Again, the amazing cover made by justpriya!
2. ...I'm still not interested
"I'm home!" Alysia called out the next day as soon as she had opened the door.
In that instant someone ran up to her with their arms outstretched.
Alysia opened her arms and her little sister flew right into them while a high-pitched giggle escaped from her mouth.
"Hey, Penny, how's it going?"
Alysia smiled as she carried the child through the hallway, dumping her bag on the stairs on the way.
"How was your day, baby?" She asked the young girl while entering the kitchen and greeting the older woman by the oven.
"Hey, Nana!" Kissing her grandmother on the cheek, she plopped down on one of the chairs and turned her attention back to her little sister on her lap.
"Cool. I helped Nana in the garden," Penny announced proudly, her cheeks pink and her whole expression glowing with pride.
"Good to know. Has she been a good girl, Nana?" Alysia questioned her grandmother, the kind of broad smile on her face that nobody in school had ever seen her with.
"She sure has. I don't know what I would have done without her help." Kindly smiling at the little girl, the elderly woman bent down to get the food out of the oven and flinched, her face momentarily a mask of severe pain - something Alysia noticed with a worried frown but luckily, little Penny missed.
Not wanting to draw her sister's attention to the fact that her grandmother was clearly in pain, Alysia made a mental note to herself to ask her Nana about it later and turned back to little Penny.
"I'm happy you're home," the three-year-old girl announced, happily grinning up at her older sister. Her big, bright blue eyes were glowing with excitement and joy.
"I'm happy I'm home, too," Alysia replied with her love for her little sister evident on her face.
"How was the day at school, honey?" Her grandmother asked while Alysia got up to help her set the table and prepare the food.
"The usual. It's just a place where everything seems to be about how popular you are and how many people know you and stuff...," Alysia said, sounding slightly bored. "I can't wait to be done and finally go to college."
She could tell that her grandmother didn't want to dwell on this topic for too long. Alysia knew that the woman who had practically raised her was worried that the same thing that happened to her daughter would happen to Alysia too; getting pregnant while in college, being dumped by the father and having to drop out and make it on her own with a child on the way and no college degree.
In order not to trouble her more with it, she decided to let it drop.
"Lissy?" Penny piped up.
"Yeah?" Alysia glanced down at the little girl before lifting her up to help her sit down on the bench.
"Are you going to play catch with me later?"
"Sure, baby," she smiled before serving the food on the three plates and digging in.
****************
"Ok, Penny, time for bed!" Alysia's grandmother said after dinner that night as they were gathered around the kitchen table.
Alysia accompanied her little sister upstairs as she always did and helped her get ready. Afterwards she carried her to the window to "say goodnight to the moon" as they always did and Penny leaned her head against Alysias shoulder and waved before she said in her high voice "Goodnight, moon, sleep well!"
Finally, Alysia layed the little girl into the bed.
"Which book do you want me to read for you today?" Alysia asked Penny after tucking the blanket around her.
"The fairytale about the poor girl that becomes a princess," Penny replied determindedly, clapping her little hands together in exitement.
"Cinderella?"
"Yeah!"
As Alysia read to her little sister, Penny played with her sisters long black hair as she listened and looked with childish exitement onto the pictures in the book.
The next part of their nightly routine consisted of Alysia drawing symbols with her finger onto Pennys back and the little girl having to guess what it was.
Alysia drew a circle, a star, a tree and a heart before getting up and kissing her little sister on the cheek.
"Goodnight, Penny!"
"Goodnight, Aly, I love you!" the little girl piped up. Alysia smiled, touched.
"I love you, too," she whispered before leaving the room.
After having taken her beloved baby sister to bed, Alysia grabbed her school things and took a seat in the living room beside her grandmother, who was reading a book filled with old recipes in the light of the small lamp positioned next to the sofa.
Sitting beside each other in comfortable silence, Alysia and her Nana each focused on their own things while enjoying the quiet company of the other. Her grandmother had never been one to talk much but nevertheless, Alysia knew that she thoroughly enjoyed spending their silent evenings together like now.
It wasn't like Alysia didn't enjoy them.
Halfway through her English homework, Alysia remembered the moment in the kitchen earlier when she'd seen her grandmother flinch.
"Nana, is it your back again?"
Serafine Jenkins lifted her gaze from the recipe she was currently studying to look at her granddaughter with the exact bright blue eyes Penny had, except that hers had long since lost the naive, wide eyed expression the little girl's held.
"It's ok, honey, don't worry. I'm just getting old," she explained and shrugged before turning back to her reading.
"Nana, this has happened a couple of times now, you should go see a doc-"
"I won't see a doctor, Alysia. It's not all that bad and I'm a grown-up woman. I can handle this..."
As always, when Alysia tried addressing the matter of Serafine's health, her grandmother immediately put her guard up and blocked any attempts at reasonable discussing.
"Alright, sorry I brought it up. Just take care of yourself, ok?" Alysia said and, with a defeated sigh, turned back to her homework.
About half an hour later, Alysia's Nana stood up, stretched carefully and positioned her holy possession of ancient cooking recipes underneath her armchair, before walking over to her granddaughter, kissing her on the cheek and wishing her a good night.
"Love you, nana!"
"You, too, honey!"
*****************
The night after this was a great "open-air"-party practically everyone from school attended.
Like most parties for underage people it took place in a parc that wasn't very popular with the older citizens and only seldomly patrolled by cops, close to a forest so that - in case of an emergency - the teenagers could flee into the near-by woods.
Somebody had put up some speakers around a make-shift dancefloor, some plastic chairs were distributed around them and there were even some guys selling booze by the edge of the forest from a plastic table with a sign that said "bar".
Since it was a friday night and they'd planned to do something together, Shelbey and Alysia were to be found, too, but neither of them looked particularly amused.
"I'm telling you, I still can't believe it! How can Patricia freaking Perkins get away with absolutely ANYTHING she does?" An angry Shelby demanded.
"I honestly don't know. All I do know is that what she pulled off there is seriously low..." Alysia stated calmly.
She never, ever got worked up over something concerning these people so she wasn't furious like Shelbey but the way she was looking at Patricia at the moment just showed pure and honest disgust. She had no respect for that girl whatsoever.
"Wanna dance?" Shelbey asked grumpily after a minute of silence. Alysia nodded and went onto the dance floor with her friend. No matter if she seemed the type or not, she enjoyed dancing like this and singing along with the music from the speakers and the crowd, even if it wasn't the kind of music she usually listened to.
Dancing was her favourite part of parties and it was mostly the reason she went in the first place . There was something about the loud music and the thumping bass that made it so easy to forget about all of your worries and just...let go.
"Hey, pretty ladies..." Someone slurred next to the two friends who were smiling at each other as they moved to the beat. Alysia and Shelbey turned around to see who was so charmingly interrupting them.
It was an obviously drunk boy with shaggy light blonde hair and a bottle of beer in his hand. He was swaying rhythmically to the beat next to them and staring at them with a seemingly blurry vision in the way only intoxicated people do.
"You know what? You are both so beautiful. Do you wanna go somewhere more private?" he slurred.
Reaching out his hand, he tried to grab the girls both around their waist but somehow placed his hands awfully close to their backsides.
"You know what? You can take your crappy pickup lines and shove them up your ass," Alysia replied, her voice even but cold, and gave him a look that made him immediately back off and retreat to his group of friends.
"Oh, what a jerk!" Shelbey sighed when the beats of "I'm sexy and I know it" started to play.
The girls continued dancing until Shelbey seemed to spot something right over Alysia's shoulder and her expression became one of utter loathing.
"Oh, that is just disgusting!"
Alysia, although already suspecting who her friend was referring to, turned around. She had been right.
Of course, it was the clique Patricia and Tyler were part of who had once again gotten Shelbey's full attention. Admittedly, what Patricia and Tyler were doing there in the middle of the dance floor for everyone to see was more of dry humping than dancing, but Alysia didn't see how it concerned Shelbey or her exactly what Tyler and Trish were doing on the dance floor.
"Sometimes I don't get you, Shelb. Why are you getting so obsessed over them? Just ignore them like I do."
"I can't. It's just not fair how they are treated like royalty even though they have done nothing to deserve that status. They get away with everything, they do anything they want without consequences and no matter what they do, everyone just runs after them like puppies. They mob people cruelly and still these people kiss their asses. It just doesn't seem fair," Shelbey ranted.
"Sure, but Tricia has been leaving you alone for quite some time so it doesn't concern you anymore..."
"But it does! I have to look at these idiots-" Shelbey not so subtly nodded her head towards the group "-all the time."
"Just ignore it, Shelb!"
"I can't! I'm not like you. Things like that just get under my skin."
"I bet I can also get under your skin," a voice snarled from behind them.
The best friends turned around just to see a boy from their year suggestively wiggling his eyebrows at them. Both of the girls merely stared at him, unbelievingly. He wanted for a few seconds before walking off, muttering "prudes" under his breath.
"Ever since people think you slept with Brandon everyone here seems to think you're a total slut like they did back when we were 14," Shelbey stated, looking at the boys retreating figure with mere disgust.
Alysia shrugged neutrally. In fact, she really did not care anymore that everyone seemed to consider her to be a slut - there was a time when she had, and that had been pure misery so she'd eventually developed the cool indifference she had now. She knew that she wasn't a slut and that was all that mattered. It didn't matter to her what people thought. It wasn't like you could change it. Or like it mattered because in just one year she'd be out of here and hopefully she wouldn't have to see those people ever again.
Just when boys came on to her like this she sometimes wished she didn't have the reputation she had because it just got majorly annoying.
The only people whose opinion mattered to her she made sure not to disappoint.
"Shelb, I'm just quickly gonna go and call Nana to make sure everything's alright," she said before walking off towards the forest nearby.
When she'd gotten far enough away from the party to only hear the music as a faint background noise, she dialed her home number and waited.
10 minutes later, Alysia made her way back to the party to dance some more. She was relieved everything was going fine at home, not that she'd really expected anything else.
"Hey, there!" Someone said in the darkness.
She jumped inwardly but turned around with her eyebrows raised to see a figure leaning against a tree nearby.
"Hey!" She replied.
A short silence engulfed the two of them.
"What is it, Connon?" She asked.
A low chuckle was audible as Tyler pushed himself away from the tree and casually strolled towards Alysia.
"Why so rude?" He asked when he stopped closely in front of her.
"Why so friendly?" She asked back.
Another low chuckle.
Once again, she wondered why he was even talking to her and why he seemed to find everything she was saying somehow amusing.
Again, there was a brief pause where none of them said anything and they merely stared at the parts of the other that they could make out in the darkness.
Now that she was a bit closer to him she had an explanation for his amusement; the air around him smelled faintly of weed and she was sure his pupils looked blown.
Alysia didn't particularly enjoy having to look up at Tyler as much as she did so she took a step back.
He smirked, clearly suspecting she was a little scared of him.
"Just wanted to let you know that I had...quite the good time with you the other night..."
Now that she paid attention to it, his voice sounded the tiniest bit slurred.
Alysia raised an eyebrow, not knowing where he was going with this.
"And I seem to recall you enjoying it, too," he continued.
Alysia remained silent.
"I just wanted to make sure you didn't tell anyone about this...thing we have going."
She didn't even realize he'd used the present tense. All she thought was that this was a surprise, after all. If anyone at school actually knew about their one night stand and how Tyler Connon was talking to her, they'd all be beyond shocked. Or disgusted...
In any way, Tyler didn't really seem to want to find out how his friends and other people would react.
"Trust me, it is not my interest to have anyone find out that I had sex with you, either," Alysia replied bluntly.
"So in that case: I was just wondering if...you were willing to...do this again?" He then asked suddenly, managing to take Alysia completely by surprise - something that didn't happen all too often.
She stared up at his dangerously close face seeing as he'd stepped closer again and she refused to back up further. His features were only illuminated by the faint moonlight coming through the trees. She raised her eyebrows.
"I want to have fun, you want to have fun. We both know we enjoyed last weekend and at least with you I know you won't get attached or anything like...some others," he explained.
"Trust me, I wouldn't. And..." She started, trying to let him know that she didn't usually sleep with a guy twice as it only led to a whole load of bullshit that she didn't feel like going through.
But Tyler cut her off by just pressing his full lips to hers.
Jerking away from him, Alysia took another step back.
"No, no, no. Never twice with the same guy," she shrugged by way of explanation and started walking away.
"So you are after all getting attached?" His voice called after her as he caught up with her.
"Nope," she said, popping the p.
"So, where's the prob..." He was cut off by a high, familiar girly giggle surprisingly close that made Alysia roll her eyes.
Before she knew it, Tyler had grabbed her around the waist and pulled her behind a tree, all the while giving her a broad grin.
Alysia felt a familiar shocked panic rise in her chest at what he was doing and escaped as quickly as she possibly could, her heart racing even though his hands were perfectly gentle and he wasn't using much force at all.
"Never, ever do that again!" Alysia hissed and roughly pushed against his chest because she hated being grabbed like this, especially in the dark when she didn't expect it (not that she was gonna tell him the reason for that).
"Ok, ok, geez, chill, will you?" He muttered quietly, clearly taken by surprise by her harshness, especially considering, Alysia mused, that he wasn't used to this kind of reaction from girls.
She hated that she'd reacted so impulsively, as that showed a sign of loss of control and sometimes even raised questions, but she couldn't help it in situations like that. Being touched unexpectedly in a way that put someone else "in charge" was something she couldn't tolerate for long without a proper panic attack following it.
As they were waiting for Trish to disappear so they could go back to the party without being seen or questioned by the girl, Tyler came closer, almost trapping Alysia against the tree.
She felt a nudge of fear inside and fought hard to keep it in check but it was useless. Her arms were already covered in goosebumps and it was all she could do not to scream and run. Memories came flooding to the surface, threatening to overwhelm her, her throat tightening dangerously. Her heart started to race and her breathing suddenly came out in short, shallow gasps.
Before she could get a serious panic attack she pushed Tyler aside and hastily stepped away from the tree.
"Look, I just think we could have some fun..." He trailed off, apparently not having noticed the panic behind Alysia's reaction, which she blamed mostly on the weed he'd smoked and his being a guy. It took her a few breaths to calm down, then she stepped closer to him again, wanting to show him that she wasn't easily intimitated contrary to what he might now think.
"Fun?" she asked and ran a hand softly down his chest, determined to show that he didn't scare her and she wasn't getting attached, trying to prove to herself that she was in control and that she wasn't afraid. As he kissed her again, Alysia gave in because it felt good that he was gentle, because she didn't want to say no now and because she knew from experience that what was undoubtedly going to follow would be well worth her while.
Screw that one-time-rule, she thought, it wasn't like any of them was ever going to get attached.
He was, after all,extraordinarily good in bed. Practice made perfect, she supposed. And so she kissed him back and wrapped her arms tightly around his neck.
*****
Soooo, now that you got a closer look at Alysia, what do you think of her? What is her dark secret?
And why is Tyler so keen on hooking up with her again?
All these questions will be answered only if you keep reading...;)
Please, please, please leave me a comment, it would really make my day!
If you haven't yet, please check out the tumblr in the external link!
Have a great day!
XOXO
Layla
P.S.: The song is Never grow up by Taylor Swift in honor of little Penny.