Best Kind of Broken

57 Pixie

It was the right decision. It was. Levi and I don’t need to add any more drama or complications to our lives anyway.

I take a shaky breath and knock on Jenna’s door.

It was the right decision.

She answers with a surprised smile. “Hey. I didn’t know you were coming by.”

“I’m afraid of lizards,” I blurt out.

She stares at me. “Okay…”

“And I hate eighties music. I truly do. I know it’s blasphemous to say so, but there it is. I hate Van Halen and Billy Joel and Cyndi Lauper.”

“Cyndi Lauper? Really?”

“And I’m afraid of losing people. Like abnormally terrified. And I’m scared out of my mind that you’re going to die and it’ll be just like Charity all over again and I’ll never recover and I just can’t—”

“Whoa. Slow down.” She holds up a hand. “I’m not going to die, Sarah.”

“But you could.”

“Well… sure. We could all die.” She shrugs. “But that’s just reality. Come here.” She pulls me into her apartment, drags me to the couch, and forces me to sit down. “Now, what is this really about?”

“Nothing. I’m just scared of you dying.”

“So you suddenly decided to knock on my door and confess your distaste for Van Halen? Uh-uh. I don’t think so.” She squints her eyes. “Does this have something to do with Levi?”

“No.”

“Sarah.”

I huff. “Yes.”

She looks at me sympathetically. “What happened?”

I not-so-briefly fill her in on all of the kissing and sexing and painting and crying of the last twenty-four hours—Jenna wanted every dirty detail and I had no qualms handing each one over to her—and for a moment, she just stares at me with her face twisted into a cross between utter confusion and extreme disappointment.

“So let me get this straight,” she says, pressing a finger to her lips. “You had crazy-hot sex with Levi.”

“Yes.”

“And then you broke up with him.”

“Yes.”

“Because you love him?”

“Correct.”

Jenna blinks. “I think we need to brush up on good reasons to break up with a guy.”

I sigh, exasperated. “You don’t get it.”

“Oh, I totally get it. You’re running away again.”

“No, I’m not. I’m making a preventative choice because I’m scared of losing Levi.”

“The same way you’re scared of losing me?”

“Well… yeah.”

“Coward.”

I mock a look of hurt. “I am not a coward.”

“Yeah, you are. Listen,” she says. “It’s okay to be afraid of lizards. It’s really weird, but it’s okay.”

“They’re like tiny, terrifying dinosaurs.”

“And it’s even okay to be ridiculously afraid of Disney’s Alice in Wonderland—”

“It is a really creepy movie,” I say defensively. “There were talking umbrella vultures and mean flower giants and hedgehog croquet balls—”

“But you can’t be afraid to love.” She looks at me seriously. “Love isn’t safe and life isn’t guaranteed. So yeah, I could die and you could lose Levi and your heart could hurt again, but that’s just life. The only alternative—Sarah, look at me—the only alternative is living without fully loving anyone else. And that’s not living at all.”

I really hate that she’s speaking to me like some wise old oracle.

And I really, really hate that she’s right.

I slump against the couch and exhale. “I know.”

She reaches for me with a tattooed arm and pulls me closer, squeezing my shoulder. “Don’t be afraid to live, Pixie.”

I still.

She cocks an eyebrow. “What? I called you Pixie. What are you going to do about it?”

I open my mouth. No one other than Charity, Ellen, and Levi have ever called me that, and Jenna calling me Pixie just feels… well…

Right.

It feels absolutely, incredibly, without a doubt right.

“Nothing,” I say with a slow smile. “You should definitely call me Pixie.”

She smiles back. “I’m glad you feel that way because I wasn’t asking your permission.”

I nod. We sit in silence.

“Hey, Jenna?” I say.

“Yeah, Pixie?”

“I want to let you in.”

She smiles again. “I think you just did.”