Empty of Anthems

Alex was gone and it turns out thirteen year old me couldn't exist without a guy in my life.

Or maybe I just couldn't exist without Robert in my life.

Alex and I hadn't spoken in weeks. Which was quite impressive, actually, when you took into account that we had all of the same friends. My girls helped, forming an impressive literal barrier between the two of us at Pizza Express and parties. One of the best moments of my eighth grade year was watching a slightly intoxicated Jacqui trip face first into a deluxe pizza while trying to flirt with Peter Hayes to stop Alex from being able to see me after we won a basketball game against some middle school from one town over. I was never really sure how she had gotten on whatever she was on while we were at Pizza Express.

I had also never been so grateful that Stacey didn't hang out with The Group anymore.

But Robert. While the girls formed the barrier, Robert made me feel like I was still Andi Gentile, a normal and sometimes charming girl who could actually function in society. Something more than just the girl who couldn't help Alex Zacharias when he was going through one of the roughest times in his life. Or wouldn't.

No. Couldn't.

Couldn't.

Meanwhile? Robert and I were hanging out at his house. It was early February and it was very cold outside and we were standing on his driveway in flannel, jeans and winter jackets. His arms were looped around my waist, his large hands cupping my small ones and my eyes were focused directly right at a basketball net his father had mounted on the property when Robert was my height. I kind of thought that if he hadn't quit basketball, his dad would have raised the net so that he could practice before meets.

But in the meantime, I got to practice between meets that I wasn't even cheering for. Robert made the very compelling argument that if I were to use my incredible rhetoric skills – and my amazing American Eagle jean skirt – to convince him to watch movies that involved dancing, it was only fair that I fully appreciate the athletic skill that went into throwing a ball into a very small hole when there were a lot of distractions happening all around you.

... Like cars. And small children. And snow. And all of the other distractions that were taking place all around me on Robert Brewster's, my new very best friend's, driveway as I held a basketball against my chest. "And focus on the net... and... go..." Robert murmured in my ear, his hand firmly directing the shot towards the net. And then he groaned loudly, his arms automatically settling around my waist. "Andi. You have to at least look at the net when you're shooting. Otherwise you're never going to get it to go where you want it to go."

How was I supposed to look where I wanted it to go when someone was breathing on my shoulder?

"It's hard, Robbie," I murmured instead, turning around to look Robert in the eye, before realizing that I was still standing in his arms. He hadn't dropped them after I completely fumbled that last shot. "And I'm cold," I added, slipping out of the awkward situation and tripping towards my bookbag to rescue a pair of gloves from it. And also to breathe.

"Oh yeah, shit, we've been out here for a couple of hours," Robert muttered, his hands shoved into his jeans pockets as the basketball bounced only twice on the beaten down behind the basketball net. "You wanna go inside and have some hot chocolate or somethin'?"

I could not speak. And the feeling felt oddly familiar, something like an afternoon full of ballet costumes, which it shouldn't have because Robert had a girlfriend who used to be my best friend and now he was my best friend, but that was the way it felt. And despite the fact that I maybe should have been unsettled by this feeling, I nodded silently and extended my gloved hand towards Robert Brewster, letting him lead me inside his house.

I could have sworn I had drunk hot chocolate in Robert's house before. But this time, as I sat on a stool at his family's newly installed island with my feet twisted around legs, it felt a thousand times different. "Do you miss basketball?" I asked quietly, probably looking to break the silence as Robert poured hot water into his own mug of powered mix.

"Every day," Robert replied just as quietly, sitting on the stool next to mine. "Or... every time I watch RJ fumble a shot that I woulda made, I do, anyway."

"Maybe you should stop coming to games and torturing yourself, All-Star." I giggled, leaning over and knocking against Robert with my shoulder. Probably an attempt to lighten the mood. Find the friend that I had – and needed – before Alex and I broke up.

"Maybe I should," Robert agreed, leaning his head down against mine. His temple pressed against my hair and I didn't even reach up to try to push it off or fix my hair. "But when I go to games, no one notices when you and me talk to each other."

"They just assume we talk about basketball," I agreed, though even while I was agreeing, I wasn't entirely sure why it would matter that people would notice Robert and I talking. But even in spite of my earlier teasing, the mood in the room was quiet and delicate. I didn't want to wreck it.

It was always quiet and delicate when we talked about basketball. I couldn't understand why Stacey... why no one else saw the way all the life and energy drained out of his face when the topic of the sport came up. Or when he was trying to avoid the topic of the sport coming up. Or when RJ was shouting just a little bit too loudly about the one shot he had managed to make after the game at Pizza Express. How was it that no one else could see it?

"Do you miss Alex?" Robert asked into the top of my head, startling me out of my reverie. I nearly dropped my hot chocolate into his lap – had he been sitting that close to me before? – and took a deep breath to settle myself before answering while sliding it onto the island. That hadn't been the question I was expecting. It made sense, of course, we were talking about basketball and Alex was a part of basketball but... it just wasn't where my mind had been. At all.

"Yeah," I admitted, tipping my head down to look at my hands spread out across my thighs. I had broken the nail on my right ring finger while we were playing basketball and not even noticed. What I did notice was Robert's chin hovering awkwardly over the space that the top of my head had filled until I had looked down for just a moment and a half too long until he sat straight up.

"Not dating him," I explained, maybe a little bit too hastily. Except that was absolutely absurd, because there was absolutely no reason for me to be rushing into an explanation. It was just because my voice was much higher than Robert's and it changed the energy of the room. That was all. "Taking to him. Kicking him in the shin after he messes up my hair. Just him, in general. Alex has been a part of my life for longer than I can remember and I wish we hadn't messed it all up by deciding that part of being in each other's lives should be kissing each other."

"Oh yeah. Kissing each other does nothing but cause problems," Robert's voice agreed, somewhat incongruously with his hands grabbing my knees and turning me on my stool to face him. It was a good thing I had set down my hot chocolate. Oh. Robert. Hi. Yes, there he was, his stool way closer to mine then I had remembered, his hands still on my knees, his eyes shining. He looked so alive, the complete opposite of the way he did when we were talking about basketball.

"Yeah, you can't be doing any of that stuff," I agreed in a tiny voice, realizing that my hands were still spread across my thighs and somehow my fingertips were touching Robert's. And I could really really feel my fingertips touching his. That was suspicious. "Unless. You... you know... like problems."

"Which lots of people do." That was what Robert said. I think.

But I wasn't really listening and it didn't really register because a second later, he had closed the small space between us and kissed me. And a less than a second after that, I was kissing him back. And less than a second after that, his hands had slid up from my knees and tangled themselves in my hair. And less than a second after that...

Oh god.

Problems.

Robert was Stacey McGill's boyfriend.