Between Love and Admiration

Chapter 2

"So what are you her counselor now?" Dani asked, laying down on the bleacher. "No, that was just out of the kindness of my heart. She covered for me, so I comforted her. We're even" I told her about what had happened yesterday. After Alana and I left school, we went to the mall and she got us Mickie D's, she was on cloud nine since the 'talk' text. He told her they would talk after school so once 3:14 came on the clock, I was sneaking back into school so she could wait for him to come out.

After she told me about the text, I tried to hold back because I knew we weren't friends and I didn't want to upset her but I couldn't. While waiting for our food in the drive-thru, I had to ask, "Why do you want to talk to him?" she looked at me for a minute, before letting her head rest on the seat smiling. "He's the one for me, so sometimes you just have to be patient until he realizes that too." As the cashier handed her the food, I wanted to say that sounded stupid but I didn't want to upset her. She looked happy and that energy was contagious so I just smiled and ate my food, grateful to be here.

"I just hope he doesn't hurt her again." I explained to Dani. "Well, he was in first block with Jessica today soooo too late." My body turned to her instinctively, with my mouth open in shock, "What!? But he told her that he wanted to talk. They're supposed to work it out." I wonder how she's taking the news. Danie adjusted the backpack under her head, still laying down and shrugged. "He's a hoe. He has been doing this all school year, why are YOU shocked?" I had heard about these three, last semester but I never saw them, except Jessica. She didn't seem to be the nicest person, so I didn't care too much about her issues. But now that I was getting to know Alana, this felt different. She was a good person that deserved to be happy. Nick made her happy. As for Jessica, I had only seen her once or twice. She stood at around 5'6, a toned but curvy shape with a mocha complexion and her bone structure was a photographer's dream. In a word, she was gorgeous. Where Alana had the pretty young girl beauty and charm, Jessica was all woman. She carried herself very well and was not only prepared for drama, she thrived in it. When Nick was on the football team and Jessica was switching between cheerleading and basketball every year, they were the ideal cliche couple until Nick started to get in trouble and cheating on her a few years ago. Which meant there were two girls that both were equally stupid in love for this guy. They have been on-and-off for years so it was obvious Jessica wasn't going to give up on Nick and Alana was going to get hurt again. Feeling myself getting angry "I don't see what about this boy is so special that these girls can't see he ain't no good."

"Yeah but you also ain't never seen him."

"So?"

"He is fine Kaia!" she emphasised with her hands in the air, before dropping them back down to say, "Like I can see forgiving him once or twice."

"I just want to know why he would do this to them. When you know they are in love with you. Fine or not, he trash."

"TRUE!." Dani said with a smile before her eyes moved from me and her smile spreaded, showing all 32 teeth, turning my attention to what she was looking at. Walking towards us was Xay, one of my closest friends, a senior and the only other person that I can tell everything to. Dani and him like each other and flirt all the time but they both were too cool to really say something. "Why are men so trash, bruh?" looking him dead in the eye. Although Xay was a senior, he was more like my brother and thus, didn't seem so unobtainable. He treated everyone kindly and although he wouldn't help us with skipping or gossip, it wasn't to be mean. He said that skip days stop feeling special the longer you do it and that we should wait until we have our own. He wasn't a fan of Alana helping me skip but he also was supportive of anything that made us, especially Dani, happy.

He took a step back and looked between us. "Nah, I'm just gonna talk to yall later." Dani, still laughing and grinning ear to ear, reached for him, "Come here, it's a real question." He begrudgingly came back over to us. "Well when you say it like that, I can't resist!." he said before slapping his hand down on her thigh making a loud pop sound. "BOY! You play too much! We wanted to talk about your classmate."

"Oh, who?"

"That senior Nick who thinks he's too much. He just thinks he can disrespect women and because he's some pretty boy with anger issues, people just accept it." I chimed in.

"I don't know about all that..."

"I do! Alana didn't deserve that."

"Kai, Alana isn't a saint." Dani sat up , "OMG! What?!"

"Nah! Lay yo bighead back down. I'm just saying, the guy isn't always the bad guy."

"How do you know that, Xay?"

"I just know Nick man. He ain't a bad guy. He's my cousin."

"OHH." I nodded my head. "My bad! You should have started with that.. So why is he still there?"

"Shit is complicated."

Remember how I said me & Dani loved a good investigation?

Dani sat up completely this time, "complicated how?"

"Y'all both know that I'm about to tell you these folks business."

"Xay, come on tell us. We just don't want to be stupid like them." Dani tried.

"No. That goes against the code so y'all gonna have to find another way to investigate, Nancy Drew." We attempted to negotiate with him but he wouldn't budge. Even though I had never known they were family, they were clearly very close. Xay was never a fan of our investigations but he would give an inch, never more.. but this was the first hard no. Which was strange, I've already decided Nick is a jerk so accepting that Xay was vouching for him. I just couldn't, I had to see for myself. We got so caught up in talking that he almost forgot why he came to the gym. Good ol Xay, misplaced his jacket in the one location he knew Dani would be. It was really cute. Until we couldn't find it.

"Someone must have taken it." Dani said, sitting back in her spot.

"You need to get back the periods almost over, we will keep looking."

"I'm NOT getting back up to look." Dani said. "This gym is too big for that, just get a new one."

"You trifling."

"And?"

"Alright", I said trying to end the argument before it started "I'll keep looking." Xay threw his hands at Dani. "I'm on the last lunch wave so it's cool. I'm not going to get in trouble." He threw his hand up, leaving.