Chapter 34 of MSL
~Amber's POV~
"Promise you'll come by for the rankings?" Kaden asked Echo for about the hundredth time.
"Yes she does." I groaned pulling him out the door.
"Yeah, I'll see you there." Echo smiled glancing at me winking quickly.
Nodding letting her know I had received her sign I dragged Kaden the rest of the way out the door and down to the sidewalk.
"Ya' know what? I'm proud of you two. You didn't do anything for my birthday. You didn't even sing to me at lunch or decorate you locker which I thought for sure you were going to." Kaden laughed.
"Yeah I know, I wanted to but Echo didn't want to make you mad." I sighed playing along like we had totally forgotten about his birthday.
"I wouldn't have gotten mad. I just didn't want to be a burden."
"Oh right." I laughed as he opened the school door for me.
Kaden thought me, Tyler, Echo, and him were getting together to watch movies and sleepover at Echo's house after the art show. But boy, was he in for a surprise.
"Thank you" I nodded walking inside.
I followed him into the art room to grab our painting and to go set it up in the lunchroom.
"Kaden, Amber. So glad to see you two here." The teacher said walking past us checking our names off her clipboard.
Kaden seemed a bit nervous looking around at all the other entries.
It wasn't required that you enter the contest. Just that you painted something for the contest. Which didn't make a whole lot of sense to me, but you got thirty extra credit points for entering and I felt pretty good about mine and Kaden's painting.
"Nervous?" I asked.
"A little. I mean there are a lot of really good entries. Maybe this wasn't a very good idea." he said a little on edge.
"Don't worry about it." I smiled. I couldn't figure out why he was so antsy but then again... I couldn't ever really figure out anything about him.
"Students? If I could have you attention I think we are about to start with this years fall art show." Mrs. Webster; our principal said over the loud speaker.
The art teacher walked up next. "The judges will be walking around taking down their scores, and asking some questions about your piece. The winners will be announced at the end. First place prize is two free tickets to Lagoon (If you don't know what Lagoon is, it's an amusement park) per person and their art will be hung in the main entry way for the rest of the year. Second place's art will be hung in the library and receive a $15 gift certificate to the Piggy Bank (best ice cream place ever), and third place's art will also be hung in the library and a $10 gift certificate to the Piggy Bank.
"The judges are making their way around the gym please be patient as they look at everyone's art and the winners will be announced around 6 o'clock." She finished turning off the mic and setting it down.
There were three judges. Two male one female. They were judging us on color and clarity, originality, and presentation.
Our colors went perfectly together, and I guess it was pretty original for a copy. If you asked me we had this one all wrapped up.
"That one looks tough." Kaden said pointing the the older male judge, who was looking at a girls comic book style painting just across the room.
"Yeah, but we got this." I said confidently.
"Yeah, I still don't understand why your so sure about us winning."
"Because look at this painting we have here. Most of the people here did self portraits and are uneven, their not very easy on the eyes." I said bluntly.
"Amber," Kaden laughed shaking his head. "I can't say I don't agree but. Still sometimes that doesn't matter to the judges, they are looking for one thing and no one knows what that is because... We'll the judges don't even know."
"Whatever, you just have to be positive." I smiled.
"I've learned not to get my hopes to high. Because most the time it doesn't work out in my favor." He said glancing at me and smiling out of the corner of his mouth.
Damn he was cute.
"Hello kids." the first judge greeted us with a smile. She was a younger lady, about twenty three maybe? Long brown hair braided down her shoulder. She was wearing a red shirt with a black and white flowered skirt.
"Hi." I smiled back.
"Okay, so I have a few questions to ask you about your painting here." She said flipping to a clean score sheet on her pink clipboard. "First, what was the inspiration behind your piece?"
I looked at Kaden as if begging him to answer. "Well, I wanted to do something different, but classic. No one else was doing anything like this and I have always loved Van Gogh's Starry Night painting so I decided to take my own spin on it." He explained.
"And what is your favorite kind of art?"
Kaden looked at me and smiled as if telling me this one was mine. God I hate art. What did this question even have to do with anything? I just like drawing and a class I can listen to my iPod in.
"I like Realism art." I smiled praying I got the name right.
"Okay, and your names?"
"I'm Kaden Albrecht, she's Echo- I mean Amber Lovely sorry." he stumbled over his words and scratched the back of his head smiling at me.
"Wow..." I laughed as the lady walked away.
The other two judges had came and talked to us and it was finally time for the winners to be announced.
"I can't believe Echo didn't show up after all that begging." Kaden laughed walking over to the stage taking a seat with everyone else.
"Yeah but honestly, she probably lost track of time." I said trying to make Echo sound better.
"Yeah probably." he nodded.
"Okay students. We would like to thank everyone for entering this years art show. It was an amazing show and you all did wonderful. It was a hard decision but it had to be done. And the winner is..."
Looking up at Kaden he was as calm as can be while I was freaking out. Waiting for them to call our names I couldn't sit still. Tapping my heel against the floor I was dying with anticipation.
As she opened up that little white envelope my heart was racing.
"Kaden Albrecht and Amber Lovely" I whispered to myself.
"Kaden Albrecht and Amber Lovely's painting of the Starry Night!" The teacher announced us in first place.
Jumping to my feet I looked at Kaden as if to say I told you so, but he just smiled a huge childish smile.
"I told you!" I shrieked.
"Yes, you did." He nodded.
"Oh, and prizes will be awarded in the front office." The teacher added.
I didn't care about who won second and third I just want our tickets to Lagoon so we could leave.
"Come on let's go." I said tugging at his arm.
"Okay." he nodded following me out of the gym.
We walked into the front office and collected our free Lagoon tickets and then made our way down to Echo's house.
"Oh crap, I forgot my bag at home. Mind if we run and go get it?" I asked him turning towards to my house, not giving him much option.
"Sure why not." he nodded still smiling.
"I still can't believe we won."
"Yeah I know huh, but you never doubted us from the start." he added as we walked up to my house.
~Kaden's POV~
Walking in front of Amber I swung open her front door for her only to open it into a ranging high school party in full force.
"Surprise." Echo smiled pulling me into a hug at the front door.
"What is this?" I asked. "I said no parties."
"Yeah, we didn't really care." Amber added.
"Well thank you." I smiled leaving my arm around Echo "I thought you might do something like this, but I didn't think you would."
"Well we did. And almost everyone from school is here. I was gonna do the whole stupid surprise thing... but as you can see it didn't work." She smiled.
"It's fine, thank you babe." I smiled kissing the side of her forehead.
"So how was the art show? I really, really wanted to come but Tyler wouldn't let me leave him alone." She said narrowing her eyes at him.
"It's fine. Don't worry about it."
"Kaden... tell her how it went." Amber nudged me.
"Oh, it wan't very cool. But we did win first place." I smiled.
Echo pulled me into a tighter hug and brushed her lips to mine. "That is awesome, I'm so proud of you two."
"Thank you." Amber said flipping her hair.
A few hours into this party and Brecken and Katie had shown up with the surprise guest Nicole, who came down for our birthday. Apparently this party was her idea because her birthday would not go uncelebrated.
Brecken had been drinking and so had Tyler, both of them were drunk off their minds and hanging all over Katie and Amber. I had, had a few drinks myself but nothing to bad and Echo was either really turned on or incredibly tired but she was a little drunk as well and kept asking me to come to bed.
"Babe, please," She said sitting down on my lap with her arms around my neck. "I want you." She whispered in my ear.
I smiled and kissed her nose gently. "In a minute."
"No. Now." She demanded sweetly. "Let's go."
She was now dragging me out the door and through the few kids on the lawn. "Where are you going?" Amber asked running after us.
"I'm not really sure." I admitted.
I mean I guess I had a pretty good idea but with Echo leading... We could be going anywhere really.
"Okay well you two have fun." Tyler nodded shooing us away.
Echo took that and ran with it. Literally... running down the street we made it all the way to her house.
She ran through the front door and all the way to her room.
"Hurry!" She screamed diving into the sheets.
"What are we doing?" I laughed.
"It's so hot." She said emerging out of the sheets. She was missing her shirt and sat up in her neon green lace bra and dark American Eagle skinny jeans. "Come on babe." She pouted.
Climbing into the mess of sheets with her I was then tackled by her skinny arms as she laid on top of me slipping her freezing cold delicate hands up my shirt. Causing me to shiver slightly.
"I love you." She whispered into my ear.
"I love you too babe."
Letting her hands do most of the talking they explored up and down my torso and rubbed my jeans.
She must have gotten board or just wanting more when she gripped the rim of my shirt and pulled it over my head and began kissing down my neck.
"I want you." She breathed against my skin.
Not sure of what I wanted I just laid there. I wanted her, but part of me didn't want to hurt her like my father had hurt me.
But, this was nothing like that. I just had to keep telling myself that.
While deep in thought I hand't noticed Echo had was undoing my belt. Great... no backing out now...
"Kaden." She said sitting up.
"Yeah?" I asked a little uneasy.
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah. For the most part." I sighed.
"You're shaking like crazy." she pointed out.
Not realizing it but I was shaking. Probably because of how cold it was and Echo had the ceiling fan on full blast.
"Just cold." I nodded.
She laid down on me resting her forehead on mine and smiled. "I can fix that."
"Can you?" I asked pressing my lips to hers.
She bit her bottom lip and nodded. I could tell she was sobering up a little. Or maybe she was never really drunk... maybe she was just acting...
"Okay." I smiled.
She started kissing me and deepening it quickly. Her hand was busy taking off my pants while the other one was tangled in my hair.
Helping her slip off my jeans I tugged on hers as well. She moaned softly into my neck as my knee gently nudged her crotch. She gripped my shoulder as her hand wondered down my chest hitting my boxers and her hand slipped in.
But just as she took me in her hand the door swung open which in return ripped her hand away.
"Brecken? What are you doing here?" Echo shot up.
"I found them!" he yelled leading someone else in the room.
"We've been looking all over for you guys." Tyler laughed sitting down on the bed.
"Yeah, you've been gone for so long. We've missed you guys." Brecken said holding onto the foot board for stability.
"We'll you found us. You can leave now." Echo said pushing Tyler's back in an attempted to get him off.
"Hey, hey, we're all be friends here." He snapped.
"No, not right now." Echo said irritated.
"Thanks to Brecken, I thought I would never see you again buddy." Tyler said patting my back.
"Yeah, thanks Brecken. You're a life savor." Echo roller her eyes crashing to the bed and rolling over. "Goodnight."
"Come on guys." I said jumping out of bed I put both my arms around them.
Leading them out the front door as if I was going to follow them I quickly shut the door before they even realized what was happening and locked it.
Climbing back in bed with Echo, I wrapped my arm around her stomach, twisting my fingers in hers and tried to fall asleep.
*** does this chapter suck... yes... the next chapter will be SOOOOOOO SUPER GOOD :3 huge surprise :D You're gonna love it!!! And best part is... it might be up tonight because... I can't sleep... haha I hope this doesn't suck as bad as I think it does...