Leaning back in the passenger seat of Angelita's car, Crybaby looks down to her arm. The inked words Ben had scribbled on her hours prior were still bold, but one line stood out more than the others. She read the words again, heart sinking.
"You can make anything beautiful."
Turning to Angelita, who was trying to not get annoyed at the slow car in front of her, Crybaby sighs.
"What's wrong now?" Angelita asks, a slight smile quickly crossing her face.
"Ben said I can make anything beautiful." She says, lifting her arm out to Angelita.
Without looking over, Angelita laughs. "That's a very "Ben" compliment."
Covering her face in her hands, Crybaby sighs again. "I don't know what to do."
"Do you have to do anything?" Angelita asks, raising her eyebrows, but keeping her eyes on the road.
"I don't know." Crybaby's voice muffles through her hands.
"Do you want to do something?" Angelita asks.
Crybaby sits up, hands dropping her to lap. "I feel like I should." She confesses.
"Like what?"
"Maybe.." She trails off, looking out the window to her right.
"Ask him out?" Angelita suggests, hands swiftly moving to turn her blinker on.
"I don't know how to ask someone out." Crybaby confesses.
"Take out your phone." Angelita says sternly enough that Crybaby does just that.
Now grasping her phone, Crybaby looks to Angelita for the next step.
"Open your texts with Ben." She continues.
Crybaby's fingers quickly tap and swipe across her phone. The screen lighting up the darkness of the night creeping into the car.
"Now what?" She asks, looking back to Angelita.
"Say something like, "do you want to go out with me?" and wait for a response." Angelita says calmly.
"I can't do it!" Crybaby declares, phone dropping into her lap. Her palms meet her face again as she burys herself in her hands.
Angelita notices Crybaby's growing frustration, quickly changing the topic.
"Hey, since it's already-" She pauses, quickly glancing to the clock in her car, "thirty minutes past curfew, would you be up for going somewhere else, while we're already out?"
The question lingers for a second as Crybaby's hands stay still over her face.
"I have a place in mind." Angelita adds, trying to persuade an answer out of her friend.
"Like where?" Crybaby asks, eyes peaking out from under her hands to look at Angelita.
"Are you up for another surprise tonight?" Angelita asks, raising an eyebrow.
"Sure, why not." Crybaby says, arms returning to her lap. "Can you tell a story on the way, though? I need to think about something else."
"A story about what?" Angelita questions, glancing to Crybaby quickly, before returning her eyes to look at the road.
"Anything." Crybaby says, "Preferably something interesting, though."
Angelita smiles. "One time, my old friend group and I built a robot, then left it in the woods."
Crybaby laughs. "Elaborate, please."
"We were bored one summer, so we went around the neighborhood and stole parts we could use to build a robot. Then, once we had a whole guy built, we wheeled him to the woods in a tiny wagon, and left him there." As she told the story, a proud smile grew across her face.
YOU ARE READING
Night Mime | K-12 AU
FanfictionCrybaby has Situational Mutism and cannot speak at her boarding school, K-12 Sleep Away. Throughout this story, Crybaby gets into her first romantic relationship, has several conflicts with some of her friends, and sneaks out with everyone else to h...
