Blueish gray story. Triggering please be careful <3, if you want to read the rest it’s under the tag blueish gray.
String hadn’t been to a sleepover….in awhile. He was really afraid of messing it up. I was a little worried about the sleepover too. Paperclip had invited me to hangout with him all day beforehand also. I felt really special. So me and him went to the lunar new year event, at some point he started drawing on my arms with sharpie. I knew what my mom would say. I knew how much trouble I’d be in when I got back home, but how could I say no to him? So I let him continue.
We giggled and laughed and it was wonderful, but still slightly uncertain and nervous. He said he was trying. Trying to give me another chance, to keep this friendship alive. And something inside me broke. So much joy, he was going to let me be by him again. But also terror, what happens if I messed it up. The sleepover was at first amazing, Paperclip gave me body glitter, and we stuck rainbow straws in my hair, and all sorts of other stuff, Orchid came, and some others I knew did too! It was great.
We started making lemon bars, and Paperclip made a quiet promise that me and him would share a room just us so we could watch something. String arrived. String was obviously very upset, all of his song files had been deleted. He found me making bracelets in the floor and hugged me tight. Generally hugs are wonderful, generally I love being touched, but there was something about this hug, that felt trapping. I couldn’t move or leave, and even though String was being really sweet, I was panicking. I made an excuse to go to the bathroom and promised myself. Im not trapped, I can leave, this is fine. When I got back String and the others were deciding on a movie, Im not sure what happened but String stalked off. No one knew where he went, but I was the only one who went looking for him. I found him in a closet, and I quietly opened the door, asking if he was okay, if he needed anything, he slammed the door shut on my fingers. Orchid somehow knew, Orchid is very good at communicating with me through his eyes. He quietly held my hand and my hurting fingers, as I smiled and laughed it off to everybody else.
My friends Fern and Tophat arrived. Tophat was wearing a beautiful hijab from her Mosque ceremony. I hugged her and plopped down on the couch.
Fern had just lost her grandpa, barely processed or talked about. She started talking about her bad experiences with some of her friends, and I shared some of mine too. Paperclip got upset at Fern. Later when he complained about Fern, blamed Fern, I disagree. It was never ever Ferns fault. But Fern disappeared after that, later I also found her in a closet. She was crying. So I sat and listened, I cried with her. As she talked about everything broken. Later Orchid and Tophat found us, but we stopped talking. And moved out of the closet. It was silly but it felt like the magic had been broken. When we went back to the group we discovered Paperclip was gone. He Had been in the upstairs bathroom for a really really long time.
Fern turned to me and said, “Fish I really don’t think he should be alone right now.”
I said, “It’s okay, Ive broke things with him before, I can do it again,”
She looked at me, and said “Im sorry you had to do that.”
Something quiet crept inside me. Something like hope,
“You knew?” I whispered, Fern nodded. She knew and she didn’t hate me, she knew and she didn’t hate me. I wanted to cry then, but instead I choked out a small, “How?”
She shrugged, “Context clues? You guys were like best friends and then suddenly you two were hardly seen together.”
“And you don’t hate me?” I asked, I just had to be sure,
She shook her head. “No fish, Ive never hated you, I don’t think anyone does, all you were trying to do is keep Paperclip alive cause you cared about him.”
I hugged her, I love Fern. I love her so. I was about to make my way up the stairs to Paperclip when he started stomping down. He was covered, covered, covered, covered. Glowering at us, we scattered like field mice. I think he knew we were guilty of conspiring even if it wasnt against him. One raised eyebrow and we were gone. Maybe I was just being paranoid. Maybe he was up there for so long for regular reasons, but I was scared it wasnt.
Paperclip later took me and Orchid outside, away from the tense party.
“This can be fun right?” He asked, with so much enthusiasm,
Orchid frowned but I understood what he wanted, he wanted me to pretend with him. So I did. I pretended the whole night until, I wanted to hide. I wanted to drop the smile plastered to my face. So I went into the bathroom, it was all dark no lights on, and into the bathtub to cry. To hide. I thought I was alone until the quietest whisper,
“Fish?” I squinted. I could vaguely make out the outline of another person, Fern. Fern and I sat there and cried, and whisper talked, and no one found us, we heard pacing, looking, but we didn’t move, we felt like watery fugitives from the law. Eventually we made our way out, laughing and wiping our tears, replastering our smiles. I didn’t tell anyone that, that had been the loveliest part of my evening. It didn’t matter did it? String eventually came out of the closet too (bumbumbum tisss gay joke) but didnt really talk to anyone. Me Tophat, Fern, and Orchid were having a wonderful time laughing and joking. Paperclip came up to me and quietly whispered,
“Wanna go watch the thing now?”
So we quietly departed from the group mumbling something about being sleepy, String perked up at that, said
“You guys are going to bed,” and Paperclip mumbled something about not really,
Strings eyes darkened, “Oh. So you were lying?”
Paperclip made some sort of excuse and we made our way to the bedroom, we assumed String hadn’t followed us. Paperclip shut the door, and we laughed watching something kind of terrifying the whole night. I got up for water, and opened the door, to find String curled up outside it. I felt à pang of annoyance at String. For waiting. For not knocking. For staying there at all. String got up and passive agressively mentioned something about following us, and having the door shut in his face. I apologized profusely, but Paperclip avoided Strings eyes. I went to get my water, and String was laying down where I had been. Paperclip locked eyes with me over Strings shoulder apologetically. I gave him my kind crinkle eyes, it’s fine it doesn’t matter. String held tight to Paperclip. It scared me a little in the room with them. I was miserable. I didn’t even want to watch anything with Paperclip, I should have just stayed with Orchid, Fern and Tophat. I went outside briefly just to get some air, why do I do this to myself? I padded softly back to the room where Paperclip and String were. But I didn’t want to go back in there. Instead I walked through the quiet house at the witching hour, alone, and restless until the rest of the house woke up.
String left early, and as soon as he did Paperclip sought me out to continue watching the thing. We ate a lot of grapes. I was the first one and the last one to leave. Helping Paperclips Mom clean up for the guests they had later, while Paperclip attempted to get me to stay. When I looked into the room me, string, and Paperclip had slept in, I noticed something that shouldn’t have been there. There was a lot of guaze. A lot of it. Bunched up by Paperclips side of the bed. It felt like a slow motion horror turn to Paperclip, he looked so nervous.
He whispered to me, “oh shit does my mom know what room we stayed in”
“Can we tell her we slept in the other one? Pleaseeee?” Sheepish downcast eyes, and a hopeful smile. I made a big show of plopping on the other bed and talking about how nice it was to sleep in while we made it. When we finally left, I wanted to throw up. I slept for the rest of the day, while Paperclip promised to have a sleepover next time with just me and Orchid.
Which was another sleepover that went really not well.
