"Guys, am I a raisin?" This earns me six extremely confused looks. We're all sat in the treehouse, because my mum insisted that "teenagers shouldn't waste their lives indoors." However, none of us can afford to get the bus to anywhere so we're sat up in this treehouse, it's about a hundred degrees and I'm having philosophical thoughts.
"Last time I checked you were a human being." Matty says from where he's lay opposite me. He lifts up his head and gives me a once over. "Yep, still human,"
"No I'm serious." I reply, bolting up so quickly I get motion-sickness. It's hard work moving when the air's this thick; it's like swimming through a really massive bowl of custard.
"Is this a metaphor?" Charlie asks, throwing a spongy tennis ball up in the air with his right hand and catching it with his left.
"That is exactly what this is. So say you have a bowl, and it's full of chocolate buttons. And in the bowl there's a raisin. Why pick a raisin when you can have a chocolate button? This is my biggest concern in life guys. Am I a raisin? I think I am."
Charlie carries on with the bouncing. Matty thumps his head against the floor. I'm pretty sure Piper is asleep.
"I'm not sure where you're going with this. BUT - I do know that we share about 50 to 60% of our DNA with a banana so...anything's possible." Charlie says, losing control of the tennis ball and catching it mere seconds before it would've hit Halle in the face. Lucas sits up almost as fast as I did.
"You're serious?" He asks, looking at Charlie incredulously.
"Absolutely."
"You mean to tell me some people are 10% more banana than others?" Lucas says, looking at his arms like they might suddenly turn yellow.
"Back to the 'me being a raisin' thing." I try to steer us back on track.
"Oh, yeah. That was a good metaphor." Charlie says, already bored with the conversation.
"No, I mean, am I a raisin?" At this Jake opens his eyes from where he is scrunched into the corner.
"Well, there's always going to be someone who prefers raisins to chocolate buttons, or is allergic to chocolate." He says thoughtfully.
"Imagine being allergic to chocolate..." Halle murmurs sadly. It's alright for her. She is a chocolate button, as far as this metaphor goes.
"I'm allergic to chocolate." Jake says, catching the tennis ball from mid-air. He tosses me it, and I -surprisingly - manage to catch it.
"That must be terrible." I say, turning over the ball in my hands (shut up).
"So you're a raisin-type person?" Charlie asks, motioning for the ball. Instead I toss it back to Jake. Ball's in your court.
His eyes meet mine for a second before he turns away. "I guess I am." He chucks it back to Charlie, who misses it. We all watch as - almost in slow motion - it bounces from the wall, off of Matty's shoulder and arcs SMACK onto Piper's forehead. We all wait, hardly daring to breathe.
She just snores a little, rolling onto her stomach.
"And people say I'm a heavy sleeper," I mutter, retrieving the ball. But my head is buzzing with raisins, and chocolate, and Jake, and allergies, and is it me or is it hot in here?
I stretch out, balancing my legs against the wall opposite me, deciding to leave metaphors in English lessons, where they belong. My stomach growls: all this talk of raisins and chocolate is making me hungry.
"I'm going to get some food." I inform the others, who all just give little grunts to acknowledge that I've spoken. It's really too hot to do anything else. I slide down the tree trunk, and head over to the cupboard. And what do I find?
Chocolate raisins. Of course.
Sometimes, the universe has strange timing. It's as I'm thinking this that I hear footsteps.
"Look what I found," I tell Jake, brandishing the packet. He laughs, blue eyes lighting up with humour.
"Maybe this is a sign. Maybe you're a chocolate raisin."
"A chocolate raisin? Where does that fit?" I wonder, ripping open the packet and dumping the contents into a bowl.
"Well, it's all a disguise." He smiles.
"Naturally, raisins in disguise."
"I mean, we have the raisin who's different and unusual and overlooked. But really it's a chocolate, but because it's a raisin on the inside it has no idea. That it's really what everyone wants: best of both worlds."
I pick up the chocolate covered raisin in between my thumb and forefinger.
"Are you saying chocolate raisins are Hannah Montana?" He laughs in response. "I thought you were allergic to chocolate?" I say, before popping the sweet into my mouth.
"Doesn't mean I don't like it." He looks at me then, straight in the eyes like he's looking down to my insignificant raisin core. I know that the humidity has made my hair go crazy and that I'm wearing no make-up and that I'll never be drop-dead gorgeous like the girls on the covers of a magazine. But this is the guy whose seen me covered in ice cream and rubbish, choking, dropped in seawater and dripping wet, and is still standing here in this kitchen, talking about metaphorical raisins and Hannah Montana and allergies.
Looking like he's not going anywhere anytime soon.
In fact looking as if he's about to kiss me.
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a/n - so this is what happens when I write and upload at 2am.
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The Almost Summer
Humor[ completed - 17/3/14 ] [ undergoing slight editing ] [ Wattyawards2014 ] [ featured on the Wattpad Official account's Summer Beach Reads list ] Autumn always knew she was named after the wrong season. She lives for the summer months, desperate f...
