Love Letters

Love Letters (Part 6)

When the weekend was over, I dragged myself into college again on Monday, the weekends were way too short! I sometimes felt like I went to sleep on Friday night and woke up on Monday morning, no idea where all my free time went.

In English, Benny came and sat next to me which I thought was strange since Benny and I never really got along. He was more Ethan’s friend than mine and though all Ethan’s friends were my friends, Benny was an exception. He was irritating to the extent that you wanted the ground to swallow you up in order to avoid having a conversation with him.

He was lanky but his body hadn't filled out to support his structure. He was skinnier than I was, one reason not to like him. His hair was always tousled, though not purposely done, it looked good. The second reason why we'd never get along, my hair was anything but tame. He had stubble centralised around his chin but the rest of his face was like a baby's bottom; smooth.

Half the lesson passed and he didn’t say a word to me, then he nudged me.

‘Hey, I need to speak to you.’

I stared at him, ‘Well? What exactly are you doing now if not speaking?’

He frowned. ‘I spoke to Ethan yesterday.’

I gave a little squeal a grabbed his forearm in excitement.

‘Excuse me at the back there, if you can’t control yourself, you can come and sit at the front.’ The teacher called to us. I stared at my hand on Benny and pulled it away quickly, he had the audacity to brush his arm where I had touched him and when I glared at him for it, he smirked and whispered, ‘Just kidding.’

‘Anyway, so he called me from an untraceable number, his number’s been out of reach recently. I didn’t get to speak to him for very long but all he said was he’s okay, they’re still settling in, his mum hasn’t been paying the phone bills so both of their contracts got cut off.’

That explained a lot, ‘Did he say anything about me?’ I demanded.

‘Just that you need to stop worrying about him, because he knows you are. He hasn’t been sending any letters either because he’s been too busy settling in, but as soon as he gets a chance, he’ll start writing.’

‘Oh.’ I said, unsure of what to say next. ‘Is that why you sat next to me today, to tell me all of that?’

He looked confused for a moment, ‘What? No, I used to sit next to Ethan before; you’re the only other person in this class that I know.’

Great, so he was going to sit next to me for the rest of the year. To be frank, he didn’t really know me, Ethan was our common ground, other than that we didn’t talk much. I knew he didn’t like me much and the feeling was mutual, but then I felt a pang of pity for him. He was that desperate for some company, he was willing to sit next to me for the rest of the year; maybe he wasn’t so bad after all.

‘Besides, you’re a loner now that Ethan’s gone, so you should be grateful that I sat next to you.’

Okay no, he was definitely still a jerk.

'Shut up, Benny.'

'Yes ma'am.' He saluted me and I rolled my eyes.

Then I started thinking, why hadn't Ethan called me instead of Benny? I mean, he could've called my mum's phone, or even my landline, we'd memorised each other's house numbers just in case. Surely he couldn't have forgotten it in a matter of weeks?

What was Ethan playing at? Of course I would worry, he hadn't been in contact with me for nearly a month and he expects me to be relaxed about it? Hell no. I was going to give him a piece of my mind as and when I spoke to him next, until then, Benny would suffer for being the bearer of such troublesome news.

I stepped on his foot under the table and then smiled at him.