teenage nightmare ² ━━ amour

39.

39.
chapter thirty-nine:
why does my
chest hurt?

"Serena? Serena. Serena!"

My words pierced the monotonous language hour, the most boring class of the day. I never thought any language other than English was charming. Not even French; especially the Kalosian slang version, which was harder to grasp. It was only better than the previous one, which I shuddered to even think about.

I rubbed my palms in an effort to keep calm. Oh, how I loved playing with this girl. "Serena?!"

"Mhm!" She hummed and wheeled around in her place to look at me. "What is it, Ash?"

I merely stared back, a goofy grin etched on my face. She looked so cute when she got mad, and her hums were angelic.

She, however, frowned at the lack of response, then called out, tapping her pen against my desk. "Ash?"

My lips curled up in a grin, but I offered no explanation. I wanted her attention, and I was ready to irritate her for it.

She turned around, gave a quick nod to the professor, and the lady continued with her work. The girl turned to Calem, a row away, and mouthed something. I noticed as he shook his head and went back to his notes.

Time for another round. "Serena? Serena!"

But she gave no reaction—

"Serena! Don't you hear me?"

I was beginning to feel a pinch of doubt creep into my mind. Was this girl going deaf? Each time I called her to tell her how I felt, regardless of how the place lacked magic, she just didn't seem to have both her ears working.

"Oi," I tried, gently tracing her neck with my pen. "Oi! Serena!"

I was beginning to feel like an Electrode—

"Sere—"

I clenched my jaw in anticipation. She stayed still, scratching her notebook.

"—na!"

This time, she craned her neck to look at me. I ran a hand through my hair to make it messier than it was, and made sure to hold her gaze. "Serena!"

"Miss Yvonne? Are you following?" The girl turned around quickly, and I was afraid she might end up spraining her neck in the process, but she nodded fervently.

I pouted and gave her one last chance. If she would ask, "what," I would tell her I liked her. A blunt confession, but seeing as none of the planned ones were working, an erratic one might as well. "Serena?"

I felt a mad frustration creep into me as she took her time to respond. Agonizing seconds of watching her hair bobbing about her shoulders as she scratched away at her notebook. When she finally did, and I opened my mouth to confess, she shot me a glare, and the words died in my throat.

No, I thought bitterly as she turned back to her notes, blinking back hot tears, I am definitely not imagining her unwillingness to hear me confess.

With that sour thought, I began doodling silently on my rough note until the end of the period. When it finally was over, Serena wheeled around. I didn't face her, though. She was the one who admitted that feeling frustrated was perfectly fine, after all.

"Hey, Ash!"

I promptly turned away and pretended to signal Gary: 'get your lazy head here!'

Gary signaled back: 'okay!' and I saw him approaching me with a lazy gait.

"Ash? Why were you calling me during class?" I heard her, cracks in her voice. Were they real? "Ash? You're ignoring me."

The next thing I knew, she reached out to take hold of my wrist, but I harshly shook it away. I felt my chest tighten with anger when her eyes flashed with a foreign emotion. Gary chose that moment to enter.

"Let's go somewhere, man. It's frustrating sitting here," I said coldly. It came out ruder than I had intended, but hadn't she been arrogant too?

I stood up and made to walk away, but she spoke again.

"What's wrong with you, Ash?"

I regarded the question. What was wrong? Everything was! She wasn't even ready to listen to me when I'd tried telling her the same statement over and over again for the past week or so, but she wants me to listen to her? That's plain bigotry!

Gary gave me an inquisitive look, and, as much as it pained me to say it, I waved her statement away with a simple, "It's me. Everything is wrong with me."

I heard a crash of something, but didn't turn to look behind. Instead, I made a beeline to the sports ground. I had an important soccer tryout to attend to, and I wasn't going to let the opportunity slip. Not even for Serena.