Chapter 21
The rest of Sunday passed as I finished my shift at Kaffeine before returning home and hitting the hay. Monday passed slowly enough after that and then, it was suddenly Tuesday, the day I was going over to Jett’s for dinner. I was incredibly nervous; sure, I had met one of his brother’s and his mother briefly but tonight I would meet his whole family, excluding his sister, and I was scared.
I had told Piper I was going over to Jett’s again today so she could drive to school again, as I really didn’t need my car today. When Piper pulled into the driveway, I had already had breakfast and had gotten ready for school so I just headed straight out the front door while grabbing my bag and locking the front door.
I gripped the handle for the passenger side door, opening it and climbing in the car.
“Wow, you sure are jittery today.” Piper stated, seeing how my leg was bouncing up and down nervously while she backed out of my driveway.
I smiled sheepishly at her. “I’m nervous.” I muttered in reply as I tucked some of my hair behind my ear.
She looked over at me for a second and rolled her eyes before putting her attention back on the road. “I don’t understand why you’re so nervous Soph, I mean, it’s not like you haven’t met his family before and it’s not like you’re his girlfriend or anything so there’s no need to be nervous.” she explained.
I sighed and sunk back slightly in my seat. “For one, I only met like half of his family and I’m still nervous because I don’t really know them plus, it feels like it’s a meet the parents’ episode anyways.” I replied.
Piper laughed. “It probably feels that way because you and Jett act like you guys are a couple sometimes.” she stated.
“We do not! When have we ever acted like a couple?” I asked, shocked that she would ask that.
“Oh come on, you told me yourself that when you went out on Friday that you guys were cuddled together and he kissed you on the cheek at the end of the night. Plus, you guys just look good together.” she replied smartly.
“Okay, I get the cuddling thing but seriously, we kiss Blake on the cheek all the time and it means nothing so what makes you think that it was anything more than friendly?” I asked.
Piper rolled her eyes. “Come on Soph, we’ve known Blake for a couple of years and you’ve only known Jett for like, a month. It wasn’t meant as a friendly kiss Sophie.” she stated as she pulled into Blake’s driveway.
“Whatever.” I replied smartly, relaxing back into my seat.
Blake got into the car and I sat their silently for the rest of the drive while Piper explained to Blake what we were talking about before he had entered the car.
“You know, you do seem happier when you hang around Jett than you ever have before.” Blake stated, as we were walking up the front steps of the school.
I nudged into his side and rolled my eyes. “Hey! I’m happy all the time.” I replied smartly, showing him a huge fake smiling while continuing beside him and Piper down the hall.
Blake threw one of his arms over my shoulder as we stopped at my locker. “Ah dear one, you are happy all the time but when you talk about Jett or what plans you guys have you have a certain glow to you that shines bright.” he explained, smiling down at me.
I blushed and looked away embarrassedly, focusing on putting the correct combination into my lock. “Shut up.” I muttered smartly, earning a quick chuckle from Blake.
When I looked around, I quickly noticed that Piper had disappeared. “Where’d Piper go?” I asked, slightly confused as I hadn’t heard her leave.
Blake rolled his eyes at me. “She got a text from Jay and headed to her locker to call him in private. She’s all loved up on her boy toy.” he replied sarcastically.
I giggled. “Yea well, I think that they’re adorable together so stop hating on them; they deserve to be happy with one another.” I replied.
“And when are you gonna make yourself happy by manning up and telling the mysterious Jett how you feel?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at me.
I scowled at him. “First of all, I’m not because I’m not brave enough to do that, plus I don’t even know if he likes me and second of all, how is he mysterious?”
Blake smirked at me. “Well, I won’t even reply to your first point as you are obviously just too shy to grow a backbone and ask a guy out but to answer your second question, how is he not mysterious? Piper and I have heard so much about him from you and know a bit about him since we’ve seen him around school a couple times but we’ve never actually met the guy.” he replied.
I was about to reply when my words got caught in my throat and I realized that neither of my friends had actually met Jett before. I had been talking about him for about a month and they had been pestering me for answers about him but he’s never actually been introduced to either of them.
“Oh…” I replied smartly, not really having another response.
Blake shrugged and smiled. “It’s cool that we don’t know him. Piper and I don’t care what he looks like or what kind of person he is… wait a second, okay we care if he’s like an axe murder or something but as long as he makes you happy at the moment we can wait until you introduce him to us.” Blake said.
I smiled at him and gave him a quick hug on the side. “Thanks, I don’t know when you guys will meet him because, just like me, he’s shy, but hopefully soon because I think you guys can be good friends.” I replied, before saying a quick goodbye and heading off to my first class of the day… biology.
The rest of the day passed rather quickly but I could hardly concentrate on what most of my teachers were saying as I was still so nervous about meeting Jett’s family tonight. During lunch I had to basically reteach myself my calculus lesson in the library as I didn’t understand a word Mr. Rioter was saying and I decided to finish the work I had been assigned then so I didn’t have to worry about it tonight when I got home. English was pretty uneventful as our teacher just decided to make us watch the older version of Romeo and Juliet, however, during the movie, I did feel a piece of paper slide onto my desk.
I unfolded the paper to see Jett’s handwriting;
I’ll meet you at your locker after last period :) –J
I turned to Jett with a questioning look on my face, wondering why he didn’t just tell me this after class, but his only reply was a small smirk and a shrug of the shoulders. I rolled my eyes in reply and drew a smiley face in reply before throwing the crimpled up piece of paper back onto his desk.
After English, anatomy passed fairly quickly and before I knew it, Jett was waiting for me at my locker at the end of the day.
“Hey.” I greeted shyly, opening my locker and dumping my textbooks inside before grabbing my English binder and sticking it into my bag, along with my pencil case.
“Hey.” he replied, leaning against the locker next to mine while he waited for me to finish and as soon as I closed my locker he straightened up. “You ready to go?” he asked, nodding to the front doors of the school.
I nodded in reply and followed him out of the school. As we got outside I clutched my zip-up hoodie slightly closer to me as there was a small wind blowing.
Jett turned to look at me quizzically. “Are you cold?” he asked.
I bit my lip and nodded shyly. “Yea but don’t worry about it, I’ll be fine until we reach your house.” I replied, assuring him that I was fine.
Jett shook his head and stopped on the sidewalk, searching through his backpack until he pulled out a huge fleece pullover. “Here, if you’re cold you can use this, I don’t mind.” he said, handing me the sweater.
I smiled at his generosity and dropped my bag to the sidewalk for a second while I pulled Jett’s sweater over my head. When I could see again, I noticed that Jett had swung both his bag and mine over his shoulder.
I raised an eyebrow at him while smiling and he just smiled in response, letting one side of his mouth raise higher than the other in a lopsided smile.
I pulled his sweater down fully, realising that it was a bit big for me; in other words, it fell down to my mid thighs. I spread my arms and looked up at Jett with an amused smile on my face. “I think that you and I have a bit of a difference in size.” I stated sarcastically.
Jett started chuckling as he nodded down the road to where his house was. “Well let’s hurry up so nobody sees you dressed up like a homeless woman.” he replied with the same sarcastic tone as me as we started walking again.
The walk to his house was pretty silent and it was then that I started to remember the main reason I was nervous about coming here in the first place. Sure I was nervous about meeting his family for real but I hadn’t mentioned the other reason which was that I was going to tell him about my parents.
I hadn’t really spoken about my parents a lot in the past year or two. The last time I remember telling anybody about them was a couple months into freshman year when I decided to tell Blake about them, as he was always wondering why I lived with my aunt and uncle and not them. I’ve been to visit their grave only a couple times in the past year, mainly Christmas, their birthday and their death anniversary but besides that I can’t really handle going down to the cemetery alone.
I know that Jett must be wondering why I’ve been avoiding the subject of my parents. Last time we were working on this project and he asked me what my parents’ names were, I didn’t exactly answer the question as I was afraid that if I mentioned them I would burst out in tears like I did when I told Blake about them. However, Jett’s really been great about respecting my privacy and noting that I didn’t want to talk about them since the few times they did come up in conversation, I completely avoided the issue and Jett just let it drop.
I hadn’t been thinking about it for a while but last night I decided to tell Jett the truth – not just because he may need the information for his English project but because I felt that as of right now, I could really trust Jett and he wouldn’t pity me once he found out.
I guess my internal rambling went on a bit longer than I thought because suddenly Jett was snapping his fingers in front of my face and I was stopped on his front porch. “When did we get here?” I wondered out loud resulting in a throaty chuckle from Jett.
“We just got here but obviously you were too wound up in your thoughts to realize that we had already walked a couple of blocks from school.” he said, clearly amused that I had been dazing off the whole way home.
I stuck my tongue out childishly. “Well, I had a lot on my mind.” I replied, stepping into the warmness of Jett’s home as he opened the front door for me.
“Sure you did.” he replied sarcastically. “Anyways, nobody’s home right now so it’s just going to be you and me here for a little under an hour, is that okay you with you?”
It registered briefly in my head that Jett and I would probably be working in his room again, alone, with nobody home, but I just nodded. “Yea, that’s cool.”
Jett nodded in reply. “Okay, well do you mind if we work in my room again like last time?” he asked, nodding up the staircase.
Again, I just nodded in response and smiled at him.
We headed upstairs quickly and entered his room. “You know, I can’t get over how much I love this paint job.” I said out loud while running my hands over some of the lyrics that were painted onto his bedroom walls.
Jett smiled at me and dropped his bag beside his bed before collapsing onto it. He rolled over and rested his head onto his hands. “Thanks, I love it too.” he said, taking a look around his room.
I smiled at him and dropped my bag near his door. “Why is it so hot in here?” I wondered out loud, not meaning to make it sound flirty at all.
Jett started laughing at me and smirked. “Well, it could be because you’re in my presence.” he replied sarcastically and I blushed a scarlet red colour.
“No seriously.” I muttered shyly, taking a seat near the top of his bed while trying to calm down my blush.
Jett just rolled over on his side to face me and smiled. “I’m thinking it has something to do with the fact that you still have my sweater and your hoodie on.” he said, picking at my outfit for a second.
“Oh.” I replied stupidly, not even realizing that I was still wearing it.
I stood up off the bed for a second, pulling his sweater over my head and taking it off before unzipping my own hoodie and taking that off as well. I was now dressed in black leggings and a slightly baggy light blue t-shirt.
“Much better.” I muttered to myself as I dropped the sweaters onto his bedroom floor.
I turned around to see Jett staring at me. “What are you looking at?” I asked, running my hand through my long red hair before taking a seat beside him on his bed again.
I seemed to have shook Jett out of some sort of trance because he shook his head quickly and looked at me with an embarrassed expression on his face. “Hmm… oh nothing.” he muttered quietly.
I didn’t know what was going on with him but I decided to let it drop and just roll my eyes at him. “Okay.” I said, suddenly getting jittery again. I wasn’t jittery because of the fact that we were alone in his house and on his bed together. No, I was nervous because I was about to tell him about my parents.
Jett quickly noted that I was wringing my hands together nervously and sat up next to me on his bed, reaching out and grabbing them. “Hey, are you all right?” he asked with concerned as he took one of my hands in each of his and started rubbing it.
I bit my lip and looked up at him. “Umm… I don’t know, I mean, yeah I’m fine, it’s just…” I rambled on, not knowing what words were the right ones to say.
Jett just looked at me worriedly. As comfort, he threw one of his arms over my shoulder to pull me closer to him and kept one of my hands intertwined with his. “What is it Soph? You know you can trust me.” he said and that made what I was about to tell him a bit easier to say as I was know 100% sure I could trust him.
I took a deep breath before letting the words out of my mouth. “I want to tell you about my parents.”
************************************************************
Cliffhanger!
Sorry about the ending but that’s the best way I could end it without adding too much into this chapter, but I would like to know what everybody thought about this chapter… good? bad? cute? Just leave your opinions below in the comment section!
I don’t think I will be able to update until Friday because I have two basketball games this week and a couple of projects I need to work on.. sorry but school has to come first for me and I hope you all understand.
Also, I would like to thank all of you because I have gotten over 5,000 reads on this story, more than 300 votes and I have surpassed the number of comments on Heart Shaped Love already! I can’t believe you guys because you are the best fans and readers ever :)
Keep voting, commenting, sharing and fanning!