Love In Actuality

15: Aaron

 

After the kiss, everything flew by so quickly. Between the jokes and the

laughs and the conversations that were revealing Kyree to me without her

knowing, it was so disappointing when the clock chimed twelve and I knew that I

had to get home or be grounded for a month. I said my goodbyes and promised

to call her soon and then climbed into my car. I still wasn’t quite sure what had

possessed me to come over in the first place- nobody had asked me to, nobody

had forced me to. It was purely an instinct thing. I drove home thinking through

the several theories I had about it. 

When I walked in the door a few minutes late and saw Laila standing

impatiently next to it my first instinct was to defend myself. However, then there

was a loud crash from the kitchen and I winced. Laila held a finger to her lips for

me to be quiet- she was big into the whole I-need-to-know-the-real-story-beforeMom-tells-us-a-load-of-crap thing. I, on the other hand, could care less.

“Jonathan, you listen to me right now. I am sick and tired of playing your little

games. You either get on that flight tomorrow or don’t come home at all. Do you

hear me?” She was practically screaming at Dad. I almost felt sorry for him.

Without a word, I silently slipped back out the door, knowing that Laila would

follow me. Since she was only fifteen, I was her only way of transportation most

days. Sometimes she got a ride with James, her quirky-yet-fun boyfriend, but

only when he could get the car. 

“James’?” I asked dully as I steered the car in his direction. 

“Yep,” Lai replied just as bored as I was. She reached over to turn on the

radio station. I doubted she actually liked the station since they played everything

but good music, but I didn’t complain about it. We drove in silence because both

of us knew that a pleasant conversation just wasn’t possible at a time like this. I

dropped her off and made my way over to Tony’s house. I knew he probably

wasn’t alone, but it still surprised me that he would leave the door unlocked andpartially opened like he did. I went to the basement, because that’s where he

always hung out. Once down there, I immediately recognized all The Populars

that were grouped around on the couches sipping God-knows-what. “Hey!

Aaron’s here!” Brianna shouted from her place on the couch. She squished

closer to Lindsey to make room for me. Brianna and I went way back.  She was

practically another sister to me. A more popular sister. A chorus of greetings and

smiles followed form the others but Lindsey remained oddly quiet. 

“Hey, Linds. What’s up?” I tried. It didn’t work. She glared back at me. 

“You know that Chelsea is sitting at home right now, crying her eyes out,

because you broke up with her?” She looked me up and down with the worst look

of disgust on her face. I felt my face turn to stone as I stared her down. “Why’d

you do it? Too much of a wimp to handle a serious relationship?”

I was collecting my response when Brianna butted in. “Lindsey, that’s

enough. Aaron didn’t say a word to you when you broke up with what’s-his-face.”

She rolled her eyes. “Whatever. I’m leaving.” Bri sighed but didn’t object. 

Once Lindsey was gone, Brianna kept going on the subject. If we weren’t

so close family-wise, I might’ve strangled her. “Just curious, Aar, who are you

with now if you’re not with Chelsea?”

“What makes you think he’s with somebody?” Tony asked, laughing.

“Hm…maybe it’s because he’s never gone two days since eighth grade

without having a girlfriend? And he’s never kept one for more than three weeks?”

Then she turned to me. “So? Who is it?”

She was right…out of the large population of girls at our high school, I had

dated almost half of them at one point of another. She took a sip of her drink and

nearly chocked on it as I told her, “Kyree.”

Once done coughing and Tony was done laughing, Brianna repeated me.

“Kyree. You mean Kyree Leigg?”

“You say that like you’ve met another Kyree,” I replied sarcastically. 

“Well you must have,” she shot back. “Kyree Leigg is the girl we threw out

of out group. For a reason. You aren’t bringing her back in by dating her. I will not

have Kyree Leigg sitting at the same lunch table as me.”My God she was acting like a social brat. “Well, you better figure out your

issues soon because Monday’s rolling around real quick and that’s when she

starts having a seat at the table.” I left because I didn’t want to argue with

Brianna, but it was still way too soon. Mom would still be on the phone with Dad

and Lai would still probably want more time with James. So, for the next few

hours, I drove around in circles, kind of like my life was at the moment.