Sparks Fly

One week later, Friday. Ellie was poring over Little Dorrit, a Charles Dickens novel assigned as reading. She'd saved the required English course on purpose, as she loved to read. She just hated to write, is the issue. She was bundled up in two hoodies and a beanie, glancing up every once in a while to watch Sophie skate.

Carlos had not appeared yet, somewhat to Ellie's dismay. Having someone distract her from homework was refreshing, if she was honest with herself. She smiled and shook her head before re-immersing herself in the story.

“What're you reading?” Ellie's smile spread, and Carlos took her book from her grasp, examining the back cover. “Looks sort of boring.”

“It is not boring, it is required reading. Now give it back before you lose my place.” Carlos smiled, handing the book back sheepishly. “Hello to you too.”

“What's it about?” Ellie sighed, folding over the corner of the page to save her place. No way she was getting any reading done now.

“Society in 1850's Britain.”

“Sounds sort of boring.” Carlos dug around his duffel for a minute, producing a box of fruit snacks and offering Ellie some. “You can do homework later.”

“I sort of gave up on the idea of getting any work done with you around on Wednesday.” Ellie pulled open the bag of snacks, popping a purple one in her mouth. Carlos smiled triumphantly.

“So have you ever tried practicing ice skating?” Ellie laughed, nearly choking on a fruit snack.

“Oh yeah, I've tried. I'm not good at sports where I have little control over my feet. Ice skating, snowboarding, skiing, skateboarding... I mean I used to do ballet, and I was good at that, but it's different. I'm not on ICE, I'm on a hardwood floor.”

“Well if you can do ballet, you can ice skate.”

“Nope, there's much less chance of me falling on my ass when I do ballet.”

“I could help you practice! I wouldn't let you fall on your ass, promise.” Ellie laughed again, shaking her head.

“Nope. I look awkward enough without being on ice.” Carlos opened his mouth to speak, then seemed to think better of it. Sophie popped up in Ellie's peripheral vision, she hadn't even noticed her lesson end.

“Did you bring me fruit snacks too?” she prodded, eyeing Carlos' duffel bag.

“Of course I did Sophie” Carlos reassured her, as if it were ridiculous to think otherwise. Sophie squealed, grabbing the box and settling herself between them.

“Ready to go home now Soph?” Ellie asked when Sophie had finished the fruit snacks. She pouted, looking between Carlos and Ellie.

“But I wanna hang out with Carlos more.” Her tiny finger pointed at Carlos, who stuck his tongue out at Ellie. Cute.

“Well, I want to go home and finish all the homework I didn't get done.”

“And I want to buy you guys pizza.” Ellie sighed, rolling her eyes at the two pouty faces before her.

“Another time, maybe. C'mon Sophie.” Sophie sighed overdramatically, slouching off towards the lobby of the skating rink.

“You're not gonna stop, are you?” Ellie asked. Carlos shook his head, picking up his hockey duffel with a grin.

“You can't always have other stuff to do. But if you really do want me to stop, I will.” Ellie bit her lip, if only to bite back a smile. Sophie could like Carlos all she wanted, but Ellie wouldn't give in that easy.

And yet, on Monday, she found herself disappointed when Carlos didn't show. While Ellie was left to her reading, Sophie was dispirited. “I want more fruit snacks.”

“We have fruit snacks at home.” Sophie crossed her little arms haughtily.

“I want Carlos' fruit snacks.” They hadn't even known the guy for more than two weeks. But then again, Ellie didn't have friends over all that often, and neither did Sophie. She would just go over to a friend's house. And Ellie was usually too busy to have time for more than a quick lunch with friends, maybe a movie.

But, to their pleasure, Carlos rushed into the lobby just as they were leaving.

“Hey!” he said, out of breath, returning the high five Sophie offered him. “I had, uh, band practice, but I wanted to bring you this.” He handed Ellie a DVD box, the title read 'Little Dorrit'.

“I didn't know there was a TV version” she marveled, smiling up at him.

“Me either, but my mom said there was. So I found it at the library, and you can watch that, cause it'll be less boring than a book. And easier to understand! And it has that guy from that one movie about that other girl. And it's long I guess. But it looks less boring than the book and it took me like an hour to find in the library and”

“YES” Ellie blurted, cutting him off.

“What?” he spluttered.

“Yes, fine - you can buy us pizza.” Sophie squealed and hugged Ellie's legs. Carlos smiled the biggest she'd seen him do yet, which was saying something, for Carlos. His face nearly glowed. “Calm down, it's just pizza.”

“Saturday?” he suggested.

“Um... I have a huge project due in a week, I wanted to work on it more this weekend...” Carlos' face fell, and he crossed his arms.

“Come on, you never get time to just relax. It'll only be two hours, at most. Which is how much time you spend talking to me anyhow, and I wasn't even here today!” Ellie sighed, blowing her bangs out of her eyes. She was getting worse at handling his pouty face. What was wrong with her?

“I'm sorry, you're right. Saturday.”