Cocoon

Chapter 14: Understanding

[LUKE]

Okay, I apologized. I did my part. Now... to wait and see what her response is.

She looked at me, almost unsatisfied. She wasn't really frowning... maybe a little. And then she sighed and turned around, walking away from me.

I blinked. Wait, did she just choose to ignore me? 

Without stopping myself, I immediately took hold of her right arm and made her face me.

"Hey!" she says. I ignored that.

"Rienna... I said 'I'm sorry.' Is it too much of me to ask for a response?"

She pulled her arm away from my grip, and I was hurt by the reaction.

"Actually Luke, it IS too much for you to ask."

"What... Why?"

She sighed, then paused, probably counting to ten. A little cliche thing she does to calm down. I waited, thinking that Patience would probably be a virtue right now.

Finally, she opened her eyes again and turned to look up at me.

[RIENNA]

I know for a fact that keeping eye contact with a person during a confrontation enhances sincerity and sterness, so I tried to lock eyes with him. But once I stared into those green eyes of his--that goes very well with his brown clean-cut hair--I tend to lose focus and my heart softens. But I can't let my feelings for him get in the way of what I think of his attitude of apologizing.

[LUKE]

"It's just that... this isn't the first time you apologized this way."

"What way?"

"After a heated argument or a misunderstanding, we end up ignoring each other. When I text or try to call you, you never answer. I try to make the first move but you don't acknowledge it. And then when you finally apologize to me personally, I accept it so that it ends the silent treatment. You know why I accept your apology? BECAUSE I hate tensions and any more confrontations, and I don't want to keep feeling bad." she explains, "So here you are, apologizing and then I'll be doing the forgiving. But what about what happened before now? Is it always going to be silent treatment before reconciliation? is it always going to be like this? While I wait for you to apologize, I endure silent treatments, ignored phone calls, and cold stares in school?"

I didn't know how to respond to that. Women. They always find ways to make things more difficult for us men.

She sighed again, then she swiped tears that was almost forming in her eyes, "I don't want to give you a hard time," Woah, did she just read my mind? "But... I wish you wouldn't give me a hard time either."

I let out a heavy exhale. All this because of a heated argument about her tradition's views on courtship. "I'm really sorry, Rienna. I didn't know that's how I made you feel..." I paused to think. 

Before I decided to finally confront her, I wondered whether to admit to her why I got upset in the first place and why I really didn't like the sound of courtship. I'm still not sure whether it's a good idea to be honest to her about that, but seeing that she was just honest with me with the way she felt about me ignoring her, I decided it would be fair to return the honesty.

"Can I take you home?"

Walking would help me keep calm while being honest with her.

She looked at me, still looking rather upset but she nodded. "Okay..."