Chapter 3 Realization (PDF)

she realized that
she wasn’t angry
with Gaia
Moore, she was
jealous

Bailey was steaming, she felt like a tea
kettle just about to blow the whistle. Why was she so
angry? Because she had just realized that her perfect
boyfriend, the one that her friends loved, the one that her
parents loved, the one that she loved—wasn’t so perfect
after all. It was hard to imagine that just a few days before
life had been perfect, she was still top in her class in NYU,
she had assisted several fun parties, and her boyfriend hadn’t totally said another girl’s name
while they were having sex.
She looked at the clock but class still had five minutes to go, she wanted to get out of
there, and fast too—because as soon as the bell rang she knew that Claire and Kelly would
probably ask her about Ed. She didn’t want her friends to know that her relationship was in
complete jeopardy, because she didn’t like to look like the little weakling or let anyone know
that she wasn’t happy, that wasn’t something that she was used to.
She had to stop thinking about this; she could already feel tears piling up in her eyes. She
took out her phone, but no luck yet, Ed had not called. She had been with Ed almost for two
years… that was her longest relationship yet…. She remembered seeing him for the first time at
the park; Claire had pointed him out to her at first while he was on a skateboard with a couple of
other guys. She remembered thinking that he was good looking, and then talking to him, and
getting to know him. She didn’t know it then but he was the greatest guy she would ever catch,
well that’s at least how she always felt about him. She jumped a little as she heard the bell ring
and ran out the door, what could she possibly do? She had to two alternatives:
1. One, break up with Ed and that’s that.
2. Or simply talk this out and try to move on.
Bailey knew that she didn’t want to break up with Ed, having a boyfriend might be easy,
but having a relationship is something that took time to build up. Bailey and Ed had been
together for two years, she had met him the first day she came to New York, and the first time
they did it together she knew she wanted to be with him. She wasn’t in love, or at least she didn’t
think so, she often thought that if she was in love, she would know it with all her heart and it
would just be a sudden realization.
As she opened the door to her dorm room she dropped her bag and stared at the clock, it
was two o’clock in the afternoon, the night before had been bad. She hadn’t had a good nights’
sleep and she knew that if she didn’t do something about Ed then she knew that she wasn’t going
to feel good at all. She wasn’t the type of person to ignore, or blow things off.
She knew that if she called, Ed might not pick up and that was something that she didn’t
want to rely on. She found herself staring at a photo of her and Ed, they were both hugging each
other in front of the beach in Ocean City, when she had gotten the photos developed she found
herself thinking that that was going to be a photo that they would both look back on years from
now.

I love Ed. She thought, otherwise why would she have thoughts of him and her in the
future? It has to be love; I’ve never been this serious with anyone else in the world. I cried last
night and I can feel tears in my eyes now. It’s my fault, I shouldn’t have pressured him into doing
something he didn’t want to do, maybe this whole time I’ve had relationships all wrong. And
even though we aren’t together because Eddy had called me by the name of another woman
during our hours of love, and even though we have just had a huge fight in which he had only
made things worse, I can’t help but want him back. I’m not mad, not even the slightest, I just
want him back in my arms and I want to let him know that we have the rest of our lives to talk
about whatever the hell we want and don’t want.
Bailey stood up and knew what she was going to do, she knew it was a risky thing, but
she knew what she wanted and she was not going to hold back anymore. She grabbed her cell
phone and pressed two.
Ring.
Ring.
Ring.
He doesn’t want to talk to me.
Ring.
He doesn’t love me like I love him….
Ring.
Ring.
Ring.
“You’ve reached –The Fargos—but they are unavailable—”
Bailey hung up the phone, Ed wasn’t going to talk to her, and she kind of had known
deep in the back of her mind that he probably wasn’t going to pick up. Those were Ed’s ways;
they had once had a small fight when Ed had found out that she had gone out dancing while he
was away at an interview for two days, and he found out that she had accidentally kissed one of
her dance partners and he didn’t talk to her for four days before she hunted him down and finally
sorted everything out.
She decided to relax a little and let him steam down, for the rest of the day she found
herself moping around her room and looking at old pictures before Claire pulled her out and took
her to get something to eat. Claire had invited another classmate named Hailey, and they
chattered about classes, boyfriends, jobs, fashion, models, actors, actresses, guys, girls, and
everything that would appear normal to anyone else. Bailey stood aside and didn’t speak a word;

she didn’t feel chatty at all. Later Bailey and Claire both went back to the dorm, Claire was doing
homework from eight to ten, but even though she was in pajamas, in her bed, under the sheets,
and her light was off, Bailey couldn’t sleep.
During the whole matter she hadn’t thought of Gaia Moore, she wasn’t sure if she felt
anger, or jealousy. But then she realized that she wasn’t angry with Gaia Moore, she was jealous.
It made her think that maybe to Ed she was nothing special, of course compared to Gaia Moore,
Ed could have been comparing her to this girl the entire time she’s been with him. “Gaia was
a big part of my life….” She cringed as she remembered the words that had escaped
from Ed’s mouth; Gaia Moore was probably sleek, beautiful, she was probably part of a Russian
mafia, and was probably brunette, she was probably really skinny and had long beautiful brown
hair…. She had once admired a tall beautiful brunette at her old school, Jane had been her name,
and she had been beautiful and tall too. She was skinny and clothes would naturally fit her like a
glove, Bailey had been kind of jealous then, but now she was super jealous.
“Want to play a game?” Gaia asked her father
while walking across Washington Square Park. It was a sunny day with
empty chess tables; she actually couldn’t remember the last time she
played a game with him. Maybe when he took her to Paris they had
played, but for once her mind hadn’t narrowed down the time or place.
“Of course,” Her father said to her as they both took their seats. Playing a game with her
dad was always exciting, that’s one thing that her mind never failed to forget, her dad was her
mentor and her best opponent, Sam had been a great player. But he had only managed to
outsmart her once or twice, while her dad almost always beat her, and he always provided a good
long battle.
They sat there for hours, predicting each other’s’ moves and outsmarting what could
possibly be the outcome. After an hour passed a couple of clouds moved in the sky and the sun
started beating hard on the pavement, she started to sweat, but the logical game that was playing
before her had her mind turning smoothly.
She guessed that her dad probably hadn’t played much either, because she managed to
overpower him and take the offense. It was a sign of weakness, losing the lead was always the
beginning of the end or the beginning of the challenge. That was one thing her dad always told
her, and before long he managed to pick up the lead again, making her pick up her defenses.
After a while several onlookers who had finished their games began to watch theirs, most
of them only watched, others became captivated by the impressive strokes that both she and her
father took.
Gaia looked up to see her father’s face, he was frowning with concentration and his arms
were folded in his chest, his behavior was demeaning and he was pretending to be frustrated.
From that point on her dad struck her with a strategy that had assumed her every move and
before she knew it she had lost and several of the onlookers looked impressed with awe or
confused in thought.

“Good game Gaia,” Her dad said cheerily, his blue eyes were dancing and twinkling with
glee.
“Thanks dad,” She said, but she felt a little disappointed at the same time. She hadn’t
been sitting on her ass the whole time he was away, she genuinely practiced, and it wasn’t like
she had had bad partners, Sam had been half way decent, Zolov had been internationally
ranked…. And to top it off she had the balls to join the chess team while she had been in
Stanford. She smirked, her dad was a genius after all, and she had to admit that during half of the
game she had been using some of the same strategies he had taught her.
“That was an amazing game,” A man with a thick accent said to them and then the crowd
scattered.
“I’m hungry, want to go to Gray’s Papaya?” She asked her dad.
“Sure,” They both stood up and joined the crowded sidewalks. Gaia couldn’t help feeling
like this was what every day should be like; it would be a dream if she could stay with her dad in
New York forever and never ever have to return to Quantico.
Ed was getting paranoid; he had just imagined
seeing Gaia Moore cross the street in front of Washington Square Park.
The wave of blonde hair had caught his attention from the
corner of his eye, and a graceful body had presented itself in the middle of
the street wearing caprice pants and a blue blouse. That couldn’t be Gaia
Moore, if he raced across the sidewalk and jumped the girl he would only
find himself staring into misery, because he knew it wouldn’t be Gaia, because it would
never be Gaia. Because last time he jumped a girl like that it had been a different girl and
he had gotten punched in the face, he was not going to risk embarrassment like that again, but
before he knew it the girl glanced back and he could have sworn that it was Gaia. He shook his
head and kept walking. Now he was not only getting paranoid, but he was getting so delusional it
was ridiculous. His mind was crowded with misery, just the thought of never seeing Gaia again
was depressing, and he didn’t know if he wanted to live on.
When Gaia first left him, for a while he had been in a coma similar to the one he was now
drowsing into. He remembered his parents telling him to get out, to do something, maybe to go
out with Heather.
After Prom Heather had progressed very well, she could see now. Victoria had even
suggested that he should try things out with Heather again, but Victoria didn’t know anything,
she didn’t know about Heather and Ed’s earlier deal which chained Ed to his chair, and if he told
Victoria, he honestly didn’t know if she would be angry with Ed or maybe shallow enough not to
understand what that meant to him. Or maybe she would understand, he remembered how much
his chair had affected her attitude towards him, but he would only leave Heather in a humiliating
corner. Ed was not that type of guy, he was not going to share the terrible promise that Heather
made him make.

But even thinking about Heather and his sister for just a little couldn’t keep Ed away
from missing Gaia, he had once believed in soul mates, and sitting on the bench, reminiscing of
sitting there with a girl that was probably half way across the world and probably not even
thinking of him told him that if he did have a soul mate, it was probably Gaia Moore.
What about Bailey?
That little voice inside his head seemed to know him well enough, and it was letting him
know that he was not an asshole. He shrugged, in spite of himself he felt guilty for what he had
said to Bailey. Maybe not telling her was a bad idea, but he couldn’t help himself. If he told
Bailey about Gaia, what could he possibly have left? Maybe he should talk to Bailey, because
fact is that he had to get real, Gaia Moore didn’t just cross the street, and Gaia Moore was
probably not missing him like he was missing her.
He also realized then that he was reliving his depressive six month Gaia
coma after she left, he thought that he had been over it, and he was such a loser, the slightest
hint of communication between him and Gaia, and he was almost ready to slip back into
depression. No, he couldn’t do that, he was reliving the depression part which told him that Gaia
Moore was not coming back, so in order to get over it, he had to move on like he did the first
time. He realized that it was about time to give Bailey a call.