Here Today, Gone Tomorrow

Haley sighed as they'd finally finished running a mile around the track for PE and silently thanked god that it was over. She sighed as they did their last stretches after running.

As they did butterflies Alex turned his head towards her, since they awkardly hadn't spoken since the New Year's kiss.

"Haley?"

"Hmm?"

"I like you."

Then Ms. Bell blew the whistle for us to head to the locker rooms but Haley sort of stood there.

"Alex," Haley called to him.

"Mmm?" He turned around to find her.

"I like you too." She smiled as Alex felt his heart melt into a pool in the pit of his stomach.

“Alright, class,” Ms. Hart called as the bell rang. “We’ve been working on our self portraits for a few days, so I thought we could take a break.” Ms. Hart smiled at each and every one of us. “Feel free to work on whatever you want, as long as its art related. Don’t forget you have to have 50 art projects in before the end of the semester.” Yeah, who could forget that?

“What do you want to work on?” Alex turned to Haley.

“I was thinking about messing with some clay.” She said standing up to go through the arch that leads to the clay room.

“For real,”Alex nodded and followed her.

“I didn’t say you had to come too,” After speaking with Haley all week, she’d become more open. She’s used to Alex now and he liked it.

“I didn’t say I was following you,” he told her right back.

Haley grabbed a couple handfuls of clay and sat down at the bench. Alex followed suit only grabbing on handful, His hands are bigger than hers. After a moment Haley had a flower-ish looking thing going on.

“What’s that?” She asked almost disgusted at his artwork.

“It’s a panda!”Alex answered as if it were amazing she couldn’t tell.

“What is that?”He mocked her.

“It’s a flower-slash-panda,” She told Alex as a matter-of-factly.

“Oh, of course it is, how could I be so stupid?”Alex wondered sarcastically.

“Yeah, how could you?” She retorted. Alex reached over her arms and grabbed a handful of her artwork.

“Alex!” She gasped at me. “Alex,” he mocked her, yet again. She reached a fist over and smashed Alex's panda bear into oblivion.

“No!” Alex cried faux anger. “Ha-ha,” Haley squished her clay back together and started over.

“What are you making now?” Alex asked leaning over to see what she was doing.

“It’s a surprise,” She elbowed him back into his spot.

“Fine then,” Alex was going to make her something that would knock her socks off.

Alex started with a simple squiggle of a line and worked into an ‘H'. When he had the ‘H' mapped and shaped, he decided he wanted to draw on it. He grabbed a dull pencil and brought it to the clay, but realized that he didn’t know what to write. He sat there for a moment and thought. Okay, he thought about peeking over Haley's shoulder… and he did.

“Alex,” Haley complained elbowing him before he could even get a glimpse of what she was making.

“Sorry, I’m just so curious,” he laughed.

“Well, stop it,” She scolded him. “Curiosity killed the cat and all.” He laughed harder and cliché comment.

“Shut up,” She giggled. He took a deep breath and looked back at his own work of art. Alex gave Haley another glance and knew what he wanted to write, but would it be too soon? He just met her and He's only known her for a little less than a month. But she smiles at him now and she talks to him. She jokes around with him and she…she’s just…perfect right? He kept staring at the molded clay lost for a second.

“Can I look now?” Alex questioned without thinking about it.

“Not until it goes through the kiln.” She spoke softly.

“I’m dying…” he complained.

“Die slow, this’ll take a while.” Haley laughed.

Haley stood up for a moment placing a piece of wax paper over the mystery sculpture.

So Alex turned to the ‘H' and started to scrawl on it. Over and over again, sometimes the words cut off, but He just continued the question on the next piece of brown mess. Haley came back and He covered his secret with his palm. Haley had red, white and pink glaze along with a few different sized brushes in her hand. She caught Alex's eye for a second and suppressed a smile. He met her half way and winked. She removed the wax paper, tossing it in his direction. He used the paper to cover his work and went to the back room. He picked out blue and yellow. He returned to find the wax paper in place; she hadn’t even bothered to peek. He started painted the words yellow and the outside blue. It took most of the hour before we placed our clay on the lid to the kiln, so Ms. Hart would put it in.

“Mine’s going to knock your socks off.” Alex told her as he went to pick up his backpack.

“You’ll be jealous when you see mine.” Haley retorted.

“Shoot, girl, I’m already jealous.” Alex puckered his lips and tried out an accent.

“Of what?” Haley laughed.

“You and your girlish figure, I’m playa hatin’.” He let his voice rise at the end.

Haley laughed at me and shook her head.

“What?” He asked tipping his head in her direction.

“You’re crazy,” for you, He thought as she kept laughing. The bell rang and he started walking next to Haley.

“So, what are you doing this weekend?” Alex wondered as they headed toward her homeroom. Haley's body went rigid and looked anywhere, but in my direction.

“I…uh… I’m busy Alex. I don’t go places on the weekends.” Haley spoke too quickly to be convincing.

“Yeah?” He didn’t believe her for a second, “What do you do then?” She went stiff and licked her lips. “I work,” her voice shook. “Oh, where? I’ll come see you.” he smiled at her.

“Can you just let it go, Alex?” She took a deep breath and released it in an instant.

“You know,” Alex spoke slowly. “You’re going to be my girlfriend before the semester ends, so you might as well get all the secrets out.” he spoke as if she were already his.

“Yeah?” She questioned harshly, “How about you tell me a secret first?” She snapped.

“What do you want to know?” Alex wondered. She just waited. “Well, my middle name is William. I like to play video games. I love to watch cartoons. When I’m around you I feel like my heart is about to explode. I eat a lot. I play sports that I’m not very good at. When I was younger I thought masturbation was a type of candy.” She slapped a hand over his mouth.

“Alright,” She sighed. “Those are just facts about yourself and…only the last one was embarrassing.” She giggled.

He mumbled behind her hand and she didn’t know what he actually said was, “Ohh, you wanted embarrassing?”

She shook her head and said, “That doesn’t matter,” She sighed and let her hand fall.

“My secret’s different,” Alex stopped to take it all in for a moment. “How different?”He questioned cocking my eyebrow.

“Too different to be publicly divulged.” She said extremely fast.

“When are you going to get some free time?”he gave her a sloppy smile. The bell rang…He was late. She shrugged her shoulders, turned away from him and walked into her homeroom. Damn…it…all…