You Made Me Fall, But That's Okay

Chapter Nineteen - Following The Rules

I was told to sit beside Ryan at the back of the class in English, something that annoyed Dan, who ritually sat beside me in that class. To be brutally honest, I didn’t care how he felt. He was the one who sat beside Rebecca in homeroom! He was the one who broke our routine first! I wasn’t going to stick to it if he didn’t. But I did feel guilty. Just because Ryan was here it didn’t mean anything between us had to change. We were best friends.

Dan told Kevin to sit beside him, who was busy asking Ryan how he knew me. Kevin laughed his head off when he found out how I met Ryan, and said, ‘Trust Laura to be clumsy’. It wasn’t my fault I was clumsy. I wasn’t accident-prone, I was adventurous. When you fell in love with a gangster, you needed to be adventurous. Maybe I just needed to work on my ‘not caring’ skills a bit more, and then I’d be fine.

Kevin’s jaw nearly dropped to the ground when he found out that Ryan was my boyfriend. ‘No way,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Laura’s never even had her first kiss! She’s too innocent! She’s Little Laura! You couldn’t be her boyfriend! She couldn’t have changed from Little Laura! She’s always going to be Little Laura!’

Ryan shrugged, grinning. ‘Laura’s a very different girl now. Isn’t that right, Little Laura?’

I gasped, elbowing him as hard as I could. One reason was because I knew what he was trying to suggest, and the other reason was because he was calling me ‘Little Laura’. I hated all the stupid nicknames I got. ‘Shut up, Ryan!’

Dan leaned around Kevin to stare at me, his mouth hanging open. Damn, I must have caught the double meaning to Ryan’s words. ‘You … did it?’

Luckily, Ms Foster interrupted our little conversation. Unluckily, Dan was probably going to get into trouble. ‘Daniel, could you please repeat what I just said?’ she challenged him, looking at him knowingly.

I had to help him. I was probably the only one half-listening to all her waffle, too. ‘We will be focusing on world literature this year and engaging in the skilful reading and analysis of all different types of literature, including fiction, non-fiction, essays, and poetry.’ I whispered over to Dan.

He repeated what I said almost instantly. Ms Foster pursed her lips, having nothing else to say now that she was proved wrong. She continued her boring blather, so we continued our small whispering session.

‘I can’t believe Little Laura had sex. I never thought I’d see the day! You’re one lucky guy, you know. Wow, Laura, you’re all grown up now.’ Kevin said, doodling on his notebook. Then he looked up at Ryan, nodding his head at casually at me. ‘Is she good?’

My cheeks blazed. ‘Since when have you got anything to do with my sex life?’ I growled.

Dan raised his eyebrows, his mouth popping open slightly. ‘So it’s really true?’

‘DANIEL!’ Ms Foster shouted at the top of her little voice, so angry that she slammed her dainty hand down onto the table. It was hard not to laugh when she looked so angry, so I bit my lip to try stop myself from smiling. ‘Stand up right now! It’s your first day and you’re already talking your head off! Interrupting the class, which has a new student! One more word and you’ll be getting detention!’

Groaning, Dan stood up. Kevin, Ryan and I sniggered. We were only twenty minutes into class and Ryan seemed to be already fitting in greatly. Of course, a girl would occasionally turn around and get a good look at him, but no one tried to flirt with him yet. I was really surprised that no one noticed how older-looking he was compared to the other lads in our class. Then again, I was shocked when I found out that he was twenty-one. He didn’t really act older, either. I had to stop worrying about stupid little things. If anyone noticed, anyway, we could pretend that he was nineteen and he got held back a year, or something. My friends were quite gullible.