Chapter Four
In Between Curiosity and Obtrusion
The next morning, when I step out of the house to walk to school, I'm surprised to see a car parked in front. The window rolls down and Kurtis pops his head out of it, grinning at me.
This isn't part of my usual morning routine and since I'm already skipping the running part of it, for a second I actually hesitate.
Kurtis knows this—knows me. "No, no, none of this OCD crap," he shakes his head and his hands at me—which he has also popping out, like half of his body is sticking out of that window. "We took a detour getting here, so you're coming with us, even if that means I have to swing you over my shoulder and drag you to the car," he warns me. I glare at him and his smile turns deadly sweet. "Oh, hey, hi Mrs. Franklin." I turn around and what do you know, my mom is now standing there. "Just came by to drive Dallas to school!"
"That's very nice of you boys." She fixes her attention on me. "Dallas, honey, you forgot your coat." She hands me the coat she bought me, the kind of thing that I'd bring to an expedition to Antarctica.
"Mom, it's like 64 degrees outside. I don't need a coat," I whine. I can hear Kurtis chuckling behind me. He finds my mother's obsession with overdressing me hilarious. I find it annoying but that's my prerogative.
"Fine, but you're taking your scarf," she says, handing me one of the many tacky Infinity scarves she's gotten me—the lucky winner today is a washed-off purple, sorta stained with grey, trimmed with tiny black pom-poms, and some of the pom-poms actually have little googly eye stuck on them. I have no idea where my mom buys these scarves, but they're often disturbing.
"Sure Mom. Thanks Mom," I answer, snatching the piece of fabric out of her hands and limp my way to the car.
"You're welcome. Have a good day at school honey," she calls back behind me.
I smile and wave at her, "Bye Mom!"
The second I shut the door of the car behind me, and Kurtis has closed his window, he bursts laughing, pointing at me. "I'm revoking your best friend status," I inform him, pouting.
"Good morning Dallas," Avery greets me, Kurtis's brother, and the owner of this car.
"Good morning Avery." I reply, smiling a little. "I didn't know you were back in town."
Avery is one year older than my sister, making him twenty-two years old. He moved to New York right out of High School. Part of my acute sense of deduction thinks he left so far away because my sister got knocked up and he liked her and it was painful seeing her pregnant with someone else's baby (and suddenly I'm thinking about Love, Rosie). Even if I grew up with Avery and I'm mostly comfortable with him, I'm unable to look in his eyes the way I look in Kurtis's. It's mostly because it feels like he's reading everything about you when he looks in your eyes. That was always a gift of is, his ability to just know how you felt. And it's also a little bit because his eyes are clear blue and it's a very destabilizing contrast with his black skin. With recessive genes, you wouldn't think someone with black skin could have anything else than brown eyes, but apparently it's possible. Kurtis told me that he met a guy once at a summer camp that was black and had natural red hair, so hey, anything is possible at this point.
"I'm back for our mom's birthday," he explained, looking at me through the rear-view mirror.
I frown. "Isn't it in like, two weeks?"
He fixes his eyes back on the road. "Hey, nothing wrong with spending some quality time with the family."
I pout at that thought. "I can't agree on that. Quality time with my family has only left me with a wounded foot."
Kurtis keeps laughing at me. "That has nothing to do with quality family time and everything to do with you being OCD and unable to deal with a situation that doesn't fit into your meticulously planned schedule."
What's he on about? "I slipped on a toy in the stairs," I remind him.
"Yeah, because your brain couldn't register that the state of the stairs at your house could ever change since it isn't in your planning."
"WHO LEAVES HOT RODS IN THE STRAIRS?!"
Both boys in the front of the car are laughing at my outburst. "Little boys that play with Hot Rods?" Kurtis offers.
I kick the back of his seat, and the rest of the car ride is pretty much silent except for the snickers coming from the two idiots. I never had to wonder what it would be like to have brothers, growing up with these two.
When Avery parks the car in front of the school, I would have loved to just stomp out of it and sprint away, so I wouldn't have to deal with the incessant teasing, but of course, I'm still disabled. Honestly, when my foot heals, I'll never take it for granted, ever again.
Kurtis walks with me to my locker and keeps his thoughts to himself, though he does chuckle from now and then. I glare at him everytime he does. But there's less frustration in my gaze because I have other things to worry about, well, thing, well, actually, person—Austin von Thalberg.
I'm worried that he'll try to talk with me again. I'm worried he'll look my way. Heck I'm worried we're breathing the same air right now, that I might be breathing oxygen that Austin has breathed out, because we don't just breathe out carbon dioxide. This worrying definitely doesn't fit into my normal routine and I don't like it.
But Austin doesn't show up all morning long. I see some of the Fantastic Four, but never the Thing.
It feels good. I can actually breathe when I walk in the cafeteria, Kurtis chatting about some particularly interesting chapter he read last night about the proper way to deal with feces around the camp.
Kurtis is reading the Bible in Latin.
Kurtis is weird.
His goal is to read all canonical religious works to really make is mind up about organized religion. I find this logical, I just don't understand the part where it has to be in Latin.
Kurtis is weird.
They serve hot chicken sandwiches and fries at the cafeteria. It's not my favourite meal, but I hate the hassle of making and bringing my own lunch every morning, so I suffer through the sometimes questionable cafeteria food. It's not so much that it's disgusting, most of the time it's pretty okay, but it's mostly that you just know, no part of those mashed potatoes were ever actual potatoes.
Kurtis and I sit down at our usual table and I take out Fangirl. Here's the thing; since I started to read it last night, I only had time to go through barely half of the book. And I have this weird thing where, if I start a book, I need to finish reading it. I can't just abandon it. It doesn't matter that I've read the story more time than I can count. I'm not logical when it comes to reading. It's like I have only two speeds when it comes to reading—not-read and binge-read.
My best friend is used to this so he doesn't take it personally. He chats with a friend of his who's in the football team and sitting at the table beside our own.
I'm reading "Underneath this veneer of slightly crazy and socially inept, I'm a complete disaster," when I feel a presence sit beside me.
It feels like there a bowling ball that drops in my stomach.
Austin von Thalberg just settles in the seat next to me, and starts digging into his food. For some reason, he's cutting everything in little pieces and mixing it all together, like even the fries. It's like he's trying to make the work of a mixer without the mixer.
I'm frozen for about a good minute. He nods with a smile at Kurtis and Kurtis nods and smiles back. And I just sit there, gapping and staring at him.
WHAT IS GOING ON?
"What are you doing here?" I hiss at him, when I've finally found my breath.
Austin frowns at me, confused and lifts the spoon filled with the messes he's made with his dinner, high, almost shaking it in my face. "Huh? Eating?"
I'm about to grab his arm but I stop myself. But that doesn't stop me from hissing again. "DON'T SIT HERE."
Now, Austin looks at me like I'm a confused toddler because, well, he's kind of already sitting here. I can see Kurtis from the corner of my eye, trying not to burst laughing. "You can't sit with us? Seriously?" Austin chuckles.
I glare at him. He's not supposed to sit at my table. He usually sits at another table with his friends, far away from here. Why does he have to change the dynamics? "No, just look, why are you sitting here?" I press, "you don't normally sit here. You're not supposed to sit here."
Before Austin can answer, Delilah slides her tray beside him and lets herself plop on the seat next to him. Today she's wearing a fifties red polka dot dress, the kind that has frills at the bottom and would be perfect to twirl around yourself. Her lips are red too and the contrast with her pale skin and black hair kind of makes me think of her as Snow White if she lived in the fifties, and had a lot of piercings. "Here," she hands Austin a DVD case, "I got it in the mail yesterday. It's kinky and in German." She wiggles her perfectly manicured eyebrows at him. "You'll love it."
"Is that an early birthday present?"
"No noob, it's called lending a movie," she answers, shaking her head. She only has fries on her plate and she digs a Tupperware out of her bag, which contains a salad. Usually, at my house when my mom makes a salad, it's like lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers and she lets us add our own dressings. This looks a lot fancier than anything my mother's ever done. There's things in there I'm not even sure I can identify.
"Ugh, I hate hot chicken day." April frowns at her tray as she joins us at the table. "I mean, I don't hate the hot chicken per say, I just hate the peas over it and the fact that the lunch lady doesn't seem to understand that 'please no peas' means NO PEAS!" She pouts and tries to push all of the peas in a specific spot on the plate. "I hate peas."
"Yeah, we know, that and onions," Lance says from behind me and comes to sit beside Delilah.
"And parsley," Austin adds.
"And for some god forsaken reason, parmesan," Delilah makes a face at her before popping a fries in her mouth.
April wrinkles her nose. "It smells like vomit."
"You have the taste buds of a toddler," Lance tells her and starts eating his hot chicken.
And I'm just sitting here, gapping, absolutely confused. WHAT IS GOING ON? Seriously? Is this some kind of joke? Am I being punk'd? I don't like this!
"Is there a particular reason why we're sitting at Dallas' table for this lunch?" Delilah asks no one in particular, dipping one of her fries on Austin's weird meal massacre. Yeah, I'd like the answer to this question myself! "Don't get me wrong, Dallas, you're a sweet girl and I have nothing against sitting with you, I just don't think you'd extend an invitation to Austin, or the whole lot of us, which leads me to believe that Austin just invited himself, which leads me to believe that he's up to no good."
Austin presses his palm against his chest, feigning hurt. "I'm a saint."
"Suuuuure," Lance drawls and chuckles.
"Don't you guys see that you're freaking out the poor girl?" April points out.
"It's okay guys," Austin hushes everyone. "I wanted to announce it while we were all together. Dallas and I are running away together. You see, she's gotten involved with really bad folks to pay for her ex-boyfriend's meth debts. They've been over for years now, but he was her first and sometimes she feels like if she'd been more present he wouldn't have resorted to meth abuse. But the other week she couldn't come up with the payment, and they beat her up and I can't have that. She's caring our love child and I just can't have our baby be put in arms way like this."
I think I'm having a heart attack. At least, it feels like I'm having a heart attack. I see black spots. Maybe I'm about to pass out—that would be a more logical option.
I shouldn't have woken up this morning. I should have known not following my schedule would blow up in my face. "What? NO! Why... no... I... WHAT?" I babble.
"Don't fret Squishy," Austin smiles at me and as beautiful as he is I find myself wanting to slap him. I've never had the desire to really slap anyone before, like, I thought I wanted to slap some stupid characters, I've wanted to slap Lissa in Vampire Academy silly sooo many times, but it's nothing compare to the urge I feel right now. "My friends are good people, they'll understand our star crossed love and my chivalrous need to protect you."
Maybe shaking him would also work. I want to scream, but I can't find my voice. "I'm... I'm not pregnant and I don't... I don't have an ex boyfriend who takes meth, I don't have an ex boyfriend," I mumble.
"Okay, so that rules out one of the reasons as to how you've gotten the limp."
Now I feel like I'm the one who's been slapped. "Seriously? All of this is about my limp?"
Austin shrugs and his friends around look amuse, like pulling stunts like this is something he does on a daily basis and it's nothing to concern themselves about. "Well, you never did tell me how you got the limp."
I glare at him. I'm not looking directly in his face, but I'm looking at his chin very menacingly. "I hurt my foot."
"Yeah, I gathered that much. How?"
My firsts are clenched on my thighs. "Why do you care?"
"Because I'm curious, and curiosity is humanities greatest trait." It's really weird to hear a Hank Green reference coming from Austin von Thalberg. But I try to not let this faze me. It's not okay. He doesn't have the right to just sit here and start saying things like this and forcing me to talk to him! It's not right.
"Leave the poor girl alone," Lance says, sighing. I want to applaud him on this. Yes, leave me aloooone!
"I don't know, social interaction like this might be good for her," Kurtis pitches in. I thought he was ignoring what was going on at the table and just talking to his friend, but he suddenly seems interested.
I glare at him and I look in his eyes while doing so. "Seriously Kurtis, you're best friend badge is getting revoked."
"Ooh! Can I have it?" Austin asks cheerfully.
Enough. I can't deal with this.
I get up. "I'm sorry, I have to leave," I tell no one in particular and I just grab my book and my bag and leave my barely touched tray of food on the table and limp away, hearing a couple of voices calling out my name.