[OLD] Shimmer (Counterpart to Tides)

Chapter Five

I entered my room as quickly as I possibly could, quietly shutting the door behind me. The events from the past hour rushed to catch up with me, and I felt like I was being suffocated with my own thoughts. What had I done? Kevin, a royal ignus had just asked me to be his girlfriend, and I had turned him down! And then, to top it all off, I had ditched him! I buried my face in my hands, and finally drifted off to sleep, fighting off the feeling that I had just made the worst decision possible.

The next morning, I went to the market again to get bread... again. I was still in a daze because of what I had done the night before, but I was getting over it, no matter how slowly it was. I was walking through the crowd of people when I saw a flash of sandy blonde hair. It reminded me of the Joshua, the gorgeous aqua... Wait. Did I just call him gorgeous? No, I certainly didn't... I couldn't have. No matter how much I tried to forget him, he just wouldn't get out of my mind. I must have been hallucinating. Finally getting through the crowd, I thought I saw the blonde hair again. When I whirled around, though, it was gone. Shaking my head to clear these thoughts, I walked over to Mr. Johnson's shop and bought some more bread. He seemed slightly confused, since I had just come the day before, but was still happy and cheerful.

I caught a glimpse of someone outside, and this time, there was no denying it. Joshua was stalking me. I rushed outside, and nearly slammed into the boy.

"Why are you following me?" I spat. I was trying not to scream because we were in a public area, and I didn't want to make people look at us like we were crazy.

I looked into Joshua's sea blue eyes and time seemed to freeze. I could see the ocean in his eyes; the rolling waves, the gentle sunlight, the calls of seagulls, the salty scent of the sea... And then, I realized that I was staring. I quickly broke eye contact, and my cheeks burned. How long had I just been staring at him? Joshua probably thought that I was the psycho now. I absentmindedly put a few strands of hair that had fallen into my face behind my ear. Joshua, suddenly wanting to leave, muttered "bye" and turned around.

"Wait!" I said quickly, grabbing his wrist. What. Did. I. Just. Do.

"So......" Joshua said slowly. He looked at me expectantly, as if waiting for me to continue. Joshua's touch suddenly burned, and blushing even harder (It was amazing that I could!) I dropped his wrist and stared at the ground, wishing that it would open up and swallow me whole.

"So......" Joshua tried again.

I gave up on begging the ground to swallow me and spoke.

"Do you-" we both said—at the same time. Oops.

I tried being polite. "You go first," we both said. What. Is. This.

"No, you," we said. Simultaneously. Again? We both chuckled.

"Okay," Joshua said, drawing the word out. Once he was sure that we wouldn't start speaking in unison again, he continued. "We need to work on that."

Forgetting for a moment that I was talking to a boy of a much higher rank, with crazy powers too (can't forget about those!), I giggled. "Yea."

Joshua smiled back at me, seeming proud of himself for making me laugh.

Things went a lot more smoothly from there. Joshua and I spent the rest of the day learning things about each other: what we liked, what we disliked, our daily lives, and countless other things. When we weren't talking about each other, we talked about random topics, such as arguing what exact color the sky was (we settled on sky blue since that was the most logical answer), what the best type of food was (we had to agree to disagree on that one, he said his mom's cooking, and I said my dad's), and where to get the best bread in town (I wouldn't budge from Mr. Johnson's, and Joshua eventually gave up). Finally, when the sun began to set, we went our separate ways, with promises to meet up again soon. We each left with a new friend, and the world seemed a brighter place, full of light.

*****

SO... JOSHUA AND ALAINA ARE FRIENDS!!! YAY!!! HOPE YOU ALL LIKED THIS CHAPTER!!!

IMPORTANT: MAKE SURE TO GO CHECK OUT TIDES BY @forever_writing_26!!! IT'S THE COUNTERPART TO THIS, AND IT'S BASICALLY THE SAME BOOK... BUT IN JOSHUA'S POV!!! SHE'S AN AMAZING WRITER, AND YOU GET TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE FABULOUS JOSHUA!

-Sophie <3