Chapter 38: 37 • The Very First Friend

Standing in her daughter’s school grounds, Eva found herself thinking once again of that business card tucked away in a safe, unsuspecting corner of the kitchen where the chances of Vincent finding it were slim to none. Once again, she thought of Millie Morgan and her offer from several years earlier.

She’d seen Mrs Morgan since that time, though not as often as Eva liked. And the busier both of them had become, with Millie opening up an outlet somewhere else and Eva having her hands full with Lillian, the shorter their conversations grew on the rare occasions they did get to run into each other. Even if by chance Millie had called to check on Eva and made plans to come visit, Vincent would suddenly come up with something else, causing Eva to cancel those very plans at the last minute.

It had somehow always been easier to disappoint Millie Morgan than anger Vincent. It hadn’t soothed the guilt – but it’d been easier. The consequences were nothing but Eva’s aching heart. And she’d always believe an aching heart was relatively preferable to bruising skin and fractured bones.

After all, she was familiar with the pain of both.

Sighing, Eva blinked herself out of her trance and cast her eyes about the parking lot, and over the entrance area of the building. Lots of the parents stood in groups of three or more, conversing amongst themselves and waiting by till they spotted their kids. There was a large enough part of Eva that wanted to join in – at the very least, to associate with one of the other mothers there. But how? Back in high-school, Eva wanted to be left alone. And now, as a woman who’d come to see how much her world differed from those of others around her, she didn’t like the solitude all that much. She wanted to learn, to know.

But maybe that was the reason to remain isolated from the other parents. She was younger than a majority of them, and they were undoubtedly more aware of how normal homes should be. What if they spotted something odd about the way Eva carried herself? With the way she wouldn’t know how to properly interact with others? What if they asked her the wrong question? Worse, what if they found out and tried to help her – and then it only backfired? Eva would definitely face the consequences then – she’d see a side of Vincent so abhorrent that she’d never be able to come back from.

Was it worth the risk?

“Mum!” Lillian’s delighted squeal snapped Eva out of her thoughts. And seeing her daughter running towards her, her pigtails flying in the breeze, Eva couldn’t stop the smile that consumed her face.

No, she figured. Not worth it. What if trying to get help only resulted in Vincent teaching Eva a lesson through Lillian? Definitely nothing was worth seeing her child get dragged into the ugly side of this life.

“Hey,” Eva laughed lightly as she bent her knees and steadied her arms for the impact of her daughter’s body colliding into her embrace. “You’re in an especially good mood,” she pointed out, feeling Lillian’s smaller hands wrap around her neck, “anything big happen?”

“Nah,” Lillian shook her head, pushing away stray hair strands from falling into her dark eyes. “But Mr Walker is back! So no more of that mean and grumpy teacher who was taking his place.”

Eva’s smile didn’t falter, and neither did her eyes on her little girl. “You’ve been talking about your favourite teacher ever since the beginning of this year and I still don’t know who he is.”

“That’s because dad always comes to meet my teachers for anything,” Lillian said, pulling out of Eva’s arms and reaching to undo her pigtails. She always undid them just as school was done for the day.

Eva shrugged, not responding as her smile dimmed just the slightest bit.

Why couldn’t Eva be the one seeing any of Lillian’s teachers when there happened to be a meeting? It didn’t even need to be only Eva – surely, she could accompany her husband couldn’t she? They could both do this together, right?

Even today, Eva was only here to pick Lillian up because she’d been notified by text that the school bus that took their route had met with a collision elsewhere and couldn’t make it. It wasn’t the first time Eva had had to bring back Lillian home, since there’d been bus cancellations other times too – but such incidents were so rare that she couldn’t call any face here familiar.

What was it about Eva that Vincent needed to keep in the dark, away from prying eyes and apart from the rest of the world? What had Eva done so horrible that it couldn’t come into the light? That her husband didn’t want others to see?

“Mum, can I play for a little bit?” Lillian stuck out her bottom lip and gazed pleadingly at Eva. “In the playground? Some of my friends are there.”

It felt weird to hear her daughter talk about friends. Eva hadn’t wanted any at Lillian’s age. Did that mean her child was having a better childhood than Eva herself ever had? “No, darling,” she said apologetically, feeling something twist inside her to have to deny her daughter this small thing. “Your dad might call to check if we reached home and he won’t like it if I got late.”

Eva had had to let Vincent know she was picking Lillian up – he’d throw a fit if she hadn’t informed him and Lillian accidentally let it slip during dinner or something. He hadn’t been entirely thrilled, of course, but there’d been no alternative – Vincent was at work and would only return in the late evening. Eva had to be the one bringing their child home.

Lillian’s hopeful eyes turned pleading as she folded her arms across her chest. “Tell him I wanted to! Tell him I play every day when waiting for the bus. Please, m–” Her eyes widened and a wide smile quickly replaced her grimace. “Mr Walker!” Lillian exclaimed and bounced on her feet. She was waving frantically now. “Mr Walker!”

“Lillian,” Eva hissed under her breath, internally groaning at having to interact with someone when she hadn’t planned for it. And not even a parent, but a teacher. A teacher! Someone who was smart and focused and successful. Someone who knew who they were and what they wanted in life. Someone who wasn’t so lost and so confused and ashamed of themselves. Someone who could be around lots of other kids because they knew what to teach them and what not to.

And there was Eva, still going to bed and waking up with the single thought that she might be doing something so horribly wrong in raising her child. She’d been a sickening daughter, a worse wife, and she had no clue how she was as a mother. Would Mr Walker be able to tell all these about her after their interaction?

Eva’s chest fluttered and her palms felt a little sweaty and damp. What would she say? She didn’t want to sound stupid. She didn’t want Lillian to be known for having a silly mother.

“Lily,” the strange voice spoke as footsteps came to a stop beside Eva. “Going home already? I thought you’d be rushing to the playground right now.”

Eva hoped and hoped that she was composing herself just right and then slowly rose up from her crouched position, dusting imaginary dust off her hands nervously. Might as well make the conversation a very brief one if it was going to happen.

“Mum won’t let me play,” Lillian complained, and Eva saw her daughter shoot her teacher a wounded look. “Can you tell mum that I was on my best behaviour today?”

“Lillian, it’s not about you not being good,” Eva quickly told her, reaching to stroke her child’s hair. “I told you, we need to –”

“Ten years,” Mr Walker interrupted Eva from where he stood beside them and her head turned to him on reflex, her confusion instantly morphing into shock. “Ten years, and I never thought I’d see you again.”

Eva was dreaming. This was an illusion. It must be.

“Do you know my mother?” Lillian asked with sudden interest and a lot of surprise in her tone. “Wow! But, mum,” Eva felt her girl’s eyes on her now, “I thought you said you’ve never seen Mr Walker before.”

Yes, Eva wanted to respond. Because Lillian had never told Eva the first name of her favourite teacher. Because Lillian had only ever referred to him by his surname. Because even though Eva had always known his surname to be Walker, never in a million light years would she have thought the man who’d come to be her child’s favourite teacher was the very boy who Eva had known as Terrence Walker.

She wasn’t breathing properly. What twist of fate was this? Where was the catch? Where was the horrible joke like it’d been with Benjie? Where was the blow to her gut after what was supposed to be one of life’s little gifts? Where was the bad? Where was the despair? Where was the point in which hope abandoned her all over again?

“You’re not saying anything,” Terrence said, his lips pulling into an effortless smile. “I might think you’ve forgotten me if it isn’t for that look on your face.”

Terrence Walker. Benjie used to refer to him as Mr Walker whenever he inquired about him during the school rides back then. How had Eva not realised? How had she not the faintest clue? It made sense, didn’t it?

She remembered once thinking that Terrence would grow up to be a teacher. She remembered him always loving the place he grew up in – which was why he had returned to their high-school halfway through from whichever place he’d transferred to before that. She should’ve known he’d never leave this town, his comfort zone. Eva hadn’t had a choice to move away – Vincent had wanted to settle down here and she hadn’t put up much of a fight because she was grateful she was at least free from Logan’s mansion. But while she resented this place, there were those who loved it. People who this place had been kind to. People like Terrence.

But never, not in any version of reality, had Eva even considered the possibility of them crossing paths again. She knew what she’d done when she cut him loose – and she’d carried that guilt and ache with her for so very long that it eventually embedded itself into her bones.

Eva felt her head tilt as her brain tried to tell her what exactly she was seeing, and that it was very much true. This wasn’t Terrence though, was it? It couldn’t be. Eva didn’t deserve his presence for the second time in life. But… but those were his pale blue eyes. Blue eyes that had once been too round and too big on his face, but ones that he’d grown into now. And that mop of red hair was his too. Red hair that had once been too long at the back of his neck, but was well maintained now. Those were still his freckles – scattered on the bridge of his nose, where a few had escaped and stuck onto his cheeks too.

Oh goodness. This was Terrence. The Terrence she’d always known. He was here. He was here.

“Terrence,” Eva called his name in a voice she did not recognise, in a tone that held too much emotion. “Terrence.” Her chin wobbled and her voice shook, and there was a dull pain spreading through her. “I remember you.”

“Terrence?” Lillian’s voice made Eva tear her eyes away from the man, from the ghost of the boy she once knew, and looked at her daughter instead. “You know Mr Walker’s first name too? He never lets us call him Terrence! Are you friends then, mum?”

Eva’s eyes drifted back to Terrence. But his eyes were on Lillian, and so was his smile.

“We’re old friends,” he told her child. “We went to the same school.”

“Ooh,” Lillian’s eyes brightened, “do you know my dad too? Mum and he went to the same school too!”

Eva didn’t know this Terrence well enough to know if there was a subtle shift in his expression. “Not really,” he said to Lillian. “But if he went to the same school that I did, maybe I’d seen him around.”

But hadn’t Terrence met Vincent in the conferences between parents and teachers? Hadn’t he recognised him?

“You must have met hi –” Eva was cut off by Lillian tugging her arm. She turned away from Terrence, “what is it, Lily?”

“Can I go play until you speak with Mr Walker?”

Strangely, Eva found that she didn’t mind the chat with Terrence – another time, she’d have run in the opposite direction. But these days Eva sometimes longed for company, for familiarity. After running into Benjie, her yearning had only intensified to a point of misery.

“Okay,” she said slowly. “Alright, okay. Go on.”

Lillian shot her the biggest smile, flashed a grin at Terrence, and then took off running where a bunch of other students were still gathered.

Eva began counting her breaths. She didn’t know what to do now, how to act. It was like coming back to a house she’d lived in for so long and knowing where all the rooms were, but not having a clue as to what lied behind those doors now.

“You were saying something?” Terrence reminded her, and Eva found a spot on his chin to focus on. She couldn’t meet his eyes.

“W-what?” She faltered, her breaths quickening. “Oh. Right… No, it’s just… you told Lily you don’t know Vince but – you must have seen him during the meetings?”

“Yeah, I’ve met with Lily’s dad,” Terrence responded, and Eva watched his hand come up to scratch his jaw. “He looked familiar – very slightly, though – so I just thought he was someone with one of those faces. Never pegged him for the guy you got involved with in junior year.”

“Yeah…” Eva muttered. It made sense, after all. Terrence never really interacted with Vincent back when they were in junior year. And by the time she’d gotten in deep with him, they were in senior year and Vincent was out of school. They had probably got glimpses of each other in passing, but never properly met – and before there was any chance of that, Vincent had somehow gotten her to sever all ties with Terrence.

It made sense – after all, if Vincent had really known Terrence, then he’d have thrown a fit the first time he met with Lillian’s teacher. But her husband hadn’t recognised him either.

“I don’t even remember what he looked like back then,” Terrence said, “but his appearance must have changed a lot. Ten years can be very long for some people.” And then, his mouth curved up into a slow smile. “And sometimes, ten years can be really short.” He nodded towards Eva, “I mean, you still look the same. I recognised you in a heartbeat.”

Eva had to smile at that. “You haven’t changed much either,” she told him quietly, dragging her eyes up his chin and daring to meet his own eyes. She was expecting to recoil, to flinch – but she didn’t. There was nothing in that pair of pale blue that made her feel anxiety or fear. They were just… blue. So terribly simple and calm.

Terrence smiled, nodded and then pushed his hands into his pockets. “So,” he turned towards the playground and gestured in that direction, “you have a daughter, huh?”

Eva’s chest warmed. “Yes,” she told him in a voice that was actually confident. “That’s my girl.”

Terrence’s eyes were back on her. “And you – how are you?”

Eva’s eyes widened. “Me?” she pointed to herself, her hand slightly trembling. “Me… I’m, you know. I’m good. I’m… I’m good.”

This time, a chuckle left his mouth. “Ten years,” he sighed with a smile, “Ten years and all you can say is that you’re good?” He shook his head with another low laugh. “You haven’t changed a bit, have you? Still an awkward turtle with –”

“– with zero social skills,” Eva whispered, the memory bursting into her mind like it had been just yesterday when she’d run into Terrence in the school corridor after he’d returned from his shift to another school. “I remember – oh my god, I remember!”

There was something different about the smile Terrence wore now – softer, somehow. “I’m glad you do,” he told her. “You know, I was never sure what happened after we left school… whether you moved to someplace else, or if you were still here. It was like you disappeared.”

Eva’s throat hurt as a lump began to form there. “Yeah,” she whispered. “I just… I got busy, I guess. I don’t know. Just didn’t like going out much.”

“Not even to bakeries?” Terrence asked with a raised eyebrow and a smile. “Whenever I used to wonder what you were doing or where you were, I’d imagine you sitting in the kitchen of some bakery. I’d think you were watching them preparing something and making notes of how they could do better.” He shrugged, “I guess even if I didn’t know what had become of you, I wanted to believe you were at your happiest… and that’s what baking was to you, wasn’t it? Your happy place?”

“Yeah,” Eva answered in a choked voice, her chest constricting. “But, you know… at one point, you were a happy place for me too. You and Maite, both.” It felt nice saying this out loud – felt like Eva was releasing some of that heaviness on her heart. Now that this version of the world was all she knew, she was learning to appreciate even the smallest amount of good. And both Maite and Terrence had always been good. She wanted them to know.

Terrence’s smile faltered a little, “Maite’s no longer in the country. She left for higher studies, and she was thinking to settle down there. We kind of lost touch over the years, but I don’t think she’s planning on coming back.”

“I think I hurt her a lot,” Eva said quietly, swallowing.

“She wasn’t the only one,” Terrence murmured, his eyes on the playground once again. And then, he cleared his throat and met Eva’s eyes. “But her going away had nothing to do with you, of course. She learnt to move past it a long time back.”

“Did you?” Eva asked, feeling another weight crumble and leave her at the revelation that Maite had moved on – but also needing to know if Terrence resented her still. “Did you learn to… to move past it too?”

“Are you asking me if I forgave you?” Terrence sounded amused. “Eva, we were teenagers. It was ten years back, for god’s sake. It’s something everyone experiences at some point in school, you know – a friend leaving them. You didn’t invent the act of doing that. You didn’t break me or Maite, you have to know that.”

There was a funny feeling inside Eva’s chest, like tiny pieces of something bigger were slowly breaking off and rolling away, making her feel lighter on the inside. If anything, she could swear it was getting easier to breathe.

“So you’re not… you’re not angry?” she asked in a small voice, blinking hard at him. “You don’t hate me for cutting you out?”

Terrence shook his head, like the thought of it was ridiculous – and then, he laughed. “You know, you were my first crush?” He snorted and shook his head. “I was such a fool. But then you stopped hanging with Maite and I during senior year, and school came to an end… and before long, I’d just gotten over it, you know?” He frowned and pursed his lips, “wait, no, sorry. You were my second crush – my first was actually Pepper Potts.”

Eva’s face scrunched up, “I don’t remember someone like that from school. But then again, I never knew much of anybody’s names.”

Terrence looked like he was trying not to laugh. “No, she’s not someone from school. She’s a hero – but never mind that now.” He shrugged, his laughter still evident in his eyes. “But I met someone while doing my degree for teaching, and we’ve been together for a while now. It’d be nice for you to meet her sometime. She’d like you.”

The words gave way to a raw feeling in Eva. It was something about the way that Terrence had been so casually certain that his partner would like Eva – a reminder that Terrence apparently never saw Eva the way she saw herself. He’d always been like that, though. Was he blind to everything that made her so wrong? How did he and Vincent see such different versions of her? And why was it that she always saw what Vincent saw, but never what Terrence did?

“Well,” she said, clearing her throat and trying to get rid of the tightness there. “I’m glad you getting past your silly crush didn’t make you forget me.”

“Hey, I developed a crush on you later,” Terrence emphasised, “but you were something else to me way before that – you were my friend. And that meant something.” He pulled a hand out of his pocket and scratched his jaw, “So, no, I didn’t just forget you.”

Eva stared at Terrence without say anything for a while, her brows furrowing slightly as she tried to make the words make sense in her head first. “Terrence…” she started carefully, “back in my old home, with my biological father, I never had any friends. And then when my mother married Logan and we moved into this town, I met you.” She smiled at fragments of that memory, nostalgia hitting her stronger than she’d ever known. “Of course I pushed you away at first too. But… I don’t know, you never gave up on me, you know? You were always so annoyingly pushy.”

Terrence chuckled at that, and Eva’s laughter blended into it.

“But then we became friends,” she murmured, “not the typical kind of friends – but the only version I knew to make.” She bit her lip, eyes losing focus right then. “That’s what you were to me, you know – what you still are. My first friend. The very first one I ever made. And I’m sorry you’re hearing this ten years too late.”

Eva’s phone buzzed and she looked down at the screen, where it displayed three new text messages and two missed calls. Had she been so lost in conversation that she hadn’t heard the alerts? Panic took a hold of her heart – nobody but Vincent would bombard her with calls and texts when she was away from home. He probably wanted to know if she’d reached back there.

“It’s never too late,” Terrence said, regaining her attention. “I’m glad my friendship meant something to you.”

“Of course it did, Terrence,” Eva told him with a genuine smile. “Even though I know I’d never been deserving of it.”

“Yes, you were,” he argued, “and if Maite were here, she’d agree with me too.”

Eva’s phoned buzzed with another text message. She closed her eyes and sighed.

“How is Vincent?” Terrence asked then, his tone careful. “I don’t think I liked him back in school… but it’d be nice to get to know him now.”

No. Oh, no, no, no. “Vincent is nice,” Eva found herself saying, “He loves me very much.”

“That’s good to hear,” Terrence smiled, nodding. “Back then, I always thought he was the one who made you cut us out of your life. It didn’t make sense otherwise.”

Eva’s heart hurt. “I’m sorry,” she said. It was all she had to give apparently.

“Stop apologising,” he sighed. “I told you. Ten years is a long time.”

Or very short, Eva thought. Because the years remained the same to her. There was no change, nothing. Just the repeat of the same old since her childhood.

“I, uh, I need to go,” Eva smiled tightly, clutching her phone in her hand. “I’m already running late.”

“Oh?” Terrence sounded confused. “Do you need to be somewhere?”

“Yes,” Eva’s eyes searched for Lillian, “home.”

“Why are you running late if you’re going home?”

Eva paused. Her heart stuttered. “Vincent… doesn’t really like it when I’m away for too long.”

She tried to block out the fact that she just said something that she shouldn’t have – even if Terrence couldn’t possibly know what she meant by it. Eva eventually spotted Lillian and called out her name, waving her hands for emphasis. Before long, her daughter was beginning to make her way to Eva.

“How are you going home?” Terrence asked, not addressing what Eva had just said much to her relief. She suspected he wanted to ask about it though. But this was the same old Terrence – too decent to ever ask someone else about their married life.

“Taxi,” Eva shrugged.

“Let me drop you,” he said suddenly, causing Eva’s eyes to widen and take a few steps back.

“What?” She shook her head, “No, that’s not necessary.”

“Of course it isn’t,” Terrence smiled. “But for the sake of an old friendship… let me do this.”

Eva bit her lip, her fingers tapping against her thigh. Lillian eventually reached her, hair all over her face and cheeks pink, dark eyes bursting with energy.

“Okay,” Eva said uncertainly, “just this once.”

Lillian had her head resting against Eva’s arm the whole ride home in the back of Terrence’s car, chatting both Eva’s and his ears off. By the time they reached the house, she seemed drained of energy and she asked Eva to carry her bag for her.

“Thank you, Terrence,” Eva told him as Lillian climbed out of the car and began hopping towards the front door. “It was nice to see you again.”

“You say that like you’re saying goodbye,” he joked, but it seemed a little hollow. “I’m still here, you know. As your friend. If you need help – for anything – I’ll always find a way to be of use.”

“And I appreciate that, I do.” Eva got out of the car and let the door close, but kept her hands on the opened window, her face lowered so that she could see Terrence. “I just… I don’t think we’ll be seeing much of each other. Like you said, I have zero social skills. There’s no point in me stepping out.”

Terrence was quiet for a while. “Well,” he smiled, “we went ten whole years without any interaction. I think I can put up with meeting you on rare occasions. Just don’t forget there’s an old friend who still thinks about you from time to time.”

Eva smiled, “yeah, just picture me sitting at a bakery.”

“That I will,” he chuckled. “See you around, Eva.”

And Eva stepped back, watched his car pull away from her home, and drive down the road.

She smiled into the late afternoon air. “See you around, Terrence.”

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Written on; 11th May 2019

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we're almost at the end, guys, i feel funny :(