Truly Yours

- X V I I -

I yawn and tap my foot against the floor impatiently. Cracking my fingers I look at Zach trying to copy an answer off Seth's paper. I glance at the clock and see there is five minutes still left for the bell. I gather all my pens and other stationary and put them into my pencil case.

Removing the bundle of answer sheet from the writing pad, I rest it on top of the table and attach the question paper to the writing pad. I look around and try to catch anyone's eye but unfortunately everyone is still writing.

Today was our last exams. After three months of beginning of our senior year, two weeks of preparation our first term exams had started this week.

The bell rings and as my roll number is at the start, I hand over the answer sheets and rush out of the class room.

"At last! Exams are over!" El squealed as she saw me from the other class.

"You know right exams are going to come once again after like two to three months?" I raised an eyebrow. She flicked her wrist and shrugged.

"How was your exam?" I asked as I tied my hair into a ponytail.

"Ughh no talking about exams anymore." Brandon groaned. I shrugged in response. Zach comes out of the classroom stuffing his belongings into his bag. He looked up and said, "You three are twinning? Or I guess triplet-ing?"

Brady, Noelle and I were wearing the same set of Adidas hoodie and sweatpants, except our colours were different. Brandon's was white, El's was red while mine was black. It was definitely decided.

We grinned and walked towards the exit. After our exams we didn't have classes. Since it was our last exam, we decided to go hang out and go for bowling. Most of the school students were going and meeting up there.

We reached the venue. Grabbing our required shoes we went to the provided lanes.

The lighting was dim and funky with top hits playing on the stereo. There were pool tables at one corner of the area and a bar and food stall at another.

"Let's take pictures!" I grabbed El and Brady. We tried to pose like the Instagram models putting up a serious face and El and I stood on either side of Brandon. Zach took the picture on his new Oppo phone and the flash and the edits made the picture look really good.

I immediately posted the picture with the caption, 'Triplets'.

"What do you want? I'll grab the food and drinks." Zach asked taking out his credit card. It seems he is paying. Everyone ordered and he went on to grab the food.

We punched in our names and started with the game. We made it according to alphabetical order so it was starting off with Brandon, me, Noelle, Xavier and ended with Zach.

Brandon began and by luck was able to knock off eight pins. I rubbed my hands together after lifting my sleeves up.

"Okay! Here we go, check this out losers!" I winked and grabbed the purple bowling ball and rolled it. I squealed and threw my arms in the air as I had gotten my first Strike.

"That's pure luck."

I turned and glared at Xavier. He was wearing a black hoodie along with jeans. I could probably see the girls swoon at his tousled hair. A few students yet again glared while the workers stared at him too.

"Sure!" I scoffed. We walked over to Zach to help him along with the food. The brought number of trays with nachos, cheese balls and a few cups with large bottles of Pepsi and Sprite. Everyone lunges to grab the food not bothering about the game for a little while.

Khalid hates cheese balls so I got his portion too. He was playing at the lane beside us along with his group of friends.

"Now watch this!" Xavier tried to bust out some moves and swiftly rolled the bowling ball. He too got a Strike. I rolled my eyes as he tapped my nose and smirked.

"I just realised we are twinning!" I said. He tossed his phone to Noelle and said, "Take a photo." He stood beside me and tugged me towards him with his arm that snaked around my waist. I could feel my cheeks go red and I tried to ignore the smirk on El's face.

"Lyn smile!" She said. I awkwardly gave a toothy grin and tried to calm my beating heart by inhaling and exhaling slowly.

She kept taking photos while commanding us.

"Come closer!"

"Pull put a funny face."

"Stand back to back and do the whole hand into a gun James Bond style."

"Do a cute face!"

"Serious face."

After numerous poses and I was fed up and grabbed the phone out of her hands. I was grateful to her for sticking around and finding ways so that Xavier and I could be together. She winked and said, "Return the favour!"

I bowled my chance and rushed to grab her phone. She stood beside Zach and I took a few pictures of theirs. Zach after a few shots pushed her out of the way. "Sit down and get a good below shot okay?"

I laid on my stomach and took a good picture. He stretched out his leg and had a whole bad boy look. "Me also!" Brady pushes him and poses. I take a few pictures of him.

"I'm done! You guys better give me credits." I dusted off myself.

After finishing our food as well as our game we walked out. Unfortunately I came second, Xavier coming first. Khalid won in his game and they both parades around dissing us all.

"You guys were just lucky!" I sighed and crossed my arms.

"It's called talent baby!" Xavier said swinging his arm around my shoulder. I froze and at the same time as Xavier was talking to Brandon, El mouths 'Baby' and I nod and we both start squealing and jumping.

"You guys okay?" Brandon asked. El and I share a look and nod. We are walking in pairs, Noelle and Zach, followed by Khalid and Brandon and behind them is Xavier and I.

"So how was your exams?" He asked. I looked up to him, "Yeah it was good. What about yours?" He shrugged not saying anything.

"I saw your story, you got a pet?" I asked tilting my head to the side.

"Yeah we got this new kitten. My sister works at the vet so they came across a litter of kittens and decided to give them up for adoption. So she adopted one herself too."

I mentally awed as I saw him speaking with such fondness and warmth. His story was posted right before the exams of him going shopping for toys for cats. I really wanted to go see it even though I wasn't a big fan of cats, but kittens on the other hand.

"You can come over today if you want to meet Shadow." He asked sliding into the driver's seat. I clicked the seat belt into place, "Sure I'll come as long as I get more onion rings. By the way, you named the kitten Shadow?" He nodded and started driving. He invited the others to join too and they were following us.

"Is it weird that I'm actually nervous? Like what if it doesn't like me?" I said as we walked up towards his door.

"Relax Lyn. Everyone loves you, I don't think a kitten not liking you is possible." Brady teased bumping his shoulder with mine. Xavier opened the door and we all got in. He walked towards the main room and suddenly we hear a meow and a running tiny black furry kitten trying to climb up his leg.

Everyone awed and cooed at the tiny creature. It had mismatched eyes-heterochromia. Xavier picked it up and gave a peck on its nose and held it in his arms like he was carrying a baby.

Everyone gushed about it and gathered around him. The kitten was suddenly aware of our presence and hid its face in Xavier's shoulder. He sat down on the couch and laid the kitten on its lap, "Come on Evy." I sat beside it slowly placing my hand on its head and stroking its chin. It meowed and snuggled into my hand licking my palm and fingers occasionally.

"See it likes you! Now me!" El squealed and tried to pet it. Shadow looked a little scared but loved the ear and chin scratches. We played with the kitten, Zach pretended to be a cat too and kept trying to communicate with it, Khalid was allergic to cats so he tried to keep his distance, Xavier and I kept in in our arms giving it a treat every now and then, Brandon played with the toys of the cat while Noelle was busy taking pictures of the kitten.

A pawsitive day feline good indeed!