Read Online The Tension of Opposites by Kristina McBride - Free Book Online Page B

just outside my body.
    When she heard my footsteps, she turned toward me. I slowed, watching as a wave of unfamiliar blue-black hair swept over her shoulder and swung to rest over the right side of her chest, hanging almost to her belly button.
    â€œWow,” I said. “I haven’t seen your hair that long since kindergarten.” And then I felt stupid. That was the first thing I said after two years?
    Awkwardly, I walked to Noelle and held out my arms to embrace her. Her body was stiff as she allowed me to hug her for a moment. When she pulled away, it was with force.
    â€œI guess everyone’s doing that, huh?” I asked, wanting to hear her voice. Needing to know if that had changed, too.
    Noelle looked to the ground and then at me. I stared into her blue-gray eyes, the eyes that used to be more familiar than my own gazing back at me when I looked into a mirror. Those eyes were the same. Almost. They held a hint of something new, like sadness or fear, but they were hers.
    â€œI’m being totally suffocated,” she said, her voice as rigid as her body.
    â€œI bet.” I shifted my weight on my bare feet. “This must be the first time you’ve left the house.”
    Noelle surprised me by shaking her head from side to side. “Huh-uh. I’ve been out almost every night. I can hardly breathe in that house.” She turned her face to the sky again, closed her eyes. “Out here, I don’t feel like a caged animal.”
    I didn’t know what to say to that. How could her house feel like a cage after the past two years?
    â€œLook,” Noelle said to the backs of her closed eyelids. “Coop tells me every time you call.” She finally opened her eyes and looked at me again. “And the picture … it was really nice. I know what you’re trying to do, and I appreciate it.” She swept some hair behind her ear. “I just … don’t care. Okay?”
    â€œI wanted you to know—”
    â€œYou never forgot me. I was always there with you. Coop told me. It’s sweet, really.” Noelle sighed. “This just isn’t my life anymore, Tess. I’m not that girl you knew all those years ago.”
    â€œNoelle, I’ll always be—”
    â€œThat’s exactly what I’m talking about.” Her hand shot out at the darkness, aiming to hit something that wasn’t there. “I’m not Noelle anymore.” She breathed heavily through her nose and clenched her jaw.
    â€œOf course you’re Noelle. Who else would you be?”
    The girl who was not Noelle looked directly into my eyes. Her stare was hard and cold. “Noelle is gone. And she’s not coming back.” She blinked. “My name is Elle.”
    As Noelle turned on the balls of her feet, her hair whipped around her body. I didn’t move as she walked away with an even stride, her back straight and tight, her arms swinging.
    In those few moments, a lifetime of friendship flashed before my eyes. Licking brownie batter from a glass bowl, sledding down Killer Hill in a foot of snow, whispering in the darkness during sleepovers, having giggle fits over prank calling the cutest boys in the high school, raiding her parents’ liquor cabinet late at night.
    Most of all, as she walked away from me, I pictured the excited look that sparked a person’s face just from being near her. She had always pulled people in, cast some strange and immediate spell. She used to shine brighter than anything I had ever known.
    But the girl who walked away from me was dark. Dull. Somehow, strangely rough. I didn’t know her at all.

Tuesday,
    October 27
    7
A Matter of Perspective
    When they walked in, I was standing in a bathroom stall, buttoning my jeans and debating whether to discuss the whole Noelle problem with Max over lunch. As their heels click-click-click ed against the tile floor, I heard the first voice.
    â€œI can’t believe he’s