Bottled Blue

I had to change my clothes again before stupid Jett came over to my house. I didn't want to make it look like I tried or wore my uniform at home, so I just wore jeans and a loose-fitting knitted sweater. Then I fixed my hair and pretended to get comfortable. Except that I couldn't just crawl into my bed and get warm. I had to do homework with stupid Jett Kanellis.

I heard it when he got there. The doorbell rang, and even though I was two floors above, I could still hear it. It sang a little song instead of just ringing like a regular bell. Then I heard my mom talking, so I decided to go save her just in case he got curious about her profession.

When I got to the bottom of the stairs, she was laughing and had my brother tucked against her hip, trying to eat her necklace. Jett looked too big to be in my house. We were a family of short people. Jett seemed to take up the whole entryway, and he usually didn't appear that big at school. Not that he was fat or anything. Just that there was so much more of him than there was of us.

"Honey, your friend is here," my mom said when I reached the bottom.

"He's not my friend."

"Well, he's cute and charming. You should invite him over more often." I was going to have to slap my own mother. His ego didn't need any more feeding. He smirked and rocked back on his heels with his hands in his hoodie pocket.

"Your mom thinks I'm cute," he said.

"My mom lost her eye in a vicious battle with an opossum. So she can't see what you really look like," I told him. He just kept smirking.

"So you guys are going to do homework?" my mom asked, ignoring my comment about the opossum. Both her eyes worked just fine except that she was nearsighted. He could probably see that. "Already?" She didn't believe us. I could tell just by her tone that she thought we were using homework as an excuse to fool around or something. Like my attitude toward him was just for show.

"Unfortunately."

"Well, go on upstairs. Let me know if you need anything."

"I'm not taking him to my bedroom."

"Well, I can't have you guys in here. I have a client calling in about an hour, and I need to get the living room cleaned up and your brother down for a nap, or I won't be able to talk to them." I sighed. She was doing this on purpose.

"C'mon." Then I turned and headed back up the stairs. Jett said thank you to my mom and followed up after me.

My bedroom was kind of small. If Jett looked small in the entryway, it was nothing compared to how he looked in my tiny bedroom. He had to bend forward as I led him to the left section. I plopped down onto the pillows.

"Your room is the attic?" he asked. I nodded.

"Yeah. Get comfortable." I pulled my bag to me so I could get my folder.

"Where's your bed?" He sat down under the window where the wall didn't have an angle that would press against his big dumb head.

"The other side. They're mirrored."

"Huh. You sure have a lot of books." The entire far wall was a bookcase. My dad built it for me because I kept running out of space for all my books. And then, when that started to run out of room, they forced me to purge.

"Is that a problem?"

"Why would it be a problem?"

"I don't know. You're asking a lot of questions."

"It wasn't a question. Just an observation."

I rolled my eyes and got the science worksheet. We basically had to construct a scientific journal and write down assigned observations or projects. More often than not, our entries would have absolutely nothing to do with what we were doing in class.

"This is stupid," I muttered.

"Your room is kind of nice. From this angle."

"My mom is the only one allowed to use the internet for work. So I don't know what you came over here for."

"This is why." He reached across the small room and pulled one of my books off the shelf. It was my astronomy book. It was my favorite subject. I was shooting for getting my degree in astrophysics once I went to college. "So Monday is the moon, you said?"

"Yes." He wrote that down in his notebook and flipped through the glossary to find the moon.

"I looked up where the moon would be tonight before I came over here. It's going to rise from over there."

"Naturally."

"And it's a waxing biggous. I don't know what that means."

"Gibbous."

"Whatever. I don't know what that even means."

"It means it's getting bigger but not all the way there yet."

"Huh."

"Like when you wax a candle. You know—when you dip it—and they get bigger?" He looked at me.

"See? I knew I was right to come here. The only problem is that it's not even going to be visible tonight due to cloud cover. So we can just write that down."

"I guess. Don't we have to write out a paragraph about our research and cite sources? But, unfortunately, I'm not a source, so we'll have to pull it from the book."

"Right you are again." He set the book down, and we scoured it for proper sentences to reference.

"Your room is freezing," he remarked.

"I know. The heater is on the other side. But I'm not letting you over there."

"Why not? What are you hiding?"

"The idea of having you in my bedroom is already too much. I don't want your giant ass in my room, okay?" He chuckled.

"Well—looks like all the fun stuff is over here anyway." I looked up at him suspiciously.

"Like what exactly?"

I didn't have anything to hide. Not from anyone. My mom always said I was proud as well as prudish. She said I was born with both fists up and ready for a fight. I didn't care what anyone thought of me. But then he reached out and pulled another book off my shelf. He was enjoying this too much, and I was suddenly very embarrassed.

"The Woman's Guide to the Kama Sutra. Nice, Aasha." I tried to snatch the book back.

"My mom gave it to me, okay? She's a therapist. It's more about sexual health than porn, you pervert." He laughed and rolled away so I couldn't take the book. Then he popped it open to a picture of a woman riding a man and really putting in a lot of effort. You couldn't actually see their business, but it was obvious it wasn't just a pose. Jett gasped.

"Aasha!" he said.

"Give it back, you nasty pervert!"

"I'm the nasty pervert! You have actual porn on your bookshelf."

"It's not porn! It's a guide on women's sexual health! And I didn't buy it, okay? My mom gave it to me when she was drunk." He snickered and turned to another page where the couple was now doing it in a bizarre and awkward-looking position that didn't look like it wouldn't be very comfortable for long. Only both their faces said otherwise. He laughed again.

"Wow, Aasha. I knew what your mom did for a living, but I really wasn't expecting this. I always thought you were kind of a prude."

"What are you talking about? I'm not a prude."

"Your ex said he tried to get down your pants for four months, and you shot him down every time. He said you had a hard time talking about genitals without using the word 'privates' like a kid."

"I can say penis and vagina just fine, thank you very much. He never got down my pants because he wasn't even my boyfriend. We only made out like one time, and he sucked at it."

"That's not what he says."

"I don't care what he says. Give me back my book."

"No, I'm invested. Go back to your homework."

"You're not reading. You're being an ass." He flipped the page again.

"Ooh, this is a good one."

I jumped off the floor and lunged at him. He was quicker than me, though, and I should have anticipated it. He played sports and was bigger and faster and had wicked fast reflexes. In an instant, he had me pinned to the cushions on the floor. He crushed my chest with his arms and leaned over me to flip another page like I was nothing more than an annoying fly he had to swat out of the way.

"What do you think about this one?" he asked, showing me the picture. I glared.

"I'll punch you."

"I won't move until I know you're not going to attack me again."

"I didn't attack you. I just want my book back."

"I'm reading. It's rude to take a book from someone while they're reading." I sighed deeply. I couldn't move my arms. I could move my legs, but it wouldn't do much good if I couldn't kick them.

"Can I have my book back?"

"Say please." I still wanted to punch him.

"Please?"

"Please what?"

"I swear I'm going to punch you in the face."

"Well, now I'm definitely not going to let you go." He flipped another page.

"Let me go!" I yelled, trying to struggle out from under him.

"Not until you ask nicely."

"Please just fucking let me go?"

"I said nicely. Don't shout it at me. My ears are delicate." I groaned again. I know he was just playing with me, but he was being a dickhead.

"I hate you so much. I hate you!" He flipped another page like he was casually reading about various sex positions.

"Mm-hmm. I can tell. Real firecracker, aren't you?"

"When I get my arms free, I'm going to wrap them around your throat and strangle you!"

"Bet you can't reach." I struggled to get my arms free, but then he leaned over me farther, stretching his whole belly across mine, resting his elbows on the floor on the other side of me.

"I can't breathe," I squeaked.

"Use your last breath wisely."

"I—hate—you." He tsked with his tongue and shook his head.

"What a wasted opportunity."

"Please, Jett. I'm being serious. I don't like this."

That seemed to work. He immediately let me go and sat back.

"Sorry. I was just messing with you," he said, shutting the book. I stood up and went to the other side of the room.

"Asshole," I muttered. Then, I went right to my bed to pull the covers over my head and ignore him. Mr. Louis was first on my list of people I wanted to murder. Jett was second.