A Glimpse of Us • Sodapop Curtis

Ｃｈａｐｔｅｒ ｓｉｘｔｅｅｎ

Tori

"What the fuck."

I quickly shifted my eyes to the owner of the hand that just scared the living shit out of me, and I couldn't be more shocked at who I was looking at.

"I never got the chance to give that back, so here I am."

I blinked at the boy in front of me in shock, I didn't expect to run into him again at an ice cream parlor of all places, it would make more sense to see him again in the middle of an alleyway or an abandoned building to be honest.

I might have only met him once before, but that was the type of energy that he gave off.

He tilted his head at me, probably waiting for an answer that I wasn't going to give because quite frankly, I was not prepared for this encounter and was confused on why he was here in the first place.

Toni and Dally both told me to stay away from him, so there obviously had to be something off about him to be so worried about me being around him. But somewhere in my gut, I had a feeling that he wasn't as bad as he was being portrayed.

It seemed like he got impatient standing around waiting for me to utter something so he scooted into the seat across from me, where Soda just got up from.

"You know, you can say thank you, I didn't have to give it back to you, I could've kept it, or sold it."

"What are you doing here?" I asked.

"You really are a stupid girl aren't you?" He mocked, "I think I literally just told you."

"I mean, how'd you know to find me here? Have you really been looking for me just to give this back?" I replied, ignoring his comment.

I ripped the knife out of table and switched it closed, shoving it into my pocket, not taking my eyes off of him once.

"Does that scare you?" He smirked, "Or are you scared that your date is going to come back and find me here?"

"So you were watching me." I uttered, leaning my head into my hand.

"Actually, I wasn't looking for you at all, I just happened to run into you, and what a great thing too because I really was going to sell it." He said lowly, leaning across the table so that I could hear him.

"I'm guessing your brother told you to stay away from me?" He asked, combing his hair back with his hand.

I nodded at him getting a little anxious at how long this conversation was taking, I didn't want Soda to come back and get the wrong idea.

I could probably just tell him that this guy is literally crazy, which it seems like he is.

"I can promise you he doesn't want you to stay away from me for what you think it is." He spoke, mirroring me, leaning his head into his opposite hand.

"What do you mean?" I asked, while looking around for Soda. Maybe he already saw him sitting here with me and decided to leave.

"You probably think your brother is telling you to stay away from me because i'm just an awful person, right?"

I nodded, waiting for him to continue. He licked his lips and I could almost see a glimmer of mischief in his eyes. I could tell that this simple conversation was amusing to him, and it probably had to due that he knew stuff that I didn't. Probably knows the same thing that Dally does, except, he's handing it a very different way.

"Are you bipolar?" I blurted.

Eric's smirk dropped before he started laughing, "What?"

"Literally the other day you wanted nothing to do with me and you were literally dragging me to get away from you, and now you look like you're so eager to chat with me."