No Rhyme or Reason

Chapter 5

"Kill the doubt that strangles my self worth."

~The Avett Brothers, Sanguine

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I sat down beside Ana in our history class on Monday and told her everything that happened with Jax. She was ecstatic when I told her we needed to go back to The Den Friday night.

"That's really nice of him," Ana said.

"Well, he looked like he was only offering out of obligation," I said, remembering how forced his offer sounded. 

"Still," she shrugged.

"I kind of feel bad, though. But, I'm also really excited to read his lyrics and hear more rap," I admitted to her. She smiled triumphantly at me. 

Later in the day, Simone told the class she wanted us to confirm our assignment ideas with her whenever we decided on them. After class, I walked up to her at her desk.

"Olivia, is it?"

I nodded my head and smiled. "I wanted to confirm my idea with you for the assignment," I said to her. I was a bit nervous to tell her, in case she thought it wasn't as interesting as I thought it might be. She nodded her head and waited. 

"I was thinking of writing about rap."

A slow smile spread across Simone's face. "Rap? That's different." She looked intrigued. "Do you listen to rap? Know anything about it?" 

I shook my head and smiled sheepishly at her. 

She smiled and nodded her head. "Good. I like it. I'm excited to see what you come up with, Olivia."

"Thanks," I said, relieved. I felt even more motivated to go to the club again this Friday night. I felt like my professor was impressed with my idea, which was what I had hoped for. I was even starting to get excited about it myself.

~

I spent Friday evening hanging with my grandparents. Every night, we had our routine where we would eat dinner in the living room and watch the news together. Usually my grams would knit or sew, and I would either do that too, study, or read beside them. Lately, I had been helping my grandmother with her projects because she wasn't able to do them on her own anymore. Maybe it sounded boring, but I loved it because it was with my grandparents. What was worse was, she was now starting to sleep more. My grandparents took afternoon naps for a while now, but this was more than that. Sometimes she would stay in bed for half the day, or go to bed just after supper. My gramps and I would sit in the living room, quiet, with the same worry on both our minds. 

I hated leaving my grandparents because I worried about my grandmother, but my gramps insisted it was fine. I grabbed a couple cookies that my gramps had made before heading over to meet Ana at her dorm. My gramps had the best chocolate chip cookie recipe that he had been making ever since my mom was little.

Ana met me outside and let me in and I waited while she finished getting ready like last week. She was excited when I handed her a bag with a couple cookies from my gramps. She offered for me to look through her closet but I stuck with the plain shirt and jeans I had on.

When we got to the club, no one was on stage yet. The music was blasting loud and everyone was dancing. Ana got a drink at the bar and then she pulled me onto the dance floor again. I felt the teeniest bit less awkward than last time, which I guess was an improvement.

"There's Jax," Ana said and pointed towards the stage. Jax was surrounded by a group of guys like normal. They were chatting over the music. There was a small group of girls that walked up to them and started chatting and flirting with the guys.