Knowing Me, Knowing You | (S/P)

Chapter 39

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Nathaniel

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"Son of a fucking bitch!" There's a sharp thud as my duffle bag lands a few meters away from me after having kicked it out of sheer frustration. The passersby at the strain station give me more than one scolding look as I pick the goddamned thing from the floor.

"Wow, someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed today." I turn around to see my sister walking in my direction.

"The zipper is stuck and my phone is inside."

"Well, I doubt it understands English, so yelling at it won't do much."

"Funny, Michelle, so funny." I try to keep my tone polite, but I really am not having it today. After stepping on her tiptoes to give me a hug and kiss me on the cheek, she looks behind me, searching. "It's only me." This time I can't help the annoyed tone on my voice, a throbbing headache threatening to reappear.

"Okay, let's go then, you're scaring off the customers."

I haven't been able to talk to Alexia all day. I knew that I shouldn't have let her go that dinner on her own. She called last night to inform me that she was staying over at her parents, which I would have loved to argue about, but she didn't give me the chance, hanging up almost immediately.

And then, this morning, I woke up to a text saying that she'd meet me in Philadelphia later this week. Bullshit, I know she isn't coming. Her lack of communication being enough proof.

She promised.

The only reason that I let her go on her own is because she promised that she'd call me if things went wrong. And now she's completely shutting me out of whatever the fuck is going down. My head is about to explode as I try the zipper of my bag again, but with no avail.

"Dammit! You shitbag-"

"Hey! Whatever is eating at you, you need to canalize your anger in another direction."  Michelle averts her eyes  from the road as she scolds me. "Mom will fix it." I throw the unfortunate thing on the backseat, giving up. "By the way, she was so pissed you didn't tell her, or anyone else, that you had a girlfriend."

A stubborn girlfriend, that is.

"You met her, actually." I blurt the words, not giving a single shit right now. Sooner or later —later as things are going— I was going to tell them how, exactly, I met Alexia. I might as well start by Michelle.

"What?" She shifts her eyes from the road to me once more, looking rather confused. "No, I didn't."

"When you came to Chicago last fall. When you and Georgina came back home from shopping, there was a girl in the apartment." That day seems so distant now, Alex and I had just began dating —that same day to be precise—, and looking back now, we've gone through a lot –we've overcame so much. Picturing her smiling face, her sparkling eyes, her lips on mine, almost makes me forget how eminently mad I am at her right now. "And then again in my office at campus."

It takes her a few seconds to connect the dots, to analyze the meaning of my words, and once she does, it's like a bomb explodes inside the car, "Your fucking student?! You're dating one of your students?!" I nod my head nonchalantly, trying to not laugh at her reaction. "You fucking shithead!" She takes her hands off the steering wheel to slap me on the head, hard.

"Michelle, what the fuck!" She ignores my complaints and instead hits me another time. "Stop it! Eyes on the road, I don't want to die on Christmas Eve!"