, Ellie and Carla ate the last of the Cookies 'n' Cream ice cream that they had hidden in Sakura's cafateria kitchens and discussed the situation with the pleasing sugar-coated feeling lacing their tongues.
"It's so stupid," Carla muttered, licking the melting ice cream of her fingers. "How could your mother just decide for you? Haven't you told her about how you feel about swimming?"
"I thought that much was obvious."
Carla rolled her eyes, snatching the ice cream tub from Ellie's sticky hands in one clean swipe. "God, you have issues. This is why you're always in so much shit in the first place, Ellie-bear."
"Thanks for the support. I'd have thought you'd be a little bit more understanding there, Carla."
"Hey, I am understanding. I just don't get why you haven't told your mum. Or your dad, for that matter. You always said that you trust him more than your mum, didn't you? Why keep your feelings a secret from him?"
Ellie shrugged, pulling the covers a little further up her body to preserve the warmth produced inside it's fibres. "You know me. What's the main reason I wouldn't want to tell someone something?"
"Well, usually it's because you don't actually like them and appreciate them as people but I'm guessing that's not the answer."
Ellie smiled, the action looking weary and tired, and nodded. The answer was simple but it was something that had dominated Ellie's life and personality for a number of years. It was a defining factor in her life, something that wasn't meant to be taken lightly. It was what made her get up every morning and ran, what pushed her to train hard, what pushed her to study for eight hours straight every day. It was what kept her from leaving competitive swimming for good. Expectations.
"I can't let them down," Ellie explained. "Even if it means doing something I hate, I can't...I can't bring myself to disappoint them in any way. If I stopped swimming, if I just up and left, my parents would be furious. It wouldn't matter how many good grades I give them or university acceptances that I produce. They'd never forgive me for 'wasting a good opportunity'. They'd just see anything I do afterwards as a complete and utter waste of time and talent."
"Well, frankly, it would but that's not the point." Carla licked the remainder of the ice cream off her spoon and hummed quietly before explaining herself. "Do you even know your parents, Ell? Because I honestly think they wouldn't care as long as you're happy, which you obviously aren't at the moment. They're not those kind of parents who push their child into something they obviously don't want to do. Couldn't you just tell them like a normal person?"
"It's not that simple, Carla," Ellie snapped, grabbing blindly for the ice cream tub. "People expect things of me-"
"Well, of course they're going to expect things of you, Ellie. That's just life."
"Not in the conventional way. People aren't meant to expect as much from an average teenager as they do from you or me. We have to give our all in everything we do, just to meet with their stupid, godforsaken expectations of us. It's exhausting, how much I have to give, in order to make other people happy."
"But you'll do it anyway, like you always do. It's an honest problem for you, Ell. You love to win and you just have this...need to please everyone around you. It's a dangerous combination, Ellie. A dangerous combination that you've never gotten over, and probably never will."
"Wow, that was dramatic. Do I hear the Pretty Little Liars theme in the background of that?"
Carla laughed, an amused sneer lighting up her face, and gently shoved Ellie further into the pile of pillows they were seated upon. "You know what I mean. You never think about yourself-well, you do but you just never consider whether or not you actually want to do what everyone else wants you to do. You're kind of co-dependent in that way. You choose social acceptance over your own peace of mind."
"Ouch. That kind of sounded like one of Mrs Hart's lectures. You don't think she's rubbing off on you, do you?"
"Of course no-Ellie, please just take this seriously, for Christ's sake."
Ellie held up her hands in surrender, leaning back as her friend's expression turned from friendly amusement to frustration. "I am taking this seriously," Ellie replied. "But I just don't think I need reminders of my own faults and personality traits, thanks. I get enough of that from my parents."
"Yeah, well, sometimes you really do need that reminder," Carla said, her tone insistent rather than angry. "And as much as I hate to say it, I'm not always going to be here to give you that wake-up call. Especially not after..."
Carla halted her explanation mid-sentence, leaving the conversation hanging in the increasingly tense air. Ellie watched her best friend with worry, her fair features turning sour as she fought against the information piling inside her mouth. Carla was hiding something from Ellie, yet again, and this time, Ellie knew that it wasn't some ridiculous secret that was hardly worth her time. It was something serious. And it obviously was meant to have an impact on Ellie.
Carla kicked her side of the covers away and stood abruptly, taking loud and shaky breaths as she shook out her hands in a nervous twitch. Whatever the news was, it was making Carla extremely nervous and as far as Ellie could see, she wasn't even trying to hide that anxious behaviour. "Ell, I...I have something to tell you."
"Right," Ellie said, taking her time between sentences. "Does it have to do with the dance schools?"
"Yes. Well, mostly but it's actually pretty terrifying and...maybe ever so slightly exciting as well and I'd rather tell you about this now, okay? It's probably not the best of times but...well, I guess there is no right time for things like this."
Ellie raised an eyebrow, thinking the worst as she always did, but leaned back against the pillows and pulled the covers tighter around herself as she let Carla explain her situation.
"Okay, so...remember how you said that you wouldn't mind if I wanted to go to a dance school or a college that specialised in dance over most subjects or whatever?" Ellie nodded slowly, watching her friend mindlessly pace back and forth in front of her before continuing on. "Well, I've been looking into a lot of the schools for a few weeks now and I kind of found a school that I really, really wanted to get into. The requirements for acceptance were a little ridiculous, and by ridiculous I mean 'horrendously hard', but I ended sending them all the things that they required for acceptance couple of weeks ago. Letters of recommendation, records of past achievements, essays and so on. Well, I just got the reply back the other day and surprisingly...I-I got in. I don't know how but...I got in."
It took Ellie a few seconds to process the information that had been delivered to her so directly. Carla had actually listened to Ellie's advice for once. She'd gotten into a dance school, against all odds, and she was finally taking the chance to be independent from Ellie and her anxiety-riddled mind.
The sentiment both pleased and worried Ellie. She hardly knew how to react, especially since she'd never received that kind of news before. Ellie had no idea what she was supposed to say, nor how she was meant to physically react, but in the end, she decided to go with the one thought that plagued her mind, overriding all the good thoughts about Carla's news. "Whe-um...Where's the school, exactly?"
That was the moment when Carla's expression turned dark. "New York," she replied. "I'm meant to start next year, if I get the grades for a double major. I'm thinking of taking up drama in uni as well but...I don't really know, to be honest."
The name of the city that Carla would eventually be moving to felt like theoretical knife to the heart. Ellie, most definitely, wasn't prepared for that kind of distance between herself and Carla. Her heart pounded in her chest as she digested the magnitude of her best friend's words but all she could say was, "Wow."
"Wow?" Carla scoffed at Ellie's reaction, her tone going from nervous to almost completely and utterly agitated in a split second. "What the hell do you mean by that, Ellie?"
"Well, I just...it's just a lot of information to take in, Carla. You're...You're moving away. You're moving away to New York for school by mid-next year, Carla. How else do you expect me to react?"
Carla glared at Ellie, crossing her arms over her chest with a hateful scowl. "That's no excuse for you to be patronising, Ellie. This is a big thing for me. Can't you be happy, at the very least?"
"God Carla, listen to me. I am happy for you," Ellie exclaimed, already getting frustrated with her inability to form proper speech. "But you are my best friend. You're my best friend and you're moving half a world away from me. How else do you expect me to react to news like that?! I'm not heartless, Carla, I do care about you. Am I not allowed to be distressed that my best friend is going to be leaving?"
"More like you're distressed that your best friend won't be here to look after you anymore," Carla hissed. "Why do you have to be so selfish all the time?! I'm not your mother. I can't care for you every fucking time you have a meltdown over some insignificant detail that spooked you just a little too badly!"
"Woah, Carla. Where the hell did that come from?! I never said that I needed you here all the time just to look after me. I do value your company, you know? Besides, I thought you did those things, like looking after me when I was upset or just plain freaking out, because-oh, I don't know? You were my friend?!"
"I am your friend, Ellie but God knows, you can be such a goddamn manipulative little bitch sometimes. Especially with your compulsive need to make everyone so fucking happy and that little habit you have of making everyone love you, even though you hardly ever appreciate them for it at all, while the rest of us are struggling to catch up. You've been given so many gifts in this world but you act as if you're the most disadvantaged person in the world! It shits me to tears, Ellie."
"Oh, you want to talk about our faults?! Let's discuss yours for a change, since we're all so focused on mine." Ellie was furious at that point, up on her feet with her fists clenched at her sides and her temper reaching record peaks as she continued to snap back at Carla. "You-You always make people feel as if their problems are nothing in comparison to others. You downplay the distress of others as if it doesn't even matter. Honestly, what gives you the right?! Why are you so determined to make others feel like their problems don't matter?"
"Why are you so determined to make me feel like I'm the monster here?! I've given up a lot for you, Ellie. I've followed you into everything; swimming, Japanese and even that fucking elective sport term in Year 8. I followed you because how else am I meant to protect you from yourself?! How else am I meant to make sure that you don't cause harm to yourself or God forbid, someone else? Have you ever thought about that, Ellie?!"
"Of course I've thought about that!" Ellie yelled, the volume of their argument rising with the seriousness of Carla's accusations. "Don't think that I haven't considered the sheer amount of times that I could have hurt myself or someone else because I was stuck in the dark again. Don't you dare think it hasn't ever crossed my mind! You don't have to protect me from everything, Carla. Even though you may deny it, I am capable of protecting myself."
"Really?" Carla said after a long pause of silence, her tone becoming increasingly more serious as their argument went on. "Just like how you protected yourself two years ago? With those pills, those drugs, Ellie? How about that?"
Ellie's heart near stopped dead at Carla's threat, long-forgotten memories surfacing in a wave of nausea and emotional pain. Ellie refused to accept that Carla had used that secret between them against her. She refused to think that her best friend would stoop that low. "That's not fair, Carla," Ellie whispered, finding that her voice had quickly disappeared along with her bubbling, white hot rage. "I thought we agreed never to bring that up again."
"Yeah, well, there are certain times that things like this need to be discussed, Ell," Carla replied with an authoritarian tone. "There really is only one way to describe you, Ellie. You're a mine field. I've said so many times now that you're probably sick of hearing it but you are a mine field. Most people don't know how to navigate you, not like me, or Aisha or even Rin for that matter. You need to learn how to loosen up. How to let things go without having a panic attack mid-sentence. It's something you'll have to do, Ellie, because I won't be there to help you anymore!"
There were tears brimming Ellie's eyes as Carla spoke, tears that Ellie wanted desperately to disappear. A simple matter of a missing best friend shouldn't result in arguments as large as this and Ellie wanted nothing more than to hit the rewind button on life, forgetting everything that had passed between the pair in the last few minutes. But life was cruel, just as it always had been, and Ellie knew that what had happened in those short, few minutes, would only sink further into those dark corners her mind for many weeks to come.
With the argument silenced and both sides exhausted, the pair stared at each other, a mixed look of hurt and shock tainting their expressions. That was the first serious argument they'd had in over two years, just after the incident that Ellie wanted so badly to forget. For the most part, she had but the moment that Carla brought it up once more, caused a shockwave to ricochet through her body. She hardly even remembered what had happened that night; it was all a blur of tears, sobbing and that strange numb feeling that had eventually overridden the pain that she could only just remember.
They had agreed to never bring that event up again. They'd made a promise to each other that the incident would be buried and forgotten, deep down in recesses of their minds. And yet despite that, Carla had used it against Ellie and caused the memory of it to surface once more. Ellie couldn't recall ever feeling so betrayed before. It was their secret, the one thing that she never should have done, and Carla had just thrown it back into her face as if it hadn't even mattered at all.
Ellie watched as Carla's eyes widened, her best friend thinking the exact same thing about the words that had left her mouth. Carla stared off into open space for a moment, shocked in all manners of the word, and then looked back to Ellie, her eyes rimmed with red.
"Ellie, I...I'm so sorry," she said desperately, taking a step forward toward Ellie. Ellie instinctively jolted herself backwards, focusing hard on her breathing. "I didn't mean it like that, I swear-"
"It's okay," Ellie snapped, looking down at the ground before she could work up the courage to even look at Carla again. "You were angry. People say stupid things when they're angry. It's okay, honestly."
"No, it's not okay, Ellie. We promised not to talk about...that and I just...threw it around like that, without even thinking." Carla's hands shook as she covered her mouth, biting her lip hard to stop herself from crying. "Oh God, and I said those things-"
"Carla, it's fine," Ellie assured her. "It's not like I didn't say any horrible things either."
The two stood in silence for a moment, watching each other in their horror-filled states, before Carla dared to speak again, her voice cracking slightly as her words were spoken in hushed tones. "I'm sorry, Ellie. I'm so, so sorry for the things I said. I had no right to use that incident against you an-"
"Carla, it's fine, honestly. I...I did kind of need a wake-up call to be honest. Just wasn't expecting something like that, is all. Besides...I did call you inconsiderate, or at least implied it. I guess I k ind of deserved it, don't you think?" Ellie smiled against the hurt she was feeling inside, trying to crack a joke at the worst of times. Like father, like daughter, she thought.
Carla smiled weakly in reply but her lovely smile failed to reach her shining eyes. "I guess...but do...do you really think that me...leaving would be bad?"
"I never said anything like that," Ellie replied. "You've already forgotten. I told you that I'd be perfectly fine if you chose to go to a dance school rather than follow me into swimming, and I am obviously fine with that, but...I don't know. Like I said before, it's just a lot to take in. We didn't exactly handle the situation in the best of ways but...you got your message across."
"Yeah...I kind of did." Carla twisted and tugged at the sleeves of her hoodie, uncertainty still present in her guilty expression. "What are you going to do, anyway? About the elite squad, I mean."
Ellie shook her head, unusually grateful for the change of subject. "I don't know," she said. "Right now, I think...I think I'd rather just spend some time with you than ponder on the subject of my woefully depressing sporting career."
A.N: So, this chapter was basically all Carla and Ellie. Because their friendship is beautiful (or at least it usually is. Muah ha ha.)
Well, there was a bit of heavy stuff in this chapter, argument and all. There definitely wasn't enough humour as I would have liked but humour wasn't really needed for this chapter. I'm kind of pushing the story along, so next chapter will most likely be on prefecturals and the events that will ensue that day.
It'll take me longer to write it, unfortunately, because I have a fair few assignments coming in from school and I need to focus on them for a while. Even though I love writing, I kind of love being first in the form for Geography, English and Japanese a bit more thanks. School is kind of hard...
Thank you to IKhandoZatman and Anon for reviewing. Thank you to everyone else to who followed and favourited the story. There are so many of you now but I love you all and I do enjoy reviews, critical, encouraging and general comments alike.
Just to pinpoint the issue that Anon brought up, I honestly am still on the fence about how I'm even meant to write the relationship between Rin and Ellie. I do agree that Rin would want to be more reserved about their relationship but Ellie is the kind of person who would be even more reserved than Rin, much to the point where she most likely wouldn't say anything about her feelings without a prompt.
I did take on your advice and make Rin and Ellie's relationship a bit more reserved but I prefer to think that their interactions would be more like those of best friends rather than that of a couple. Do you see where I'm going with this? Good, because I was about to start ranting and that wouldn't have been good.
Until the next chapter...
