Run Away; C.R

(thirteen)

riley

i turn to the next page in my book, which i have been occupying myself with for the past three hours. it is twelve o clock on a thursday afternoon, meaning everyone whom i associate myself with would be attending school at this very moment. relief courses through me when i remember that tomorrow is their last day before winter break. a whole two weeks without me being alone.

as i'm lost in thought, emily's home phone begins to vibrate from beside me, and my heart beat accelerates wildly.

i thought he had forgotten, or that he was never actually going to call me. i thought maybe it was just pity that he asked for my number. of course, i don't have a cell phone so i used emily's home phone, which i was pretty sure went extinct. who even has a home phone anymore?

i extend my arm, grabbing the telephone and answering the call.

"riley?" his deep voice speaks with a bit of static interfering.

"yeah, it's me. hey zack." i reply, leaning back onto the couch cushion to stare at the rippled ceiling.

"hey, how are you?" he starts conversation, and we chat for a while.

when he found me at that small coffee shop a few days ago, freezing to death, drenched in white paint, and on the verge of tears, i explained to him small parts of why i was upset. i merely told him that one of my close friends blames me for something when i was only trying to help. he was so sweet, and we talked over four cups of coffee and a dozen cinnamon rolls. we had the most random conversations, and before i knew it, the sun had set and the moon was glistening up in the sky. the best news, though, was finding out that he'd graduated last year due to having enough credits as a junior.

"so listen, are you free tonight?" he asks suddenly.

"depends. do you have something planned?" i ask, hoping i sound a little less utterly nervous than i actually am.

"in fact i do. i may or may not have scored some tickets to that play you were telling me about on saturday. the one you said was sold out?" he tells me, and my i gasp at him through the phone.

"you got them? how?!"

lately, i had been seeing signs around town about the screening of a big play happening tonight, and it was a revised version of one of my favorite books ever. i wanted to see it achingly bad, but when i went to purchase a ticket, they were all sold out.

"that is a secret." he says, "may i pick you up at seven?" he asks, and i don't sense an ounce of nervousness in his tone. if he is afraid of rejection he is not showing it.

"of course." i say, smiling through the phone, but my smile fades when i remember what this could possibly be. "but.. is this, like, a date?" i ask, then mentally slap myself with thirty six sledge hammers for being so stupidly blunt about it.

"it can be whatever you want it to be." he informs me, and i quietly sigh in deep relief. i don't have those type of feelings towards him right now. we'd only just met, and i still have to sort out everything with chandler and-

chandler.

oh god, the boiling emotions fight their way back into the entrance of my mind. as hard as it was to put our argument out of my mind, i still can't go a few minutes without remembering every detail play through my head. i'm so mad at him. i'm mad at him for shouting at me, for blaming me for something that was most definitely not my fault, and for letting me walk home in the freezing cold all alone. it would have been his fault if i ended up with pneumonia, and for that he deserves what i am giving him.