LOVELORN

13|Freedom & daisies

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

AFTER WHAT happened, I walked Zora home. I wanted to stay, but she refused, not wanting me to get in trouble with my parents. We argued back and forth for a bit about that before she got Avi to pick me up. I reluctantly said goodbye, telling her to text me.

"What happened to your knuckles?" Avi confronted me about, halfway home.

"Punched a guy."

His eyebrows rose. "Who?"

"Gael."

His head whipped around. "Gael?"

"Keep your eyes on the road," I reprimanded. Then adressed his curiosity. "He confronted Zora, but I found him and we dealt with it."

His hands tightened around the steering wheel, a muscle in his jaw twitching. I expected him to say more, but he just stayed quiet for the rest of the ride, silently fuming.

"I scared him pretty bad, and he can't punch for the life of him. It's fine, Avi," I reassured him as he parked the car.

"What if he corners you or Zora with guys who do know how to throw a punch? What are you going to do then? You shouldn't have done that, it put you both in danger. You can't go messing around with guys like that."

The possibility had crossed my mind, I was sort of relying on the fact that we still had the audio recording and he wouldn't want us to release that. If that failed, there were witnesses to when he confessed at the party as well.

I told Avi as much.

"I don't know, Naya. This could backfire. Let me know if it does, okay? Don't avoid telling me because of your ego."

We walked up to the door. "Yeah, yeah, I will. And you know I would never do anything to intentionally get Zora in danger. But she was getting cornered by the guy, I had to do something. If I didn't, he'd seize another opportunity to do it again."

"Yeah, I get it. I would too. Be careful though."

"I will."

Avi unlocked the door. We took off our shoes and both headed into the kitchen to get a snack. I'd barely had time to finish it when I heard the sound of a car pulling up to the driveway.

"They're already home?"

"Well, it's only a little earlier than they usually get home," Avi answered.

"Guess I just lost track of time."

Usually, I would have escaped up to my room, but today I stayed put. I needed to tell them about my grade, regardless of their reaction. At least I would have Avi here. Seeing as he stood in juxtaposition with my failure with his consistent success, I wasn't sure if his presence would be beneficial or not.

The door opened and I held my breath. Avi went to greet them and I trailed after him begrudgingly.

"Hi kids," Pa greeted us. "How's your school day been?"

"It was good. We got our math tests back."

"Oh, that's great, how'd you do?" Ma chimed in.