Painting Flowers // Ashton Irwin [au]

Fifteen

Emilia's POV

My shoes click loudly against the floor, echoing in the hallway as I jog to my philosophy class. If it weren't for a guy arguing with me about why the library only has soft-cover versions of Lord of the Flies and not hardcovers, I wouldn't be running late to class right now. Thankfully, I was able to use my amazing sense of self-control to shut him up before I lost every ounce of patience and threw every soft-cover book at the guy to show him that the words on the page don't change regardless of the cover material.

I make a beeline through the hallway, weaving around students who think it's okay to stand around and block the pathway. It's okay guys; go and stand there forever. It's not like I have a class to get to anyway.

I turn the corner sharply, half expecting to make a clean entrance to the classroom, but instead, I run into a sturdy guy blocking the doorway.

"Sorry, I didn't see-Michael?" My train of thought takes a turn when he faces me.

"I don't know how you cannot see me," he says with a grin. The red locks that I've been accustomed to seeing have been replaced with black, making his already pale skin ghost-like.

"You dyed your hair," I say, reaching up and examining his hair between my fingers.

"Lola did it for me," he says, pointing to his girlfriend who also blocks the doorway. "She said I should tone my hair down if I'm going to a wedding in a few weeks."

"Good call," I say, giving Lola a nod of approval.

"I may not know the bride-to-be, but I do know that no attendee should make more of an impression than her," she says. "And I think there should be only one red-head in this relationship. I call dibs."

"And I call foul play," Michael challenges. "It doesn't count if you're a natural red-head."

"No, it gives me an advantage," she says with a smirk.

"Okay, that's enough you two," I say. "If you don't move, I'm really going to be late for class."

"I already saved us seats in the back," Lola says, pointing to her backpack and notebooks occupying two seats. "I'll meet you there."

Leaving the odd couple, I take a seat take and pull out a notebook and pen from my backpack. Lola sends Michael off with a kiss and hurries to sit next to me when our professor enters the room.

"Sorry about that," Lola says, just as the lecture begins. I like Lola and she's awesome for always saving me a seat, but she's just as bad as Ashton when it comes to talking to me while I'm writing notes. "For the past week, he has been stopping by before his class to give me these chocolates that have pick-up lines on the wrapper. They're so bad it's cute."

"How bad?" I ask.

"Read for yourself."

She hands me what I'm assuming to be today's chocolate and I unwrap the foil packaging and laugh at what's written inside.

"Are you a tamale? 'Cause you're hot..." I read aloud. "This is so bad."

"That's not even the worst of them. You should have read the one about meeting all of his koala-fications." She giggles softly, cautious not to disturb the class.

"Why is he giving you these?"

"I think it's for Valentine's Day. Chocolate, cheesy pick-up lines; all he needs is to show up with a bouquet of flowers and he'll have all the ingredients for a very stereotypical lovey dovey day."

My smile slowly drops and I grip my pen tightly. I've done so well forgetting about it until now. I made it a point not to look through my planner this week so that I wouldn't be reminded. But just like every year, this romantic commercial holiday makes it impossible.