Gilbert is unsurrounded, his profile outlines a pointed nose and a prominent Adam's apple. It's been awhile since I have seen him alone, he always seems to have an arm slung around his brother or an elbow propped against Feliciano's shoulder, in a perpetual state of hanging off of someone. But here he stands, untethered, and I've already made the decision to come here so I just…
…step…
…forward.
Another step. Someone bumps into me, another girl who's taller and it happens all the time, people don't really notice or stop when this happens so-
"Oh, sorry!" She looks back at me, I don't recognize her and she doesn't seem to recognize me so the interaction ends as quickly as it began.
"Don't go tripping all over yourself, Maple." Gilbert calls out, perhaps a witness to every detail. He's got his jacket slung over his shoulder. We're at the time of the year where the weather will change three times in a day, from my classroom window the slight breeze streaming through the leaves and branches in the courtyard gave hope that the short walk to the car wouldn't be a horrible few minutes of my life.
"Hey, Gilbert."
How does this start? How should it start? I've only been 'alone' once with Gilbert, when he pulled me into the teacher's lounge, and the more I thought of it the more I knew just how much of a fabrication it all turned out to be. Doubt existed, the familiar pessimism that deters anyone. But somehow I thought, believed more than I let on, that maybe Bella was a fairy godmother. Maybe when she showed up at this school, and she saw me with those cheerful green eyes of hers and decided something about me, that whatever she could come up with would be the missing ingredients to it all. Maybe I really tricked myself into believing I was a princess, a girl whose life was, only then, just starting to begin.
Maybe, what I saw in the redness of Gilbert's eyes were the pink hues of rose-tinted glasses.
But that doesn't mean he's not a friend.
"Hey, how's it going? Bella nearly gave me a beating after she heard me ask for an apology from you, and she got me feeling really bad, you know? I hate that. Not feeling bad about her obviously, 'cause she's been a freak and all, but feeling bad that I... made you feel bad? Jeez that sounds dumb, you get what I mean!"
Not so good at apologies. That's fine, I can be good enough at them for both of us. "I'm sorry too, Gilbert, I sincerely wasn't trying to ignore you, I thought you might have wanted space from us after all that so I decided to give you it."
He shrugs. "It's cool. Hard to read my amazing facial features sometimes, since I am always composed, calm, cool, colle-"
"Gilbert."
"Ah! Ludwig don't scare me like that!"
"Apologies, I only wanted to know if I should wait for you at the car or if you have plans." The straight-laced and perfectly postured German never wavered his stare away from his older brother, as if he were on a mission for the answer to this simple question.
"Hm, Maddie were you just coming over to make amends? As someone who often has people coming up to him so they can be on good terms with him-"
"You are too long-winded. This is why you got into fights." Ludwig criticizes point-blank.
"Hey!" Embarrassed, Gilbert's ears turn pink at the ends. "That's enough from you." Gilbert
shoves Ludwig, not strongly, and the blond barely reacts, his form like concrete. But he does voluntarily step away. "Fine. I will wait at the car." It was as if he was our chaperone who decided he was done with the task.
"I-I did, actually, have more to talk to you about, if you aren't too busy of course I don't want to make your brother wait or anything!"
"It's all right! We can walk and talk, you have to meet up with Alfred and Bella don't you?"
"Sure… so, it's about Bella. I-I understand if you're so annoyed by that whole thing that you don't want to get involved but-"
"It's only annoying when I'm the one who's right all along, when it should be easy for anyone to see! Let me guess, you aren't okay with how it turned out, either?"
"No…"
"See! I guess you're shy or whatever, but think about it this way, if we all went full-in together this would've been over faster! Sometimes you gotta hurt some people's feelings, maybe insult them or bully them just a little—nothing too serious—and, there ya go! You get just what you want when you want it, no lingering on any of it. Lingering should be avoided at all costs unless you're lingering on happy memories-" Gilbert got the door for me, we come out of the side of the foyer with the vending machines.
"Crap you didn't say what it was yet. What exactly drove you to come to me, which obviously you did come to me first and have yet to go to any other source of advice since I'm clearly the best there is-"
"U-uh yes, I have, sort of, except Kat since she was there but, the short of it is that, w-well…" I only slowed down by a fraction of a moment and I take a breath, "I asked Abel at Envy about why Bella would do what she did-"
"Yes, lying about where she lives, mhm…" He interludes uselessly.
"-and he told me that he doesn't understand why she would get everyone to drop her off at that house, he said she tries to think it's all part of a normal life…? Which we already knew or else why would she say that, right?"
"Shit, Maple, you've been thinking about this! Like connecting red strings on a board thinking about this! That's cool as hell. Not that you don't think or something, just you never speak this much. Keep going though, what's new that he did tell you? Must have been something."
"He said that it was for safety reasons…? But when I implied that he's well… treating her badly, he denied that completely and…"
Here is safe.
"From what I understood, they came here, to Canada, because where they were in Belgium wasn't safe for them. Their parents didn't come with them, they stayed behind."
"Shady, shady, shady! Their last name is Janssen, right?" Gilbert didn't wait for a response, pulling his phone out from his back pocket, a little bird chain swinging from the top of it. "Haven't stalked her Facebook or anything…" He murmured to himself, nimble fingers already opening the Facebook app and typing her name into the search bar, the blue button notifying their friend status. "Hmm, you noticed she doesn't actually have her face on here?" He tilted the screen towards me, allowing a clearer view of her profile picture: the back of a blonde girl's head, the hairstyle cut to the shoulders like Bella's, wearing a floppy hay-thatched hat. The cover photo featured a field of sunflowers. "And she's only got like, twenty friends. I recognize most of the people on the list too, all from school." Gilbert further noted. He was leaning against a column now, the two of us in front of the western-facing entrance.
"I… never noticed that, actually." Wow, Maddie, you sure are brainy aren't you.
Gilbert shrugged. "Well, it looks weird, I can look into it some more and check in with you about it tonight or something. Actually I don't think we're even friends on there, are we? Here." He spun the phone towards me.
"Uh, all right…" Strange, how I was just feeling annoyed about them being friends on there without me, and now it looked like we were teaming up online to find the dirt on Bella. As I found my own page, Gilbert continued on. "Her brother's name is Abel, right?" I nodded, clicking the friend request button. "I'll look into him too, then."
"Did you need me to do anything…?" Gilbert holds the door open for me, I can somewhat make out Alfred in the parking lot, looking out for me, reaching for his phone, no doubt about to ask what's taking so long.
"I prefer to do my research on my-" For whatever reason, Gilbert caught himself. "Uh, well, if you want! If you aren't busy tonight, doing homework or something."
"I have my first hockey practice of the season, actually…" My voice deflates. What if Gilbert finds something crucial while I'm at practice? And I'll get too distracted by what he might have found to concentrate, and it would really be bad luck to start the season off with so much worry…
Perhaps sensing my nerves, Gilbert pats my shoulder before parting ways. "Hey, don't stress about it. Chances are nothing crazy is going to come of it. Maybe their parents are super shitty and that's why they came here. Say she doesn't want to talk to them so she made a generic profile. I really have to go now though before Ludwig tells our mom about my 'tardiness.' Later!"
"Later…" I don't know if it was reassuring at all to go to Gilbert about any of it. The small comfort is that I feel less alone, after all there was no way Katyusha would feel comfortable enough to dig around in other people's family troubles, and with Alfred…
"Hey, Mads!" There he was, a tornado coming upon me. "What are you doing just standing there? Come on, you'll be late for practice you little ice monkey!" Alfred effectively dragged me away. Alfred's mouth was always too big, admittedly Gilbert's wasn't much smaller but he did keep to himself more. "You looked like such a weirdo just standing there…" Alfred's voice rambles on, fading.
I suppose, later, all will come to light.
"All right you guys, I expect you've been on your training regiment while the season's been out." Coach Brown begins. Now, admittedly, I tend to slack on my physical exercise in the slow times of the year. I'll go for an evening run with mom, head to the gym a few times, mostly weekends… in reality I should be more on top of it but I guess I just get… lazy. My nutrition, however, is generally decent. Besides the pancakes I gorge on occasionally—okay maybe frequently—I keep it clean and the two weeks leading up to the season I clear out junk food completely. All in all, I manage to keep up.
"We'll start with a round or two of King of the Hill, keep it light to start, keep it fun." Once everyone got their puck, Brown gave the go ahead with the blow of his whistle. The greetings between returning teammates were cut short, I had only asked Tino how he was doing before we were all called on. Being the only girl on our team, I'll often get a bit picked on as an 'easy target' by the boys, although everyone is still relatively gentle towards me in comparison. So, of course, I expect that the others will keep close to me as we all circle around each other, keeping our own puck in check while trying to knock other players' puck away from them. Ivan was the first to get someone else out, then I rounded up on Regis, slid my stick in and his puck went bounding off. I stayed on for longer than I expected, knowing how distracted I was, third to last to remain in the drill. Ivan, more honed from the start, was the one to win the round. As promised we went into the second round, and this time I was booted far earlier on.
"Bonnefoy, I expect to see more hussle!" Brown chastised, keeping his eyes on the ensuing drill. Ivan came out on top again. Well, he always did blow off energy straight away, he is built like a mountain with the grace of a fox. After warm ups, Brown then got us into a simple breakout drill. Tino dropped the puck and I skated forwards a bit before rounding back, taking control of the puck, rounding the net and swung it back at him. As he went forward, I remained in close quarters, expecting to defend the net from an offense coming from the other side. Ethan O'Ray streamlined his way in my direction, a new guy to our group and most likely assumed I wasn't much of a challenge to him. With some effort that would have appeared effortless, I allowed him to get closer, not quite in my range as he still had the common sense to skirt around me. I nudged to one side and then the other, keeping my eyes on the puck I snapped into action and tapped the puck out of his control. Behind me I could hear Ivan saying good job to Harley, the defense to his offence, and with a closer look spotted a puck hugging the side of the net.
A couple more drills and we got into a short-lived game, one side of the arena and first to score wins. Tino and I were on the same side, Ivan and Harley our immediate opposition. I stood crouched at a distance from Harley, both of us as concentrated as the other on where the puck was going. It was a no-goalie game, the net completely open. Ivan is close more than once in getting the goal, Tino just slightly after. iIt's only out of coordination that when I get on Harley for the puck Tino is just in the right position to nudge it out of our stick-on-stick play and have it sail into the net, Ivan and everyone else too late to interfere with the momentum.
For fun, Brown tells us to skate around the rink if we like, our practice was over. Myself and Tino get into a steady rhythm next to each other, some of the more immature guys wagging their eyebrows, whistling or making kissy faces at us as they pass. It was always funny to them to joke about us being together, ever since we made friends when Tino joined the team. Really, I'd only found a hockey companion in someone with a similar nature to my own.
"So you must be very happy with all the new friends you have now!" Tino says cheerfully, continuing our conversation from just before practice got into motion.
"Well, it is nice…"
"You don't sound so sure?" Tino prodded, not altogether intrusive.
"It's just-" It doesn't seem necessary to give all the details out about friends from school, hockey was separated from that and really, gossiping about Bella wouldn't really help. "Different. I feel like my one friend is hiding something from me, something important…"
"Ah. Maybe she's worried you might judge her." Tino suggests simply.
"Maybe… though I don't know why. I try not to judge people."
"I don't know about that!" Tino laughed. "When George first got on the team, you were so frustrated with his lack of skills, you trash talked him all the time!"
"He got better!" I defended myself. Maybe Tino had something of a point. I wasn't the kindest person to Bella when she first inserted herself into my life, just like I wasn't the most kind to newbies in the team. She appeared to me as too bright, too energetic, someone that would cause problems. Perhaps Bella Janssen didn't want to create a nuisance of herself all this time.
"If what she's hiding means she's in trouble, though, she deserves help. And support." I added, more for my own sake. We all need justification and, in the end, if Bella was in over her head wouldn't it be better if she had friends around to rely upon when things got rough? She shouldn't always be the one cleaning up problems, like collecting Abel after a bender in the dead of night.
Tino shrugs. "You might be right."
I don't say anything to that. I have to be right, or else what me and Gilbert are doing is wrong.
While my nose is practically planted into my social textbook, a ding from my phone alerts me to a notification. No shock there. A new message.
Gilbert's first choice was to wave at me. Frowning, then sticking my tongue out at the silliness, I then waved back. What a strange guy, I thought only old peopled used that function.
'So, nothing specifically about either of them. Wayyyyy too many results popped up for Bella, even when I put her birthday in too. Only a few results for Abel, but none of them looked like him at all. Also found some news article about a guy named Abel Janssen who donated a bunch of money to a Cancer foundation, looked more into that but the birthdates don't line up that guy is in his 50s.'
'Then… it's dead -_-'
'Not exactly. I decided to search up news stories about siblings going abroad. A lot of it didn't make any sense, I mean it was all in German or French. BUT, going through google images, showed me something interesting.'
'What?!' Something interesting? Were either of them in stock photos, models, famous? That didn't seem to line up, wouldn't the Canadian media discover rather quickly if a Belgian celebrity was coming to the country? There should have been some buzz I would have caught wind of if that were the case.
'I picture of them and when I went to the source, it looked like it was a clip from a Belgian newspaper. So, I did what any normal person would do…"
'And?' Leave it to Gilbert to draw out the suspense of a story, rather than get to the point. He had a flare for drama.
'And, the jury is still out. Had to get a few things done today before I could dig into this, so I didn't make the post about it too long ago. Here's the link:' As promised, Gilbert dropped it in the message, and when I followed it there were, indeed, no responses yet. His reddit username, interestingly, was AlbinoGod. 'So you can see for yourself if anything comes of it tonight. If I see anything tomorrow morning we can meet up and talk about it at lunch. Sound good?'
'I think so… thanks, Gilbert ^^'
'Of course! Night, Maple.'
As I was about to message a quick goodnight in turn, I noticed the three dots indicating a new message being written, and held back in curiosity.
'(ﾉ≧ڡ≦)'
A soft laugh escaped my lips, followed by my eyes rolling playfully. Gilbert sure was in a better mood with someone in his corner. 'Night! (◕‿◕✿)'
'Maaaaaaaaple!' 'Maddie, message me!' 'GAHHH!'
Suffice to say, Gilbert wasted little time in reaching out to me the next morning, before I even got the chance to look at the link again. His pure excitement, wonder of wonders, let me know that something certainly did come out of the reddit search. His sense of excitement rubbed me the wrong way, however, scaring me out of looking at the replies myself. It was a nonsensical fear, obviously if Gilbert poses a question to the internet, the internet will provide some sort of answer. It wasn't a revelation. Nevertheless, my heart raced to know that, with little more than a click of the button, whatever information Bella guarded, whatever information Abel was using to manipulate me, that could all be revealed without any fuss.
'Yes?'
I brushed my teeth, combined my hair, changed, all before taking another glance at my phone. When I join everyone at the kitchen table, and peer down at my phone, mom takes notice. "Dear, how come you have your phone out? Please put it away." It is a request I have no problem complying to. Though my ignoring the messages don't stop their consistency, Gilbert is as demanding of my attention.
When I do finally bring my phone out again to check, I'm in the passenger seat of Alfred's car and he's pulling us out of the driveway. Sifting over the earlier messages I pay far more attention to the latest ones, as it mostly starts with Gilbert boasting of his online prowess. Then, finally, he gets to the point.
'Meet me in at the park across the street at lunch, don't bring anyone! We have to debrief.'
"What's got your attention so much this morning anyways, Mads?" Alfred inquires innocently, one hand on the steering wheel. He was right to ask, I usually wasn't this glued to my phone this early in the day.
"Uh, it's just this assignment for my math class. I'm going to work on it alone in the library later to really focus, if you could let the others know." The excuse was on the fly, I was getting better at coming up with little fibs on the daily it seemed.
The morning went by fast, Bella tried telling me a bit about her conversation with Antonio the night before, though Mr. Vargas's booming voice to begin the lesson cut her short. In PE she managed to tell me more of it, how maybe during the summer, with all of us and my parents we could take a road trip down to see him. It was a pleasant image, especially with the cold weather really setting in. I was inclined to agree with her and did so, hoping that whatever issue I was getting closer and closer to figuring out would be resolved before then. I told Bella the same excuse as Alfred for missing out on lunch, heading in the direction of the library before turning sharply to the right. The exit I chose was a bit more inconvenient, but made it less likely that I would run into anyone I knew before getting to the park.
As if we were part of some sort of shady business, Gilbert sat at one of the benches wearing a hat and a grey sweater, somehow sticking out more than if he were wearing his regular clothes. On closer inspection, he was also sporting a pair of shades in cool minus ten-degree weather. For someone so clever, he really didn't have a clue when it came to presenting himself. "Hello, Gilbert." I greeted, not noticing the pair of ear buds he was wearing until he took one out.
"Oh, Maple! Fuck man, I can't believe how-"
"Wait, wait…" I tried to interrupt, to no avail.
"huge this is! Like what a weird conspiracy, I didn't let anyone know why I was really asking about them, got to test the waters and everything-"
"Gilbert…" I tried again, putting a gentle hand to his shoulder in an attempt to calm him down. "Please, slow down. I haven't looked at reddit this morning." I informed him softly, my voice petering out towards the end.
"What? Why not, it's absolutely wild!" Gilbert was practically jumping in place, he had already burst off of the bench like it was on fire.
"I just… it made me a little… w-worried, to be honest…"
"You got cold feet, then? If you want I can just keep it between me and them, go to Bella about it myself and confront her on it. She knows I've been more suspicious than everyone else, it wouldn't surprise her that I looked into it some more. Wouldn't have to bring you up at all."
"…really?" I could just let Gilbert handle it from here. I'm not the confrontational type, everyone knows this. Everyone knows it's Gilbert who's the fighter, who lets everyone know what's what. Not little Madeline Bonnefoy, who only roared on the ice.
"Yeah, it's not really necessary for both of us to come at it anyways." Gilbert confirmed, nonchalant.
"Um… M-Maddie?" Squeaky, nervous, altogether too mild to be here and now. I spin around in the same time span of my next heartbeat and there's Katyusha, looking between myself and Gilbert. "A-Alfred told me this morning you were having a math problem s-so I was heading to the library and I saw you going the other way, and heading here, you were going so much faster than me and-and I thought you were maybe wanted to study outside but-" She paused. "I can see you were meeting Gilbert, I don't know what's going on but… I can go."
Desperately, I looked to Gilbert to assess how to proceed but he didn't seem perturbed by the new addition in the least. "Like a ghost…" she heard him mutter to himself, clearly ready to let us hash it out. "W-wait!" As Kat began walking away, I traced her steps and waited for her to stop. "It's, all right… I didn't think you'd want to bother with this stuff anymore, after our conversation about Bella. And I don't know, it seems like Gilbert did find something out about it but-but we don't have to know! He can just talk to her about it, and we can just all go back to school-"
"Found something out?" Katyusha's navy eyes grew wide. "And you don't have to go back to Abel about anything…"
"She never had to go to him to begin with, I could have always covered this one." Gilbert chooses then to brag, an inappropriate time to do so.
"Are you sure you don't want to hear, Maddie? I think it would be gentler, coming from all of us…" She stared, warily, past me, eyes landing on Gilbert. Well, there was something to be said about that look. Was it really a good idea to let all of the responsibility fall onto Gilbert, who had made it obvious he wouldn't take the most sensitive approach to the matter?
"Well… maybe… I don't know if I can-" I take a deep breath. I did ask for this, I asked for it from Bella, from Abel, I asked for confirmation from Kat and assistance from Gilbert. Whatever it was, even if Bella didn't want me to know, even if I wasn't entitled to the information, it was without a doubt eating at Bella every day. Every day she had to pretend that her life was one thing when it really was another, and she needed help… who was going to be there?
"Okay. Go on, Gilbert."
"You sure?" I nodded. "All right… well, for context Kat…" Gilbert detailed the events of the day prior for Katyusha, before getting into the outcome of the reddit post.
"As it turns out… Bella and Abel aren't exactly Bella and Abel. Well, those are their first names, but their last name isn't Janssen. It's Verhoeven. Their dad is Gabriel Verhoeven, he was arrested just before school started this year, for drug trafficking and other not-so-clean offences." Gilbert said this all matter-of-factly, as if the information didn't bother him whatsoever.
"What about their mom? Why aren't they with her?" Katyusha's voice was breathy, eyes as wide as plates.
Gilbert shrugged. "No one said much on that, must not be part of the picture. They've got a brother-"
A brother's birthday.
"I miss my brother a lot."
"Madeline... did Bella tell you it was my birthday?"
"He went missing around the same time all of this was going on. Loads of rumours about that one."
Jesus… my eyes slide shut, against the sound.
"This… this is too sensitive, Gilbert! Were you going to go up and get angry with her for hiding all of this from us?! I don't blame her!" Katyusha released a fury I had never known to come from her.
"I was-"
"You will not. I thought, maybe you were going to make this all sound reasonable, that it was necessary for this truth to come out. But we found out all we needed to really know from Abel. They have been through a lot. She is safe here. That's what matters."
"But-"
"But nothing." Katyusha whirls away from Gilbert, leaving the both of us stunned. "Isn't it clear, now? We can stop poking at it, we can mind our own business, now. What more can you want from her? To hear it from her? What will that accomplish?" Katyusha accuses, and although her stare is not trained at me, I feel the scrutiny all the same.
"That's what I thought." Katyusha concludes when her questions are met by thin air. "And, Maddie… it will be all right." She smiles weakly at me, turns away again and I don't stop her this time.
Katyusha was not as weak-willed as I painted her out to be. Or maybe, in all of this, she was outgrowing me.
"Damn…" Gilbert mutters, moving in to stand next to me. "Girl has a way of making people feel like ass." He comments aloud, hands in his pockets now.
"Are you going to do it… still?" I whisper, unwilling to look him in the eyes despite how they were covered by black lenses.
"Not sure. Ludwig was talking to me yesterday, when we were coming home. About how I used to fight. He said he could tell when I was about to get into one, hours or even days before it actually happened. Usually by my complaining, but he could also tell with how I acted… said I would just vibrate, with hostile, excited energy. He said he could tell it was coming off of me, when we were driving, and he warned me not to get into trouble. He worries a lot, like you. Just doesn't show it on his face."
Gilbert steps forward, looking out, towards our school. "Guess I won't start a fight, then. Stopped for him." He looks back, a somber smile, redness showing through black lenses. "Can stop for you too, this time. If you want."
"I think…" I'm thinking of cupcakes, and how Bella said she wasn't sure of whether her brother was even aware of where he was and there's a horrible taste in my mouth as I remember a drunken Abel on what I thought was his birthday. "I think, I want to understand. But I want to leave Bella alone, about it. She doesn't want to think about it. And we can't tell anyone about this, they are trying to hide here."
"Just told you and Kat, wasn't planning on shouting it out of a microphone. I don't want them to have to leave or anything either." You just wanted to be right.
"Okay… okay." I nodded. "Let's get back to school, then." I suggested. Lunch must be halfway over at least, maybe I could grab something to eat before afternoon classes kicked in. Without any objection Gilbert and I made our way back to campus, I opted out of going to the cafeteria and stopped at a vending machine instead.
Maybe, Katyusha was right. Maybe it was best to get back to my own business.
Author's Note:
Oof, not sure how I'll manage to write a hockey game when just writing for the practice was a struggle :') Let me know what you guys think about the big reveal, this plot has been planned a long time ago with the seeds sprinkled throughout, it was really a matter of getting it to this point and beyond. Hope you think I handled it well, I felt that the suspense for it was built up enough at this point for someone to do some more actual sleuthing.
At this point, sorry PruCan shippers, but I can safely cross out PrussiaxCanada as the "endship." It was pretty strongly going to be that until, after writing more of the story, I decided it was best to friendzone that one. I want to say that it will be MapleTea but… I can't lol when the final chapter comes, I will put the endship in the description!