Can we talk?

Ashley stared at the text she just received. She hesitated to move. She felt she had to prepare herself for the conversation that was about to be had. She didn't know what the conversation was going to entail, but she prepared for the worst. When running headfirst into a problem, Ashley had to have an action plan. Her hand jolted as she took one last moment to read the text over.

Can we talk?

Ashley didn't know what to expect, but she had all her defenses up. She picked up the phone and dialed Grace's number. Ashley could hear Grace's upset breaths through the phone. "Grace?"

"I-I don't know what happened, Ashley." Grace struggled to speak.

"I'm on my way over." Ashley hung up the phone, grabbed her car keys, and rushed out of the door. She rang Grace's extravagant doorbell bouncing nervously on her heels with thoughts racing through her head. Grace answered the door slowly and began crying as soon as she saw Ashley standing there. Ashley pushed her way into the house, and pulled Grace into a hug to attempt to calm her down. Ashley eventually led Grace to the family room and sat beside her on the sofa. "Now," she started, handing Grace a full box of tissues, "you want to tell me what the hell is going on? Or do I just have to nod my head and pretend like I understand? Because I'm fine doing either, but you and I both know I prefer the former over the latter."

Grace sniffled and smiled at her friend. "Ashley," Grace could feel tears force themselves out again, "I did something terrible." She spoke through tears. Grace was known to always be the calm, cool, and collected friend. She was the spontaneous one who proposed crazy adventures and didn't care about what classmates said behind her back. Usually she was the one someone cried to. Ashley couldn't remember the last time Grace was the one crying.

"Oh my God, Grace." The worst thought possible ran through Ashley's head. "You didn't..." Grace just nodded regretfully, knowing that Ashley knew exactly what Grace had done. Ashley scooted closer to Grace and held her hands in her own. "What happened?"

"I don't know." Grace struggled to form words through her tears. "He was so great to me, and was always just so sweet, and I tried to keep myself away, but I couldn't. I made one mistake after another and ruined everything."

"I knew that you had a little crush on him, Grace, but I never thought you would ever act on it." Ashley couldn't help but come off disappointed.

"I know! I don't know how I let it get this far."

"How long?" Ashley didn't know why she asked, she just did.

"A year." Grace didn't want to believe her own answer.

Ashley didn't reply. She refused to believe Grace at first, but then she didn't know what to do. "You have to tell her." That was the only logical thing that Ashley could think of.

"Are you crazy?"

"Grace. A year? You have to tell her." Grace started balling again and Ashley wrapped her into a hug. "That's the only thing you can do now, Grace. You have to tell her." Ashley held a sobbing Grace in her arms for the rest of the night. She reassured her that everything would be okay, but only after she made right what she had done wrong. There was no excuse for what had been going on for the last year, but Ashley believed Grace still had a chance to fix things. There was no way everything would be perfect, but they could be better.

Ashley spent the night at Grace's and painfully dragged both of them to school once Friday morning rolled around. The two forced themselves to make it through the school day while also managing to avoid one another. Ashley pulled Grace aside before the football game had started that night. "So?"

"So?" Grace asked Ashley, confused.

"Have you talked to her?"

"Has she hit me with a car yet?"

"Good point." Ashley rolled her neck backwards and sighed. "Grace, you have to tell her. I'm not about to stand around and let this just happen. If you don't tell her tonight, I have to be the one to. At least if it comes from you, you have a chance to apologize and hope she listens."

"I know," Grace hung her head. As the football game had ended, Ashley shot Grace a look. Grace nodded at Ashley and caught up to the football team and pulled one of them aside.

"What do you want?" The player snapped at her.

"We need to tell her." Grace's statement started an argument between the two of them. They went back and forth, going mostly unnoticed by the crowd of people around them. Both managed to keep their tone in check for awhile, until Grace finally struck the wrong nerve.

"I don't care, Grace!" He finally yelled. "You promised you wouldn't tell Katie!"

"I can't keep this from her, Jesse! Please, I can't keep lying like this. One of us has to tell her," Grace pleaded.

"Tell me what?" Katie stood still as a statue, staring at her boyfriend and one of her best friends. There was silence. Neither Jesse nor Grace responded. "Tell me what?" Katie repeated, only this time more sternly.

Jesse exchanged a look with Grace. He sighed, telling her, "Go home, Grace. Please." Grace attempted to plead her case with him, but he only repeated himself. "Go. Home." Grace gave up and as a flood of people rushed from the stands and out into the parking lot, she disappeared and left Jesse standing across from Katie. Jesse stared at Katie, not knowing what to say. "I have to change. The team's probably waiting." Katie didn't respond. Jesse begged her to wait for him as he ran into the locker room after his teammates. He sighed with a small amount of relief as he left the locker room and saw Katie waiting by his Jeep. "Come on, let's go eat."

"Jesse," Katie stopped him.

"Yes?" He nervously smiled at her.

"Let's just...Let's just go home." Katie became too nervous to confront her boyfriend.

The car ride to Katie's house was a silent one. To the two in the car, though, it felt like anything but silent. Both had thoughts running a mile a minute. Jesse slowed the car to a stop in front of Katie's house and she sat still in the passenger seat, only moving to look over at him in the driver's seat. "Bye babe," Jesse leaned over to kiss her but Katie turned away, rejecting him. "Um...okay? You want to tell me what's wrong?"

"Don't you ever get tired of this?" Katie asked him in a serious tone.

"Tired of what? Kissing you?" Jesse's dark eyebrow rose.

"No. Of us always fighting and then being fine two seconds later. Of us constantly going back and forth from being best friends one minute to hating one another the next. Don't you get tired of all this...pretending?"

"Katie, I love you. I'm not faking that. Couples fight. So what? We never actually break up. Not for any significant period of time." Jesse smiled at her, attempting to get a smile back, but it wasn't working.

"What have you been hiding from me?"

Jesse sighed, "Nothing."

"Jesse. You're lying to me. That's all we ever do – we lie to each other. Can we please be honest? For once?" Katie asked.

"Katie, please. What you heard me talking about tonight was nothing," Jesse stubbornly refuted. "Grace always over exaggerates everything. You know that."

"I turned you in to Mr. Bates." Katie stated frankly.

"I know that." Jesse spoke through his teeth.

"No. You know what I did. You don't know why. I turned you in because you were an arrogant asshole who needed to be reminded that he wasn't anything special." Katie explained.

"Excuse me?"

"Your turn to be honest." Katie sarcastically smiled at him.

"I don't have anything to confess to you." Jesse looked away from her, and slouched in his seat.

"You really think that we can be together for two years and I can't tell when you're lying?"

"It's nothing babe, just relax and get some rest. We'll talk about this tomorrow." Jesse suggested. He began to fiddle with his steering wheel and refused to make eye contact with Jesse.

"No." Katie rejected, "We're talking about this now. What have you been hiding from me?"

"Katie, this isn't a good-"

"What have you been hiding?!" Katie interrupted him.

"Nothing that can't wait 'til morning."

"Jesse! I swear to god, if you don't tell m-"

"I've been cheating on you!" Jesse blurted out.

There was silence for a moment before Katie spoke up. "What?"

"I slept with Grace."

"Goodnight Jesse." Katie calmly said, exiting the car.

"Katie wait!" Jesse ran after her. He made his way in front of her and held her position. "Katie, it was a mistake. I can't begin to tell you how guilty I feel. I didn't want to tell you because I didn't want to hurt you any more than I already have."

"The problem is that I know for a fact that you're not guilty because you love me and you made a mistake. You're not guilty because you don't want to hurt me. You're guilty because you got caught."

"Katie, please. Just listen to me."

"Wait," Katie stared at him with realization hitting her all at once. "Monday family night?" Jesse looked at the ground, knowing he just got caught in another lie. "Leave." Katie pointed to his car.

"I'm not leaving until you agree to hear me out." Jesse refused to move.

"Fine. If you won't go, I will." Katie stormed down the street. Jesse ran after her. He followed her, begging to at least talk about it. Katie turned around with a tear in her eye. "You cheated on me!" She yelled. "With my best friend!"

"I know and I know it was wrong but-"

"No. I always knew Grace had a crush on you, but I trusted you not to act on it." Katie continued walking. "Just go away, Jesse. We're done."

"We're not done until I say we are."

"We're done, Jesse! Goodbye." Katie glared at him. After a moment, Jesse walked back to his car, slammed his door behind him, and drove off mad. Katie wiped a tear from her cheek as she pulled out her phone and called Ashley. "Ash? Where are you?" She said sniffling.

Ashley drove as fast as she could to get to Katie's house. She ran in and Katie ran up to her crying. "Katie, what happened?" Ashley asked, wiping a tear from her cheek.

"Jesse's been cheating on me. How could I be so stupid?"

"You're not stupid. We all were blind if we couldn't see that it was going on for a year." Ashley consoled her.

"Wait," Katie sniffled and looked at her, "A year? How did you know that?"

"Because I-"

"You knew?!"

"Only for a day and-"

"And you didn't tell me?!"

"Katie, I gave Grace today to tell you. I was planning to come over in the morning and-"

"Bull shit! That's total bull shit! You are my best friend. You're supposed to be there for these things. You're supposed to tell me about them! You're supposed to tell me as soon as you find out. That's what a best friend does!" Katie was now crying even more than before.

"Katie..." Ashley tried to speak up, but Katie was too hysterical to let her.

"I can't even trust you. I have to go." Katie ran out of her house again. This time she noticed Dana's car and ran across the street to her house. She didn't know why but she knocked on the door. What am I even doing here? Katie thought to herself. This is just dumb. Katie turned to walk away. She probably doesn't even care about me or my stupid relationship problems.

"Katie?" Dana's voice stopped her.

Katie turned back around to face Dana. "I'm sorry," she began, "I just didn't know who to go to and everything just fell apart and I just can't anymore. I just can't do this. I can't keep lying to everyone. I can't keep lying to myself." Katie rambled on.

"Do you want to come in?" Dana stepped aside to let her in and shut the door behind her. "What happened?" Katie instantly hugged Dana and cried. "Whoa, Katie..." Dana hugged her back. "It's okay. Can you tell me what happened?" Dana asked, pulling away.

"Oh you know, nothing too exciting. Just the fact that Jesse cheated on me with Grace and Ashley knew about it." Katie explained.

"What? Come on, let's just calm you down. You've had a long night, so maybe we should just get you to bed. You need rest first, it's getting late. You can spend the night here if you want." Dana spent the next hour calming Katie down and getting her mind off of what had happened.

They walked up to Dana's room, searching for clothes for Katie to wear to bed. "Are you sure I can spend the night?" Katie asked, finally tear free. "It's really not that deep since I can just walk across the street."

"Katie, it's not a big deal if you sleep here. Plus it seems like you'd be happier with company. You can wear these." Dana tossed her sweatpants and a t-shirt. "You can take my bed. If you need anything else, I'll be on the couch downstairs."

"Oh no, I don't want to make you sleep on the couch. Just sleep in the same bed. You said it yourself," she shrugged, "I'd be happier with company."

"O-okay." Dana uneasily agreed. Katie smiled at Dana and went to the bathroom to change. The two quickly fell asleep on opposite sides of Dana's bed after Dana kept Katie's mind off of Jesse by telling her stories about different folklores.

On Saturday morning, Dana woke up and realized that she had inadvertently put her arm around Katie while they slept. Dana awkwardly and slowly tried to move without bothering Katie. She slowly lifted her arm and turned to lie on her back. As she moved, however, Katie turned around and cuddled into Dana more. Dana sported a nervous look on her face and glanced down at the girl curled into her. Dana didn't want to disturb Katie's sleep, and some part of her didn't want Katie to move, so she absentmindedly smiled to herself as she wrapped her arms around Katie and attempted to fall back asleep. Katie's eyes peeked open for a moment when she felt Dana adjust. Katie tilted her head and saw Dana's eyes closed, making her assume Dana was asleep. Katie gained a vast grin on her face as she closed her eyes and held onto Dana as tight as possible.