FKA x inc. – FKA x inc.
after finishing lunch alone and thoughtful, i leave the pool room and head to my next class. something about edward's exit felt gravitational and sad, something about the way he spoke to me felt too wet and weighed me down. walking to biology feels like wading through a thick swamp, a large maze inside edward's irises. i finish the rest of the school day in a slight haze, ignoring mr. banner's complaints concerning the water dripping from my hair, ignoring the continuous whispers now that edward isn't by my side, ignoring the foggy numbness that was seeping through the water inside me and filling my lungs to full capacity. when the dismissal bell rings, i've not seen edward once since lunch ended. the implication of his absence settles uncomfortably at the base of my stomach but there is also a quiet voice that comforts me for having already dealt with the inevitable. i walk towards the pool room, my eyes downcast, deep in thought.
i mean, seriously, what other outcome could have come about? if he'd been hoping to talk his way into my pants he was sorely mistaken, and surely after realizing this himself he'd have grown tired of me and found another puzzle to solve. really, his enigmatic tantrum was saving us a lot of trouble and irritation.
i walk into the locker room and ignore the curious faces of all the girls around me, heading to my locker to change into uniform. the atmosphere feels tense and almost mocking, probably due to the mounting paranoia inside me. of all edward's interests, i was the most shortlived. i wonder if that is what my teammates are whispering about while i walk down the aisle; my incompetence, my appearance, my disposition…
alice cullen is waiting by my locker today – a tiny, delicate girl with an impish smirk, her colorful eyes too large for her face and too fierce for her body. the strength of her stare is a contradiction to her lithe form. her obsidian hair is gelled and spiked in all directions, like molded igneous rock. it really was an incredibly smart decision for her to dye it at the beginning of her freshman year. the blackness offsets her multicolored eyes perfectly; highlighting the hazel mixture and how the brown blends into green and into blue as you get farther from her pupils and deeper into her irises. she's leaning against my locker as though we've been friends for years and her comfortability in this annoys me. it's too reminiscent of her older brother which brings my mind back to his words…
"it wouldn't kill you."
i can't wait to dive into the water and bury those words beneath the waves.
"bella." she says casually. i open my locker and toss my backpack inside before hauling off my shirt.
"it seems i've dropped one cullen and picked up another." i grumble, pulling down my pants.
"my brother giving you problems? then again, if he weren't i probably wouldn't be having a conversation with you. he sort of put me up to this."
"did he? well, your shift is done for the day. i'll put in a good word for you. you're free to go." i turn away from her then, mildly offended that it took a word from edward to get her to talk to me. looks like edward was meddling in all my affairs now.
"that's not what i meant," she mumbles but i'm already tuning her out and slipping on the tight lycra brand suit provided to us by the school back when they had high hopes for the popularity of our team. new members are now required to purchase their own suits as we're no longer capable of sponging any more money from the budget. i open my locker door wider, blocking her face and providing myself with privacy as i adjust the corners and creases of my suit. i allow alice's voice to drain into the mundane chatter behind me and begin pinning my hair up for for my swim cap. it doesn't matter what she meant. soon enough she'll filter back into the student body just like her disingenuous older brother.
a loud bang echoes off the locker door beside me and reverberates off the locker room walls. all the voices cease and their owners look in my direction. i in turn peel back my locker door to look at alice.
"so like i was saying," she grinds out through her straight, white teeth, "it's really rude to ignore someone who's trying to talk to you." the atmosphere in the room turns to one of acute interest. everyone is tuning in to our conversation. holding on to the door, i lean closer to her, extremely annoyed.
"i have no intention of being nice to you." i whisper. i'm confused now. was i supposed to make an effort to befriend her? were we supposed to bond and become pseudo-sisters, erroneously connected over edward cullen?
or worse: was i supposed to want to talk to her? does he think i'm lonely, that bastard with no sense of personal boundaries? what if the two of them just pity me from afar and what if edward finally got tired of his charity case? a sharp sting pinches the flesh of my chest and slices me open. slowly the girls turn towards each other and begin talking again, adjusting their suits and pinning their hair. alice stops leaning on the lockers and places her hands on her hips before bending her upper body towards me.
"yesterday edward said something to me that made me very interested in talking to you. he said we both believed we were better than everyone else and refused to talk to anyone because of it. i didn't talk to you for the same reasons you didn't talk to me; i believed you were boring, generic and static – sleepwalking like everyone else in this school. and i'm sure you think that of me." i close my locker door and lean against it, looking at alice, really looking at her.
"so you're saying you're not boring, generic and stagnant?"
"what i'm saying is, i'm willing to give you a chance to prove me wrong if you're willing to give me a chance to prove you wrong." a laugh spills through my mouth and drips onto the floor before i can stop myself. alice smiles and sighs, visibly relieved. "i'll take that as a yes." she picks up her swim cap off the bench in front of her and jams it onto her head. "i hope edward hasn't put you off the cullen family for good."
"very nearly," i say, still smiling as i put my swim cap on as well. i begin walking towards the pool room and she follows my lead, easily keeping up pace.
"i wouldn't blame you. more than half the girls in this school won't even look in my direction." for a brief moment i look over at alice, curious and thoughtful. that must be hard, having the weight of your brother's reputation bearing down on your ability to make friends with everyone else. and i was almost cast into the category of those girls as well – i was willing to punish alice for her brother's rudeness with me earlier.
"i'm sorry." i murmur, embarrassed.
"oh it's all right, i don't really think about it too much. i'm sure i'm not missing out on any scintillating conversations."
the pool room is empty save for a few of the girls on the team, all of which are sitting on several of the benches and prattling away. getting dressed into their suits is all for show. the swim club is the easiest way to earn extra curricular credit for the least amount of labor, the biggest bang for your buck. even our coach is late on a regular basis, having much better things to do than watch a bunch of disinterested teenagers swim from one end of the pool to the other. alice and i stand side by side, silent as we watch the water ripple and reflect onto the walls.
"i'll race ya," alice says suddenly, adjusting her swim cap.
"i'm not really into the racing thing." i admit. "i'm just here for the swimming itself."
"okay….then, i'll swim ya!" before i can say anything alice dives like a ribbon fluttering before turning to steel and piercing the surface. within a second she's beneath the water and gliding more beautifully than i ever could. i quickly follow behind her, smiling as the water engulfs my body. i've never shared a moment like this with anyone. i wonder if she feels the intense clarity i feel as i deprive myself of oxygen and enjoy the cooling sensation on my skin and the burning sensation in my lungs. i wonder if alice also immerses herself not just in water, but in another dimension. i swim after her as she races to the surface for another breath of air, relaxed and placated by the watery film over my eyes as i follow her form. she looks like something out of a mythical story, a waterborn creature gone to the surface to indulge the humans. soon after she dives back down i'm breaking the surface and inhaling another breath as well. leisurely, i swim behind her, alternating between butterfly and breast strokes respectively. alice reaches the end of the pool after another surface break and then turns to me, a large grin plastered on her face. she's pulled off her swim cap and motions for me to do the same. her hair looks like a frame of darkness, elongated by the water and outlining her pale face. i stifle a giggle in my chest at the two bubbles lodged in both her nostrils and swim over to her smiling. part of me wants to be able to lie at the bottom of the pool with alice. we'd be quiet as mice, staring at the ceiling through the eight feet of water. i wave at her, slowed down by the drag of the waves, before taking off my swim cap and brushing my hair out of my face. alice takes both of my hands and together we spin around in a slow circle, laughing internally. it's almost bizarre, the level of connection i feel with her, especially since i previously loathed the idea. i no longer want to bury her brother's words in the cement at the base of the pool. i know what he meant and i know that he's right. it wouldn't kill me to get close to someone, to open up and share a part of me with a person around me. and in this moment i'm able to recognize the potential for alice cullen and i. the water is her sanctuary as well and i feel it has been for a long time. with our left hand fingers locked and our swim caps mangled between the palms of our right hands, we swim to the surface, moving our legs in synchronization. as soon as we reach the air we burst into laughter, giggling and sputtering water like a bunch of childhood friends. nothing is heavy, everything is light and feathery, like living on another planet. the fog from my chest is gone and replaced with the same bubbles as the ones in alice's nostrils. the feeling is wonderful but only lasts for a moment.
alice and i both turn our heads when the entrance door slams shut. the sound echoes as our coach walks into the room, munching happily on what appears to be a large muffin. edward cullen is following closely behind her, smiling at me with a large brown bag in his hand.