The Last Time the Rain Fell

When lunch finally rolled around, I was sitting at a bench outside much like the day before with Adam, Eli, and Clare. Adam and I had agreed that we would split what was the last slice of chocolate cake in half and he was holding my half hostage because of his recent discovery.

“Adam, if you love me, you’ll give me my fucking cake!” I whined, earning a few chuckles from Eli and Clare who were both watching our banter.

“I can’t believe you didn’t tell me that, Liv. We always tell each other everything.” he said, still holding my cake out of my reach.

“How could you not notice it? We sleep in each other’s bed almost every night.”

“You know that I’m not the smart one in this relationship.” he said.

I whined and lifted up my shirt, successfully flashing both Eli and Clare the small tattoo on my hip, twisting the ball off and taking the cool metal of my bellybutton ring out of my skin. I placed it on the table and looked at him expectantly.

“Do you feel better now?” I asked.

“Don’t think I don’t know about the other one.” he said, teasing me by opening the plastic container and beginning to eat his half of the cake.

“How exactly did you find out about this?” I asked him.

“I noticed it last night when we were in the basement; I just didn’t want to distract myself from teasing you about Jake.”

“Wait,” Clare began in between spurts of laughter that Eli was experiencing as well, “What happened between you and Jake?”

“Nothing happened, Adam’s just being an ass and he doesn’t want to give me food.”

“I highly doubt cake counts as a food group.” Eli pointed out.

I groaned and folded my arms over the table, placing my forehead on top of them.

“What’s wrong with her?” I heard Drew’s familiar voice ask.

“She’s mad because I want her to take out her secret piercings.” Adam said.

“The secret tattoo doesn’t bother you but the tongue ring and belly button ring do?”

“He’s my favorite cousin.” I mumbled into my skin.

I heard Drew walk away and I slowly brought my head up, looking at Adam who had an increasing amused expression on his face that I was sure Clare and Eli were also sporting. Adam looked at me expectantly and I frowned before moving my tongue around in my mouth to untwist the ball and slip the tongue ring out. Adam held his hand that was holding my belly button ring in it and I put the metal that was in my mouth in his hand. He held the slice of cake out to me and I snatched it from his hands.

“All this for fucking cake.” I muttered.

“Clare and I used to have matching piercings.” Eli said.

“Really? Wait, why is it ‘used to?’” I asked.

“Well, Eli still has his but I had to take mine off because while we got it I was going through a rebellious phase and a while after when Eli and I were taking a break I just took it out.” Clare explained.

The bell rang and we all rushed to class, Eli and I walking into our class side-by-side. The class, unfortunately, passed by quickly and before I knew it, Drew was driving me to Clare’s house where I was supposed to be meeting up with Jake. He stopped the car in front of the house and looked at me with sad eyes.

“Drew,” I began to ask, “What’s wrong?”

“I think I’m going to drop out of Degrassi.” he said.

“W-What? Why would you do that?” I asked him, stuttering my words a bit.

“After everything that happened I just can’t deal with school anymore. There’s this girl in my year, Fiona, that’s looking for a roommate. I think I’m going to go live with her since I got that job.”

“Do you really think that’s wise?” I asked.

“Yeah, mom said that everyone in her house goes to school and I don’t want to do that anymore. Do you think you’ll be okay with Dallas in the house?” he asked.

I smiled and playfully punched him in the arm.

“I haven’t even seen him since the second day I came to stay with you guys.” I said.

Drew chuckled and gestured to the house in front of us.

“Go ‘tutor’ Jake.” he said.

“I have no idea what you mean by that.”

“Get out of the car, Liv.” he said playfully.

I smiled and unlocked the door, grabbing my book as I opened the door. I closed the car door behind me and walked to the front door, knocking when I reached it. The door opened and I was taken back at the person in front of me.

“Eli,” I asked as I stepped through the doorway, “What are you doing here?”

“I’m over here a lot, plus I’m waiting for Clare to finish getting ready.” he said with a shrug.

“Yeah, I know, Adam told me.” I said,

“Really,” he began to question as he stepped closer to me, “You’ve been talking about me, Olive?”

“Olive? Nobody calls me Olive.” I said.

Eli shrugged again, something that seemed to be a common occurrence for him.

“I guess it’s going to be my special name for you. May I ask why you’re here?”

“Jake needs help with Chemistry and he wants to feed off my huge brain.”

“I almost forgot you had that class with him. I thought you had Chemistry with me for a minute there.”

Clare came downstairs with Jake behind her as the words came out of Eli’s mouth. Her hair and makeup was done expertly and her hair was curled nicely. Eli grabbed her hand in his and they each say goodbye to both me and Jake before they walked out of the door.

“So,” Jake began after we sat down next to each other on the couch in the living room, “we’re all alone.”

He wrapped an arm around my shoulder and pulled me closer to his warm body. He leaned his lips down to mine and kissed me, our lips moving together slowly as unwanted thoughts of Eli ran through my clouded mind. Jake slowly pushed my back down onto the couch and his rand carefully pushed the edge of my shirt up as if he was testing the waters. My tattooed hip was exposed and I pulled away from him.

“Don’t you think we should work on your Chemistry?” I asked as his lips placed butterfly kisses on my neck.

“Is that your way of saying this is going a little too fast for you?” he asked, pulling away from me to look into my blue eyes that held specks of the lightest grey.

I bit the corner of my bottom lip and nodded my head slowly. Jake’s weight and warmth was moved off of my body and I sat up as he did - our bodies less than an inch away from each other. He opened his book and wrapped his arm around me again. After an hour of trying to explain things to him, we decided to take a break and he turned the TV on as we munched on the popcorn that sat in an orange bowl atop my lap.

“Olivia,” he began as I leaned in slightly closer to him to rest my head on his chest, “I know we only met yesterday, but do you want to go out with me?”

“We already went out on a ‘not date.’” I said with a chuckle.

“No, I meant like do you want to be my girlfriend?” he asked.

“You’ve only known me for a day, I could be a psychopathic killer with fourteen kids.” I joked.

I could feel his chest rumble with chuckles and I smiled as he pulled me a tad closer to him.

“You’re not, right?” he asked in the same playful tone I had used.

“There’s only one way for you to find out.”

“Does that mean yes?”

“Yes, it does.” I said, moving to place a kiss on his lips that he happily returned.