WingWard Side

Chapter 14: Sweatshirt

There was three knocks on my window, and Pluto was waiting outside. Funny, I had both Jackson's coming over through my window that day. I opened it up and she crawled inside, stumbling onto the floor not-so-gracefully. She was wearing a jean jacket with a yellow shirt and a black pleated skirt. It was weird, ever since we started dating, she hadn't been wearing her big baggy clothes anymore. It was like she had become more confident in herself. That was cute.

"Pluto-" I closed the window behind her, keeping out the draft. "You're way later than I was expecting."

"I had to wait for Aden to go to bed. He didn't want me coming over for some reason."

I realized. "Oh yeah... that's prolly my fault." I rubbed the back of my neck. "I told em I didn't wanna talk till tomorrow. Oops." I chuckled a bit.

"Why?"

"I didn't think I was really ready..."

"Ready for what?" She looked at me worried, that pained look in her eyes. ...right, she didn't know yet. Ugh, it would be so nice to just, I don't know let her read my mind or something. I wasn't ready yet.

I looked away and pressed my lips together, not knowing what to say, how to explain, how to get out of this, how to look at her or-

"Hey." She walked over and put her hands on my shoulders. My eyes widened, a little surprised. "We don't have to talk right now. You don't even have to tell me." She smiled, then pulled me into a hug. "Let's just hang for  a bit. Kay?"

"Okay." I squeezed her back, relieved. From how she was talking, it seemed like she kinda knew what was going on. Or had an idea. Maybe Roger explained it wasn't between us. Which, thank you, would've been real awkward if I told her I didn't want to say it yet.

She pulled away, watched me for a second with a sweet, caring look, then started walking around my room. I watched her for a second as she scanned my shelves, my desk, my floor, my closet. She spotted something in my closet and ran over, disappeared in my clothes, and pulled out a box.

"Chess?!"

I gave her a look. "Are you kidding me? I don't even know why I still have that." I yanked it away and kicked it under my bed.

"Remember when we would play that all the time?" She sat on my bed, reaching over and pulling it back out.

"All the time? We played it 3 times and I lost every time because you wouldn't tell me how to play and all I knew was how to move my pawns." I started laughing and searched along my desk for something to do. "I still don't know how to play..." I grumbled.

"You don't have a very great view." She interrupted, looking out the window.

I looked out too.  "What do you mean, I can see the whole park."

"Yeah, and it's creepy, with that one streetlight." She shuddered. "And I meant of the sky."

I rolled my eyes, recognizing where she was going. "This talk again..."

"See from my window, it's up near the ceiling, because I live in the basement."

"Pluto I know I've been to your house before."

"And when I'm laying down, and it's open, it's the perfect angle to see the stars."

I turned around to look at her. "Yeah well your window also leaks so... who's is better now?" She glared, and I gave a smug look. I turned back to my desk.

"How about I teach you how to play chess." She asked with a head tilt. I raised an eyebrow at her. "For real this time." She giggled.

"Hmm, I don't believe you."