Sɪᴄᴋ⁻⁻Jsᴄʜʟᴀᴛᴛ//Fᴇᴍ ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 5

My alarm clock echoes off the walls of my brain, and I groan.

Fuck I'm so hungover.

I hoist myself out of bed and start my routine. Brush teeth, contact lenses, coffee, makeup, outfit, breakfast, bus to train, train to Baylor.

good morning

This time I get an SMS message from Schlatt.

What are you doing up?

He responds right away.

I wanted to wish you safe travels

Then a few seconds later he types this:

:)

last night was great. thanks again for taking me to eclipse

The lack of capitalization hurt my soul but texting me at 5:53 am was the sweetest thing ever.

I had a great time too :)

You should rest.

I waited around 20 minutes for the next text.

mb I fell asleep

have a good day Olive

I shoved my hands between my thighs and smiled. I would be thinking about this for the rest of the bumpy bus ride while I slept before arriving at the train.

...

"You came home so late last night we didn't get a chance to talk about your date!" Korine jumped off the couch and hugged me.

"Korine, I gotta get ready for work. We can talk about it after." It was 7:30 pm and I still had to make my coffee and eat something.

"Okay." She frowned. "You got home so late I thought he kidnapped you or something!" She chuckled. "Did you have fun, at least?"

I think back to the rooftop and the sunset and how his brown eyes looked like hot honey. I remember his smile and his high-pitched maniacal laugh and those arms.

"Yeah, it was fine." I brush past Korine so she doesn't figure out the underlying vibe I have towards the date.

"Ooh, I think you like him." She sings songs. "I saw your search history on Spotify! You played 'I Think He Knows!'" We share a Spotify account and of course, Korine decided to check.

"Whatever! He's still not that funny anyway!"

Lie. Absolute lie. I don't know why I'm lying. But I am.

He's one of the funniest fucking people I've ever met.

...

As I drive home from work, exhausted and hungry, a message pops up on the screen in front of me.

SCHLATT sent you a message. READ, IGNORE, REPLY

I press READ and smile as the automated voice of the program reads out: how was ur day?

I feel something bite at my sides as I look at the message. It was very sweet of him to text me before I went to school and to text me as I got home from work, but there was something that just... didn't sit well with me. I've gotten over his contrasting personalities in real life and online, but there was something else nagging within me. I couldn't figure out what.

When I got home and saw a note from Korine saying that she had the night shift, I made myself a PB and J sandwich and ate it over the sink.