The Pieces of Me

chapter seven

The time I spent in Sam's car is on my mind every day for the following week, it has plagued my mind aimlessly and every day, no matter what I try; I can't seem to shake the feeling that things are changing. He was kind and I don't mean that in a way that implies that he isn't always but up until the start of this year's we were just friends who didn't like to get drunk and cared more about shoes.

I could fault myself for never realising just how much we have in common but the more I think about it; and I think about it often, it makes me realise that the majority of time we all spent bonding and going out and being stupid he spent with Layla and lord knows she didn't want anyone else knowing him.

He was kind of just the guy that was around sometimes and that would muck around with Mark when he needed help on a project or presentation or the guy to go to when the rest of the boys were training for a game that neither were a part of. When we met in Freshman year it was because he had met Alfie and Hugo and they had invited him to this dorm party that Claudia was dragging me too, we played some stupid party game and then from that point on he was part of the group.

Horridly I think that I would have been the least upset had he gone with Layla and never come back, forcing us to forget about him and just accept the fact that some friendships just don't work out and we are a big group so it shouldn't be that much of a surprise.

Except now he is here, no more Layla and the subsequent anger that followed him around the remainder of Sophomore year; not that I am discrediting the way he felt, it just made it feel like he was still gone. He laughed with me at the party and smiled at me even when he was angry that I was putting myself in pain and risking my long-term health.

He seemed secretive back then but now he admits things we ease, no more dancing around subjects because he knows that sharing too much was going to result in a fight that he couldn't win. He cares and when I had to go through high school with the weight of knowing that I was too much to handle, having a group of friends- family, is something that I want to preserve.

Perhaps that is why my heart is racing every time I think about that night in his car when he cheersed our fries and voiced his appreciation for throwing Layla out on her ass, maybe it is the way he regards me with a fondness that I haven't seen before.

I have never been very apt at noticing when people care, or even understanding how to move with it.

I could be reading too far into a friendship that is just now getting the chance to bloom, but I have this nervous but excited knot in my chest that bends, then tightens and expands when a message from him pops up or when I find myself back in dark with only a car light showcasing his sparkling blue eyes.

We are changing and the prospect of the family bending and folding if my feelings explode makes me nervous, prompting me to banish my daydreams and put my phone back down.

"You're not normally this fidgety" Hugo smirks, placing the number twenty placard in the centre of our small oak table and pulling out the chair he had left vacant for the past seven minutes while he ordered our omelettes.

It was enough time to let me get lost in the abyss of things I have to worry about and although my morphing feelings for Sam that I haven't yet decoded take up the brunt of my time recently, things at home still loom over me like a parasite the exterminators just can't kill.

"You aren't normally this observant" I fire back, raising both eyebrows at him because try as I might he has never succeeded in teaching me how to do one.

"It isn't hard to notice Soapie, you're drumming your fingers like you have something to prove" he smiles, pouring me a glass of water from the cold jug he brought back with him.