Apparition

Chapter 3: Question
“Nathan, do you mind if I take Natalia out to lunch today? Just the two of us?” Lawren asked. As he spoke, he glared at Nathan and scrutinized his movements.
“Of course not! You two have fun!” Nathan said and smiled overly-enthusiastically
Lawren turned around and rolled his eyes.
“You aren’t trying to get rid of me, are you?” I asked and laughed.
“Of course not,” he said and chuckled. “I just want you to keep an equal balance between your friends and me, that’s all.”
“You’re so sweet.”
The bell rang and everyone jumped out of their seats to get to lunch.
“See you after lunch, my love,” Nathan said and kissed me. “Don’t forget your coat. It’s cold outside.”
“Bye,” I responded lamely.
“So, where’re we going, Lawren?” I asked as I packed up my math notebook.
Lawren didn’t respond and I looked up at him. He was glowering at Nathan as he walked out the door.
“Really, Lawren?” I asked and sighed. “I thought you were past all of that stuff!”
He scoffed. “Oh please! Did you see what he just did? He deliberately kissed you in front of me to get me jealous! That stupid-”
“Lawren, calm down! You can get so jealous sometimes.”
“Oh, and you don’t get jealous when you see another girl with Nathan?” He asked.
“We aren’t talking about me,” I said pertly.
He laughed. “Let’s get going.”
After we put our things in our locker and I grabbed my coat, we walked to Lawren’s bike. He still hasn’t gotten a car. His parents decided that when he graduated high school, then it would be the good time to give him a car since he’s planning on going to college in California.
Lawren tossed my a helmet and put his on.
“You planned this,” I said. It wasn’t a question.
He smiled at me.
I stood on the pegs of Lawren’s bike that he put on just for me and held onto his shoulders.
We rode off campus and since we were using a bike for transportation, where we were going wasn’t so far.
“Why are we on our way to the park?” I asked when I recognized the way we were going.
“We’re going to grab a hotdog then I want to tell you something.” It was obvious he was smiling by the tone of his voice.
When we got to Cowen Park, the first thing we did was grab our hotdogs from the hotdog vendor. The person selling the hotdogs must’ve been really cold if he had a space heater behind him and he still looked frozen.
I took a bite of my hotdog then swallowed. “Okay, you said you had to tell me something?”
“Let’s walk and talk,” he said and pointed to the track that was covered in snow. “This is a long Winter, don’t you think? I mean, it’s the end of February and it’s snowing like a blizzard!”
“Yeah,” I agreed and kicked some snow out of my pathway.
When we finished our hotdog, Lawren still didn’t start telling me what he had to tell me.
“Are you going to tell me now?” I asked and laughed.
“Oh, right!” He said like he completely forgot when it was obvious he was nervous to ask.
I rubber my hands together and warmed them up with my breath.
“Are your hands cold?” He asked then took my hands in his.
I looked at him and laughed ludicrously.
“Natalia, if your boyfriend already hasn’t asked you, will you go to prom with me?” He asked confidently.
I was speechless. I smiled then gripped his hands tighter.
“Is that a yes?” He asked excitedly.
I sighed but I was still smiling. “Lawren, you’re my best friend. Isn’t that enough?”
“Then we can go as best friends!”
He wasn’t making this easy. “Lawren, I can’t go with you. I’m going with Nathan,” I said gently.
“Has he even asked you?” He said in disgust.
“Well… no. But that’s just how it goes. He’s my boyfriend which means I should go with him regardless. It’s just that Nathan has been forgetting things lately but I know he’s going to get around it and if he doesn’t I’m still going with him, Lawren.”
“But prom is less than a month away! How much time does he have?! Natalia, if he hasn’t asked you yet then he doesn’t care!”
Once again I was speechless but this time it was because of anger. I turned around and walked away, my hands curled into fists.
“Natalia! Wait! Where’re you going?” He said and blocked my path.
“Who are you to say Nathan doesn’t care about me?” I snapped. I walked around Lawren and headed towards school.
“I didn’t mean it like that!” He said and caught up with me.
“Get out of my way!” I yelled straight into his face. I knew what I was doing and I was doing it intentionally.
Lawren’s whole body stiffened and I watched as his stare became distant and his pupils dilate. He stepped robotically out of my path and I walked smugly away from him and out of the park.
I haven’t used my ability in such a long time and I was surprised it still worked so easily. Well, what else did I expect?
I pulled out my phone and looked at the clock. I was going to be late for sure. The bell was going to ring in two minutes and I still wasn’t going to make it if I ran.
“Miss. Wellington, you’re late,” Mrs. Boulder said when I walked into my science class.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled. My teeth my vibrating and I was sure my face was pink or purple.
“Take your seat. Mr. Franklin will catch you up with what we’re doing.”
“What happened?” Nathan asked when I sat down next to him.
“I walked back to school.”
“I can see that but why?”
I shook my head. “I’ll tell you after school. So, what’re we doing?”
Sixth period was utterly awkward because I had that class with Lawren. I didn’t look at him or talk to him throughout the whole class. My back was to him the whole time and I was just facing Nathan.
Nathan would give me a disapproving look every time Lawren tried to talk to me but I ignored him.
I was excited to get out of that class when the bell rung. I passed by Lawren like I was oblivious to the fact that he was sitting right beside me.
“So what happened?” Nathan asked me as we drove off campus and headed to his house.
“Lawren asked me to prom, I declined, he told me you didn’t care about me, I got mad and used my ability on him, and walked back to school by myself,” I said simply.
“Why would he think I didn’t care about you?”
“Because you haven’t asked me to prom yet but I couldn’t care less if you didn’t because I know we’d go together regardless.”
He looked over at me and smiled. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” I responded with a returning smile.
The days were short and by the time we got to Nathan’s house it was almost dark. It was weird since it was almost Spring but living in Seattle, Washington was always unpredictable.
Nathan opened the front door and led me in. The lights were dimmed throughout the house. The chandelier above my head was beautiful with the lights dimmed.
“Where’s Keith and Sarah?” I asked.
“Oh, they went out for a while with Ella, Leonardo, and Charlotte. They’ll be back at midnight,” he said and helped my pull off my coat.
“It smells good,” I said. The house smelled of ylang ylang and lavender. It wasn’t too strong but just right.
Nathan took my hand and led me to the dining room. The dining table had two tall candles in the center, two chairs and plates with food already in it. There were two wine glasses and a familiar bottle of apple cider.
“Aw, Nathan! This is so beautiful!” I turned around and wrapped my arms around his neck. I looked into his eyes and kissed him. “How did you have time to do this?”
“I had the help of Keith and Ella,” he said. “Take a seat.”
I let go of him and sat in the chair he pulled out for me.
He opened the bottle of cider and poured it into our glasses. I smiled as I watched him. Nathan always made me feel beyond extraordinary. I knew we were inseparable and nothing can ever change the way we feel for each other. I know I’m young but there’s nothing wrong with saying I already found my soul mate because I knew it was true.
“So, what’s the special occasion?” I asked when Nathan sat down across from me.
I took a bite of my food and it was still warm which meant the food wasn’t cooked too long ago.
“But first, what is this? It’s delicious!”
Nathan chuckled. “It is chicken flambé glazed with Dijon sauce.”
I took another bite and sighed with a smile.
“Anyways,” I said and laughed. “What’s the occasion?”
“Let’s finish eating first, alright?” He said.
“You’re making me anxious!” I laughed.
“It makes thing all the better.”
When we were both done with our dinner, Nathan led me up the stairs and to the office room. I stayed in the door frame as Nathan pulled open the bookshelf at the corner of the room.
“We’re going to the white room?” I asked. The white room was where all ghosts trained. Every ghost family owned a white room or used another ghosts white room. We had our own.
“C’mon.” He held out one hand for me to take. We walked through the hall and when we got to the door at the end of the hall he covered my eyes with his hands.
“Nathan, what’re you doing?”
“It’s a surprise,” he whispered in my ear in a mellifluous voice.
I heard the heavy door open up in front of me then the large lights flicker to life. He led me to somewhere in the large room.
“Are you ready?” He asked.
“Is this another car?” The last time Nathan did this to me, he bought me my dream car; a Mercedes- Benz CLK550 Cabriolet.
He chuckled. “No. So are you ready?”
“Yup,” I said, popping the “P”.
He took his hands off my eyes and it took me a while for my eyes to adjust to the bright room. When I got my vision back the first thing I noticed was the four letter word written in large cursive pink letters on the wall across from me. I gasped. The words were framed in long stemmed roses. The roses weren’t painted on like the word. There had to be at least five dozen or maybe more roses hanging on the wall to frame such a small word in such large letters.
I was completely speechless. I turned around to face Nathan, a smile across his face.
“Natalia, will you go to prom with me?” He asked in a low, mellifluous voice like before.
I tried to open my mouth to say yes but I couldn’t so I nodded my head vigorously.
“What was that?” He asked, curving his hand over his ear and leaning his head toward me.
I tried to say yes once again but all I managed to do was squeak.
He put his hands on his hips. “Natalia, use your grown-up words,” he teased.
“Yes!” I finally managed to say. “Yes, you idiot! Yes!” I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him.