Inked Perfection

Chapter 35

"Size 6 please." I inform the guy at the counter, giving out skates. 

"Hey, you're the girl who used to come here all the time with that other guy." He says, scrutinizing me. Flashes of memories fill my mind and I shake my head. I give him a confused look, trying to throw him off track but the guy was persistent. Why can't the skates giving counter be  unisex? Stupid sexist people. "You know, the brunette guy, with the blue eyes? The two of you used to come here every other day. The guy wasn't worth remembering but your antics caught everyone's eye. I'm sure it was you." 

"Now I remember. I'm sorry we aren't together anymore and that's a part of my life I don't want to recollect. So could you please give me my skates and I will be on my way."

"What happened? I always thought you guys would get married or something like that." Yeah, me too. I tell myself, giving him a sad smile. I might be over Harry but he will always be an important part of my life and I know that no matter what I do and who I love, I will always love him. 

"Malia? What's taking you so long?" Chris asks, coming up to me.

"Nothing. Let's go?" I ask and go to the bench to put on my skates. Chris sits down next to me and gets too close to my face. "Heard of a personal bubble?" I ask moving back.

"No." He says. I don't even bother to argue. "I was just wondering what's wrong."

"What's wrong?" I ask feigning innocence. His deadpan stare weakened my act. "The guy at the counter just asked me about Harry and it kind of caught me off guard but I'm fine now."

"Oh." He murmurs and leaves it at that.

"I am serious when I say I'm over what happened but it hurts you know?" He nods his head in understanding and stands up, giving me his hand.

I take his hand and skate out to the middle of the rink where Ryan and Ashton were standing in deep conversation. "Are the two of you planning my murder?" I ask as I approach them. They shrug off my question and begin to skate. I clench my fists in frustration and stomp my foot, completely forgetting that I'm on skates. Resulting in me falling on my butt. The two idiots turn back and start laughing.

"I told you." Ryan says, struggling to form proper words between his laughter. "She's a little ball of cuteness when she's angry and she forgets her surroundings in that state resulting in moments like these." I can't believe they planned to make me fall and ruin my reputation, well I'm taking revenge and aren't they in for a huge surprise, I think smiling wickedly.

"Ladies, gentlemen and others, form lines as we're going to do the line dance." the DJ says. I quickly join everyone as they form lines.

"Hey." A familiar voice says from next to me. I look to my right and see Guy-who-helped-me-up.

"Guy-who-helped-me-up!" I shout ecstatically, causing people to turn and look at me. He looks at me with his blue eyes and starts laughing. His laugh was quite contagious that I started laughing along too. 

"You do know I have a name right?" He says shouting over the demonstration music, after we had stopped laughing.

"Yeah but I don't want to know." I say.

"You told me we'll introduce ourselves if we meet again."

"I did say that didn't I? Okay then, I'm Malia. You can call me whatever you want, as long as it sounds like it belongs to my name." I tell him.

"Well Mia, I'm Jesse. I don't think you can shorten it any further."  

"Is that a challenge I smell." I ask him with narrowed eyes.