Misfit Theater Company (Wattys Winner 2018)

12. Wow, Okay Gina

Gina finally wears me down—she has no idea that I'm still a little bothered that she joined theater and Layla's group without talking to me about any of it—so I meet her Sunday for lunch at the mall. Mom needs to get some new sweaters she said, so I keep my cell phone handy and agree with text her if Gina and I leave the food court at all.

We meet inside the entrance to the food court, where the mall sign reads, "Welcome to Riverside Mall."

"Remember to text me if you leave this area," Mom reminds me. "Hi Gina."

"Hey there Miss M," Gina replies, but Mom doesn't wait long enough to really hear her before she's on her way to whatever sweater stores she's planning to visit.

Gina looks back at me and sort of breathes into a smile. "So... Sbarro?"

"Sure," I say. It's one of the few places in this food court that has any vegetarian options. I order a huge slice of plain cheese and Gina orders her usual huge slice of supreme.

Once we have our food, I follow Gina's mermaid green hair, pulled out of her face with a long purple sash. She picks a table and plops her tray down, so I do the same.

"Are you getting a drink?" she asks, sitting down in the chair that faces the entrance. She has this weird thing where she only sits in the spot where she can see people entering and exiting the room. After all these years, I still don't know if it's a curiosity thing, an insecurity thing, or a power thing.

"Yeah," I say. She doesn't stand up to join me, but I'm still standing; so I offer, "Want me to get you something?"

"Oh, thanks, yeah," she says, pushing her cup across the table towards me. She picks up her phone from the table and starts scrolling through some app. Probably Instagram. She's obsessed. My suspicions are confirmed when she takes a picture of her pizza. Nothing is real unless it's on the internet, right?

She can't even see my subtle eye roll as I grab our cups and head over to the drink station.

"Coke Zero," she calls after me.

"Okay," I say.

I don't want to make a big deal of it, especially not in public, but I'm not happy. Why am I always the one who has to do things? With Gina, it's always been the same. I am always the one who has to do the work. It's always my house that we have to hang out at. It's always me that has to do her favors. It's always me who has to change her schedule to accommodate for Gina, and the second it's inconvenient for me, she's mad I couldn't completely rearrange my life around her. I'm so sick of it.

A voice in my head, the voice that remembers how long Gina and I have been friends and how much we've been through together, asks, "But isn't that what she tried to fix by joining theater?"

I fill her cup and decide to give her a chance to make up for it, but I'm still not going to let all of this slide.

"Dylan already liked my photo," she says when I sit down. She's still fixed on her phone. I set her drink down in front of her, and she immediately lifts it to take a sip. "When is he going to accept that we're over?" she asks herself? Me? Her phone? I don't know. "I bet he wants to ask me to the Snow Ball. I wouldn't be surprised if he shows up now that he knows I'm here."

"So, what did you want to talk about today?"

She sets her phone down and looks up at me with raised eye brows. "I just wanted to hang out. I haven't seen you in forever."

I fake a laugh. "We hung out last weekend."

"Yeah, but that was a whole week ago. We don't go a whole week without hanging out. I was so pumped to be in your theater class now, and it feels like... I don't know, like you weren't happy to see me there?"