_Chapter 25_
Elliot Warren
In the following week, things took its good time to finally settle down. More or less at least. Some things went fine or even improved and some either just remained the same or got worse.
What I mean is that Ricky, Christo and Derek eventually were on good terms with their teammates. I even got to know some of them personally and they were all really nice.
The public apology from Spencer was indeed something else for us. For him, it was probably the most degrading thing in the world. But judged by what he did, it shouldn't even be considered a punishment. It's merely the least he could do if he didn't want to disgrace himself even more.
The principal was not up for apologizing for his wrong accusation and the punishment with the excuse that it could be taken in for breaking into school. Either way, it already happened so there wasn't anything that could have changed the outcome one way or another.
Our baseball team and basketball team were still not on the same page, though. I mean, I couldn't expect miracles to happen obviously. It's not like they started hating each other because of the incident. If you wanted to solve the problem, you had to grab it by the roots.
And the only thing that actually got worse during the week was Christo's and Derek's relationship. Ricky and I agreed that we didn't want to butt in and mess in their business or in the worst case, cause even more problems. Thus, we just let them handle it.
...although they were doing a pretty bad job at it so far.
Anyway.
I was meanwhile sitting at the lunch table, Derek and Christo were again absent and Ricky couldn't stop stealing my food. "Hey stop!" I warned him. "Just because you didn't like what you chose, doesn't mean you can have mine!"
"Oh come on, can't you have a little empathy for my hungry tummy?" He complained. I blinked at him for a couple seconds before I just pushed him my tray without a word. "W-wait you don't want to eat?" He frowned. "But you have to!"
I was ready to open my mouth and spout something as stupid as what he just said, but I couldn't find anything fitting that reached that level of hypocrisy and therefore, I remained silent.
In that time, my eyes unconsciously followed Anderson that just entered the cafeteria door and pulled some gazes on him. I didn't really understand what the matter was with him. He seemed a little moody these days, but I couldn't tell from what. Because as far as I heard, it should be going quite well for him and his team.
"Hey Ricky, you don't ever want to make up with him?" I wondered.
"With who? Anderson?" His gaze also landed on him then. "Not really. He hates me. Why would I put any effort in that?"
"But what if he doesn't hate you in particular? And what if he actually wants to befriends with you, would you accept it?" I mean, I don't really know Anderson personally that well, nor can I tell how he acted before the incident, but if even Ricky himself claims that he wasn't that bad of a guy, then I didn't understand why they both were still on bad terms with each other when they actually have a lot of similarities.
"Well hypothetically, if you ask like that, I think I would. That rivalry is just a pain in the ass anyway. I don't know who started it or decided to keep it up, but what I do know is that it is not getting us anywhere. It's completely unnecessary. Not that Anderson himself would ever want to be friends with me, though," he shrugged and almost finished my meal while he was at that which is why I stared at him in a overly conspicuous way that made him stop shoving my meal in his mouth instantly. "Uh you were still planing on eating that?"
"How can you be so-," I wasn't even able to finish the sentence before getting interrupted.
"If you want I can treat you to a meal next time," he nodded.
"Why don't you just go now and get me something to eat instead!" I sighed but he shook his head like he didn't want to.
"This is already sold out anyway, and the rest just looks like mine." I stared at his boiling soup or whatever it was that was invading his plate.
"What's going on here?" Someone new decided to join our table. It was one of Ricky's teammates, Myles if I remembered correctly.
"That Ricky ain't capable enough to choose his food properly without causing problems for me," I crossed my arms.
"I told you, I'll make it up to you," he promised.
"Like how? Go to a fancy restaurant?" I was actually just joking but judged from his gleaming eyes he seriously put it into consideration.
"Yeah! We can go on a date! We never went on one before. And we're already dating for a while now, isn't that weird?" He pointed out. "Let's go to that new Japanese restaurant that just opened a couple weeks ago."
I just looked away. "I don't want to."
"Huh? What do you mean you don't want to?"
"So you guys are the real deal, hm?" Myles I chuckled. "But aren't you worried? Some people are not all supportive about it. There will always be people talking bad about you. Although given my impression, you guys don't really seem bothered at all anyway."
Ricky just smirked and shook his head. "It doesn't matter. If they want to detest us for liking each other then they can go ahead. They won't be getting anything from it anyway. Besides, look at that face!" He pinched my cheek and quickly let go before I could slap it away. "The only thing I could be worried about, is anyone making him cry."
"You made me cry," I added. "You should be worried about yourself!"
"See! Ain't he cute! Well most of the time he is." I threw a punch at him for that comment. "Yeah the rest of the time he's just blatantly annoying," he scowled and rubbed his paining upper arm.
"Would you shut up?" I sighed. He was talking like he wasn't the one who was taking first place in the battle of annoyance. "Anyway, I'll take my leave. I have better things to do than to watch you eat!"
"Oh please, don't be mad about that. I promise we will go out on a date some time," he assured me as if it made things any better.
"I told you I don't want to!" These were my last words before I left to head for my locker. On the way, I surprisingly spot Christo and Derek. My hand shot in the air, wanting to greet them but their heated conversation or more like argument was nothing I wanted to deal with. Therefore, my hand instantly dropped.
My curiosity almost got the hang of me when the question of what they were arguing about went through my mind. Considering that they both were never the ones to seriously fight with each other, it was understandable for myself to get a bit worried.
Still, my hands were tied in this case. Sometimes I just had to mind my own business. And that was what I did as soon as I took my turn to get my books from my locker. But the very moment I closed it, I jumped in fright at the face that hid behind it and apparently waited for me "W-what the hell, you scared the shit out of me," I sighed. "What do you want?"
It was Anderson. "I want to talk." Talk? With me? Did we still have some unfinished business? "Just follow me," he went ahead, leaving me on the end to catch up on him.
And me? Yeah well of course I was confused. Although, I had planned to talk to him anyway. But that he would come up to me personally, I would have never predicted that.
We eventually reached the spot where him and his friends tend to hang out often. It was at the back of the school yard where I also spot some of his mates but kept a solid distance from them when he stopped and faced me.
And that was it.
He just looked at me without saying a word like he was waiting for me to start the conversation.
Hence, I got a little irritated. "What? Were you just joking with me? If you just lured me out to waste my time then I'll turn right back around and leave!"
He pursed his lips and crossed his arms. "To be honest, I really don't want to talk with you." And that's a solid way on how to confuse someone even more. "But it doesn't feel right to leave things like this," he sighed and settled down.
"Uhm last time I checked, nothing significant between us happened that induced a change of your heart so suddenly," I frowned. "No really, if you don't want to talk to me then you don't have to force it. There's nothing pleasurable on my side either."
"Ough, you're such a pain in the ass. I still don't get how Martinez could like a thing like you," he huffed.
I scrunched my face at that. "I would like to know that, too actually. However, I also don't exactly know why I like him."
"Right you're both equally annoying, so it fits some how," he shrugged.
"Well you're no saint either." I can easily recollect a lot of times where he definitely deserved a solid amount of hot mustard in his nose. But still... "Why do you despise Ricky that much?"
"Because I just do." Wow, what a satisfying answer, I rolled my eyes at him.
"I'm serious, constantly picking fights with each other, aren't you slowly getting tired of it?" I sighed. Even I couldn't stand that anymore. Having to make sure that Ricky didn't get into trouble... I thought that he should be the one keeping an eye on me, not the other way around. Although the thought of him babysitting me just made me shudder in disgust nonetheless.
"You know, Ricky doesn't even want to fight with you anymore. Won't you at least give reconciliating with him a second thought? It would make things so much easier."
He kept quiet, probably taking the time to actually think about it. But at the end he didn't utter anything about it. "Well at the end of the day, it remains your choice. Who am I to put my nose in again. Minding my business ain't my forte after all," I itched the back of my head in guilt. "Maybe I should go now, your mates are already giving me awkward looks."
That was when I was about to leave as I said, but was stopped right in the moment. "No, wait." So he hadn't finished yet.
"For that," he started as he looked every where but in my face and moved quite frankly from one leg to the other. "For not minding your business on this one. I think, I should uh thank you for that."
... I blinked at him. "What?"
Was I surprised? Hell yeah I was. And did I see that coming? Not in a gazillion years. And by the perplexed expression I had, he could obviously tell.
"The thought of how I excessively tormented and pestered Martinez for something that he didn't do still urges me. It makes me really sick that I would have seriously continued if all of this would have still be swept under the rug if it weren't for you."
Jeez, didn't I already mentioned that he and Ricky were just too similar in a certain way. Look how they were both giving me way too much credit for something anyone could have done.
"If that is all you wanted to say to me then you really shouldn't have bothered. Coming over to thank me for something this trivial-" I sighed. "-makes me uncomfortable. It doesn't feel like I earned it in anyway. Besides, I just did it for Ricky, it bothered me a lot how he suffered from it."
"Still, your actions shouldn't be taken for granted," he shrugged.
"If you want to thank me that much, go make up with Ricky and apologize. You don't know his father, keeping him out of trouble is even getting on my nerves."
I shook my head with a small chuckle as I slowly approached him and jokingly threw a punch on his chest. "Ricky was right. You're not that bad of a guy after all."
And with that I turned around and left after I gave him playful wave as a good bye.
___________________
I'm currently considering whether I want an Epilogue on this one and if I do then what should it be about, hm...
~J🎒