before heading home zion decided he needed to call off formal with arielle in order to ask ryan instead.
"hi love" arielle smiled coming out of her home to greet zion in the driveway.
"arielle look i need to tell you something—"
"take me to get some ice cream first please, i have a craving" arielle begged jumping into zion's truck.
zion rolled his eyes knowing he wouldn't be able to tell her no. he drove in silence while arielle talked about the latest gossip at ridge view hs.
"everyone kept talking about today, like about how i shouldn't have asked you but i don't really care, and i wasn't gonna what for you to do it so oh well" arielle giggled.
zion simply nodded his head paying no attention to her. he quickly pulled into a parking space and walked alongside arielle to cold stone.
"so who do you think nick is taking to formal? joanna wants to ask him, but she said she sees him with that new girl ryan a lot and maybe he already asked her" arielle said.
"she doesn't like him like that" zion scoffed.
"are you sure about that one?" arielle laughed pointed inside the glass windows of cold stone.
nick was staring intensely at ryan while she wiped his lips with a napkin because of the ice cream he has spread on his face.
"asshole" zion whispered.
he opened the door as arielle walked in before him. the bell above the door made everyone's eyes turn.
"welcome to cold stone" the cashier greeted.
"yo what's up z" nick stood up from his chair.
"sup" zion simply nodded his head, leaving nick hanging.
"hi, i don't we've talked before but i'm arielle" the girl greeted herself to ryan.
"ok, i'm gonna go now" ryan ignored her. "nick?"
"uh yeah sure let's go" nick agreed.
"bye ry" zion said.
ryan didn't say a word, but did give him a smile. she hugged nick's arm and the two made their way out.
"see, it looks like a thing" arielle smirked before ordering her ice cream.
__________
"you're gonna get me beat up" nick laughed as he unclinged ryan's arms from his.
"did you hear her?" ryan groaned making nick laugh.
"hI, i DoN't We'Ve TaLkEd BeFoRe BuT i'M aRiElLe" ryan mocked.
"she's not that bad of a person, she's just persistent with things she wants" nick said.
"zion isn't a thing, he's a person" ryan rolled her eyes.
nick put his key in the ignition and started the car to take ryan home.
"i hope i gave you some clarity today, zions a great guy. he had his moments and doesn't always make the best choices but you can't blame him for the choices he makes when you haven't told him what you feel" nick half smiled before dropping her off.
"thanks nicky" ryan reached over to hug him.
ryan made her way inside her home to find her brother in her room.
"what are you doing here?" she asked him.
"mom and dad are, you know, so i came in here because i didn't wanna hear it" lucas said to his sister.
"fighting again? that's like the third time this week"
"yeah, after zion left, mom told dad about about picking up his trash and it turned into something bigger somehow"
"wait zion was here?"
"yeah he told dad he needed help with english so dad let him look at your notebook"
"lucas, which book did he look through?"
"the blue one"
ryan rushed over to her backpack to assure herself of the bad news she was hearing.
the only blue notebook in her bag was her journal.
it would have been fine if he would have seen it any other time. all it had was doodles that she drew. for each page she would put on a song and draw whatever she felt.
except for the fact that last week when she tried to do it again, she couldn't draw. catching feelings by iñigo pascual was playing through her headphones and she couldn't think of anything to draw. just one consistent name filled her mind.
zion.
"how long was he looking through my journal?"
"like 20 minutes" lucas shrugged.
"fuck" ryan whispered.
"that's a dollar in the swear jar" lucas laughed making ryan roll her eyes.
if he saw the page he'd probably think she was a stalker. no wonder he went to arielle after coming over to her house.
school tomorrow was going to be kind of awkward.
________
authors note
this book is a floppppp
but i love it so i don't care too
much right now