heart strings♥

chapter eight: that's just Betty, literally hot...

Raysa and Alex said nothing on their way to school. Alex got to Raysa's house by car, driven by his driver. Then he told his driver to leave and that he didn't need to be picked up after school, since he wanted to walk Raysa home.

When their shoulders bumped into each other, Alex intentionally and teasingly bumped her again. She stumbled a little and glared at him playfully before she pushed hard. Alex grinned and shoved her by her shoulder. Raysa laughed and punched him on his.

"Ok, ok, you win," Alex chuckled then coughed. Raysa patted his back, "Easy there. Are you ok? You look a little pale."

"I'm fine," he assured her, but still she didn't look convinced. Raysa stared at him, he surely didn't look okay to her. But since Alex was still fine enough to walk with her, she thought she shouldn't nag him to go home and rest.

"Hey," she said directing them to a different topic, "When did you become that tall?" she said as she went on her toes and tried to reach the top of his head. He shrugged, "Puberty."

Alex smiled to himself, glad that the awkward wall between them was now gone, and he knew all too well how annoyed Raysa had been about their height differences. He smirked, "Since when did you become so small?" he said as he patted her head affectionately. Raysa narrowed her eyes and pouted, "Oh, shut up."

Raysa stared at him for a while until Alex felt self conscious and cleared his throat, "What is it?"

"You've become seriously hot," she said. Alex choked and blushed, "Um, thanks?" he forgot how blunt and direct she can be at times. Then he raked his eyes intentionally at Raysa from top to bottom. "Hey!" Raysa complained as she hugged herself with red cheeks. Alex laughed "You turned out pretty good yourself."

She blushed, her heart raced, so she deliberately changed the subject, "So, have you had any girlfriends?"

"I guess so," Alex answered. He was beginning to have a headache and was struggling on hiding the pain from showing in his face.

Raysa shrugged, but was really hoping that he hadn't had any girls. "How many have you dated?" she asked curiously.

"Are you jealous?" he teased. He avoided the question, he didn't wanna rack his brain for the names of the girls whom he never considered important, his headache would only get worse.

"I'm not," she muttered. She really was.

After a moment of silence, Alex said, "At school..." he started.

"Hmm?"

Raysa noticed how uncomfortable he was as he continued, "You'll probably hear people saying things to me. Most of them aren't...good... It's up to you to believe them or not."

Raysa studied his face, "Why would they say bad things about you?"

"You'll find out sooner or later," Alex muttered.

"You've somehow changed a bit Alex," she commented slowing down her pace.

"So I've been told," he said dryly.

"It's just that you somehow seem distant and cold," she said.

"A lot of things had happened during the past six years," he said coldly.

When they passed through the gate, all eyes were on them, followed by whispers and murmurs. Raysa couldn't help but wonder what the hell could Alex have been doing to attract so much unwanted attention. Although she kept trying to get some answers from him, Alex continued to ignore them.

When they had to go through a crowd, Alex took her hand. Her heart raced again and she kept reminding herself , "Stop it! It's just Alex!"

She noticed that his hand was too warm, she wondered if he was catching a fever or something.