Chapter 25: Chapter 25

The next morning, I appeared to have cooled down...enough. Regardless of the fact that I felt relieved for the first time in a long time, I still had a feeling buried deep, a feeling in which was making me come to believe that today would be no better than any other day.

In addition to making my life more hellish, Katrina made sure as to milk every piece of information out of me once we left the library, though the most important topic was if Jesse and I were official. If it weren't for her being my best friend, I would have strangled her to death. But her persistence wasn't enough for me to say anything, except that there was nothing going on. In a way, I felt like I was lying - but I threw it aside before I could think it through, since it felt as if I were lying about everything anyway.

As I trudged through the parking lot, sloshing through the snow-covered pavement, I found myself to have been staring at Jesse's Camaro. Quickly bypassing it, I couldn't help but give it one last glance before I opened up the main doors of the school.

I'm surprised you weren't hung for scratching that. It must have cost a fortune – and then another fortune to keep it intact and then yet another to fix it.

Standing at the door of my first class, the sound of laughing and incoherent chatter filled my ears. I realized then, that I had found my way in one piece – one piece, meaning, that I hadn't received any harassment from Jesse yet.

Throughout the class, I tried to make no acknowledgement of the boy in the back of the room. Try as I may though, I still heard him – but didn't have it in me to turn around and look at him.

Towards the end of the hour, it seemed to me that Jesse couldn't stand being unnoticed – or at least unnoticed by me, judging by his persistence when it came to testing my endurance.

He scooted into the seat beside me, shooing the person who was already there off, and shifted so that his entire frame was facing me. With a sigh, I turned my head – meeting his eyes and becoming unwilling as to look away first.

He made a warm smile, and I immediately noticed how the little movement caused his navy eyes to glint. "Hi."

Well...there's a first for everything...

Before I could respond, the loud sound of the bell ringing made me hastily clutch my bag. With a victory smile, I got up from my seat and darted out of the classroom door.

For a second, I had thought he would head off to his class. But by now, I should have known something like that wouldn't happen.

"You know, it feels like déjà vu when I do stuff like this. It almost feels like I've been chasing you through the halls almost a million times," he said, a childlike tone in his voice.

"Then why don't you stop doing it?"

Before I had any time to realize what he did, he sped up and shifted in front of me - stopping me in my tracks. "Because I'm chasing you for a reason."

I sighed again, crossing my arms. "What do you want then?"

He leaned forward – staring at me with glass-like eyes and an innocent yet severely hypnotic expression. Such a sight would have made me slap him, but somehow, in a way I wanted to do the complete opposite.

As strange as it sounded, my gaze miraculously found their way to his lips.

Deciding to play along at whatever he was trying, I froze. My mouth opened slightly, and my whole expression became blank. My arms fell limply at my sides, causing my bag to slip off my shoulder and dangle over my forearm.

Jesse gawked, and his eyes widened – an expression of disbelief crossing his face.

But like always, I had to ruin it. With him somewhat close, I smiled deviously and whispered. "Nice try, but you need to practice in the mirror more if you want that to work."

With a laugh, I went around him.

"Why do you take everything I do or say, as a joke?"

I stopped, hearing the seriousness in his tone, and turned back around. "That's because everything you do and say, is a joke."

He gave me a harsh look. "Well, for your information, when I said I liked you – I wasn't kidding."

I paused, seeming to have hesitated too long.

Great, now no witty response, what's happening to you?

I watched as he let out a sigh, and turned toward the windows facing out toward the courtyard. There were only a few people around us, hurrying to class, but by now I could care less about what kind of reputation I had when I was with Jesse. I seemed to have ruined everything when I decided running around in a prostitute costume would work.

I walked up to him, keeping a safe distance away. "Fine, I'm sorry." When he heard that, he side glanced at me, wanting to smile but instantly let it go and turned away again. "What do you want me to do, to make up for taking you as a joke all this time?"

With wide eyes, he snapped his gaze to me once I finished talking. Almost like he was about to—

God, this guy was desperate. "I'm not taking my clothes off though."

He let out a small laugh, and looked away for a second. "I wasn't going to ask that," he said, smiling to himself. After a short second, he turned to me again. "But, there's one thing."

I stared at him cautiously, preparing to run away, expecting the worst.

The sound of his stuff dropping to the floor snapped me out of the reverie that was building up when he took a step toward me.

"I'm going to kiss you," he started. Once he said that, I found myself to be backing away from him – even though he was only walking further towards me. "And don't hit me, or yell, or even run."

I gave him a stern look, and then tightened the grip on my bag, shifting so that it rose back up to my shoulder. "Uh...no thanks."

Before I could walk away, he turned on me. "Don't you think you've tortured me enough?"

"I should ask you the same thing," I retorted, glaring at him. "When will you get it, Jesse? When will you get that I'm not going to give in?"

"Why the hell do you think I'm still here? You think I like being turned down all the time? Because to be honest, it sucks." He took a breath, trying to calm himself – though it didn't even seem to be working. "But being that you're not like the girls I'm used to, being turned down over and over isn't going to bother me as much as it should. It's about time you get that."

I gaped at him, unable to muster up something to say, and froze. He seemed to have done the same, and remained staring at me.

Just as he was going to turn his gaze away though, something slammed behind me – a locker by the sounds of it. Jesse met my eyes once, before inclining his head to the side to see who it was. At the sight of his gaze turning cold, I turned and looked over my shoulder to see Kale.

I stood, staring at him, with my cheeks flushing from realizing that he heard Jesse and I.

He gave us both a prolonged stare, before turning away and walking off.

In a daze, I glanced back at Jesse – barely realizing that the halls had cleared.

"I should go." As I went around him, I became cautious as to how he looked – almost as if he were about to reach out and grab me.

"I'll see you, then."

The sound of his voice – almost pained, had me instantly pause. But as the time it took for me to turn around to see him progressed, he wasn't there once I turned, neither was his stuff that he dropped.

I snapped out of my trance once the tardy bell rang, and I quickly hurried to class.

~*~

"The cold weather seemed to have heated up during the day, but you won't dress out. Just practice your kicking, while the guy's practice their throws. Be sure to stay out of the way though, you don't want to get hit."

I'm sure no one does.

The coach tightened her grip on the bag she was holding, pushed open the doors of the locker room, and led us outside. A few girls had a pair of heels on, so I already knew by now that playing any sort of sport was out of the question for them.

There wasn't much snow as I expected when we walked out, but it was still cold – no matter that the sun peeked out from behind the plush clouds.

I trudged blindly behind my class, allowing myself a glance at the boys across the field. In the bunch, and apparently around his friends, I looked on time to see Jesse passing a football.

Although he didn't seem to be one for sports, he did have a good throw, judging by how fast the ball flew from him to his partner.

I suddenly remembered when I kicked a soccer ball at him.

How hitting him eased my temper...

"Carson?"

Just as I heard the voice behind me, Jesse looked up. Even from being quite apart, I noticed his expression turn severe as he stared my way. The worst part about it, was that he wouldn't look away after he saw who it was.

Whirling around, I came to find Kale again. His expression lightened as he took me in, but all in all, I wasn't too fond of being stared at as if he were already used to me.

The odd thing I observed was that he obviously didn't have this class at this time – which had me wondering if he ditched his real class and came all the way over to the field. Looking at him now, his hair seemed damp again, the beige color seeming darker than it was before – almost as if he were outside for a while.

I found my voice, but it came out with more attitude than I hoped for. "What?"

He looked up, after a moment of thought. "I saw you with Jesse."

I gave him a firm look. "Yeah, I saw you watching us, too. What do you want?" At last, I finally came to realize how rude I was becoming.

He stuffed his hands in his pockets and glanced around awkwardly – looking as if he wasn't planning on answering me.

"Look, I don't have time for this. Just find someone else, alright?" Hurriedly, I turned away and tried to catch up to my class, but as I did that, he spoke again, making me stop once more.

"In all honesty, I wasn't going to try anything," he said, seeming to be carefully choosing his words. "I just thought I'd warn you while I could."

I turned back around to face him, crossing my arms. "About what?"

"Well, for starters, you seem to be really close to him."

"No, I'm—"

He cut me off. "Yes you are. Just know that he doesn't have a nice history when it comes to girls."

"I think by now, I'd know that, Kale."

He smiled when I said his name. "Just warning you, it's not everyday he goes after the smart ones."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "Well...thanks for the warning, but I can take care of myself."

He half smiled. I turned back around, seeing that half of my class was sitting under the shade, while the other half was trying to gather as much snow as they could to throw it at each other.

I slowed down. Something was off.

"Carson!"

My gaze snapped up. The first thing I saw was Jesse's face, white and horror-stricken, as if he just committed a crime. He seemed closer, and as I paid more attention, he seemed to be debating on running away or running to me.

But then I caught sight of a faint shadow, up in the air, coming my way.

There was another first. There was a football coming straight at me, and judging by Jesse's reaction, he seemed to be the one who threw it. Given the short amount of time I had to see it, the aim seemed to be off. It almost looked as if it were initially aimed for someone behind me.

I didn't have enough time to do anything, let alone see if Kale was still there or not, before the football hit me.