Stay With Them Tonight

Ryan and Kelly “suddenly” decided to drive alone that morning so of course Jason and I were stuck riding together. We took his car, and were running a bit late, so he was going over the speed limit, and I was only encouraging him to hurry up.

“Why did you take so long?” he asked, staring at the road. The five to ten minute drive was about to turn into a two minute drive.

“I was in the car first! What took you so long!?”

“I overslept!” he defended himself.

“Stop playing so much Black Ops! Maybe you’ll get more sleep!”

“My alarm didn’t go off!”

“If it really didn’t, which I highly doubt, it was only because you threw it into the wall too many times.” I glared at him. His hair was damp and looked like he had just messed it up with a towel. I tried not to laugh at the sight, but a tiny chuckle slipped past. His hair was even curlier when it as damp, and it was drying in weird directions. He saw me staring at it and ran a hand through it, still looking down the road.

“What?” he asked suspiciously.

“You look like you slept upside down and your hair forgot what gravity was.” I said honestly. I laughed again, to which he looked at me like I was insane, rubbed his head again, and returned his hand to the steering wheel, looking contemplative. I shrugged my laugher off and watched the scenery flash by.

When we screeched to a halt in one of the last available parking spaces in the back lot (not literally screeching, Jason is a pretty good driver, despite having a lead-foot), it was silent, all the normal people either ditching or already in class. I stopped when Jason grabbed my hand from behind.

“Are we going to talk?” he aked.

“Now?!” I pointed to the building, saying we were obviously late.

“What’s a few extra minutes? It’s not like they’ll notice.” He reasoned. I looked around for a reason not to.

“They might call my parents,” I tried.

“I saw your dad closing the door behind you when you ran outside. They know you’re late.” He answered. Darn him.

“I can’t lie to the person at the desk. I’m a bad liar.”

“You don’t have to; I’m a good liar.”

“Yeah, probably too good,” I mumbled to myself. He glared at me, frustrated.

“Okay, okay! I have no more excuses. What do you want to talk about?” He raised his eyebrow. I rose mine (attempted to) back. He pulled me to the side of the doors so we couldn’t be seen standing around talking through the door-windows.

“Allie, the whole thing about the ki—” the door banged open behind us and I whipped around to see a teacher. It was one of the nicer teachers, but she didn’t look happy.

“I thought I saw someone out here. And what exactly are you doing?” she scrutinized us, looking for drugs or signs of PDA, I guess. Like we would do something two feet from the door, y’know . . .

“We were late. We come to school together,” Jason explained, sounding annoyed. She shot a glare at him.

“Sorry, I thought I dropped my phone. We’re neighbors, so we drive together,” I explained, relieved at the intervention.

I wanted to hug the teacher for letting me avoid an awkward conversation; “Allie, it was all a mistake. I don’t like you at all. What- did you think I had feelings for you? Because I kissed you? I kiss a different girl every day.” Jason would never say it like that, and I’m sure it was just the little pessimist inside me telling me that’s what I thought Jason would be thinking as he laid it out in nicer words.

The teacher gave us one more look before opening the door and escorting us to the front desk for late passes, and then following us until we were safely in our separate classes. Kelly gave me an amused smirk as I made as little noise as possible putting my bag down in the silent classroom. I felt twenty pairs of eyes staring at me until the teacher cleared her throat (this, thankfully, was a different female teacher) and went on talking.

Kelly elbowed me with a knowing look, and Greg was asking questions with his- suspiciously happy; what happened to make him so giddy?- eyes. I frowned and banged my head down on my notebook.

I needed to get the talk with Jason over already.

*****

Want to go to the zoo? Tyler texted me suddenly during a break. I smiled when I realized he was specifically texting me on the break so I could reply quickly.

Zoo? Hell yes! Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! I grinned as I replied. It was only a few seconds before my phone gave another obnoxious buzz signaling a text.

I’ll pick you up after school?

Sure. You don’t have any classes?

Nope. I’m all yours.

:D I’ll see you later, then! I put my phone on silent and returned my phone to my pocket, walking into my next class, humming a random song.

I exclaimed when I saw Rachel in the seat that had sat empty for a while.

“Rachel!” I shouted, hugging her from behind. “You’re back!” It was then that I noticed that she and Greg were holding hands under the desk.

“Awwwwww,” I cooed. “Finally!” I switched to a new topic:

“Greg, if you hurt Rachel I will personally deliver her your head on a platter. Rachel, if you hurt Greg I will personally take away every pair of shoes you own, and I will burn down your closet.” Rachel gasped. Greg looked at me with wide eyes. I grinned at them both.

“I lose my head but she only loses a few pieces of clothing?” He asked incredulously.

“You have no idea what I have been able to stuff in that closet, mister,” Rachel joked.

The class passed uneventfully, besides the fact that Rachel and Greg held hands throughout. They were too cute.

*****

English twisted my head around when we read some old text that had a lot of “haseth” and “’twixes (yum, but confusing in old literature)” and “thys” and a lot of other words a first grader would come up with, and I spent the class alternating between begging Katie and Kelly for help and banging my head on the desk when I missed something obvious. I practically ran out of that room and into the next one- math.

When finally, finally lunch came, I rested my head on my arms and recouped for the last period. I didn’t eat, because I would eat a whole bunch of junk at the zoo. The grin I had on was hidden under my hair.

“What are you smiling so creepily for?” Katie asked, her face appearing at my level at the edge of the table. I jumped; this girl was silent and you never really noticed her until she was right on top of you.

“Nothing~!” I sung the word. I noticed Jason give me a weird look, and felt a little guilty about being a bitch and avoiding the conversation I knew I needed to endure. I would listen to it tomorrow.

I promised myself, subtly pinky swearing myself.

Of course, I wouldn’t have time after the computer class to do it because Tyler would be picking me up and we would be heading to the zoo.