Forbidden Love

Chapter 26

On Monday Michelle asked Joe if he had had a good Valentine's Day.

I scowled at her.

Joe wrapped his arm around me, smiled at me and thanked her for asking telling her it had been a lovely day.

This clearly hadn't been how she had planned for this to go because she didn't say anything more and left.

"What does she want?" I asked when she was out of earshot.

"Maybe she's just being friendly." Joe suggested.

"No." I said, what she was doing wasn't friendly.

February turned into March and Michelle continued to bother me.

Joe was no longer grounded now.

I assumed once he wasn't grounded he would have no reason to spend any time with Michelle at all. He said it would be too mean to ignore her all together if she wanted to hang out with them.

This meant that at least twice a week found Michelle hanging around for no good reason other than to annoy me as far as I could tell. She would hang off Joe's every word and progressively put me in a poorer mood the longer she was there. Joe refused to stop hanging out with her, saying she was hurt and in need of a friend.

As the Easter holidays approached the weather the weather only got better.

The weekend before our last week of school before Easter break the rain was coming down heavy. I rushed into the youth centre with my hood up and Ethan by my side.

We joined the long queue to sign in. It was always busy on days like this.

In behind us came Joe and Michelle. Michelle was laughing at something Joe had said.

"Hey!" Joe said when he saw us.

I smiled at him.

He took my hood that was still up and gently pulled it down before leaning in for a kiss, "much better." He whispered.

I smiled a more sincere smile now.

We go inside and Michelle sits right next to Joe.

I was having a good day. Having fun with my friends and Joe. I could almost forget that Michelle was even there.

"Joe?" Michelle asked with a twisted smile, "could you go get me a drink of coke?" She held out some money for him.

"Erm, sure." He let the money drop into his hand. "Anyone else want anything?" He asked around the group. They all shook their heads.

Joe lifted his hand from where it had been resting on my leg, "I'll be back in a minute." He whispered to me.

I smiled at him and he left.

Michelle's eyes followed him as he made his way across the room to where they had the small tuc shop set up. As soon as he made it over there she stood up and followed him over.

I turned so I could watch her. She walked up to him. They seemed to talk and then she leant towards him as if she was going to kiss him!

Before she could Joe shoved her away and came storming back over to our table with an angry look on his face.

"Can we get out of here?" He asked me. I could tell by his voice he was upset.

"What just happened?" I asked standing up to meet him.

"Can we just get out of here?" He sounded desperate to leave.

I nodded, "it's a horrible day." I reminded him.