Once upon a story

Chapter Seven

The voice seemed to follow me everywhere, its tone would suddenly become that of my mothers or Georgie’s or a teacher and I wouldn’t be able to reply. Each time I looked out of the window I saw the forest and felt a powerful feeling to walk in-between the trees and watch the green light dance across my skin. The memory of the voice stopped me from going back into the forest for the rest of the week but that didn’t stop me from thinking about it. Each day I pretty much ran from school so I didn’t have to see Kallum's car turn up so I had no idea whether HE was still around not that he strayed far from my thoughts anyway. The main problem was how Sam1 had decided that it is a great idea to spend every minute of every day teasing me about 'Mr green eyes' as she had taken to calling him. It was alright to begin with as I could just laugh it off but now her and Georgie are using it as a thing to get Kallum's attention. Sadly it's working.

"Faith hasn't even spoken to him, have you!?!" Josh almost shouted in order to save me yet again from another session of teasing,

"No, I haven’t, he's probably and idiot like Kallum" as I said it I knew it wasn't true. The words left a bad taste in my mouth and again I wondered when I had become so strangely attached to a guy I had never spoken to. In real life at least.  

"Yes but it could have been love at first sight" Sam1 insists causing me to push her of the chair she had balanced on in the over crowed school café. On returning from the floor I received a death glare which I smugly acknowledged.

"And Kallum is not an idiot!" Georgie whispered from beside me with an offended look, this just made Sam2 and I crack up laughing and causing both of us to have our chairs unceremoniously pulled from underneath of us.

"Why don't you just ask Kallum if 'mr green eyes' is an idiot!"  Sam2 remarked from his position on the floor, probably hoping for a change in conversation although it didn't work.

"Yes, we should, come on Georgie!" Sam1 laughed grabbing her hand and dragging her through the maze of chairs and across the café.

"This can't go well" Sam2 said finally standing up whist grinning before pulling me up as well. I stood rooted to the spot with conflicting feelings, I didn’t trust the combination of Sam1 and Georgie on the topic of a boy but I didn’t want to go speak to an egoistic teen male. My resistance was futile as we walked towards where Kallum was waiting, leaning against a wall, chewing gum. His current position confirmed all the things I had thought of him in the past.

"Hello Kallum! How are you?" Sam1 gushed but only received a grunt in reply "You know the blonde, green eyed guy who drives you to school, his name is Toff right?! Anyway..." She is cut off by Georgie 

"Anyway is he an idiot, not in a dumb way, just you know" Georgie ending with a giggle and together they stare at Kallum waiting expectantly and a tad excited for his answer 

“Toff, he's a mate, he's cool. Is one of you interested?" the bored slur of his speech made it hard to not roll my eyes however no one would deny the way he stared at me throughout the last phrase but it was unlikely to come up as his gaze quickly returned to the two hair twirling girls in front of him. 

Sam1 began nodding frantically "Yeah Fa" she started but I easily cut her off

"Well none of us know him, so the answer would be no, why doesn't he go here? Is he just older" my glare was vaguely patronising but I don't care, I wanted answers from the gum chewing model reject in front of me

"He just doesn't go here, I've got to go" he replied in monotone, completely sealing himself off by simply crossing his arms against his chest. I looked up at him slightly annoyed by his short answer but the worry in his eyes that displayed that he had just learnt something important told me not to say anything else. He turned away from us with a slight wave to Sam1 and Georgie before walking off. I watched him weave through the crowd, he walked with a strong stride and as if on cue his ride turned up, the driver’s seat filled with Toff, who opened the door for Kallum and the others who all seemed to have the same need to leave school at the same time.

For the rest of the day we heard various re-enactments of that conversation, each being even more different to the real one than I had ever imagined possible. By the time the final bell went I was thankful to leave school and have the weekend away. As it was a Friday Jack said that I could catch a ride home with him and Tyler. See his best mate had turned seventeen a while back and was determined to drive around as much as possible, this somehow also included picking up me on various days of the week but I couldn’t complain. As I wasn’t walking through even the outskirts of the forest it was taking me double the time to walk home than normal.  

Jack held the door open with a small bow but was only rewarded with a slap on the head. Embarrassing elder brother. Tyler’s car was second hand from his aunt’s ex-boyfriends daughter boyfriends’ brother or something like that and it smelt like BBQ crisps regardless of the amount of air fresheners that there were hanging from most of the surfaces.

"How was school?" Jack asked as Tyler started the engine with a scary choking grunt

"Do you really care?" I laugh fastening my seatbelt

"Erm... No, hey looks like you have an admirer" he teased. I swivelled round in the seat to see Kallum pointing at me, he had returned dramatically during last lesson apparently and was supporting a new bruise running down his forearm but that was just a rumour. Beside him stood Toff and it was very odd to see him out of the car for once, he looked weird surrounded by each of the kids in school uniform but when he was standing you could tell he wasn't older. He was only slightly taller than Kallum and with his hands placed firmly in each pocket you could see he was unused to the female attention her was receiving. Perhaps this was due to his tight t-shirt and skinny black jeans. He was talking to Kallum who was getting more and more agitated in a very animated way but the only reaction Toff gave was a slight half smile. 

"Ok, can we go now?" I ask 

"Totally" Josh and Tyler reply in matching American accent that were equally as terrible, I giggle at their joint weirdness but it is reliving to do so, all I have done is worry recently and perhaps the cure is a little taste of laughter. The car journey back to our house turned into an accent challenge which ended by Tyler impersonating Josh who delivered him a slap around the head which made the car swerve slightly. It’s strange to think that regardless of the fun I was having my thoughts kept flicking back to a certain green eyed boy with a small half smile.