Billie and I sat at the foot of the ocean, our jean shorts sitting vulnerable against the sand, a fact that I’ll probably regret once I uncomfortably drive back home. But there was a reason that it was worth it, as I watched Billie’s brown hair blow wildly in the California wind.
It had been a while since I’d last seen the girl. She had been on across the world on tour for several months. She had even asked me to accompany her, but I couldn’t do it. I wasn’t brave enough. Visualizing glistening sweat dripping down her body after a set, seeing her smiling and flirting around with her new influencer friends, and knowing that every night, she’d be cuddling into me, her legs entrapping mine in a tiny queen bed.
Just like she’s done since we were kids.
I couldn’t bear to feel these sinful feelings about my own best friend. Like an objectifying beast, so instead, I found myself a distraction. Jack.
Jack was nice. He approached me during an intense manga reading at the library, cutely stuttering out something along the lines of “you’re beautiful.” Nobody had ever called me beautiful, well, nobody except Billie. He invited me out to coffee, and we talked about the weather, about life, about fears, about hopes. He understood me in a way that nobody else had ever cared to before. Nobody except for the girl beside me.
“So...” The girl playfully spoke, “When were you going to tell me about Jack?” Huh? I hadn’t told her about him, for a very good reason. Recognizing my confused expression, the brown-haired girl laughed, “Dude, I had to find this out from Zoey. I mean, you tell her, but you didn’t tell me?”
I let out an awkward chuckle.” There’s a lot I haven’t told you.” I thought.
“Umm, well, Jack is nice.”
Billie cocked her head to the side, “Really, that’s all, just nice?” It was obvious she was skeptical, as I had never in my life expressed an interest in a boy, and now I was dating one.
But it was true. When Billie left, I spent almost every night at Jack’s house. At first, not much would happen between the two of us. We would order Chinese takeout, challenge each other in Just Dance, Binge watch How I Met Your Mother, and we would also kiss a bit. I say only a bit because there was no passion, not from me and not from him. But for some reason, we both put up with it. I didn’t find out why until a couple weeks later.
Jack and I met at our regular meet up spot, the coffee shop across from the library. Jack had offered to pay for our orders while I went to the restroom. As I walked out of the restroom, I found Jack, talking to a barista. The same Barista that’s working every time we’re there. Jack had both our drinks in hand, yapping nervously like he always does to the poor worker, but it was then that I noticed. That look.
His eyes were shimmering like a pile of gold was in front of him. His smile wider than the Nile Delta. Meanwhile, the man in front of him looked oblivious to this fact, but I wasn’t. It’s the same look that I caught myself giving to Billie.
Later that night, as we were binging season four of our favorite show, I finally spoke. “I saw.” I simply said. Jack jolted for a second and sighed. “And I see the way you look at the girl on your lock screen.” The two of us said nothing else, instead we scooted closer to each other. Jack lifted my body onto his lap and we let our lips do the talking.
It was not sweet, it was not tender, and it was not angry. It was filled with longingness. Not for each other, but for who we wished the other could be. But I knew that Jack wasn’t my childhood best friend, as he knew I wasn’t the handsome barista he admired. We called each other the Tracys to each other’s Robin. Nobody understood me the way Jack did. He became my closest friend, a companion that I could express my deepest feelings about Billie to and then kiss it all away and pretend like none of it existed.
But it did. I felt it every time she would call in from her hotel room after a concert, pouting and complaining about how much she missed me and how she wished I wasn't so stubborn on my decision of not coming with her. I felt it whenever she would send me good morning texts at exactly the same time every day, even when she was on the complete opposite side of the world. And I felt it whenever she would flash me that gorgeous smile of hers whenever she felt that I was feeling down. So yes, Jack was nice, great even! But he wasn't her.
I hadn’t even realized how silent I had gotten reminiscing about Jack and I’s pathetic relationship, two homosexuals roleplaying as people we weren’t, that I failed to notice how awkward the atmosphere had become.
“Well,” Billie finally broke the silence, “I’m glad you and your boyfriend are so in love.”
There was something weird in the way that she said it, but I didn’t get to think too much about it as she pulled me in, her lips pecking my forehead, how she’s always does. Because to her there was no meaning behind it. To her I was only her best friend and that’s all I would ever be to her. She rested her head on my shoulder as I laid my head on top of hers, together watching the glistening blue ocean. And as waves of the ocean kissed our feet, as the seagulls soared through the sky, as her warm breath invaded my shoulder, a terrible thought encroached my mind: I wished I could be in love with Jack the same way I was helplessly in love with the ocean.