“You wouldn’t need to. No lies, Nicole.” Phil knew about Nicole’s memory.
She huffed. “First day I met him, we fooled around. When he was campaigning for Student Council. We’ve been going at it steadily ever since. Except for a few periods, one was when you and I were t-”
“I trust you, Nicole.” Phil soothed her.
“Good.” Nicole replied flatly.
“I thought you said he was a master manipulator, and he had his way with girls.”
“I was l- ugh… I was… It’s… complicated. There’s a lot of depth and backstory to this and I don’t wanna get into it.” Nicole uneasily replied.
“You know what that sounds like.” Phil noted.
“He’s not… treating me badly. He’s sweet. Really.” Nicole replied, not very convincingly.
“Is there anything romantic there?”
“God no.” Nicole replied immediately, which gave Phil immediate relief. “He’s so far from my type it’s not funny.”
“So what, you’re keeping him at bay and preventing him from fucking innocent girls by keeping him to yourself?”
There was silence from the other end of the line. “Is that so much of a bad thing?” Nicole finally protested.
Phil chuckled. “It’s an unorthodox approach, but if it works. I just hope… I…”
“Yeah.” Nicole quietly let him know.
“I just want you to be happy.”
“Yeah.” she repeated. No one said anything until she continued. “He’s a good friend too.”
“Nicole, you wouldn’t normally want to be friends with guys that manipulate young girls. The fuck?”
“I think… he has good intentions. Maybe I can save him.” Her tone was getting weaker.
“You’re going to get burned in the process.” Phil noted.
“Yeah, I’m going to get fucking burned.” Nicole’s tone was breaking down. “I’ve been fucking burned. So much shit has happened, Phil. So much. I’m scared for him, I hate him like half the time, I don’t know what the fuck is going on with my emotions, and I can’t even do council meetings without feeling sick to my stomach.”
“Yeah, I know you’re thinking of quitting.” Phil pointed out.
She paused. “How would you come to know something like that?”
“I have good intuitions.” he simply responded. “Nicole… did I do something wrong? I keep going back to our… our first time. And I-” Nicole started to say something but Phil keep going. “Please, please just let me finish. And I know I asked if you were okay with it but I can’t help but feel afterwards you regretted it, or maybe I didn’t do enough to make sure you were comfortable with it or with me, and maybe you felt like I was forceful, and maybe I was or something.”
Phil heard Nicole sigh in impatient anger over the phone. “Phil, you weren’t anything but a gentleman.” Nicole admitted. “But I… I dunno. I… fuck.” He heard her voice get weak and start to quiver again. “It just felt…. wrong. And I couldn’t bring myself to tell you how wrong it felt because I thought you’d think something was wrong with you. And I think somewhere along the way I accidentally convinced myself you were the bad guy and too forceful or something. I do that sometimes. I get too wrapped up in my own emotions and I just fuckin’ lie. I lie, Phil. I’m not a good person. I…” She wasn’t able to complete that sentence. She just started crying.
“It’s okay.” Phil repeated a few times into the phone as he listened to her cry. “Hey. For what it’s worth, I should have been more sensitive to your past and gone slower. I thought you enjoyed it when I asserted, but I think I took it too far. It was wrong, and I’m sorry.”
Nicole scoffed, sniffling. “I don’t fucking deserve you.” she mumbled.
“In the end, I’m pretty sure I was the one that didn’t deserve you.” he replied.
“I really wish things could have worked out between us.” Nicole continued. “You’re going to make a girl really happy someday. I kinda wish I was that girl.”
“Hey, I just know you’re not, and I always just wanted to move on and keep going as friends.” Phil lied, knowing he wasn’t ever going to give up on being the one for Nicole.
Another scoff came from the other end. “You know I don’t like using the l-word, but if I were ever to use it, I would say it to you.”
Phil chuckled. “I appreciate the sentiment. But for now I’ll settle for you staying on council.”
“Of course I’m going to stay on the fucking council.” Nicole growled. “I’m sorry I was so childish. I’ll try to just… talk shit out with you in the future.”
“No matter how bad things get, we’ll just talk?”
“No matter how bad things get.” Nicole softly promised. “Apology accepted. And let’s hang out soon too. I just wanna… yeah. I wanna hang out with you again.”
“I’d really enjoy that, Nicole.” Phil replied warmly. “Thanks for having this talk with me. It helped a lot.”
“It helped me too.” Nicole replied.
“But… watch out for Adam. I still don’t trust him.”
“Yeah, that makes two of us.” Nicole replied, and the two shared a laugh. “I dunno how to feel about him. High school messes with the brain something fuckin’ fierce.”
“Yeah, no kidding.” Phil replied, then let a pause fill the air. “Well, I’m sure you have a lot of shit to do. I’ll let you go.”
“Okay. See ya, Philly.” Nicole told him.
“See ya.” Phil replied, staying on until he heard the dial tone. Phil sighed again, and just stared at the wall. Things still felt… incomplete, but at least he knew now that the most confusing times between him and Nicole were behind him.
***
It was nice to dream, to believe in something. That said it was a huge mistake to believe in absolutes. Just as one should never say never, they should never say other absolutes – ‘always,’ ‘ definitely’ or even ‘absolutely’. It was nice to dream that Nicole and Phil were on better terms now, even just as friends, but the universe had other plans.
Phil had been accused of something. Something heinous. Something illegal. There was just one problem – he didn’t do it. He was hosting a party, a party his family was famous for hosting, when some freshman girl had cornered Phil and asked him for boy-trouble advice. Phil was never one to deny someone advice, even if it was a freshman – if he had it his way, freshman would never have been invited to his parties – and gladly invited her to his room where the two could talk. The girl started out sweet, telling him her story, but then as the story got more sexual, so too did the conversation, and then the advancements came.
Phil was reasonably buzzed from the alcohol, and given he and Olivia hadn’t met up in a while, he was sexually starved. He was weak, and when she got bolder, he decided to match her boldness, figuring he could chalk this up to a silly party fling. He was still respectful, of course – he confirmed that she wanted it and asked if she was sober enough to understand what they were doing – and before long they were having a good time. They had gone at it, fucking like rabbits for a few minutes, before the girl hopped off of him and said in her most sickly sweet voice, “Sorry, I just needed some leverage.” Phil was confused, naked, and on his back, wondering what the hell she meant before she stuck her finger down her throat to start producing tears. She then promptly picked up her clothes, put them on, and burst out of the room sobbing.