Her Lovely Scar

Chapter 19 ~ Surprises

Eli stayed on the phone with me as I sobbed through the night. Despite that he had his last few finals to take that morning, he stayed awake and comforted me. I felt bad for keeping him up, but he insisted on talking to me until I felt better. Even when the conversation ran short, he stayed on the phone, just listening to me cry.

"You know," he calls out softly. I sniffle to let him know I'm listening. "The first time I saw you, you were crying too." He says.

"Yeah, I know." I reply feeling my face heat up from embarrassment.

"And I tried to cheer you up then too." He says, and I wipe my eyes for the millionth time. "Except that time you ended up slapping me." He chuckles.

I bow my head feeling absolutely guilty. "I'm sorry." I reply, only getting him to laugh.

"I'ts okay, it surprised me, but I'm okay now. I'm just wondering if slapping me again would make you feel better." He says, and I let out a short laugh.

"Sorry, I shouldn't laugh at that." I apologize, but I hear him laughing on the other line.

"I'm glad it got you to laugh though." He replies, and I find myself smiling.

"I feel horrible for hitting you." I tell him, hearing him sigh.

"I got my payback though, so I'd call it even."

"What?" I sit up confused. "What payback?" He chuckles mischievously.

"I got you to open up to me." He answers. I feel the blush spread against my cheeks as those words register in my head.

"You sound like you have some evil plot against me." I whine getting him to laugh again.

"And who says I don't?" His voice sounds playful, but I wasn't sure about that.

"Do you?" I ask, trying to sound like I was playing along.

There's a long pause before I hear his reply.

"No." He sounded so depressed about this. "Ugh, I was trying to come up with something clever to say, but I couldn't think of anything." He admits.

I couldn't help it, I out right laughed. I could hear him laugh too as I continued to giggle. I'm so grateful to have met Eli. Our meeting was a bit weird and out of the blue, but I was starting to believe there was a reason to our encounter.

"Raven," Eli calls out after a few moments of silence.

"Hm?" I answer, suddenly feeling sleepy.

"Come over."

I feel my body go stiff and suddenly my heart is beating loudly in my ears. Come over? To his dorm room? Now? At this hour? Won't people assume stuff? Is he not thinking? Why am I suddenly so nervous?

"What?" I find myself asking.

"Tomorrow," Eli answers. "We can have lunch and you can come with Laurie to see me off at the air port."

I slap my forehead feeling stupid. Of course that's what he meant. What the hell was I thinking? Eli isn't that kind of guy!

"Um," I would have to skip out on the last half of school. But Eli was worth it. "Yeah, I'll be there." I answer.

"Awesome, I'll cook. What do you like?" He asks.

I don't know how much longer we talked on the phone. We kept talking for hours about the stupidest things, and I think that was due to the lack of sleep. I didn't know when it happened, but sometime during the night I fell asleep. When I woke up my alarm was blaring, and the sun was already out.