Snowflakes Fall and So Did I

~CHAPTER 8~

"Alright," I say, trying to sound confident like my father. "What are your questions?"

Jack looked at me in surprise. "Wait what? You're serious?"

Now it was me who was confused. "Um....yes? Why wouldn't I be?"

Jack rubbed his neck and chuckled nervously. "I just...I didn't think it would be this easy. I thought you'd....well...not want to talk. You're not exactly social. If I had known you'd be willing, I would have came to you a long ago."

Thank you, Captain Obvious, for stating my social issues that I'm already well aware of. "Well," I start, nervously picking at the grass, "I still don't want to talk, especially since I know where this conversation is going, but...I want to get it out of the way. It's way overdue and I'm done waiting. I'm tired of it."

Jack released a shaky laugh that was filled with disbelief rather than humor. "It really is you then, isn't it? You're the girl I helped off the pond six years ago."

My heart sped up, beating faster than lightning in the span of one second, and my palms feel sweaty as I tried not to fiddle with them. I knew he knew. I knew it all along. I nodded and said, "Yes, I am. And you're the boy who helped me get off the ice. The boy whose father..." I didn't finish. I didn't need to. We both know what happened.

"So you knew it was me?" He asked.

I nodded once more. "I knew it was you as soon as I saw you at Open House." I pause to swallow, hating how dry and tight my throat is. "I'm guessing you knew right on sight too?"

A small smile tugs at his lips and he nods. "Yeah. You've kinda..." he rubs his neck and chuckles nervously, "You've kinda been haunting my dreams."

My eyes widened. "Really?"

"Yeah," Jack nervously chuckles again and removes his hand from his neck to his lap, "I only remembered how you looked as a kid though. I tried imagining you older, but it didn't quite look right in my mind. But as soon as I saw you during Open House...I just knew it was you."

When he stopped talking to let me speak, I found myself blushing at the words that escaped my mouth. "I've dreamt about you too." I wasn't sure about him, but my mind went straight to the gutter. Not the perverted gutter, but the lovey-dovey gutter. He better not have interpreted it that way like I had. Before I could even see his reaction I quickly kept talking. "But...uh...anyway. Rapunzel never told me about being friends with you or about you attending the school. A part of me, however, always knew despite there being a chance that you wouldn't be there. That's why I wasn't all that surprised to see you. I was surprised, but not entirely. Deep down I was expecting you."

This time there was no nervousness in his chuckle. "Well, I hate to break it to you, but I was not at all expecting you." I softly laugh at this as he goes on. "For as long as I've known your cousin, Rapunzel has never mentioned you to me. Well, I mean, she would talk about you and Anna from time to time, but she never told me that the three of you were there that night." He pauses to sigh and lean back against the tree. He crosses his arms and legs and shakes his head.

"She never told me that it was you I had helped, or that it was Anna who my dad had saved. I can't believe she didn't say anything. Unless she didn't remember me like how I didn't remember her. I mean, I remember there being other kids, but I don't remember them as clearly as I did you. It didn't click that she was one of the people there until I finally came out of my short denial and accepted the fact that you're the girl from my past and her cousin."

So he was in short denial too, huh? For how long? My denial only lasted for a few seconds before I accepted everything. Actually, I still don't accept it. Even now, after a whole month of attending school with him, it's still so very surreal.