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day one of doomed friendship
He hears her fingers dancing over black and white keys before he sees her. It's not the first time he has ever seen her, really they've gone to school together since about seventh grade. She's in the practice room and she's playing a song he knows. He learnt it a year ago and hasn't played it since but he creeps beneath the door frame anyways and watches for a moment, to see if she will sing.
"Just too unreal, all this. Watching the words fall from my lips." It's almost a whisper as her fingers blend into the keys.
Beginning his strides to her, he sings, "baiting some girl — with hypotheses!"
Her playing stops. She freezes, fingers practically cutting into the piano as her neck twists to see him. Without hesitation, he sits on the bench next to her, places his fingers on the keys, and looks to her. It is the first time he actually looks particularly closely at her face but it's not a tender moment in which his breath is taken away and he realizes she is the most beautiful girl he has ever seen — an angel in his school — and wonders why he has never noticed her and wishes he had taken the time to know her.
She is plenty pretty, he can see. Her eyes are dark, so unlike her mother's (he has seen her mother, how could he not have?) and warm. Her hair is also dark but unruly and curly (he thinks naturally but who knows). The skin beneath her eyes is dark too, like she doesn't sleep but lives off of caffeine (he's seen her drinking Red Bull around school) and the keys of her piano. There's a lot about her that is dark though her skin is almost sickly pale. Still, she's pretty.
Maybe he thinks she should sleep more and dress nicer but he also thinks she's pretty.
So he urges her to sing the next part with him as his fingers press into the keys, feeling the familiar pattern of this song.
"Haven't you heard the word of your body?" A smile stitches itself onto his lips at the sound of their voices intertwined. It fades when she pushes his hands off the keys mid measure to play slower — was he playing the wrong tempo?
"Grasping at pearls with my fingertips," she sings, glancing at him from the corner of her eye.
He pries one of her hands off the piano and replaces it with his, "holding her hand like some little tease."
They play the rest of the song like that, her hand cautiously in his and their fingers moving delicately over white and black. He doesn't bother looking back at her in favor of not fucking up the song until it's over.
She scoots away almost immediately, her fingers leaving his warm and just a bit sweaty from her hand. Her eyes are back on the key and she's playing Mozart like it's her lifeline with such focus he thinks she's going to cry.
"I'm Gabe, by the way," he smirks, shaking the hand already accustomed to his touch.
Tearing her hand from his again, she launches into a different measure and plays the wrong keys. "Fuck," she breathes out, her hands stilling for once. "Fuck," she repeats. He sits and watches her fuck up the keys again and again until she slams them down in anger. "Natalie," she finally tells him.
"I know," he says though he didn't. He knew her face and her family, not her name.
Still, she freezes up and curiously presses down on middle C with momentarily pursed lips. "That's a little creepy," she tries a measure and he can't really place the sonata, just knows it's Mozart, "that you know."
He laughs at this. "We've gone to the same school since like middle school." Again, she freezes, her eyebrows furrowing. He laughs harder at this because he can see her thoughts; we go to school together? You, like, existin the same universe?
"We have?" She asks, setting her hands against the keys with a little twitch in her neck.
He nods, smiling lightly. "Yeah, we're in the same grade. My locker is one down from yours and I know that because yours always smells like Red Bull."
She pauses, refusing to look at him and trying another measure. "It's creepy that you've smelled my locker," she tells him stiffly.
He laughs again and scoots closer to her.
The brunette clears her throat and scoots away to the very edge of the chair. "I still have this room for, like, 13 more minutes so ... Bye?"
She's kind of a dick but Gabe is too so he scoots closer to her again and smirks at her. "So, I'm up for Mozart, huh?"
Natalie is sure to continue ignoring him as she plays a sonata he still can't place but fucks with anyways.
day three of doomed friendship
He figures out when she goes to her locker just so he can slam into the one between theirs with a smirk and bother her.
"Hey, Nat. Mozart again today?"
She grunts in response and pulls her Calc book out of her locker before slamming it (she's extra loud and angry today, he notes). "Go away, Gabe," she huffs, "don't you have football practice after school?"
He can't help but smile because she's done her research on him. "Aww, but watching you play is so much more fun. Besides, Coach has postponed practice to 3:30 for the rest of the year," Gabe feigns a pout, wiping an imaginary tear.
Natalie spins on her heel, not even bothering to respond.
He doesn't follow but he does yell after her to embarrass her.
day twelve of doomed friendship
Natalie always books the practice room for 3:00 to 3:30 and is always two minutes later than she wants to be but makes the best out of it anyways. Much to her distain, Gabe figures this out within three days and is sure to show up at 3:07, usually in a football jersey and jeans.
Today, however, Gabe lacks a football jersey. In fact, he lacks any shirt whatsoever.
She hates how red that makes her face and tries to look only at the keys and ignore the muscled flesh she can see out of the corner of her eye. "Everything else goes away, everything else goes away," she sings quietly, screwing up. "Fuck," she groans.
"What's the matter, Natalie? Distracted?" He's gloating and she can just hear his smirk.
"Everything is great, why wouldn't it be great? I'm fine," she insists, her fingers twitching on the keys. "I ... I'll play it, perfectly. I mean ... Yale has no place for a basket case, unless she can play, perfectly." A mistake. "Perfectly." Another. "Perfectly." And another.
Tentatively placing his hand on her back, he tries to look her in the eyes. "Nat?"
"Fuck," she hisses, slamming down on the keys. "Fuck!"
"Hey, hey, Nat, calm down," he rubs her back. Is she more like her mother than he'd thought with those dark eyes?
She slams the piano again, shaking now. "Fuck," she whispers. Her fingers take to the keys, playing angrier now. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck — this is fucking perfect!"
"Nat, it's okay, just calm down," he tries.
"If I can't even play, I'll never get away. Never get away. Never get away. Never be free!"
It really hadn't occurred to him how shitty her home life must be.
day nineteen of doomed friendship
They're quiet in his bedroom. Gabe is sure not to get too close to her. He doesn't know if he's afraid she'll have an outburst again or if he doesn't want to make her feel trapped.
(He feels strangely like she's a time bomb and he shouldn't keep her in his room.)
"I can't believe your mom is letting you have a girl in your bedroom," she laughs.
He smiles, "well, we aren't doing anything. Yet." Natalie glares at him and he shrugs because, really, it was worth a shot.
They stay quiet for a half hour, just till she makes a joke about how much caffeine she's had today alone (he's mildly concerned and kind of thinks that she's going to pass a kidney stone if she keeps this up). He doesn't laugh but stares at her mouth because she just mentioned it. Fuck.
Gabe knew she was pretty and that teasing her was fun but does he want to kiss her?
Even if he does, he doesn't do it.
day thirty-five of doomed friendship
He kisses her on a Tuesday in the practice room because they were fucking around with a duet again and there was a moment they were still and just staring at each other and then his mouth was on hers and she tasted like all the Red Bull she drinks.
"What the fuck was that?" She asks when she yanks away and scoots back to the edge like the first day.
His mind is buzzing and he kind of thinks his heart is fluttering down in his stomach and that, even though she's not the hottest girl in school, she looks kind of like the world right now. Gabe opens his mouth but nothing comes out so he blinks instead.
An eyebrow shoots up, her eyes wide. "Well?"
"This ... Look, I — I know that I'm not perfect. I ... This planet is dying just like our chances at state. This country's corrupt and broke, totally not great," he starts.
"Um, Gabe, all that's true and, I guess that I care but what — "
He scoots closer, "I'm trying to tell you — I love you?"
Natalie jumps up. "What?"
"Yeah, everything's fucked and some times you think you're dying but I've never felt so alive. Our politician's are all always lying and this planet is on its way to destruction. I'm failing two classes and might get kicked off the team," he continues, completely unsure of where he's going with this.
"And this is one fucked up seduction," she sighs, rubbing her temple.
"My life and this world are kind of broken, just like your mom and her lack of care," he gulps, getting off the chair, "but one thing is working if you're standing there!"
She fumbles to pick her bag up "Gabe, look, I — we can't. It so wouldn't work," Natalie tells him, heading for the door (it's only 3:14, he realizes, glancing at the clock).
"I know, Nat. I get it. Your mom is crazy, your dad is in denial, you're a wreck. So am I. We can be a wreck together!" He mentally hits himself for that, that was so stupid.
Her head is shaking and her hand is going to the door.
"Perfect for you!" He shouts.
She freezes in her confusion and glances back at him. "What did you say?"
Stepping towards her, he tries to clear his mind. "Perfect for you. I could be perfect for you. I know I'm an ass, I'm controlling, and kind of annoying, that's true, but I might be perfect — Nat, I'll make myself perfect for you," he promises.
"We'd sink like the Titanic but faster," she tells him, taking a step back.
"You're so optimistic," Gabe laughs, his arms crossed and confident in himself again.
Sighing, she takes another step backwards. "You know my schedule's a disaster," she tries. He just laughs. Again. Natalie kind of hates how often he laughs at her.
"We could make it work, Nat," he smirks.
Another step backwards. "Just think of the forecast if you tried to date me." She's hardly making sense but he keeps smirking at her like he knows everything and she's torn between punching him and kissing him.
Gabe rolls his eyes, "ooh, the weather. Terrifying."
"I'd freak and then you'd hate me," she exclaims.
"I know that you're fucked up, and, yeah, I'm fucked up too. But, Natalie, I'll be perfect for you," he whispers, "the next time your mom has an episode or they don't go to your recital, we can be the one thing in this world that doesn't hurt."
"You've got some nerve, Gabe, but I'm all nerves," she tells him, not moving.
"I'll make everything better if you just let me," he tells her, his eyes almost pleading.
She's quiet for a moment, taking a step closer to him. "I ... You would be perfect for me, and I'll try to be perfect for you," she whispers, looking up at him.
He closes the space and kisses her again.
day fifty-six of doomed friendship
It's terrible and she almost screams but he's roped into meeting her family when Dan realizes why she wants to go to the football game that Friday.
"So, which one's your boyfriend, Nat?" He asks, shivering a bit in the cold. She hasn't called him her boyfriend at all and he hasn't called her his girlfriend. They don't hold hands in the halls or anything, they just eat lunch together, meet in the practice room every school day, and go on ... Dates sometimes.
She groans and points out number 23. "That one, that's Gabe," she says. Diana smiles at her daughter even though she hadn't known the brunette even had a boyfriend until today. (No, Natalie had not been planning on telling them.) "But, uhm, I don't think you'll be able to meet him after the game, Dad."
"Why not? Come on, Nat, it's gonna be good." She doesn't believe that for even half of a second.
"He has ... Homework?" That's lame, that's so, so lame.
Dan rolls his eyes and puts an arm around her, "come on, Nat, your mom's meds are working great this time — we're even having — "
"Gabe has surgery!" She interjects, covering her ears.
She doesn't think Dan heard her because he keeps going on about how Diana is fine and everything is fine and it'll be fine. Natalie still doesn't believe that.
"He has rabies?" Natalie tries, desperate.
Later, she finds out rabies are not a good excuse as Gabe grins at her parents and kisses her cheek with wet hair and a helmet in hand.
night fifty-six of doomed friendship
Dinner is okay until it's shit and her dead brother is back from the grave — it feels like her 11th birthday all over again. Gabe doesn't hold her in her bedroom as Dan forgets her again and Diana is lost in the boy who she'll never know but he listens to her. That's all that matters and everything is not fine but this is.
"He died before I was born but ... It's like he's still here. And I'm not here. What kind of bullshit is that? He's fucking Superboy and I'm Invisible Girl when he's been dead since before I was even born! Fuck! I wish I was invisible! I wish I could just disappear when I wanted to and fucking fly away from here!" She's screaming but he doesn't flinch.
"Would you really?" He asks, quiet in the light.
Her lips purse together for a moment, thinking it over. "I would. If I could fly, I'd fly so far from here. I'm already not here — just like her."
"She loves you — probably as much as she can."
It's the wrong thing to say entirely.
"I am here," she screams. "He's fucking dead and he's gone but I am here and she doesn't see that! Goddamnit!"
Diana is in the doorway, quiet like Gabe but confused in her eyes. "Natalie, you know I love you. You're our pride and joy. You're our perfect plan, you know that. I — I love you." She doesn't say "as much as I can" but Natalie isn't stupid. She knows that it doesn't have to be said to be true.
"You wish he was here," she whispers.
Gabe really wishes he knew what to do now.
day sixty of doomed friendship
The devil makes a habit out of visiting her and she makes a habit out of loving him.
She's on drugs now because her mother is still stuck on her brother and her father doesn't even realize she's fucked up right now. Gabe still visits her every school day at 3:07 and she plays Mozart and sometimes he plays jazz (always on his saxophone because she'll kill him if he tries with the piano) and they try to pretend she's not high as fuck.
They're not the only thing in this world that doesn't hurt.
(Then again, he never promised that while her mom was being electrocuted they would be.)
day ninety-four of doomed friendship
He takes her to different clubs that look and sound the same and asks what she's on and the answer always changes because she's always on different combinations (there's always Xanax and, secretly, he thinks maybe she needs that one).
Everything is going to shit and maybe he's not perfect for her.
Gabe keeps trying anyways because he has to. He promised her. He fucking promised her. Oh, God, why did he promise her? Isn't that how Dan got stuck with all the fucking crazy?
She dances in ways Natalie Goodman should never dance but he lets her. Her hands are all over him in ways Natalie Goodman would never be but he lets her. She kisses him in ways Natalie Goodman could never kiss but he lets her.
He lets her. He lets her. Heletsherheletsherheletsherheletsherheletsher — fuck.
She wants sex but he knows this isn't Natalie.
"Are you even here anymore, Nat?"
day one hundred and eight of doomed friendship
It happens too fast and then she's falling faster, faster still. No one should ever fall that fast. He didn't even fall that fast for her. Fuck, his grades didn't fall that fast.
Gabe hasn't heard from her in weeks (he hasn't counted) but he hears from someone else who isn't her friend that her mother has forgotten her. She's not there. She's not there. She won't speak to him and she's not there.
"Natalie?" He's at her locker again and it still smells like Red Bull.
She doesn't reply but it's not like the first few times.
"Nat?" He whispers, not sure if he still gets to call her that.
She tenses but still says nothing.
"Hey," he tries.
Her eyes squeeze tight but she loosens her shoulders and sighs, "hey."
"It's been weeks," he mutters, "I was hoping you'd call."
Natalie shrugs, "I've been crazed." She's done with her books but she doesn't close her locker, she turns to him with pursed lips. There are still dark half circles under her eyes and her hair is still a wild mess but her eyes aren't just dark, there's red to them, from the drugs or from crying.
"Are we through?" He wants to take her hand but he thinks that he shouldn't.
Her sigh sounds heavy like it hurts her and she closes her eyes, "if you want us to be."
"I don't want us to be," he whispers.
"Gabe, don't. Please don't do this to me," Natalie groans, pained and tired.
This time, he doesn't hesitate to take her hand again, like the first day. He knows better than to talk about her mom right now. "Look, just ... March first, there's a dance. It's in like a month but can't you say you'll go with me?"
The locker slams shut and she practically jumps away from him. "I don't do dances," she mumbles.
He steps towards her. "Do this dance with me?"
"Goodbye, Gabriel," she whispers, walking away. He swears he hears her ask him to catch her but she's already gone before he can ask.
She leaves silence in her wake. "She called me Gabriel," he murmurs. He knows now she hates him for not being there. "Catch me, I'm falling."
day one hundred and thirty-two of doomed friendship
It's Valentine's Day and he waits by her locker with a red balloon in the shape of a treble clef. She starts to turn away the moment she sees him.
"Hey!" He calls after her, running to the brunette.
Sighing, she stops. "Hey," she mutters.
"It's in less than a month," he tells her, handing over the balloon, "you hate it, I know, but please, Nat, let's go to the dance."
She doesn't take the balloon from him, "not a chance."
"Please, let me help you again," he begs.
Natalie starts walking to class again. "Not right now," she mutters. The bell hasn't even rang.
Wincing slightly, he wraps his fingers around her wrist, tugging gently. "Okay, then when? Just, just give me a date — let me hear you play Mozart again."
"Let it go! It's already too late!" She screams. Everyone is looking now. She hates this kind of attention and she's probably dying inside but she glares at Gabe anyways.
"It can't be too late," he whispers, his voice breaking, "God, Nat, it can't be too late. I'm sorry I wasn't there, those weeks but I wanted to be!"
"Shut up and listen to me!" She yanks her wrist away from him.
Gabe lets go of the balloon. "Why won't you just go with me?"
"I'm too fucked up for this." He knows she means that he's too fucked up for her, that they're too fucked up together, that none of this will work.
He begs for a chance, asks and he pleads.
"You just don't give up," she sighs.
They're a foot apart and he doesn't even try to close the distance this time. "So don't give up on me," he asks. He's fucking terrified that she's going to give up on him.
"Goodbye, Gabriel."
Maybe it is too late.
day one hundred and forty-six of doomed friendship
There's only one more day until the dance and he doesn't even know if she'll show but he's rented a tux. He's never been so fucking scared.
Gabe isn't quite sure how but he ends up at her house and Diana lets him in.
"So, how are you, Mrs. Goodman?" He doesn't know what she knows anymore.
"I've been better, Gabe. I ... I've been better. How are you?" She smiles weakly and pours him a soda with shaking hands.
He shrugs, "Natalie hates me so ..."
"She hates me too," Diana whispers, "do you love her?"
He almost laughs but then he's crying. Fucking crying. "So goddamn much," he sobs, clutching his sides. "I fucked up so badly."
Diana holds him for a bit and he wonders if maybe she's okay now. Then Natalie is downstairs, tense and defensive already.
"Hey," he says.
She tugs at her sleeve. "Hey."
"Look, Natalie, I ... Tomorrow's the dance. Just, just give me a chance. I'll wait for you and ..." He gets up, walking towards her, "if you show, we'll go. If you don't ..."
Dark eyes ask him to not. She doesn't want to think about this and she doesn't want him to be here anymore. But she doesn't say anything. Yet.
"Are you clean?" He asks, not caring if Diana is here anymore.
Her eyes squeeze shut and she grips the railing of the stairs. He crossed the line. Why can't he keep his mouth shut just for once? "Goodbye, Gabriel."
He leaves and he cries again because he can't help her.
day one hundred and forty-seven of doomed friendship
Waiting is absolute hell and it's almost eight and he just knows that she's not going to show up now because he asked the wrong question. He'll never see her again and it's all his fault. Allhisfaultallhisfaultallhisfaultallhisfaultallhisfault — oh.
He sees her for the first time again but this time it is a tender moment in which his breath is taken away and he realizes she is the most beautiful girl he has ever seen — an angel in his school — and wonders why he has never noticed her and wishes he had taken the time to know her. Most importantly, he wishes he hadn't fucked it all up so badly.
"Hey," he chokes out, his eyes wide. It strikes Gabe that he's probably looking at her like she's the whole world again because he feels his heart fluttering in his stomach again.
She smiles a bit. "Hey."
His mouth is hanging half open for a minute before he speaks again. "You look like ... Like a star, a vision in blue," he whispers.
"Oh. I do?"
Gabe wonders how in hell someone can be so perfect and beautiful and amazing and not know it as he takes in the sight of her. Her eyes are still dark and her hair is still curly and there are still dark half circles beneath her eyes but there is no red in her eyes and her hair isn't wild tonight and she's okay and right there in front of him and that's what matters.
"And you are," he breathes out. More than one thing is working with her standing there.
She is here. She is here. Natalie Goodman is here and he has never been so goddamn happy in his life.
"Hey," he laughs a little (it's been awhile since she heard him laugh), "you came!"
Natalie shrugs, smiling. "Well, I said that I might," she jokes. She never said that, they both know it. He was so sure she wasn't going to come, she said goodbye so many times.
"I thought we were through," he laughs again. She looks hurt. "Me and you," he mutters.
Her head shakes. "Not tonight." Not tomorrow, he prays. He doesn't want them to be over.
"Will your mom be okay?" Gabe knows that he's asked the wrong question again and he opens his mouth to take it back because he's an idiot.
She sighs. "Well, she might be," she whispers, "someday."
"For know it's all fine," he tries because he wants it to be fine again. Gabe wants to never take her to a club again and to kiss her and for them to study together and for everything to be okay.
"She's still on my mind," Natalie tells him. "Hey ... Hey, am I crazy? Oh, God, what if I'm crazy?"
Gabe laughs. He laughs harder than he has in a long time. "Yes, you're crazy but so am I so let us be crazy — no, perfect together," he tells her, walking closer to her.
"I'm crazy," she laughs too but it's pained and he knows she's imagining herself as her mother.
"Hey, hey, shhh. Crazy is perfect. Fucked up is perfect. That's why I'm perfect, perfect for you," he tells her, caressing her cheek, "God, Natalie, you're perfect."
She closes the space between them for once and her mouth is warmer than any other time they've kissed. He thinks they're falling faster than any human should but that's okay tonight.