Snow White and Seven Devils (rewrite) ✅

(2) Out of Awkward

2.

When I met Dale Cattermole, he looked innocent enough. Dale wasn't innocent; it would be an insult to the word to call him that. The Cattermole's had just moved next to the house and I met him in school. It wasn't a pretty experience, in fact I won't bother calling it an experience at all.

He broke my favorite pencil, tripped me when I was walking back to the gate where my parents were suppose to fetch me, dropped red paint on my new shoes and cut the hem of my frilly frock with a scissor. In conclusion; Dale Cattermole was born a devil.

Dale Cattermole was a lot of other things, a complexity and an enigma that I could never exactly figure out. Yes he was stupid and annoying but he was also nice and thoughtful, a person who couldn't bear to see anyone in pain. He was the same guy who kicked Robby Milan when Robby pushed me during our play, he carried my bags for me when we entered primary school and I injured my shoulder, he shared his lunch with me when Daniel accidentally knocked mine.

In summary, I had never been able to know exactly what I felt for him. I had never been able to like him completely, I had never been able to hate him completely either. And now after I was recovering from the sudden overwhelming sensation of seeing him all grown up, I couldn't help but wonder about that shocked expression on his face.

Last night we didn't get to talk much, we just greeted each other and he asked some things about New York, though I couldn't find any genuine interest in his voice. His voice...it was different now, just like the rest of him, it wasn't as high pitched and thin as I remembered. Mrs. Cattermole spoke while I ate bits of food. How could I eat when there was a guy ogling at me like I had grown a third eye on my forehead?

''Did you like it!'' I jumped at mom's voice and turned towards the door abruptly, feeling my cheeks grow hot as if I had been doing something wrong.

''You scared me.'' I put a hand on my heart dramatically,

''So, did you like it or not?'' She leaned against the wall and motioned towards the shelves lining the walls. A big grin spread on my face and I nodded, a little too fiercely,

''I love it, I still can't believe you kept this safe.'' The room was like heaven, it smelled of paper and everywhere I looked, there were just books. And mom had done good work at keeping it clean and shiny, there wasn't dust on the books or the wood, and the tiles were spotless as well. Now she had handed the duty to me and I had taken it gladly. Even though it was my second day here, I had started helping in lot of things, except cooking, I was a terrible cook. I had never mind doing house work and there was still time for school to start, so it would keep me busy until then.

''Here, let me show you something,'' she walked towards the desk that sat beside the window and opened the first drawer, pulling out a glass jar. On closer inspection I saw a hole in its surface and a piece of paper glued to the glass, it was sharpie-d with ''Book Bank''.

''What is this?'' I asked taking the jar from her hand,

''It's a thing I did a few months back, I threw in a little bit of money almost daily and didn't touch it until the end of the month. So after each month I had enough savings to go book shopping!'' I smiled; the idea was really good, especially for an addict like me.

''That's really smart,'' I replied, ''I like this method, lets keep this here.'' I set it in the middle of the desk and beamed back at her.

''It was actually Carmen's idea, I kept complaining how I was wasting too much money in bookstores so she said that it was up to me to restrict myself.''

''It was intelligent of me, right?'' Carmen jogged down the stairs and joined us; she had been helping me a lot with unpacking my stuff. Since there were still two weeks until school neither her nor Daniel were busy with anything.