Chapter Three
"Bye, James! Have a great day and I love you!" I said to him before sending him off to play with his daycare friends. I walked out of the building and drove to school.
The day seemed to drag on and on until lunchtime came, when I was faced with that same familiar face. He walked right up to me, placed his food next to mine and sat down. Great, Adalie picked a great day to go off campus for food. "Well, hello, I guess it was meant to be." He smiled happily and I forced a polite smile back.
"Uhh, you go here?" I was kind of confused as to why we'd never met or even seen each other before. Sure, I was what some people may call a bit of a loner, but I wasn't oblivious to those around me. And believe me, Christian was not someone you could ignore with his extremely good looks.
"Yeah, how come we've never met before?" He looked just as surprised as I felt that we'd never even once glanced at each other.
"I don't know, I'm not one to have tons of friends." I knew that Christian was one of the more popular people, so I figured he wouldn't approve of me being a 'loner' and maybe give up on talking to me- before it was too late.
"Sometimes I wish I was like that; there are times when always being around a ton of people can get annoying." Well then, guess my plan didn't work too well. All it did was give him something to relate to me with. Something we had in common.
"Yeah." I stared down at my food and wondered why he was even talking to me. It's not like I was being really nice and charming or anything so I didn't see the point.
"So, tell me why you don't want us to get to know each other?" He tried to seem casual while he tried to see if I would look him in the eye. I didn't.
"I just don't."
"Come on, there's got to be a reason. Is it that you just don't like me?" He pressed. Man, this dude was beginning to show me he was a persistent one.
"No, I have my reasons and since they have nothing to do with you personally, you don't need to know."
"Ah, see, that's where we disagree. I think that I at least deserve to know why you will barely talk to or look at me."
"I don't care if we 'disagreed', you don't need to know." I repeated, ignoring his last comment. I wasn't looking at him because of three reasons. One, he had amazing eyes (I was a sucker for amazing eyes) and I didn't want to look into them and get all nervous, forgetting all of my 'no relationship' rules. Second, he was obviously cute and I was already nervous enough just being near him. And finally the most important reason; I didn't want to get to know him at all because then I may like him and later get attached.
"Look-" he was starting to look a little impatient when Adalie chose the perfect time to butt in.
"Hey guys! Christian, mind if I steal her away for a little while?" She asked politely, giving me a look that said I needed to tell her everything later.
"Sure, go ahead," he looked a little unhappy but it was for the better. If I made him unhappy then chances were he wouldn't want to be around me. Problem solved. "It's not like she's talking to me that much anyway." He muttered as he walked past me, so that only I could hear. Once he was out of earshot Adalie smiled and turned to me.
"So what's going on between you two?" She began, raising an eyebrow to highlight her curiosity.
"We're barely even talking, nothing at all is going on." I give her the 'duh, how could you think something was up?' look.
"Ok so maybe things aren't going anywhere now but-" I cut her off before she could finish that sentence. I knew what she was going to say. 'But after you get to know each other maybe something could happen. You guys would be so cute!' She's said it practically every time a guy had been interested in me in the past.
"No, we're not going there this time. I appreciate what you are trying to do but-" Now it was her turn to cut me off.
"Look, I'm not saying 'oh, go jump into a relationship with this dude you barely know!' All I'm trying to get across is that you should actually give a guy a chance for once; you never know what could come out of it. And Christian really is a great guy, I've known him forever."
"Ok, I get it but, Add, let's be serious here; the facts are still the same. My main priority is taking care of James. I am still trying to get straight 'A's and I still don't have the time!" I listed off the reasons happily. Every time I said them it reminded me not to start anything with anyone. So I'd say them all day if that's what I had to do to keep myself from considering being with Christian.
"I still don't agree with you but whatever. It's your decision." She mumbled so quietly I was surprised I heard clearly. I smiled hesitantly and that was the last we spoke about that for the rest of the day.
That afternoon, James was coming down with some sort of cold so I was up with him most of the night because he couldn't sleep. When I woke up Adalie said she wasn't feeling too well either so I said my goodbyes and headed to school, leaving them at home. I was pretty tired and all I wanted to do was go back to sleep but, since I obviously couldn't do that, I just wanted to get this day over with and not talk to anyone.
"Hey, Kayla!" Well, I guess we don't always get what we want, now do we? I spun around to see Christian walking towards me with a silly grin on his face. "How are you?" He sounded well rested, carefree and happy. I wish I could be like that. I thought to myself until I realized that he was waiting for my response.
"Tired, I didn't sleep too well last night." I answered simply because I didn't want to give him too much detail.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Why not?" We had reached my locker and I was getting books out of it with my back to him.
"Someone I live with is sick and I was up with him all night." I didn't even realize what I'd just said until it was too late. So much for not giving him too much detail. Now he was just going to ask questions about what guy I live with.
"Him?" I nodded and slung my backpack over my shoulder. "Who?"
"My little brother." I lied, hoping he would buy it and drop the subject. It's not that I was ashamed of James or anything, I just didn't like bringing random people, especially guys, into his life unless I was sure they were permanent and good examples. Sure, I knew that Christian simply finding out about him wasn't too drastic but it was putting us on a road I did not want to lead us down.
"Oh, ok. Well, again, I'm sorry you didn't sleep well and I hope your little brother gets better." He seemed like he was being genuine with what he was saying but I couldn't be sure. "How old is he?"
"Three..." I looked him straight in the eye, searching for some form of insincerity, but couldn't find any. He was being completely serious with his concern for us. He held my gaze for a second longer and I had to force myself to tear my eyes away and stare at the ground. "Well I've gotta get to class."
I was relieved beyond belief when it was finally lunch. That day had gone by way too slow and it was only halfway through! I sighed heavily and bought a lunch, trying to figure out where there was to sit with little to no people around.
I spotted a place outside on the grass and sat down, resting on my elbows and closing my eyes to enjoy the feel of the warm sun on my face. It suddenly got a lot darker and I looked up to see the silhouette of a guy that seemed a little taller than me. "Well hello there, Kayla." He said, sitting down next to me. I took a good look at his face but couldn't recognize him if my life depended on it.
"Um, hey? How do you know my name?"
"The question is how do you NOT know MY name?" He flashed an overly confident grin to match his overly confident sentence.
"Because I don't waste my time with people who say unnecessary stuff like that. Now, you can either answer my question or leave but do one of those before I leave."
"Ooh feisty, I like it." I rolled my eyes and stood up with my lunch in hand. He jumped up as quickly as I did, with a very surprised look on his cute face. "Whoa, girl! I didn't know you were serious!" I started to walk away but he grabbed my arm and said, "Dude, everyone knows your name." What? That was so not true. He really needed to be quiet if this lying was going to continue.
"Uh-huh, yeah." I let the sarcasm surround my words as I said them.
"No, I'm serious! All the guys want to talk to you but they're too afraid to because you're so... intimidating and you only hang out with that Addie girl and recently I've seen you with Christian Harris. And speaking of that, you two going out?"
"Her name is Adalie and no, Christian and I are not dating." And I walked away, not caring if he tried to stop me again. I sat down at the first empty table I saw and began eating.
"Mind if I join you?" I was kind of relieved when I looked up and saw Christian standing in front of me. Did I mind if he ate with me? I wasn't sure, so I just nodded because I didn't want to be rude and say no.
We sat in almost complete silence the whole lunch period. However, it wasn't the awkward 'Man, I've gotta think of some stuff to say right now!' kind, it was the comfortable kind where it didn't matter that no one was saying anything. It surprised and sort of scared me how comfortable I was getting around him.
James had gotten better the next day so he went back to daycare, but Adalie was still sick two days later. Christian had sat with me the next day and the day after that. It was sort of becoming a routine of ours. I would sit down at an empty table and, minutes later, he would walk in and sit next to me.
By the third day we sat together we were actually talking like normal people. I realized that he was a really cool guy but I didn't let myself think that for long before frantically running through the reasons in my head.
Adalie returned to school on Friday but had to stay inside and make up a test during lunch, so that left Christian and I to our little 'routine.' Except, something seemed a little different with him today. I was about to ask him what was up until he spoke first. "Kayla, do you want to go out with me this weekend?"