Nadia’s eyes went wide, and her heart started to race rapidly. Her surroundings blurred, as a forceful hand dragged her out of the crowded hallway into a smaller less populated corridor. “Let me go!” She cried out nervously. She hadn’t even gotten a good look at who had yanked her out of the hallway and had a very bad nagging feeling. Her stomach lurched. When she was finally able to secure her footing she glanced up nervously to see who had dragged her so viciously. Immediately her heart grew heavy.
Garfield stood in front of her, a pained look on his face. Deciding the best course of action was not to speak at all she simply looked down at the floor. She knew something was terribly off the moment she had looked up and saw him standing in front of her. If the look on his face hadn’t given it away, the forceful hand yanking he had just pulled would have. Nadia had expected to look up and see Calvin, who’s generally angry nature would have warranted an equally angry wrist grabbing. Nadia generally considered Garfield the human equivalent of sunshine, and when people talked about Garfield they used words like ‘charming, charismatic, and ever so polite’ when describing him. All adjectives that would lead you to expect he’d never be able to Jerk a girl around a corner like that. Yet, despite all odds here they were.
Still staring down at the floor nervously, Nadia shifted the weight on her feet as she thought. She couldn’t remember doing anything wrong so she automatically assumed the worst. The worst being that Garfield had pinned together all the facts and figured out that she was Gossip Witch. Every inch of Nadia’s body felt as if it was made of iron, and the more time passed the heavier her limbs felt. She felt awful. Normally she didn’t feel bad about writing really personal articles about others online for her gossip blog (especially because everything she wrote was true), but also normally she didn’t date her interviewees afterwards. Nadia had always been careful not to get to close to anyone, to avoid this exact scenario. Calvin knew her secret, and kept it well. She had never had to deal with the drama of anyone else finding out before.
“I can’t believe you!” Garfield said breaking the silence, at this point Nadia was unsure how much time she had spent staring at the floor. She gulped. “I opened up to you - and the first thing you did was literally tell everyone.” He continued his voice low, disappointment and betrayal filling his words. “And it’s not even like you told a friend, and they told a few people and it got around!” He shook his head. “You literally told the whole entire school - everyone knows…” Garfield went on his voice starting to break. “I trusted you.” Garfield said, finally managing to break Nadia’s iron gaze at the floor. She noticed he was beginning to tear up, and it felt like her heart shattered only to replaced by guilt. “I can’t believe I trusted you.” He uttered the words quietly, almost unable to get them out.
Nadia starred back blankly at him unsure what to say. He stared back at her desperately as if he was expecting some sort of explanation. She couldn’t find one. Nadia had started out getting to know Garfield the same way she did anyone else when she was going to write about them for Gossip Witch. She played them. Using whatever tactics she needed to achieve the desired outcome, becoming whoever she needed to be to fit the scenario. She never felt bad about it either - it’s not like people had to open up to her. Plus she never published anything that wasn’t true, so never had she ever felt bad about running Gossip Witch until now.
She wished desperately that she had some kind of excuse. It didn’t work. Nadia had played Garfield the same way she did everyone else, but instead of the usual gather information and ditch Garfield broke a lot of her walls down and her usual plan was thrown into disarray. They ended up getting way too close, and he learned way to much about her. This was only bound to happen. It was all her fault. Nadia felt like she could cry. She couldn’t remember the last time she had cried, she always messed with others emotions - people rarely messed with hers. In a sick way, it made her like Garfield even more.
“I can’t believe this.” Garfield said in remark to her long lived silence. “Are you even going to try to defend yourself?” He asked her in disbelief. He wanted an explanation incredibly badly, he couldn’t believe that some one would use him like that without a reason. Yet, Nadia was still silent. As he waited for some kind of response her rubbed his temples, frustrated even beginning to turn a bit red. A look of shock over took his face, and he looked back at Nadia fearfully. “Was any of this even real?” He asked, his voice incredibly shaky.
Yes! Nadia wanted to shout, but she couldn’t bring her self too and instead morosely starred down at her hands, which were clamped together and resting on her thighs. She wanted to hide, she could feel his burning stare and it made her feel naked and oh so ashamed. Nothing could have made her feel better in that moment then if she could have defended herself. However, she couldn’t find the words to defend herself. It was probably because they're weren’t any she thought. So she kept quiet.
This only made Garfield angrier, her silence affirming his suspicions. “Goodbye Nadia.” He said firmly, the he turned in the other direction and headed away from her. As he quickly paced down the hallway not even sparing her a single glance back her previous resolve crashed into a million pieces and she feel down to her knees. She felt dead inside. She just stayed there on her knees unsure what to do. Nadia had never ever been good at processing or dealing with her emotions. She normally just ignored them until they went away. Tears began to fill her eyes, telling her that this time things were going to be a lot different.
