A sky full of stars and he was staring at her.
—atticus
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Shine - David O'Dowda
All of the Stars - Ed Sheeran
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AUDREY
Leaning against the cool classroom wall with my knees pulled up, I casually practised spinning my Staedtler pencil around my fingers as I got a good eyeful at the rest of my classmates. Most of them were silently immersed in the Math work, their heads down as they jotted down answers in their notebooks. I couldn't stop my eyes from traveling to the back, which happened to be the area where Brent and Cameron were seated. Ashton—the remaining member of the trio—had dropped out of Math a month ago, from what I'd heard.
The poor guy had been receiving 'E's the way Sergio Ramos received yellow cards.
Thankfully, the instant Cameron was about to catch me looking and meet my explicit gaze, my pencil dropped to the floor. Perfect timing. I plunged under Syd's chair to pick it back up.
"Who are you so engaged texting?" I asked in a hushed tone, noticing Syd's notebook page was empty save for the date and page number in the top left corner.
Syd whipped her head up at my whispered comment. "Huh?"
"I mean, I'm not judging or anything, but this task has been assigned sixteen minutes ago and you haven't even touched your pen." She stared at me, blinking blankly a few times, a far-off air about her. I almost began worrying that the girl had been hypnotized or something when she spoke up.
"Wait what? What task?"
I held back a smile and inclined my head. "You know the tasks teachers set us, that we're supposed to kinda do in class? 'Cause, you know, they're gonna be graded and stuff but whatever."
She bulged her eyes out, finally snapping out of her daze."Oh, crap! Which exercise?!"
"Shhhh," I glanced at Mr. Barnard but his concentration was buried deep under a frown and the computer screen in front of him. "Fourteen-B."
She hurriedly scanned the textbook page full of numbers and graphs, her jaw dropping. "Have you already done all of it?"
"Sorta." I retook my pencil spinning practice session.
Her jaw dropped an inch lower as she gaped at me for a split second. "You have? "I shrugged. "I'm gonna copy your answers, k?"
I snorted. "Sure, go ahead."
"You're a lifesaver," she began scribbling down equation after equation ferally.
"Who were you texting though?"
No response. The probability that she didn't hear me because she was too busy transferring my answers to her book was considerable, but I still didn't buy it.
"Syyyd." I whisper-whined. Still no response.
The phone sitting atop her table gave a short buzz as its screen lit up. I glimpsed at it, wondering who was the mysterious responsible for her new message.
"Minnie?" I read the name of the recipient aloud, slightly amused. "Who's Minnie? And why does Minnie have a green heart emoji next to his name?"
"Shh!" she snatched her phone away from my view, shoving it into her bag.
"I thought heart emojis were reserved for the important people. Like, for instance, best friends," I feigned a dramatic cough.
She rolled her eyes. "Don't worry, I've got you with a red heart emoji."
"Yeah but green's cuter. I want green too. I'm envious of Minnie now—who the heck's Minnie anyway—" mid-sentence, the puzzle in my brain clicked. Minnie. Do-minni. . .
"Wait wait wait wait—Is that who I think it is?" A smirk crawled onto my lips.
"Shhhh! He's gonna hear," she pointed at the totally absent-minded and oblivious Mr. Barnard, and I almost guffawed out loud. He was definitely not gonna hear. The level of noise in the classroom was very gradually building up, most of the students realizing the teacher had flown off to his own distant world. "Better tell me what happened yesterday."
"What was yesterday?" It was my turn to act slow-witted now.
"Did you find Cameron? Did you talk to him?"
"Ohhh. Yeah. Yeah, I have." I pretended to be more interested in the pencil in my hand.
She shook her head expectantly, "And? What happened?"
I didn't say anything. My cheeks were warming up and I could bet they were already suffused with color. I took a deep breath and trained all my attention to the striped pencil spinning between my fingers. I'd almost mastered this skill.
"Aud, what are you so smiley about? Spill the tea."
Was I really smiling? Was it so apparent? Was I really such an open book? Dang. What I knew for a fact though, was that Syd wasn't gonna leave me alone until I told her.
Should I just plainly drop the bomb?
"I'll tell you if you won't freak out and gush about it."
"Yes, yes yes yes. I won't." I wanted to snort. She would. She totally would.
"Okay, whatever, here it comes. I may or may not have had my first kiss."
Her eyes turned into two humongous round moons.
"You whaat?!"
"Shhhh!"I almost clasped her mouth. "Tone it down! Are you trying to be heard from Mexico?!" I whisper-shrieked at her.
"Sorry sorry sorry. But wait, I'm confused—"
"So am I. It's not what you think at all, though. It didn't mean anything."
"Yeah, sure, so you're just friends, I guess."
"Not even that, you see! It's totally weird between us. That's why I didn't wanna tell you, cause you wouldn't understand. I don't even understand myself. And you told me you weren't gonna gush."
"Okay, got it. No gushing. And I wasn't gushing! But wait, didn't you already have your first kiss with that guy from dance. . .—what was his name. . .Calum?"
"Syd! We agreed not to mention it again. That doesn't count—it was just a stupid spin-the-bottle. The biggest regret of my lifetime."
She rolled her big, chocolate eyes. "Drama queen."
"Uhh, excuse me, it's getting a bit too noisy. I'm sure you've got enough work to get on with!" Mr. Barnard spared us a tiny speck of his attention before going back to his computer screen and zoning out again. I sometimes wondered if teachers had certain memorized phrases they just randomly scattered out on us from time to time.
"Aud," Syd spoke up again, after a safe pause of pretended work. "Aud."
"What."
"What in this world does this doodle mean?" She pointed at a lambda symbol from my exercise book.
"Lambda. Greek letter." She gaped at me, pure terror spreading through her face. "It's just to show that these two equations are multiples of each other."
She blinked a few times, then leaned her head on her hands and started massaging her temples, her dark curls falling in the way. "Okay. I wanna cry. I'm so screwed. When is the test? Next week? Listen, Auds, I need an urgent study date. You understand this topic, don't you?"
"Which one? Exponentials and logarithms?"
"I've no idea. But I'm in desperate need of a catch-up. Can I have a fast-track tutoring sesh with you? Pleasey please."
"Sure. We could do it tonight," I gasped, an idea lighting up in my brain. "We could do it in Barry's. I've been wanting to go for ages now. I need my dose of freshly baked pastry. I deserve it."
"Yeah," she seemed content at first but, after flipping her voluminous hair, froze. "Wait. Tonight. Tonight I can't." She set her eyes on me apologetically.
I made a gesture that spoke for itself, asking why.
"Tonight I've got this. . .kinda. . .date," the last word squeezed out of her with difficulty.
"With Minnie?" My smirk was already queueing up to appear again. "Do-minnie-c?"
"Okay, yeah. I owe it to you. He's invited me someplace." She flicked the rubber hairband on her wrist. "Hey, but I've got an idea! You could totally come along. I'll ask him but he certainly wouldn't mind. You guys are friends, right?"
I stretched my arms, screwing up my face in lack of conviction. "Third-wheeling much?"
"Oh, no, it's not like that. We're not an actual couple or anything. We've just been seeing each other lately, but never on official dates and stuff like that."
"Well, tonight sounds like the one that'll change that. Where's he taking you? Somewhere romantic?"
"Nah," she waved it off but then thought for a moment. "You think so?"
I shrugged. After a while, the snorting sound I was containing for so long at the back of my throat broke loose. Syd looked up sharply, bewildered.
"Sorry, I just can't. Did you come up with 'Minnie' yourself?"
"Shut up." She jabbed at my ribs with her elbow but that only fueled my chortling up.
It took me a long time to be able to stop.
* * *
It wasn't usually hard for me to find sleep. I don't know what was wrong with me tonight.
No matter how many times I tossed and turned and changed positions I couldn't calm my body down and drift off to the esoteric world of dreams.
In the end, I gave up. Kicking the fluffy blanket off my body, I stood up and switched the table lamp light on. Strangely enough, the precious collection of soundless words—my current book— laying on my bedside table wasn't tempting me in the least that night.
Taking my phone with me, I uncovered the window curtain and climbed out to my favourite little spot on the roof. My safe place. My hiding place. One that no one knew about.
No one except for Cameron.
My fingers seemed to get a mind of their own as they opened his chat. The sudden brightness of my screen jabbed at my eyes before I could adjust it. The last thing hanging in there was the multitude of my missed calls. I wasn't intending to actually type anything but when— to my surprise— he appeared to be online, my uncontrollable fingers took action.
Me: hey
Me: what are you doing up so late?
I didn't expect him to reply. In fact, I was considering deleting the messages altogether when he typed back.
Cam: i could be asking you the same question
Cam: in fact, i am. what are you doing up so late? it's past midnight
Me: can't sleep
He left me on read. This dude.
I put the phone aside and let my mind loose contemplating the heart-stirring beauty of the night. A silver curve of the moon hovered amidst the starry sky. There's nothing more breathtaking for me than the past-midnight city, with its empty streets and quiet aura. It never failed to overawe me.
My eyes fluttered shut to the sedative chirping of crickets as a crisp breeze tickled my bare feet. All I was wearing over my pyjamas was a lilac sweatshirt with a cartoon avocado patch. It was a strikingly warm winter.
I opened my eyes only to spot an approaching figure on the road in front. He was skateboarding towards my house.
I waited patiently as he walked towards right under where I was sitting, wondering what on earth he was planning to do next. He shocked the crap out of me as he started climbing our house.
"Are you insane?" I whispered.
He kept climbing up confidently. "I am no pilot; yet, wert thou as far. As that vast shore wash'd with the farthest sea, I would adventure for such merchandise."
"What the heck are you saying?"
He finally managed to make his way up and dropped himself beside me."I thought you were a literature connoisseur."
It struck me. "Did you just. . .you did not just quote Romeo and Juliet— "
"Yep." he chirped.
I just facepalmed my forehead at this unbelievable boy. "Did you even understand a word of what you said?"
"Nope. But I do remember it by heart from Grade 7. You have to give me a little credit for that."
"How did you even climb up here so easily?" I asked, peeking down at the ground, getting chills just at the thought of descending that distance.
"Dunno, I guess I'm just naturally brilliant." I grilled him with my stare. "Okay, I'll tell you. I did do bouldering several years ago. And top rope."
"Isn't that. . .I don't know, a tad bit dangerous?"
"Yeah, yeah, I had my brainless phase back in the day. The New York phase, if you like. At least I know how to climb now."
I hugged one leg tight against my chest. "Cameron, why are you here?"
He shrugged his shoulders. "You said you couldn't sleep. I can't either. I figured you'd be in your unconventional secret spot. Came to make you some company."
"Yeah but. . .why are you here?" At last, the climate encircling us shifted.
His tone was different, more serious when he spoke. "I think we both know that. . ." he trailed off.
"What?"
"That we've got things between us to sort out. And I don't think our last encounter did a lot for that." His voice was low, words cutting through the darkness.
I took my time to pronounce. "I guess."
"Look, I'm sorry for the things I said about— "
"Don't," I quietened him, laying my cheek on my knee to face him. "It's okay. We both said quite a lot."
He nodded pensively. "Here's my proposal. Let's start over."
The corners of my lips curled into a small, contemplative smile. "Let's."
"Good." The next few seconds of silence between us were filled by the tranquil sounds of the night. I hugged my leg tighter. "Can I ask you a question?" He spoke up, after some time.
"Uh-hm." I hummed, drowsily.
"Who are we to each other then?"
Ah. What a question, indeed. The kind of question that you wish you wouldn't have to answer but rather have someone answer to yourself.
"Somewhere past the strangers' stage?" I could only provide him with this much for certain.
"I'll dare say I thought that was beyond question."
I changed my sitting position, leaning back on my arms and pondering. "How about strangers who share deep thoughts on a roof at night?"
Our gazes crossed and locked on key. Both contemplative, both trying to figure each other out, both knowing we could say more—much more— yet paradoxically both choosing to drown in silence instead.
We didn't dare interrupt the music of midnight, nor the serenity of the cool breath of wind. That same wind that kept flailing Cameron's toffee locks of hair in the way of his eyes. His warm, tender hazel eyes.
"Agreed then."
I was the one to undo the padlock our gazes were stuck in as I turned my eyes to the starlit sky once again.
"It's so beautiful," my lips moved without me intending for them to.
"It is," his voice trickled fluidly, like molten chocolate.
But when I turned around, his eyes weren't fixed on the spine-tingling sights above us. . . but on me.
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hi guys
one quick question. how did you find the length of this chapter? too short, too long or just right?
fank you for everything <3
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