Over Again

I heard a click from inside the room, and Brandy stepped aside from the door. She curled one side of her mouth, and left me alone in the hallway.

I pressed my hand against the cool grey handle, taking a deep breath. Then, I opened the door, and I stepped in.

The room didn't have a lightbulb, but there were a couple lamps scattered around the room here and there. The walls were painted black, but one was a deep red. It was covered with stuff that I couldn't make out.

There was a window in the middle of one of the black walls, with a little ledge with pillows on them. Gracie was sitting on the left side of the ledge, clutching a pillow to her chest.

"What," she demanded. I sighed.

"I'm sorry," I said and sat on her bed. It was the same one that she had three years ago, but it had a different sheet on it. Gracie grunted. "I know you're not not going to forgive me easily, I know that. Could we still be friends, though?"

"I don't think I want to be your friend anymore..." She whispered, still staing out the window. There was a little park across the street from her house, and I think she was watching the children running around.

"Please? We don't have to be as close as...before," I begged. She shrugged. I'll take that as an okay...for now.

"Why do you have your room...like this?" I ask, shifting uncomfortably. She looks over at me, sadness in her eyes.

"Things have changed since you left, Zayn. Everything has changed...including me." She sighs, looking down at the carpet in her floor.

"I know," I sigh.

"No, you don't know..." she walks over to the wall that was painted red, ripping one of the things off the wall and walkin back over to me.

She hands it to me, an I see that it was one of the notes I had written to her during XFactor. I look up at her, confused.

"I hadn't watched, and I didn't write back, but I did keep every note you write to me, up until the last one." She smiled sympathetically at me.

The last note I had written her is maybe a month before we got eliminated. It had said that everything was going fine, the boys said hi-not that they'd ever seen her or knew her- and that I missed her. She never responded back to my letters, and after that one, I kind of just gave up.

"Things got worse after you left. My dad...started gambling. He was drunken almost every night he came back...if he came back. My mother got laid off, and I had to provide for the family. And then I started fighting...."

She looked down.

Notes