Accidentally Yours

“You all right?” Kat asked me for the nth time during lunch.

“Yeah,” I replied.

“What are you thinking about?”

“Aly.”

Kat sighed, for the nth time as well. “Aly this, Aly that. As your current best friend, I’m getting jealous. I mean, come on. She betrayed you.”

I looked at her, saw her pouting and her hands crossed over her chest, and laughed. “You don’t have to be jealous. I want to be friends with her again for the sake of moving on and accepting everything, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to leave you.”

She sobbed overdramatically as she hugged me, “I love you so much, Hayley Ross!” Then she turned to Raven, who we were now sharing our table with. “Now, come on, say it with me—I love you Hayley Ross!”

I glanced at Raven. He glanced back at me. We both turned away.

“What is this?” Kat cut in mischievously. “Shy, eh?”

For the sake of ending the conversation, I said, “Look here, Kat. Raven doesn’t love me, and I feel the same. We’re just doing this for…”

“…for the soon-to-be baby, I know,” she finished. “But that is too sad! You have to actually try to fall in love with each other.”

“That’s impossible,” Raven finally said something. “This girl here won’t fall in love with me, because her Prince Charming’s just right there.”

I turned impulsively to where Raven pointed his thumb at and blurted, “Where?”

“See, I told you so,” Raven told Kat before he took a sip of his Coke.

Kat, in turn, hit my head with her palm. “You moron. How could you be so fucking stubborn? Just get a move on, will you? Sooner or later, you’re going to have to be married to Prince Charming number two here.”

Right. I was going to end up with Raven because we had done the s-word. “Should I start writing Evans as my last name now?” The words came out like acid.

He glared at me, and I glared back. It was impossible to fall in love with each other in this state. “Should I start calling you darling now?”

“By all means, of course, honey.”

Kat whistled. “Whew. You guys have a loooooong way to go.”

I trailed off as I thought about things—the current situation—seriously. What was I doing, acting as if everything was perfectly fine? If I do get pregnant and if we do end up until the end of our days together, what would happen? We would have to lie to our kid and show him/her how much daddy and mommy loved each other…by kissing, hugging, petting, and…having more of the s-word.

I shivered and shook the nasty thoughts away from my head. I had enough of imagining the s-word. I felt like I was becoming more and more tainted with each minute of thinking.

Something—someone—blew against my ear, and I turned abruptly, hitting Raven’s head with mine.“Ouch!” we both yelled.

“What was that for?” I demanded, gently massaging the part that took the hit.

“You were spacing out,” he replied, gritting his teeth at the pain of our head collision. “God, you didn’t have to hit me with your stubborn head.”

“It was an accident, all right?”

“And you call me clumsy.”

“Will you two shut up?” Kat growled as she ate her cheeseburger. “Geez. For a couple, you fight a lot.”

“We—are—not—a—couple!” I defended my side, emphasizing each word to make sure they embedded themselves on Kat's brain.

Raven didn’t say anything, and everything fell back into an awkward silence.



Kat had Judo practice, Raven had a part-time job, and I was all alone. In between thoughts of grabbing some ice cream and going to the library, I decided to just go home. It had been a long day, anyway. For some reason, arguing with Raven drained all the energy I had.

“Hayley,” a familiar voice called me from behind. I looked past my shoulder and saw Aly. I felt a pang, like a thunder bolt hit me straight to the chest.

“Aly.”

“You see,” she began nervously. I wondered why she was always nervous around me. “I came to ask a favor from you.”

Favor? “What about?”

She started nibbling with her lip, nd twirled her fingers through her blonde hair as she did so. “It’s about…Rob.”

“I’m listening.”

“Would it be okay…to ask you to…if he approaches you and talks to you,” she stumbled over her words. “Would it be okay to ask you to stay away from him?”

I didn’t know how to react. I smiled half-heartedly. “Wh-what are you talking about, Aly? Rob hasn’t talked to me since the party.”

“W-well, while we were in his bedroom, he said something really weird and…” her voice shook like crazy now, almost as if she were about to cry.

“Aly—Aly, calm down,” I reassured her. She held on to my arms for support.

“He told me you were…as a girl, of course I’d feel insecure…”

Just before I was about to ask her what she was trying to say, her phone rang, and she reached for it in her pocket. "Hello, Rob?” she answered. “Um—I’m alone. Yep. I’ll see you then. Bye. I love you.”

She flipped it shut and stared back at me.

“So y-you see,” she continued. “I love Rob, and I know he l-loves me. Please don’t…don’t try to be in the way.”

“Hey, look here, I’m not trying to get in the way—“

“Rob said you looked extremely beautiful that night,” she cut me off. “So please, don’t say you aren’t. Why else would you fix yourself like that? To even go to such lengths as wearing clothes like that is a bit…”

“I’m not—really. Believe me, Aly. I’m not trying to catch his attention, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

“Listen, I forgive you, Hayley, and I really do want to be your friend again. Let’s just forgive each other and forget about all the shit from our past. See you.”

She walked quickly away from me. It was that easy for her. And what had she meant by ‘I forgive you, Hayley?’ Shouldn’t I be the one saying that? Forget all the shit from our past? Was it that easy for her?

And what was Rob trying to do anyway, saying those words in front of Aly?



Later that night, I couldn’t sleep a wink. Thoughts danced around my head, making me restless. I sent Kat a message, asking if she was still awake.

A few seconds later, she replied: No. It’s 1AM. Y would I be asleep? Get 2 sleep young lady, before I put u 2 sleep myself. Her reply was so ‘Kat-like’; sarcasm overflowed out of her, even in her messages.

Randomly, I texted Raven—I actually had his number—and sent him a blank message. My ringtone played seconds later, startling me so much that I almost threw my phone to the other side of the wall.

It took me a minute to answer. “Hello, who is this?”

A laugh on the other line. “Who is this? Doesn’t your phone have caller IDs?”

It was the first time a boy, other than Rob, called me on the phone. “Raven?”

“No, it’s your mom,” he said sarcastically. “Of course it’s Raven. Who else could call you at this hour?”

“Um, why did you call?”

“Um, why did you send me a blank message?”

I smiled to myself. “I’m sorry. Did I wake you up?”

“You actually consider my human needs, don’t you?”

“Stop answering my questions with questions.”

He laughed again. His voice sounded deeper than usual, almost as if it weren’t him on the other line. “I was sleeping, but then you sent a message. I thought then that you couldn’t sleep.”

“You were right.”

“So what’s wrong?”

I breathed in, wondering if I should tell him about my conversation with Aly. I decided not to, since it wasn’t important—to him, anyways. “I just couldn’t. Randomly.”

“Heh,” was all he replied.

“That ‘heh’ thing of yours is starting to annoy me. It’s like, you have something insulting to say to me,” I said, actually copying how he did the 'heh' word.

“I do.”

“What do you mean, you do?” I demanded dramatically, but inside I was kind of laughing.

“Nothing,” he answered, his voice almost inaudible. “Just practicing my answer if ever we really get married in the future.”

“Wh-what are you saying?” I felt as though my heart stopped.

“Do you believe in love?”

“I do. Why?”

“See, you’re practicing it with me now,” he chuckled lowly.

I blushed even more. “Quit teasing me.”

“Try to sleep now,” he continued. “I won’t hung up until you fall asleep.”

“Why are you so kind to me?”

“That’s valid only for today, since I can’t see your monster-like face.”

“I’m going to kill you tomorrow,” I yawned.

He laughed again before he said, “Just get some sleep. Good night.”

“If the time comes that we really do get married…“ Slowly, I closed my eyes, feeling the drowsiness overcome me. “...and get to promise forever in front of the altar…will you say I do?”



Raven’s grip on his phone tightened. That girl, he mused, asks the weirdest questions. He looked up at the glow in the dark stars as he thought of what to say.

“Will you?” he asked shortly.

There was a long silence on the other line. He sighed, realizing that Hayley had already fallen asleep. He looked at the wall clock. It was past one already, and they had classes in the morning.

Just as he was about to hung up, Hayley whispered hazily, “I…will…”

Raven’s face felt warm all of a sudden. Then, he smiled to himself, closed his eyes and listened to Hayley’s sleeping breaths, with the phone still against his ear, until he fell asleep.