Who Do I love?

“Mr. Alvarez, your lab partner is Miss Linith.. Mis Linith, please show Mr. Alvarez where he is supposed to go.” I couldn’t help but glare at the back of Mr. Pascaal’s head as by his orders, I was forced to be nice to a murderer. I said nothing though, and just waved once at Dante. As if on cue, he began to stroll over to my table, winking at me like he was the ‘it’ guy.. the little bastard. I tried to comfort myself with the thought that he most likely didn’t remember me, but that just infuriated me even more. Of course he wouldn’t remember me; what would one insignificant girl mean when he had probably killed thousands?

“Miss Linith, I expect you to answer any questions Mr. Alvarez has about our class, and I also expect you to make him feel as welcome as possible—“ ‘oh shut up!’ I felt like yelling at him. Why the hell should I have to be nice to a fucker like Dante? One who had killed barely a teenager in front of my very eyes? I already hated him to much for words. This time, I couldn’t help the vicious glare that came over my face, but of course it wasn’t directed at my teacher; it was directed at the killer himself.

The rest of the class period went on with me trying – and failing – to act one part civilized. Every time Dante would try and ask me something I would send him a vicious glare; every time he tried to talk to me, I would act as if he wasn’t there. I’m honestly surprised that I wasn’t chastised for such behavior, or that it wasn’t noticed in the first place. Not that I expected Mr. Pascaal to scold me like a kindergartener – or that I wanted him to – but from the way he seemed to be trying to suck up to Dante, I thought he just might.

All in all, I couldn’t explain my relief when the bell finally rang. When the ear-splitting sounb reverberated threw the room, I picked up my backpack, and began heading towards the exit of the classroom. As I started to shove through the people who were going my opposite direction, my pace started to slow, and I got more frustrated. I was looking every where for Aileen, but I couldn’t find her yet.

“Hey Rose,” I glanced up from the floor I had been lovingly glaring at, to meet a pair of seemingly brown eyes. ‘Dante’ I thought to myself angrily. I was about to just turn away and ignore the idiot, but he caught up to me and put a haulting hand on my shoulder. I couldn’t help but flinch away from the unwanted contact; my muscles bunched in defense.

“Hey babe, what you got against me?” He started up again.

“You don’t remember me, do you?” I asked him in a vemonous voice – the pitch of my words lowering slightly with the rage I felt. “The girl who’s not human? The girl you shockingly didn’t kill?”

I could almost say that I knew exactly when he figured out who I was; a flicker of recognition was the only cue I could go by, though, so I couldn’t be entirely sure.

“Is that why you hate me so, darling?” he asked me; a half-sinister half-seductive smile creeping onto his face. “I’d honestly think you’d come up with better reasons than that.”

I instinctively began to back towards the wall of lockers behind me. I tried not to show how much I was nervous around Dante, but I couldn’t help it. Besides the obvious reason to be afraid of him, something told me I feared other things from him, as well.

“Scared of me, Rose?” He asked me in the softest voice, yet it carried over the noise of the crowd. That, or I was just becoming to atuned to it. He started to slink towards me; almost falling into that predator’s prowl.

“N-no.” I tried to say as convincingly as possible, but I’m not sure I pulled it off. I was indeed scared of him, not only because I knew he could kill me in a snap, but also because of what I was starting to feel for him. When I saw him coming towards me, I didn’t feel like running anymore; I wanted him to come closer. My lower belly started to clench in anticipation, because it was obvious something would happen, and as much as I hated to admit it, I wanted it to.

“Rose,” I almost jumped when I heard Aileen’s voice call out to mme. I instinctively straightened from the leaning pose I had unconsciously taken, and quickly glanced around. Aileen was shoving her way threw the crowd of milling students, her eyes on me. They seemed to yell at me: ‘who the hell is that hottie?’

“Well see ya later, babe.” I glanced over at Dante to see him wink at me suggestively – my stomach tightened in response – before sneaking off in some random direction.

“He’s hot.” I jumped when I heard Aileen’s voice – this time, barely a foot away from me – interrupt my thoughts. “Who is he?”

“Dante Alvarez.” I said in a dreamy voice. “And yes, he is indeed.”

“Rose, what’s gotten into you? You never get so gooy-eyed over some guy. He is just some guy, right? Is he someone I’m supposed to know about or something?” Aileen started barraging me with questions, but sadly the only thing I could do was stare after the direction Dante had gone.

“Rose!” I snapped out of my thoughts to glance over at Aileen. “Did you hear the last things I asked you?” I bit my lip – trying to hold back a smile – but the small grin crept over my face anyway.

“No.” I said truthfully. Aileen let an exasperated sigh fall from her lips before just shaking her head at me.

“This is what happens to teens who go all crazy over some guy.” She said in a mock sad tone. “Well come on, we have to get to athletics.”

“Hey,” I protested in defense “I have so not gone crazy over some guy. It’s not my fault he’s totally hot, and you can’t disagree with that – that he’s hot, that is.”

“Oh fine Rose, just rub it in my face that you’ve got some sexy god all over you.” Aileen said in her pretend hurt voice.

“Yeah right. He wasn’t all over me, it was more the other way around. God, now I feel like such a slut for like, wanting him so much or something.” I responded in disgust.

“Rose, didn’t you see the way he was looking at you? He most likely would’ve kissed you if I hadn’t come along and—“ At that moment, the ear-splitting sound of the tardy bell rang out, sadly from the speaker right above my head.

“Ah fuck,” I moaned. “Now we’re tardy to athletics, and I have a headache. To top it all off, Coach will most likely make us run a fucking mile. Fuck.”

“Well isn’t someone just joyous right now?” Aileen said in a mocking tone. I sent her a half-hearted glare, and began to jog quickly towards the school’s gym. We were already tardy, but it was better to get to class a few seconds late, than the thirty minutes late we would be if we didn’t hurry. When I got to the gym, I shoved the doors open, and jogged in, glancing around to regain my Barings.

Sixty or so girls were lined up in straight rows, all dressed in the similar uniform of t-shirts – emblazoned with a number and the school sign – and ridiculus looking grey shorts. They were currently standing from one of the stretches they had done – I didn’t know which one – and when they heard the gym door open, they turned there heads to look at Aileen and I – who had entered.

“Ladies, do your stretches! Just because some people—“ here the coach stopped to glare at Aileen and I “decide it is okay to be late to class, doesn’t mean everyone needs to stop and watch the distraction they present.” I let an inaudible sigh fall from my lips, and slowly turned to look at Coach Jones.

Coach Jones – formally known as just ‘coach’ – was in one word, a plain bitch. No one liked her – thanks to the harsh attitude she had everywhere she went – and that included me. Hell, she wasn’t helping my opinion of her right now, by giving me the rudest look I’ve ever gotten.

“Get dressed – both of y’all – do the stretches, and run the mile,” were the words that fell from her lips. Not wanting to be bitched at by a teacher, I turned to obey her orders, though every fiber of my being commanded I didn’t.

“Linith!” I quickly turned around to meet the harsh gaze of Coach – an eyebrow raised in confusion. “What do you say to me?”

“Yes ma’m,” I spat out threw gritted teeth. I couldn’t help start to hate her now; instead of the normal dislike. She gave me one of those ‘ha, I win’ looks before nodding – my signal to leave. I turned around, and started to head toward the locker room.

“I can’t stand her,” I said to Aileen in annoyance as I dressed out into the athletics uniform. “She acts like just because she’s the coach, everyone should just fucking bow down to her damn awesomeness.”

“I don’t know…” Aileen started up. “She doesn’t seem so bad.”

“That’s because she never gets on your case about anything. Your little Miss Perfect in her eyes, but if I just stretch the wrong way, it’s worth me running a mile. I swear she hates me, and I didn’t even do anything to the bitch.” By this time, Aileen and I had finished dressing; we were currently jogging towards the doors that led out onto the track. I brought out my ipod, and started blasting Breaking Benjamin into my ears.

As I ran, I couldn’t help but slip into the music; it felt like the beats were running threw my body; it was as if the voices were part of my soul. I loved this feeling. I only got it when I was running; when I was testing my endurance limits. Ironically it was only then that I could relax.

Soon enough, the rhythm of my running became natural to me – thud thud, went my sneakers on the turf of the track. In and out passed my breath through my lungs. Sometimes I would hold my breath, and the only sounds I could hear would be the music in my ears and the pounding of my heart.

When I had finally made it around the track four times, I glanced around me to see most of the girls were already outside. A few were playing volleyball, but most of them were running like me. I was going to keep on running; I had already started to step forward, when I felt a light tap on my shoulder. Glancing sideways, I saw Aileen motioning for me to take out my headphones. I took one out to listen to her.

“Rose, is it cool if I go play volleyball? You don’t have to come with me, I just…” I raised an eyebrow in surprise; Aileen had never played volleyball during athletics before. Not that I knew of, anyway. I shrugged and watched as she turned and jogged towards the volleyball players.

After a while of watching, I had to admit that Aileen was pretty good at the sport; I didn’t think I had ever seen her miss a ball coming her way. Shrugging off the slight feeling of replacement I felt, I shoved the earphone back into my ear, and started to run again.