Love In Actuality

18: Kyree

“Oh, God. Look who’s back. Miss Little Suicide,” somebody sneered. I just

stood there, waiting for them to get it all out before I told them off. Just like I was

going to tell Aaron off later about what a mistake this had been.

“Watch. Next she’ll be asking one of us to drown her or something.” MissLittle-Suicide’s friend took a step towards me. “What? Nothing to say, Kylie?”

My mouth was open when somebody grabbed my arm from behind. I

turned to realize it was Laila. “It’s Kyree, Rachel. Don’t be such an attention hog

and get a life, okay?” I was actually kind of impressed by Laila sticking up for me.

I…I definitely didn’t expect it from her. She dove into the pool, probably not even

caring that it was thirteen feet deep where we stood. 

I glanced up and realized that Aaron was watching me. 

So, of course, I jumped in after her. 

*   *   *

After practice, when my hair was officially soaked through with chlorine,

and then more soaked with anti-green-hair shampoo, Laila and I were finding

ourselves laughing about the stupidest of things. She told me hilarious stories

about her and Aaron growing up, which only made me wish that I had my own

sister back. 

I almost forgot about my fight with Aaron until we went over there and

Laila made a point of leaving so that we could talk. Her excuse was that she had

to “talk to…somebody…about…a thing…they were working on for…James’

birthday…” Which was crazy, because I knew James, and his birthday wasn’t

until the spring. 

“So…thanks, I guess. And…” How could I phrase this to make it seem like

I meant it?

“And?”

“And…I’m sorry for accusing you.”

His face softened, and he reached to pull my stubborn bangs back out of

my face. Even now, I could feel the curls against my back and knew I only hadminutes before it frizzed up. “You know I asked you this morning because I

wanted to spend time with you, Ree.”

“That was your main reason,” I pointed out. “You had an ulterior motive to

make me do something, and to actually go to school on time. I think that you may

actually be trying to change my ways.” My eyebrows rose in suspicion as he

looked away, confirming my guess. “So, thank you. For helping me see what I

couldn’t.”

“Your welcome,” he said, half mocking, half serious. “Any of that pasta

left? Lai has got to try that.”

*   *   *

“This is possibly the worst idea you have ever had. And that includes

when you dragged me out of the ocean,” I whispered to Aaron as he led me to

his lunch table Tuesday afternoon. I made a point of looking nonchalant about

everything so that they wouldn’t get the satisfaction of seeing me intimidated.

When, truth was, they scared the crap out of me. 

“If I hadn’t dragged you out, then we wouldn’t have been together,

remember? Good comes from bad. Just remember that.” We reached the table,

and I sat down on the end so that I would only have to talk to two people. One of

them being Aaron. “You guys know Ree, right?”