"I can't believe she actually kissed you" Everyone else had gone but Marley. She was still staring at me from my bed. "Does that make you two a thing? Should I not have removed her?" She made a creeped out face that made me chuckle a little.
"No. Definitely. You did good, Mar"
"Oh thank god! Watching you kiss people is like- uch!" She stuck out her tongue.
"What exactly happened? I kinda went into shock" I tried to hide my blush. Seriously, Grace? Shock?
"You did? Ha" Marley laughed. "You really don't know what happened?" She giggled when I shook my head. "Here" she pointed to her hips "here" her stomach "here" her chest "amn fere" she said while pointing at the tongue she was sticking out of her mouth.
"Oh god" I covered my face with my hand. My face felt like it was on fire.
"My thoughts exactly" Marley snorted. "And you still have no idea why she did it?" I shook my head.
"Answer hasn't changed. She was saying something about not doing something and then she was- that" I blushed even more.
"I have an idea" Marley whipped out her phone and started dialing someone's number feverishly, the tip of her tongue visible from the corner of her pursed lips. "Pick up... Pick up... Pick up..." she put in one of her earbuds to listen. "There you are! You free?...Can you come by Grace's house?...Yeah... Not at all... Hazel problems... Tell me about it... Yeah... See you soon, bye" she hung up. "Micha is here in five" she stated.
"Not that I mind, but why?"
"First, I figure she should get more involved with the group if I'm going to date her. Second, if what you said about the triplet thing is true, then Micha should understand Hazel a lot better than either or both of us" she shrugged. "And don't lecture me about the P.D.A. rule. I was there when we had that talk with Robbie and Cael" she added. "Ice cream?" She pulled me -while I grumbled about trying to eat better- down the stairs and got herself a bowl of Cookie Dough and put a pint of my Strawberry ice cream in one of my hands, and a spoon in the other. "You're out of Birthday"
"Cause I ate it all during all my other Hazel problems!" I groaned but started eating the ice cream anyway. We'd just sat down when my doorbell rang.
"Not it!" I instinctively yelled. Marley rolled her eyes and got up. I started picking the cookie dough out of her ice cream as quickly as I could until I heard Micha and Marley at the top of the stairs.
"What did she do this time?" Micha sat cross-legged on the floor. I opened my mouth to speak, by Marley got to it first.
"They made out" she groaned when she realized I'd eaten her favorite part of her treat.
"Riley owes me five bucks" Micha flipped her hair cockily. "She is jealous. She thinks you two are a thing because of how close, friendly, touchy, open, whatever you two are with each other. To her, the talking has nothing to do with it. She sees you two being very physically close, and she sees that as physical attraction and dependence" she explained.
"Okay, even if she was jealous, she still doesn't like me. How does that work?" I stared at my ice cream.
"She wants to satisfy her envy by taking ownership of you as an object. She does not understand that she likes you. She wants you. That does not mean she knows that she likes you. She probably sees any feelings you give her as being your fault and being negative, and she is under the impression that these are just chemical signals you can control. She blames you for whatever she feels, and she is confused by this, and eventually blames you more, is guilty, blames it on you, etcetera etcetera. She doesn't know she is jealous. She knows she wants you. That is all she knows she wants the object of Grace. There is no connection to the emotional component whatsoever. Just her blaming you for what she feels. Oh look, I went on a rant" she took out a dollar from her pocket and moved it to another "this goes into my rant jar"
"Uh..." I tried to make sense of what she'd said. How do you think it's someone else's fault for making you like them but not actually like them?
"Try talking to Kayla or Megan. The firsts generally do a lot of research into these things. If you ever have a problem, they're likely to get the science of it, and I get what it feels like. I side more to Kayla, but that doesn't make me any less a second than Hazel, who sides to Alexa" she shrugged.
"So... What do I do about it?" I tugged my hair back.
"I guess just wait it out. Deal with what comes when it comes. Don't try to make sense of Hazel the way you think makes sense. Try to think like her. She was heavily influenced by an emotionless sister, who only thought of herself, and now she is trying to understand that she isn't Alexa, although she mostly thinks like she is. It's really confusing, but whatever. Megan has gotten her a long way. Go at this right, it could be really easy for you to gain her physical affections. She'll have an emotional outburst once she realizes she is feeling things, then I'd recommend you try to understand why, give her space, she'll figure it out and she'll come running back" Micha waved her hand around. "Oh. And if-slash-when you get a story on Alexa, it would be very... Educational to know"
*sorry, short chapter, but I had two frees and Micha had a theory and I figured it can't be too horrible to post a short chapter. Anyway... What ya think?