Picasso's Promise

Episode 20| In between

Picasso's P.O.V.

If I repeat "damn, that's crazy," and "wow, really?" while someone's sharing a story, chances are I'm not listening to a fucking word coming out of their mouth.

In homeroom, Javier wasn't getting the hint. I wish he fucking would.

He kept his mouth moving when he heard the disinterest in my voice, rehashing the fight he was having with his girl. I wasn't about to tell him to shut up about it. He wouldn't listen anyhow. He'd talk over me, telling me he hasn't gotten to the good part yet and that I'd regret not knowing.

I never do.

No one wanted to be subjected to hearing about his demented girl swinging her purse at his face for seeing him flirt with another woman, or how she filled his gas tank with sand when she found out he was sending nudes to another girl. His stories sounded fake, and quite frankly, I was on his girlfriend's defense if anything when it came down to the details.

She never left so I couldn't call her anything besides stupid or a gold-digger.

Everyone in my crew knew she wasn't staying around for love. Remaining with a chump like Javier came down to one reason-well, two to be exact.

He had a top-of-the-line sports car handed to him from his father and a wade of cash ready to flash at any girl willing to drool over it. The money might've as well had glue on it considering how stuck his girlfriend was to it, allowing just about anything to come between them and still not flee for the exit.

Really, it made no sense to me why normal people stuck around with cheating partners, even if there were kids involved. Only people that I considered understandable for staying around after infidelity were those married to celebrities or ultra-wealthy tycoons. Having a car and some spare cash wasn't enough. I'd need to be swimming in money, estates, and oversea getaways in order to ignore a sidepiece.

"The bitch is crazy!" he stated proudly. "I don't know what's gotten into her."

"You can't call every girl crazy when you're the one that pushes them to that point," Genesis chirped. "Funny how the girls only called crazy, but no one asks what got her that mad. She probably has a lot to be angry about with a guy like you."

"Who the fuck was asking you?" Javier puffed. "Stay out my business."

"No cursing, Javier." Mr. Ramos said from behind his desk, taking his earlobe. His eyes were half-open. I was surprised he even heard us at all, considering he never flinches at our profanity.

Genesis rolled her eyes. "Maybe if you weren't so damn loud everyone wouldn't be hearing about your business."

"You being in hearing range doesn't mean I want your input. I was telling Picasso, not you. Go back to talking about dildos and depression with your girls."

"Is it meth? Is that what you're on right now? Because what you said made zero sense," Genesis snapped. "You sound no different than a tweaker. I can't see how any girl would tolerate being around you more than ten minutes."

"You're only saying that because of what you see from the waist up, not the waist down," he said with a wink, gaining a noisy groan and an extra eye roll from Genesis. "And trust me, it's more than ten minutes. Half an hour is more like it."

The groans turned to gags.

"Aw, c'mon, no need to make that noise when I didn't put anything in your mouth yet."

"Please," I waved my hand up, "Get a room or get out of my face. I don't want to hear you guys flirting in front of me."

Genesis's face became a bright red, fanning herself and touching her hand to her collarbone. "I wasn't flirting with him," she said hooking her fingers to my arm. I tried to shake her off, but she wouldn't budge. "I only came over here to talk to you, baby-"

"Let go of me." I demanded. "And call me Picasso, or don't talk to me at all."

My attention was divided between scrolling through my phone and eyeing the door. Their bickering was background noise to me until that point.

Fifteen minutes ago, the bell rang loudly throughout the nearly emptied-out hallways, warning students that they would be marked as late if they weren't in their designated classrooms. By this time, Sydney should've been in class at this point, but she was nowhere to be found. Knowing that I'd seen her in the cafeteria this morning, I was getting concerned.

Swiping my binder of the table, I left the two arguing nimrods to see if Jeremiah knew anything I didn't. Sydney didn't seem to have many friends here, but I'd seen her spend her lunch with Jeremiah earlier in the year, staying in the library during lunch.

When I'd see her from outside the window, I'd contemplate on going in, but never got the courage to. I was always with my friends and they never wanted to make a detour. Our path was the same for every lunch break, heading to the gym like we did every year since we were freshman.

"Where are you going?" Genesis asked from behind me.

I glanced at her momentarily as I said: "Away from you guys. I'm getting a migraine listening to y'all scream at each other like a couple going through a divorce."

Jeremiah's shoulders bounced when I set my binder on his desk, startled from my arrival. "Don't get up," I said when he began to shift off his seat, possibly to offer it to me. I had that affect on people. "I wanted to ask you something."

"I'm all ears."

"I was wondering if you saw Sydney by any chance."

"No, not today at least. I haven't seen her," he revealed as I got into the seat next to him. "It's not really like her to skip homeroom."

"That's what I was thinking." I slid my phone out of my pocket, pressing the message app to see if she had sent anything. When I saw nothing new, I sent a text of my own to her. I wasn't in the mood to sit around Genesis or Javier any longer than I had to.

Before pressing send, the classroom door opened and Sydney strolled in with just five minutes to spare of class. She came to halt when her eyes fell on me, jerking her head to the back of the room where my ex was, and then headed straight for me after locking eyes with Genesis.

"You're in my seat," she said with an easy smile, one that made you grin in response. "I'd like it back."

"Sure thing." I hopped out the seat and made way for her. "Are you ok?"

"No...no, I'm not," she whispered. Sydney tugged on her sleeves, pushing them past her knuckles. "I got cornered by Yennifer in the restroom before homeroom. I didn't get out till now."

"She had you held up for that long?" Jeremiah asked.

"No, I was hiding for that long," she answered. "Picasso, I...I don't know about us hanging out during lunch, or even later this week. This isn't going to end well."

"What did she do to you, Sydney?" I inquired, patting my fingertips to her shoulder blade, but retreated when she began to shutter at my touch.

She gifted me with silence, filled with a quietness that gave me enough moment

That was it. I didn't hear anything from her to know what I had to do. Picking up my things, I took long strides to the back of the room with no means being nice or gentle.

Being cold to Genesis wasn't working. I had to make my intentions known, embarrass her even, so she would get out of my life. I had struggled to fully cut her off before, but there was no way for me to let behavior like this slide for much longer. I would end up losing Sydney out of fear; life altering danger that was misplaced and should've been directed at me. I wanted to feel that pain, take it from her so she didn't need to suffer what I caused.

Genesis turned when I called out her name.

But her wide grin didn't prepare her for what I had to say.

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