"Hazel." The older girl greeted brusquely as I boarded the passenger seat of her car. It smelt strongly of her, but also of Marley, the various materials of the Night School, cleaning spray, and a little bit of Grace, too.
"Micha." I replied with the same emotionless tone. Boredly, I crossed the seatbelt over my chest and clicked it into its port.
Shrugging, Micha pulled out of my driveway and pressed a few buttons on the dashboard before quiet music began playing. She murmured the lyrics as she drove. I surveyed her car, having nothing better to do with myself. I got bored with it very quickly. So I challenged myself to study Micha without letting her know what I was doing.
She had a small burn on her arm, probably from her work at the N.S. (I had heard about her having a mishap from Megan as we'd waited for her to pick me up). There were a few scrapes on her biceps and neck, along with some faded bruises dotted all over her skin. I could easily guess what had caused them.
"Do I have anything interesting on my face there, Zel?" Micha kept her eyes forward but they hardened a little more.
"Your girlfriend was pretty rough with you, no?" I partially scowled, partially smirked. Micha licked her lips, a slight crease forming on her brow as her lips thinned.
"Yes." She closed the topic very quickly. "If you don't mind, my sex life isn't really your business, and I'd rather you not talk about it." She snapped with sudden sharpness. I snorted with indignation at her temperamental attitude.
"Alright. Although I hardly see why you're getting so worked up over it."
"Because I love my girlfriend and you're trying to make the fact that we had sex seem comical. It wasn't. Don't treat it that way." She sighed exasperatedly at me.
"Okay." I stated just to get her off my back. I didn't understand people. This was why I preferred to keep my business my own. That and everything else. It also made me miss Grace again. She was in love with me yet she had no problem with my teasing her about her passing out or the comicality of the moment. She was a happy girl. Micha was too much like me for my liking. Too generic.
"We're here." The girl grumbled as she parked at a small building off an intersected dotted with local shops. The store we were closest to had huge glass windows and a beautiful array of colorful flowers in little shelf-like structures out in front.
"Look," the older girl abruptly locked the doors, sighing and leaning her head back. Her head rolled a little to set her stony eyes dead onto mine. Micha had strange eyes for our race. "I want to start clean with you. Your soulmate is practically joined by the hip to the girl I'm in love with, so I don't think that conflict between us is good. Especially when I barely know why you have such animosity for me in the first place." Her eyes twitched around my expression to trace subtle behavioral changes.
"I'd really prefer you not talk about her." I cringed.
"Marley? Grace? Why?" She frowned.
"No. The other one. Her. You know why I don't like you. Please don't talk about her." I snapped without a care for my shortness. I knew Micha could handle my fire. And she did.
"My soulmate." The older girl pursed her lips and furrowed her eyebrows distastefully.
"Yes."
"I am going to respect your desire to not talk about her now because I can see that there is something I'm not aware of. However, I do intend to have a full conversation with you about her at some point once you'd be comfortable. For now, I will let it go." She stated in a way that mirrored the apathetic tone of analysis I often used.
"Thank you." I replied despite myself. God, I guess the brunette human really had begun to turn me soft. Not that it was good or bad of her. But she had done it.
"Do you honestly think you have feelings for Grace?" She asked abruptly.
"Undoubtedly." I was proud of the confidence and ease of the statement. It made me warm to think that if Grace had heard me, she'd've smiled at the confession.
"That's good because you do." She shrugged, leaving her car and me in a confused but not really bothered mindset.
I, sighing at the antics of the older girl, got out of her car and followed her to the doors of the shop, where she was holding the door open for me and casually checking her phone with this loving smile written across her face. I instantly knew she was texting Marley, and I wondered if I was the same way when I texted Grace. I did feel my lips tug into a small smile at the thought of her. Her scent. Her eyes. Her body. I craved her.
"Jesus, Hazel, control yourself." Micha snickered rather rudely, shorting and cringing. I frowned at her and ignored the remark. She stuffed her phone back in her pocket just as I was taking mine out. I opened up messages and went into my messages with Grace, thumbs poised but still because I had literally no idea what to say to her. I wanted to call her name just to hear her- er, read her voice.
Me: Grace?
"Hazel, what do you want?" Micha stated boredly. "Wait, let me guess." She leaned in close to me, her face right above my shoulder, making me fear she'd invade my space further, making me recoil. "Tea?" She ignored my discontentment with her closeness, shrugging.
"Chai latte." I muttered, eyes flickering to my phone in anticipation for Grace's reply.
Grace: Hey :) What's up?
My heart skipped a beat (or few) when I read the message she'd sent me. How did something so simple make me want to run to her and bring her impossibly close to me?
Me: Out with Micha... I'd rather be with you. I miss you.
Grace: Me too, Zel. I'll see you tomorrow though, right? School?
Me: Of course, babe.
I decided I'd leave the pet name because she tended to do the same to me, so I was interested in her potential reaction to my saying it.
Grace: Zel, omg you're so cute <3 can I um like face time you later? I just miss you like you wouldn't belive...
Grace: **Believe
Grace: Ugh I gtg Marley's annoying me... Ily, K? ttyl?
Hazel: Translation?
Grace: Lol, I love you, baby. I'll talk to you later, K?
Me: Okay
I almost told her I loved her, just out of habit because it's what I did when Megan told me she loved me. But I don't think I was in love with her, or if I was, I didn't know it, and I wanted to know it before I said anything. I did, however, know I missed her. I missed everything. I missed the sweetness of her lips, the divine flavor of her skin, how soft she was, how she sounded when she laughed or moaned.
"Hazel, stop it." Micha snorted again. "Is she sending you nudes or something?" She added with a cringe as she looked at the cashier, placing our order.
"W-what?" I gulped, shaking the instantaneous fantasy out of my head. "No."
"Hm." Micha simply shrugged like it didn't bother her.
"Names?" The spindly teenage boy behind the counter leaned forward, eyeing Micha and I. Humans. Only Grace was allowed to look at me like he was.
"Micha. Hazel." Micha gestured to each of us.
"Hot girl gray eyes, hot girl blue eyes." He flirted.
"Excuse m-" I was this close to punching the idiot, but found Micha's arms around my waist.
"Um, what? No one talks to me or my girlfriend like that." Micha gave the boy a glare so realistically jealous I was actually convinced, for a moment, that there was material behind it.
"What? Damn." He smirked, "still-"
"I will beat your pathetic ass to a pulp in three seconds if you do not leave us alone." I snapped. Micha wrapped her arms around my waist and pulled me against her, wary of my injuries.
"I'd back off if I were you." Micha put it, putting her chin on my shoulder.
"O-okay." The boy made a beeline for whatever he was supposed to be doing, and I immediately pried Micha off me.
"What was that?" I narrowed my eyes at her skeptically.
"It got rid of him, didn't it? God, Zel, I didn't enjoy it any more than you did." She rolled her eyes, throwing a quick 'thank you' to the person handing us our drinks.
"I'm sure there are plenty of other ways to divert people, why that?" I scowled at her again.
"Oh no, she caught me! I'm secretly in love with the almighty Hazel Sinclair!" Micha put her hands up wile she was actually surprised, a mocking look on her face. "For fuck's sake, it's a test of character. If you actually hated me, you'd've jumped or some shit. You just don't like me on your own conscious accord." She sighed. "I could also do this," she suddenly pulled me closer by my waist, making me stiffen, "and know that again, you do not have an instinct against me, which would show a deep seated unconscious animosity. Your lack of instantaneous rejection tells me that you make a conscious effort to actively express contempt." She sat at a two person table, taking a sip of her drink. "The coffee here is utter crap. Your plant juice any better?" She smirked slightly, knowing she had the upper hand in our silent struggle to get our ideas through the other's head.
"How do you do that so well?" I squinted at the older girl, trying to figure her out like she figured out everyone else.
"Tells, reactions, physical signs of emotion or nerve, blah and other boring stuff." She shrugged, "probably a combination of first social understand and second logic."
"Physical signs like what? How do you understand emotion from physical behavior?" I clasped my hands tightly around my hot drink, ignoring the slight burning sensation.
"It varies from person to person but yes. I like to think of a lot of emotions as having physical gold standards and symptoms."
"So if you knew what you were physically experiencing, you'd know the emotion causing it?"
"Hazel, Hazel, Hazel," she smirked with this annoying knowingness in the gleam of her eyes and the twist in her lip, "if you want to know what I think about your feelings for Grace, it's obvious that you definitely adore her. Maybe not love her, maybe, because that one's hard to tell, but you definitely have a big something good for her."
"What... What does love feel like?" I asked tentatively, looking at my hands with shame at the fact I needed help from her.
"It lacks algorithm. Very largely composed of oxymoronic pieces. Honestly, I can't define it. I don't think you'll know it when you're in love. But you'll feel love. Mane just not by that name or meaning."
"What?" I blinked, lazily staring up at her. You'd think it would be easy for her to tell me something because she thought like me but no. Ugh. This whole love thing sounds like a lot of unnecessary drama and complications.
"Don't give me that look. I'm telling you all I can without making unrealistic or overcomplicated notions. Love is just something that happens. It's circular. It's linear. It's algorithmic. It's fanciful. It's something you feel that doesn't have verbal translation or reason." Oddly, her eyes sort of glazed over and slowly narrowed down to her coffee, this small but heavy smile parting her lips like she had won an award no one else knew about. Maybe she had. Maybe that was love I saw on her. Still, I didn't like the vague nature of her explanation or the probability of misunderstanding I risked in taking her face to fact and using it as a basis for analysis. I was not Micha, and according to her, we would not love the same (but we also would?).
"How do you know you love her?" I don't know why I neglected Marley's name. But I did. And I wasn't about to specify.
"I know... Because I love her." She stated firmly, looking up at me with a spirited soul in her eyes. "And that means everything and nothing at all. Whether it be to me or to anyone." She smiled again, straight through me. "Human nature (our nature) is not algorithmic, Hazel. Especially in romantic affairs. I advise you to take that to heart and try a different approach to your feelings."
"Oh." I nodded even though I was actually confused to the point where I considered disregarding the older girl's words completely.
"I wouldn't expect anyone- even you- to understand something so primal and strange just in the span of a few words. More or less, I suppose... Anyway, my girlfriend has a date to drag me to, so let's get going." She stated, getting to her feet.