Living Again

Living Again~ Six

CHAPTER 6

I sat on a sofa near the door and flipped through some random life magazine to pass time. The library was simply designed. There were shelves and shelves of books in the front and when you walked in a bit further, behind them were desks and chairs.We had agreed on coming here at 10 a.m to get things started on our project. Joe insisted on dropping me off even though I could have walked, but I ended up reaching there 15 minutes earlier.

When I told him and Claire over breakfast about my plans, they were intrigued and wanted to know everything, but still pretended it was no big deal. Even though it was just for school work, I hadn't gone out to meet a friend (not that Ethan could be counted as a friend) for a month. I guess they thought I was finally leaving the past behind and moving on. Most of all Claire was interested in the fact that it was a guy friend I was meeting up with.

"A boy? Well, is it like a study date?" She had asked me eagerly. 

"No," I replied firmly. "We get together, we discuss our project and that's it." 

"Oh ok." Her face fell and she went back to her salad.

Sitting there, I was very aware of what happened the last time I was waiting for Ethan at a certain location. This time, though, he had no choice but to show up. Unless he's more interested in embarassing me than improving his grades. I rolled my eyes at the thought, he's Ethan Reed, it's actually possible for him to think that way.

I flipped the page again and skimmed through an article about obesity in children, there was a picture of an overweight child smiling. Well atleast he looked happy. 

"Hey." I looked up and there was Ethan. He was casually dressed in jeans and a dark green polo shirt. His blonde hair was slightly messy and when I look closer his face was flushed, and there wash a sheen oh sweat down his neck. Odd.

"Hi, you're early." Just by five minutes or so, but I still felt the need to display my shock.

"Well, um, I just wanted to be on time, you know.. So you don't think that I'm not showing up at all like last time.." He trailed off, looking at his feet nervously.

"Ok then, let's get to work" I walked over to one of the tables, without a backward glance. I took a seat and he sat across from me. I was determined not to face any awkward silences so I kept the conversation productive without skipping a beat. "The topic is world war one, we can base it on anything related to that. But first we need to decide how we want to present it, like should we make a big poster? or a presentation on the computer?"

"Whatever you want to do," He shrugged, then leaned back and reached into his pockets looking for something while continuing "a presentation would be easier but a poster could probably get us more credit, if we display it well."

He was right, I wondered if I would end up doing the creative stuff as well. I didn't know many guys who were willing to decorate a poster, even though it was about war. He finally took his hand out of his pocket and was now rubbing his neck with the small handkerchief.

"Have you been running?" I asked without thinking.  

"Yeah, if the weather is nice I like to go out for a jog." 

"Oh, right."

No wonder he was so fit. Maybe I should add that to my list. As I pondered over this idea I noticed something. He was now rubbing sweat off his forehead. But the movement was not what caught my attention, it was the handkerchief itself. It was a bright blue colour with little cartoons all over it.

Before I knew what I was doing, I started laughing. He look at me, raising his brows. I couldn't stop. The supposedly manly and popular guy using a baby handkerchief. Hilarious!