"Give him a break guys, I'll tell you everything, I paid for this story with my blood!" Liam Johnson won the attention of our classmates creating a diversion for Elijah and me, he half dragged me out of my seat as I didn't move first, not registering that he was pulling me.
Feeling a bit slow, I walked through the aisle and outside the classroom without asking him what he wanted from me. As soon as we were out, my eyes found her. The look inside her big pretty eyes said she was waiting for me.
I wracked my brains trying to come up with a good excuse to leave Elijah, but he beat me to it.
"Looks like King is here for you man, catch you around later." He said.
I couldn't believe what both twins were doing for me, one was sparing me the suffocation while the other was being the perfect wingman. Elizabeth's eyes became guarded, probably questioning my IQ by now.
"Your second week is off to a bad start, isn't it?" She asked. I had no idea why she was suddenly in the mood to make small talk with me. What would be the next topic? The weather?
"It's just a small change of pace." I tried to keep my answer vague but honest at the same time, just because she was scheming and lying, I shouldn't be forced to do the same. I was still trying to figure out the real story behind what happened in the parking lot, but because the principal was using the 'Elizabeth's attention' card, I couldn't concentrate.
"But you didn't ask for this change." She was back to making assumptions again. And I wondered if my little confrontation with the girl I let down was circling around the school, her comment felt a bit related to that somehow.
"Nothing I can't handle." It was just a small fight...
"Anchorage will do a number on you, many things will change for you here,"
.
.
.
Was she telling me to keep my mouth shut about today?
"You happen to know something that I don't?" I asked half dark half sarcastically.
She looked thoughtful as if weighing whether to confess everything altogether or just keep it all to herself. Her contemplating features were so mesmerizing that I found it hard to keep my eyes off her, surpassing the number of seconds a guy could stare at a girl without looking like a creep.
'Do you have to be this beautiful?'
Her thoughtful moment passed, something changed in her eyes, and they climbed up to find my eyes lazily, I swore she looked almost as if she was about to reprimand me.
"Do you plan on staying here, then?"
It was the first time I felt unwelcomed in this city — the girl was not trying to hide her resentment, who was holding the grudge now?
"…For now, yes," I answered honestly.
"Why?" She was not going to drop it.
I wanted to expose what they wanted to cover but I wanted to keep her around at the same time. Her dark doe eyes pressed for an answer, Why did Li and I choose to come here anyway?
"Were you ever in a position where you couldn't stay but you couldn't let go either? Did you ever want to keep a connection without really being connected?" I answered both her question and mine with more questions, doubting she understood a word.
"You ran away from someone's arms only to fall right back into their embrace? Sounds familiar, yeah." She sounded bitter.
"Not quite, but something like that…" The thought of her in someone's arms... I found that too upsetting.
"…When did the accident happen?" She knew about my parents. It was not a surprise, probably everyone here did.
"October." I cleared my throat.
"Were you close to them?" Elizabeth's questions were cold and downright inappropriate. So why wasn't I feeling the usual burning sensation when I thought about mom and dad?
"Every family has its issues, but our bonds were solid."
"The man that raised you too?"
I couldn't ignore her peculiar choice of words, but her doe eyes looked so innocent, she could have cursed at me right then and there and I would probably end up not getting offended.
"He will always be my best friend." I swallowed back my emotions.
"That's an interesting statement coming from a real teenager."
I didn't know that teenagers had categories other than real. This conversation was getting weirder by the minute.
"... We both put effort and invested in the relationship." It was true.
"But your mother was more distant." Her statements kept on coming my way.
I shook my head twice. "Absolutely not, my mother was the definition of perfect. We were very close,"
She frowned as if she found that hard to believe.
I scratched the back of my neck twice. The familiar heat spread through my ears. Why did I have to give her the ugly details? She was in her own world, her face contorted as if she was trying to memorize a long chemical equation. Maybe she didn't get along well with Mrs. White. Or maybe girls assumed all boys favored their fathers naturally. I couldn't stop myself from explaining further.
"She worked from home; she was always around. She always carried everything on her shoulders… she was the reason why my brother and I were always close to each other... She was everything."
I missed her terribly.
"You're trying to fill the void she left," she was jumping to conclusions now.
"So?" It wasn't true, but I just wanted to see where she was going with that.
"That's just not going to happen." She sighed, as if my problem was her problem.
I faked a sigh of my own. "So, I'll be bothering you some more from now on," I implied, willing to do anything for this conversation not to be our last one.
Her eyes lost innocence and suddenly flashed with anger. "You act as if nothing can get to you," she muttered in a low voice. "Half of the time if not more, it is too much, I'm sure of it."
I knew that much, her brown reddish eyes were piercing through my act from the very start. I felt relieved for some reason.
"You do what's unnecessary." She summarized.
I stood there just gazing at her.
"That should change soon too," unlike her conditional statement, she sounded positive.
"Will you stick around to witness that, or are you going AWOL on me all over again?" I demanded. My eyes stared as deep into her bottomless eyes as possible, not caring where they were taking me. Half wanting to stay lost there.
"We shall both see about that," she said without a second thought to what her words were doing to me.
As cold as ever.
I suddenly glanced around us, realizing that the halls were too empty, when did the bell ring? I sighed for real this time, not wanting to let her go.
"Are you skipping class now?" she asked too seriously considering that she was the principal's daughter.
I kept it real because I had no reason to hide it from her "I want to keep talking to you."
"Let's get back to math then, unless you want to get detention with me?" She smiled widely, and it was nothing short of an advertisement for some toothpaste.
"I think Mrs. White had enough of me for one day,"
"She had enough of me too."
"Math it is then," I said.
***
The second round of math went by as fast as the first one, I had to glance at the girl sitting beside me every now and then just to make sure that she hadn't turned into smoke yet. I copied what was written on the whiteboard twice on two different pages and kept squeezing hard on the pen until it almost cracked in half.
Each time she moved her hair around, the constant presence of jasmine overdosed within me.
Snow had turned into rain outside the window, and the rest of the day went by in a haze.
She was always either next to me or very close by, in the cafeteria she sat at a table alone, her usual friends nowhere to be seen. When it was time to go home, she suddenly disappeared without a word. Disappointing me.
By the time I reached the parking lot with the twins, her Ram was still there. I couldn't wait to get home and process.
My eyes searched everywhere for her right before I went inside the Subaru. I found her standing under the stone umbrella, but her beautiful hair was wet, dripping with the rain. The only person next to her was the other girl, the senior, her hands were waving as if she was explaining something of vital importance or describing something very passionately.
Elizabeth's eyes never left me, not even when I caught her staring.
'What are you staring at me for?'
Her lips curved up into a smile, her hand went up as well, and she waved twice at me forcing the other girl to look my way. It was all under 'normal' until I locked eyes with Elizabeth's friend for the first time, immediately noticing something familiar about her.
Her eyes were too light, just like that other guy, Wyatt.
It was a coincidence, I thought to myself and then nodded to myself once as well, needing the extra confirmation. That's when the other girl nodded at me in return. I turned away and quickly made my way inside the car and closed the door.
***
When I opened my eyes the next morning, I had one hell of a headache.
It was extremely hard to sleep the night before, I kept repeating every single word that was exchanged between us. Wishing at times if I had said something different and imagined what her reaction might have been, or wishing I was able to casually whisper something in her ear, just like Wyatt had done the other day.
I jumped up to look at the view outside, and only saw the face of the girl again.
I rubbed my eyes to focus once more, it was then that I finally realized that there was no snow, very uncharacteristic of Alaska, a strange-looking sun was beginning to rise in the sky, and I wondered if I could take the bike to school for once.
Always the optimist.
Li had left for university again before I took a shower. I was beginning to doubt that something was wrong, it was never like that in Portland, he was still in the same department. So, what was up with all his absence, or was he avoiding me?
I wrapped a towel around my lower half and stood in front of the mirror to brush my teeth.
I heated a few already made cheese toasts, courtesy of my favorite chef, feeling incredibly hungry today, I drank a whole carton of milk without bothering with a cup and felt guilty afterward. Mom would've hated it.
I dismissed the idea quickly and tried not to dwell on the fact that I was looking forward to school.
I wanted to confront her that I was on to the entire cover-up business; why should I go to great lengths wanting her to stay with me when I can just ask her frankly to do so? It wouldn't be the first time I asked a girl out, what was the big deal this time around?
Would she go out with me if I asked her to?
Or would she arch her perfect eyebrow and demand more explanations?