Click to Subscribe - By L. M. Augustine Page 0,35

had a best friend to count on.

Finally, in the middle of the night, I get a call from Cat. I’m dead asleep when my phone vibrates on my bedside table, so knocked out, in fact, that it takes several rings for me to even wake up. When I do, I scramble out of bed, fumble around for the phone, and click “TALK,” nearly murdering my lamp and history textbook in the process.

“Hello?” I mutter, completely groggy, and slowly sink back into bed. I glance at the time—3:30 a.m. A sigh escapes me. I don’t think there’s a worse possible time to call someone.

“This better be important…” I mutter to myself.

“West,” Cat says, and her voice is so clear and strong that it sounds like she’s just slept a good twelve hours. I am not sure what universe she lives in, but I’ve decided if that’s the case, either she’s insane or nocturnal. Probably both.

I collapse back onto my pillow. “That’s my name.”

“It is.”

“And you’re calling at 3:30 in the morning… why?”

“Because I felt like it,” she says simply.

“You woke me up because you felt like it?”

“I did.”

I shake my head, closing my eyes and sinking back into the covers. I switch the phone to speaker and place it on my chest instead, so I can lean back as I talk. “Cat, you’re amazing, but do you actually have something important to say? I’m a normal human being, believe it or not, and that means I like to sleep at three—”

“You missed ‘fabulous,’” Cat cuts in. “I’m not just amazing. I’m also fabulous.”

I roll my eyes even though she can’t see me. I yawn loudly, and I’m sure I’m going to fall back asleep any second now.

“So let me get this straight,” I say, taking another breath. “You’re calling me at three-thirty because you feel like it? And also because you want to remind me how fabulous you are?”

“That’s exactly it. Also, I’m glad you’ve come to understand the ways of my inner fabulousness.”

“Cat,” I mutter, rolling over onto my stomach. My eyelids grow heavier, and the reminder that I have to wake up for school in two and a half hours seems to make me even more exhausted. “I’m going to bed. I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Goodnight.”

Cat doesn’t respond after that, and I vaguely wonder if she’s just calling to annoy me or is legitimately angry again or… something else. I don’t the let the thought continue. Right now, I just need to sleep. We can talk again in the morning.

With that, I sit up and start to turn off my phone.

“Wait,” Cat says suddenly, and I hear muffled cursing on her end of the phone like she already regrets it.

“Yes?”

She pauses, takes a deep breath. “That’s not… the reason I’m calling.”

“Then what is?” I don’t mean for it to come across so flippantly, but I’m too tired to think of anything but sleep sleep sleeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

Her voice is quiet now, slow and easy. “You really want to know?”

“I guess?”

She hesitates, and I can just make out her muffled breathing as she contemplates whether whatever she’s about to say will be worth it. I know because I do it too. Do it to her, all the damn time nowadays. “West…” she says, and I can practically feel her sitting next to me, her side pressed to mine, touching my arm and whispering into my ear. And strangely, I… like the idea.

I scrub the thought out of my head the instant it comes up. I can’t be attracted to Cat. Wait, no. I am not attracted to Cat. End of story.

“West,” Cat says, more softly this time, “I’m calling you at three-thirty in the morning on a Thursday because I want to hear your voice.”

That shuts me up.

In an instant, all of the exhaustion seems to rush out of me. I sit up, pressing the phone closer to my ear. My heart is pounding now, and I feel something inside of me grow, something light and buoyant. I want to hear your voice, she said. Oh my god oh my god oh my god. She wants to hear my voice!

I shake my head. Why do I care? Why does it matter that she likes talking to me? She’s my best friend, so of course she does.

But the thing is, it does matter. It matters so much it scares me.

“I was lying on my bed because I couldn’t sleep, and thinking about how I missed you and then I wanted to hear