Eloise Howard is the new girl with a dangerous curiosity and hot-headed temper.
Isaac Lahey is the boy that has a knack for making her blood boil.
Long story short, they're both stubborn and it's complicated.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
...
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07. because I was over on the bench
ﾟ. : ･*: ✧ ｡･:* : ﾟ
"She's not even French! She's a French-Canadian, which means she's just a Canadian... who can speak French!" Lydia ranted from behind the steering wheel of her blue Toyota car.
"The audacity," Eloise feigned shock in the passenger seat.
"If I'm going to place my own mental health into the hands of a high school counsellor," Lydia sniffed, her raspberry-coloured gloved hands tightening on the wheel as she continued her rant. "I'd prefer her to be a little more qualified than an off-brand French teacher."
Despite her impassioned tirade, the strawberry blonde never took her glaring eyes off the road and the distant traffic ahead. Which to Eloise, who was still in the process of putting her shoes on and tying the laces up after getting rushed out of the house, was a small comfort. Driving with the meticulous girl on most days was pleasantly enjoyable, yet now, Eloise couldn't help but notice how distracted the typically precise and exact Lydia seemed to be. She had already hit two sidewalk curbs while making sharper than necessary turns in empty intersections.
Lydia's pressed rant seemed to resonate deeper emotions than the superficial topic of the guidance counsellor's nationality warranted.
"The only reason I'm doing this miserable counselling in the first place is to appease my parents so they don't take away my car keys," Lydia went on. She took her sharp eyes off the road momentarily to glance pointedly at the blonde in the passenger seat, who was brushing the dirt from her sneakers off the thighs of her dark black jeans. "You know without me driving, you'd have to bike to the game. Imagine how knotted and messy your hair would be, not to mention how sweaty riding a bike is! As your friend, I simply can't allow it."
"And I am forever indebted to you because of it," Eloise quipped. She flashed Lydia an unapologetic grin as the strawberry blonde rolled her eyes.
They sat together in silence as Lydia proceeded to make a left, then a right, then another left, nearly hitting a startled pedestrian at the crosswalk intersection.
"So, why do your parents think you need therapy?" Eloise finally asked, keeping one concerning eye on Lydia and one on the clear road ahead of them. The blonde tried to keep her tone, light and casual, lest she push Lydia Martin too far out of the confiding friendship zone and into intrusive territory. "I thought you said everything was alright after the woods? Are you feeling okay?"
"Oh, my parents think there's some residual trauma," Lydia waved away the comment dismissively, "but I've been absolutely fine, never better actually."
