Free When Our Worlds Collide by Lindsey Iler Page B

dresser that is just right
inside my room. The movie is still paused. He looks at the screen then back at
me. “Pretty Woman, huh?”
    “Did you come here to talk to me about my movie choice or
are you stalling?” I ask with an edge to my voice. “I know that you don’t have
any homework you want to ask me about, so let’s just get to the point, Graham.
That way you can quit wasting my time and yours.”
    Something about Graham brings out the worst side of me. I
never speak to anyone like I speak to him. I watch him as he looks down at his
feet refusing to look up at me. His tennis shoes sure are holding his
attention. A long hot breath of air releases from between his lips.
    “I’ve been replaying that night in my head since it happened
and nothing that I say can change anything that has happened. Not that I
expected it to, but I thought that I could come up with something. Just
something that would at least ease the pain that I caused you and nothing
seemed to fit right,” he explains uncomfortably looking directly at me now.
Guys like Graham weren’t used to apologizing. I tried to interrupt him but he
continues on. “What I did, what I did to you, isn’t forgivable. I made a bad
decision and you got hurt in the process and I’m sorry. I know that apologizing
isn’t enough, but it’s all that I have to give you.”
    Graham walks around this town like he is invisible. It feels
strange watching him like this, standing in front of me lost and flustered. It
sort of makes me feel a sense of power as if I hold something over someone as
powerful as Graham. I only see him from afar playing baseball or walking
through the halls of the high school with everyone else walking in his shadow.
He stands in front of me and I get a glimpse of that person that I am looking
for. He is the person who caught my eye right before I started dancing on the
stage at the talent show and he is the person that mouthed “Thanks” after I
gave him a simple answer in Government class as if it was this huge gesture.
There is sincerity to Graham that he clearly doesn’t allow many to see. 
    I sit watching him for longer than is necessary taking him
in knowing that moments with Graham are going to be limited for me. “I don’t
expect anything from you if that’s what you think. I didn’t do it for me. I did
it for you,” I explain as honestly as I know how. I look away from him as soon
as the words leave my mouth. This is why I wanted to avoid this conversation
all together. I don’t know where to begin to explain any of this without
sounding like some 7th grader with a school girl crush.
    “Why? You could have easily told the police everything. I
have never given you a reason to protect me, so why did you do it? Because I’ve
been trying to figure it out, Kennedy, and I can’t come up with any reasonable
explanation.”
    “Sit down please. You’re making me nervous,” I scoot over to
the other side of my bed leaving a spot open for him to sit. He hesitantly
moves over to where I am sitting and looks over at me before taking a seat next
to me. I nod at him to reassure that it is okay. “We need to get a few things
straight. I didn’t do it for myself. I didn’t think that I was going to benefit
in letting you walk away from me with clean hands, but I knew that you would .
I’ve seen you play baseball, Graham. I’m not willing to allow you to throw away
your entire future because you made a bad decision. So you went out and got
drunk and ran me over. I don’t believe that one moment should define you for
the rest of your life.
    He sits looking at me taking in everything that I just said
before speaking. “You shouldn’t have done that,” he whispers just loud enough
for me to hear. I raise an eyebrow knowing that he is grateful for my decision.
    “The detective came and visited me in the hospital. If
that’s what you really want then I can let them know that it was you, but I
don’t want to do that. I was in the