Landon
I was finally ungrounded. Which was great; I could hang with Alice more. I would miss my quiet time in my room as I read the multiple books my dad had that he let me borrow. I most certainly wouldn't miss the orders Mandy spit at me every chance she got.
It would be less frequent, I hope. Mandy wasn't too happy about me walking home, but didn't act upon it. By acting upon it I mean telling my dad and making me grounded longer. Which surprised me. I figured she'd jump at the opportunity to get me in trouble like she has done in the past.
Currently, I was on the phone with Alice. "So have the two of you made it official that you guys are dating?"
I let out a sigh. "Nope."
"And why not?" She asked loudly in the phone, sounding more upset about it than I should be. I wasn't too upset about it. I got to hang with him and talk to him. It wasn't like we had to become exclusive, but I didn't want him to think I didn't want us to either.
"I dunno," I shrugged even though she couldn't see me, "it's not like we aren't talking. We are talking. We both know our feelings towards one another."
"Oh, I know. I can tell."
"What do you mean? Besides the obvious of me telling you."
She laughed. "Okay, well for starters you have this like radiant-I'm-so-happy vibe going on when you get to school. Which is, like, so cute and adorable, Landon. Plus, you started wearing that one perfume -- hmm, what is it even called again? Isn't it vanilla or something?"
I chuckled, "Yes, it is vanilla. It smells good."
"I couldn't agree more on it smelling good." She replied.
"No more talk about me, what about you?"
"What about me?"
I wiggled my eyebrows then remembered once again she couldn't see me, so I stopped before anyone walked in and thought I was creepy by making my eyebrows dance. "You and Jessie!? Duh."
"Oh, no. We are not even a -- a thing!" She protested, "We haven't talked much since Bates and you kissed at the park." As soon as I had got home and no one was awake, I called her and told her all about it.
"And why not?"
"I guess he's busy."
"Bates told me he has been helping Jonas try to find him a girlfriend," I informed her and I heard her scoff.
"I could easily help them with that. Ugh. Stupid boys." She huffed with annoyance towards Jessie, "All I need is Netflix."
"You should go talk to him, Alice." I advised, "With two people talking, it goes both ways. If he isn't talking to you much, you go talk to him. You can do it; you're Alice Martin!"
She didn't say anything for a while, but I could tell she was thinking about it, "Okay, okay," she said just as I was about to question if she were still on the phone, "I will."
"That's my girl," I grinned.
"Yes. Well, this girl needs sleep -- so do you, we have school tomorrow." Alice said. After we exchanged goodnights and byes to one another, we hung up.
•••
"Okay, guess what?" Alice said as soon as we sat down in lunch, she was grinning.
"What?"
"I kinda sorta thing Jessie likes me,"
"Is it not obvious enough?" I asked, biting a carrot.
She shrugged before taking a sip of her water. "Look, I did what you said. I talked to him."
"And?"
"He kinda sorta held my hand," she said, her neck and cheeks starting to get a slight shade of pink.
"Ahhh!" I beamed, "That's so freaking cute! Okay, okay. I need to calm down -- I'm gonna pass out from all that cuteness."
Alice smirked, "Or you are about to blush crazily when I tell you this,"
"Tell me what?"
"That Bates is totally staring you down," I whipped my head towards the direction of their table. Jessie and Jonas were eating away while Bates was grinning, looking at me.
I blinked.
Then I waved at him stupidly while my cheeks heated up from embarrassment. A wave? Seriously!? I was mentally smacking myself while I looked down at my tray. "Is he still looking?" I hissed.
"No, that wave was very amusing," she said before taking a sip from her water. I moved my tray towards her, letting her have my pizza.
"Here," I said, ignoring her comment, "I'm not hungry."
She looked down at the pizza. "Neither am I."
I rolled my eyes. "Uh-huh. Sure, Alice, you haven't even touched your salad and if I was hungry I'd eat both. Unfortunately, I'm not. So you go ahead."
"I had a big breakfast," she excused, pushing it away, "You know when Dad makes those pancakes? I ate, like, four then I had some eggs with..orange juice."
"But you don't like orange juice,"
"Sorry, I meant apple juice. You know how I love apple juice!" Alice said, seeming nervous.
Before I could question her any further, she began eating the pizza. Then the salad. Then mine and hers fruit cup. "Gosh, you were hungry,"
She slowly chewed on her last bite of fruit, "Huh. Guess I was.." She looks at her empty water bottle, frowning. "Now I need to use the bathroom from all that water. See you in art class?"
•••
"Hey Lan," Bates said, sitting beside me in art class, "Mind if I sit here?" He was sitting in the same seat he sat when we had free time and his painting was so.. beautiful.
I was struggling to breathe and didn't trust my voice, so I just nodded. Alice still wasn't in art class. I didn't know what was taking her so long unless they had a long line in the bathroom.
"How are you?" He asked me. I turned to look at him, looking at his brown eyes -- the kind you get lost in, and I always did.
"Good." I managed to say, my voice soft.
His tongue darted out to wet his lower lip, making my gaze fall onto his lips. He was looking at my face, so he knew I was staring unquestionably at his lips. His lips turned up into a small smile, making me look back up at him to see him watching me.
Busted.
"So," he said, his index finger running lightly over my arm which raised goosebumps on my skin, "Wanna hang out after school?"
I thought for a moment, Mandy nor my dad would like the idea of me hanging out after school -- with a boy -- and only us two. I'd have to tell them. "Uhm, maybe. I'll need to ask Mandy."
"Okay," he had already removed his fingers from my arm. And I wished he hadn't, but I stayed put and didn't say anything about it. Bates turned his attention to Mrs. Ellie who was shuffling papers and putting them in a pile at the edge of her desk before heaving a tired sigh. Alice still hadn't come to class. Was she skipping? Did she leave? Did she get picked up early?
"Good evening, class," she welcomed the class, ruffling down her pencil skirt, "Today we will be using oil pastels. Now not everyone will be good at it, so we must start easy. Okay? I got some pears from the local supermarket for us all to use as our muse and paint with the oil pastels." She said, smiling as she put the two pears on a table in the middle of the room. "I'm not looking for five star work, but I am expecting it to look good and clean. After all, this will be taken as a grade. Good luck."
Bates had already begun, using different oil pastels to make it look more like the pear, more realistic. He was so good at painting.
Bates looked up at me. "Are you going to keep watching me or are you going to work on your assignment?" He nudged me with his elbow lightly, making me look down and begin working, Alice never came to class.
•••
Bates and I were leaning against the wall by the school. I dialed Mandy's number. She answered on the fourth ring.
"What?" She snapped as soon as she answered.
"Um, hi. I was wondering if I could hang with my... uh, Bates."
"I don't even know who that is, Landon. So I most definitely won't let you."
"Can he come over to the house?" As soon as I said it, I cringed. Maybe I was moving to fast. Plus, what about Emmy? Mandy let out a sigh, sounding tired.
"What about your sister?" I asked him, moving the phone away from my ear.
"There is a daycare at the school." He said, "I'll just have to go and tell them she will have to stay at the after school daycare for a couple hours."
"Mandy?"
"I don't know how your dad will feel about it, but fine. Whatever. You two need to ride the bus, I have errands to run before I get home."
"Okay. Thanks!" I hung up, smiling and turned to Bates who was already looking at me. "You can come over to the house."
"Great," he said, starting to walk and I followed him, "Now I need to go and tell Emmy she needs to go to daycare."
•••
We arrived at my house not long after Emmy went to daycare. We stepped inside and he looked around. "You have a nice house," he said slowly.
I grabbed his wrist and pulled him along, our hands ended up intertwining. "I'll give you a tour," I pulled him all throughout the house, showing him all the rooms.
"Who is that?" He asked, pointing to a picture hanging on the wall.
"That's Connor and I at my dad's and Mandy's wedding," I said, looking at the picture with him.
He nodded, "You look good in that pic. But I prefer your hair down," he turned to me, picking a strand of my dark hair.
"Um, thanks," I blushed, looking down at my feet. I walked towards my room, opening the door. "This is my room."
He looked around, smiling a bit. "I like it." Then he walked around, looking at the things hung on my wall. "You like a lot of quotes, don't you?" He was standing by the multiple printed out or handwritten quotes.
"Yeah," I walked up beside him, looking at them like he was, "I do."
"What's one of your favorite ones?" He asked, looking at me. I kept looking at the quotes. I liked them all. They all meant something to me and has a part of me.
I looked at them for a long time, reading and rereading them all. I kept going back and reading a certain one, so I pointed to it. It read:
What lies behind us and what lies ahead of us are tiny matters compared to what lives within us.
- Henery David Thoreau
He read it and was quiet for a little while before finally speaking, "Very well said, I'd say. Where do you get all these quotes from?"
I smiled lightly, "Tumblr at its finest." He chuckled, sitting down on my bed.
"Comfy bed," he noted.
"Thanks." I said, debating if I should go sit beside him. Before I could over think it, he stood up.
"So what do you wanna do?"
"Want to watch a movie?" I asked him, receiving a nod from him.
We went to the living room. We walked over to the stack of movies that were lined up on the small, mini bookshelf. "What are you in the mood for?" I asked, "Horror, romance, action, comedy?"
He sent me a dazzling smile, "Horror. Mainly, so I can hold you when you get scared."
My face went red. I scoffed, trying to play it cool, but mostly probably looked like a flustered red faced weirdo, "I don't get scared, Bates."
"Wanna bet?" He raised his eyebrows at me. "If you get scared, you have to do whatever I say. If you don't get scared, I do whatever you tell me to do."
"For like a whole week me or you do whatever one of us tell each other?"
"It's whatever you want. The winner chooses whatever they want." He said. "Deal?"
What if he made me do something embarrassing? Oh, who am I kidding. He wouldn't ever do such a thing, I hope not. Plus, I won't get scared. I'll win.
"Deal," I said. We shook hands to seal the deal officially.
"Ah, look!" Bates exclaimed, picking up a movie, "You guys happen to have The Exorcist."
Crap. Kill me now.
"Oh," I said, my stomach forming into a knot. "How . . . lovely."
He grinned mischievously. "Great! Let's put it in."
"That's not fair," I tried to argue, "you know I couldn't watch it because --"
"You got scared?" He asked, poking my nose, "I thought you didn't get scared."
Literally. Kill me. Now.
"Uhm, no." I took the movie out of his hand, "let's watch it."