“That’s it! I’m done! We—you and me—we’re over. We’re done,” she finally snapped, shoving the boy’s cotton covered shoulder and spinning away from him.
Without giving him a chance to respond, Natalya ducked into the adjacent hall and pressed her weight against the cool brick wall. Her shoes squeaked in protest of the quick movement, courtesy of the wet floors. It was probably the last rain of the year; it was getting colder. 
“You okay?” a soft voice asked, causing Natalya’s head to snap up in the direction of the person she hadn’t noticed before.
“Yeah,” she croaked, wishing her voice were stronger to reflect how she actually felt about the break-up. “I’m alright.”
The other girl stood up from her seat on the black metal bench and moved closer to Natalya.
“I’m Stephanie,” she smiled, extending one hand in greeting and using the other to brush a stray strand of hair away from her freckled cheek.
Natalya hesitated, looking at the bright brown-eyed sandy blonde in front of her. For a long moment she wrestled with the idea of just walking away; it probably wouldn’t hurt this Stephanie too badly. They were in the same junior English class, but they weren’t close. They had never spoken.
But… maybe what Nat needed to counter the abundant gray and black in her life was a bit of… color. Stephanie seemed like nothing but color.
So she stuck her hand out and grasped Stephanie’s firmly in her own.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Natalya. Nat, for short.”
“Can I ask you something, Nat?”
“Fire away,” she twisted one of six black bracelets around her wrist, eyes fixed on the sickeningly-yellow tile flooring.
“Do you do that a lot?”
“What?”
“Use lame, overworked clichés to break-up with your deadbeat boyfriends?”
Nat snorted, and allowed a smirk to slowly creep onto her bright red lips. Yes, she certainly was colorful.
“I tend to use those words a lot, yeah. I’m a fan of that particular overworked cliché.”
“It sounded fresh coming from you,” Stephanie added, a bright rose hue dusting her cheeks. “For the record.”
“I know,” Nat grinned.
***
The pounding on the door was incessant and ridiculously loud. She could hear the jingle of the pumpkin decoration hanging on the inside of the doorknob as it crashed against the metal door. It was all too apparent that the house was old as the entire doorframe shook under the force of the knocking.
Stephanie thought for sure the person on the other side was dying. That was the only thing that could explain why she needed to scramble up the stairs in a thin sweater and flannel pajama pants at midnight on a Friday.
Bang, bang, bang.
“What is going on?” she hissed, slapping the light switch to illuminate the porch. Next, she flicked the deadbolt unlocked and twisted the cool metal knob before pulling the heavy door open to reveal her visitor.
“Hey,” Nat smiled, half her mouth obscured by her carefully placed hand.
“What happened?” Steph demanded, as she pushed open the screen door. Icy wind cut through the heat of the house, nipping at Stephanie’s cheeks. Her eyes roved over Nat’s flushed cheeks and red nose as she flagged the other girl inside. Natalya moved her hand slightly and Stephanie gasped as she noticed a smear of burgundy on her chin. “Your face-”
“Is seriously messed up. I know,” Nat snorted, stepping into the house and pulling a rubber band from her wrist to tie her hair back in a messy tangle.
“That’s a bit of an understatement,” Steph shot back, ushering Natalya into the kitchen and guiding her onto one of the Ikea barstools.
Stephanie brought the kitchen lights up and moved to stand directly in front of Nat.
It was obvious that she’d been beaten up. Her bottom lip was split thanks to her left canine; a bright spot of blood was gathering there and spilling onto her chin. There was a small cut running right through her left eyebrow, staining it a deep currant color. The space just beneath her left eye was red and puffy. Stephanie suspected it would be a dark bruise by morning.
“How bad?” Steph demanded, locating an icepack in the array of Tyson frozen French fries and individually wrapped cuts of Kroger meat. She shivered against the chill of the freezer before shoving it closed.
“Not bad-”
“I completely disagree,” Stephanie said flatly. “It’s never been this bad.”
“My dad got home earlier,” Nat sighed, reaching for the icepack perched on the corner of the granite countertop. “It’s always worse after his trips. She thinks she can ease off her meds while he’s gone,” Nat rolled her eyes. “As if he somehow won’t notice when he gets home that his wife isn’t zonked out anymore.”
“I can’t really fault her for not wanting to be a zombie.” As Steph waved Nat’s hand away from the icepack, she noticed red marks on the portion of Nat’s forearm that peeked out from beneath her dark leather jacket. “But doesn’t she see how trying this every time affects you? Doesn’t she care?”
“The only time she cares is when she’s there enough to remember she’s my mother.”
Stephanie looked Nat over closely. It wasn’t hard to find the sadness woven into her features; it was impossible to miss the secrets she held in her dull blue eyes. Steph deliberately set the icepack on the washcloth and folded the corners over before passing it to Natalya.
Nat pressed the cloth to her left eye, held back a wince, and continued.
“Obviously, she wasn’t out of it when Dad got home,” she sighed. “He noticed.”
“Did he hit you?” Stephanie demanded, her voice wavering with anger.
“No.”
“Then how do you explain this?” Steph gestured to Nat’s various injuries.
“Bookcases aren’t all that forgiving.”
“He threw you into a bookcase.” Steph deadpanned, pursing her lips and trying to look less upset than she felt, with little success. “You’re staying here for a while.”
“That’s probably for the best,” Nat agreed, her tone more tired than upset. “I told dad I was done and I left. He didn’t try to stop me. When I walked out he was lording over the house from his stupid, ratty old chair downing his seventh scotch.”
Stephanie turned her back on Nat and clutched the corner of the countertop in an attempt to keep her composure. Seconds slipped by silently as she allowed herself to channel the overwhelming anger into the force of her grip. Her hand shook as she imagined Robert getting drunk enough to throw his daughter into a bookshelf.
A second later, she released the counter and turned back to face Natalya with a forced smile on her lips.
“Okay,” she sighed. “Let’s get you some pajamas.”
***
“Come on,” Nat whined after a painful minute of Steph’s stony silence. “You can’t seriously be mad at me? You’ve been asked to-”
“You just don’t get it!” Stephanie snapped back, folding her sticky pink Papermate eraser back and forth in her hands until it began to fissure and break into two parts. “It was supposed to be… I don’t know. Offered? Not asked for.”
“You didn’t ask for anything.”
“No, you did. Which makes it that much worse, somehow.”
“So now I’m not allowed to help my best friend?” Nat’s face fell into a pout, her lower lip comically pressed forward so that Stephanie couldn’t miss it. As if on command, her big blue eyes filled with a shield of watery tears. God, she was good at making that face.
“Of course you can help,” Steph relented. “Just don’t… some things are only worth having if I earn them on my own.”
“Fine, fine,” Natalya seemed to agree for a brief second, but then her hands were waving away Steph’s concerns with the magical powers contained in her black nail polish. When she finally stopped moving, the only thing left in her eyes was mischief. “Tell me you’re not excited, though. Painting a mural on the wall of the cafeteria? Every single person in this condemned place we call a school will see it.”
Despite herself, Stephanie felt the smile worm its way onto her face. She flipped half of the broken eraser on her desk idly, reading part of the word she’d split down the middle. Of course she was excited; Nat knew that better than anyone.
“I’m excited,” she admitted.
Nat’s eyes lit up as she heard the words and she moved to pull something out of her backpack. “I even got you something extra.”
“What?”
“A congratulatory gift,” Nat clarified, sliding the wrapped package across the table. “Go ahead, open it.”
“We’re in the middle of class-”
“Well we haven’t paid any attention so far,” Nat smirked, raising an arched eyebrow in a high curve. “Open it.”
Before Steph could protest again the shrill sound of the bell sliced through the quiet, officially releasing them from their school day. Steph sighed in relief, visibly more relaxed as she pulled at the first piece of tape. Nat couldn’t help rolling her eyes-her best friend was such a paranoid person.
Steph worked to get past the wrapping paper daintily before deciding that using force was the best policy, She tore through the thick brown paper in a single motion, a loud riiiip murdering the silence and revealing a black cardboard box hidden beneath. She carefully removed the lid to see the contents of her present: a tiny little easel and an even tinier canvas, neither more than three inches in height.
Steph let out a small giggle as she pulled the easel out and stood it up proudly on the corner of her desk.
“See?” Nat teased, “I knew you’d get it.”
“Get what?”
“What the easel is for.”
“I have absolutely no idea what it's for!”
“It’s a practice mural. A baby mural. That way you make all the horrible errors here and not in the one place every student in the building will be able to criticize your work and-”
“Wow, you’re horrible,” Stephanie laughed, always entertained by Nat’s good-natured ribbing. “Thanks for this.”
“Of course. I mean, I had to get it because I promised the “mural recruiter” that even though you were a terrible artist you’d make all the mistakes here and not-”
Steph elbowed Nat in the side, cutting her off, while picking up her backpack and settling the rough, fraying strap over her shoulder.
“Stop it,” she laughed, trying to dodge Steph’s attack. “I’m done, I swear.”
Rolling her eyes, Stephanie stepped away.
“I sure hope so,” she grinned, waiting for Nat to get her things together. “Otherwise we’re done here. I’ll just take my tiny practice mural and go.”
“I’m done,” Nat repeated, smiling kindly and joining Steph at the door. “I won’t tease you anymore, no matter how much fun it is.”
***
Natalya knew they were in trouble the moment their playful, teasing words morphed from light-hearted jokes to real ammunition. The words “I’m done” and “we’re done” had been something of a joke between them since their first meeting, but this was different. It felt different.
“I’m done!” Natalya snapped. “I can’t keep doing this. Your life is tough, yes. But I can’t always be here when you need to cry your eyes out over a test you didn’t ace.”
“I’m not asking you to! I only-!” Stephanie tried to clarify, but Nat wasn’t having it.
“Some of us have real problems, Stephanie! Problems like alcoholic fathers and bipolar mothers and God, you getting an eighty-six on a physics test shouldn’t be a good enough reason for me to drop everything and come rushing over here!”
“Okay, I get it! Your problems are bigger than mine and I’m a silly little girl who’s delusional and idealistic for thinking that grades in school actually matter to my future. I get it. You’re done with me. We’re done.”
For the first time in the middle of an argument, Natalya hesitated. There were two options.
Option one: they could have this argument again. The lines were common knowledge, like a play they’d practiced over and over. Natalya criticized Steph's policy of perpetual perfection; Stephanie berated Nat’s lack of a functional future plan. It wouldn’t be new. Natalya knew how it would end, and she suspected Stephanie did too.
Option two: she could walk away. At this point, given that ninety percent of their conversations were arguments and the other ten percent were petty exchanges about the weather, it probably wouldn’t even be that painful.
When Nat considered the kind of pain that came after Steph lashed out with vicious words, option two only looked more and more viable. Preferable, even.
Nat knew they were past the point where apologies could fix things. Her last six pleas for forgiveness-at least-were meaningless. Natalya had the feeling Stephanie recognized they were both holding onto a friendship that was long gone.
Forever ago Stephanie had brought color back into Natalya’s life. Now, it felt as though she were the one leeching the color out of it. Everything lapsed into a monochromatic, bland color scheme when they were together.
“Yeah,” Nat breathed finally. Her voice sounded broken to her own ears. She doubted Steph even recognized the tremor for what it was. “We’re done.”
Stephanie’s brown eyes widened.
“I didn’t think you’d be able to say that,” she admitted. Her expression was dazed, as though someone had punched her but she couldn't understand why.
“I knew you couldn’t,” Nat shrugged. “You always were more sentimental.” She wasn’t sure that was true, now. Or that it ever was. 
“I’m gonna miss you.”
“I’ll be around.” I’ll miss you, too.
“It won’t be the same,” Stephanie argued.
“It will be exactly the same,” Natalya forced a weak smile. “That’s the problem.”
Stephanie sucked in a breath. For a heartbeat it looked like she might try to stop what was happening.
She didn’t.
“You’re right,” was all Steph said in reply.
Silence settled between them. It was Natalya’s cue to leave.
She pulled her jacket tighter around her body as she stepped out onto the porch. Frigid air bit at her cheeks and snow crunched under her feet as she stumbled to her car. It felt like there were a thousand things left unresolved. But there was nothing else to say.