Sanity // s.m. [IN EDITING]

[16]

Shawn

***

"I need you to come pick me up from school. Corey is sick."

Elliot's voice sounds entirely different over the phone. Sometimes I will pick up the phone without even checking the caller ID, and then she begins rambling right away and I get so confused because I don't know who it is. It's almost like she does it on purpose-- disguises her voice so she can make secret calls.

"Who is this?" I ask nonchalantly, and as soon as it came out of my mouth, I realized who it was.

"It's Elle. So, can you?"

I sigh, standing up and walking over to the door, grabbing my keys from the wooden table beside it. "Actually, I have a really insightful solution to this dilemma-- learn to drive."

Elliot laughs through the phone, and I knew the face she was making all too well.

"You know very well why I don't drive," She scoffs. "The road is dangerous. But I feel safe with you and Corey. Your eyes never leave the windshield, your hands never leave the steering wheel. It's reassuring."

I unlock the door and step out into the September air of Pickering, the breeze hitting me right in the face, but I soon adjusted.

"Whatever," I roll my eyes. "I'll be there soon."

"See, I knew I could count on you."

"You're just lucky I wasn't doing anything productive. Had I been, I don't know, studying or something--"

"For as long as I've known you, you've never done anything productive with your life, Mendes," She cuts me off.

"Inaccurate," I say as I climb into my car, starting the engine and buckling my seatbelt. "I hit 400k on vine last week."

"Okay, whatever," She giggles that cute little giggle. "Are you on your way?"

"Unfortunately."

I back out of the driveway slowly, driving down the street of my neighborhood and heading towards our high school. Elle usually stays after school there to finish a mural she's been working on or something, I don't know.

Her art is being displayed all over school, along with some other kid-- but people are only taking notice of hers. They're hanging her canvases all down the hallways, and of course, there's the mural displaying the school's colors and team name in the main hall.

People are used to them now, but sometimes people still gape at the beauty of them. They didn't think a sophomore could be so talented, but I already knew her capabilities-- and I knew she was going far with them too. Further than the art hallways. And just that simple thought both excited and terrified me.

When I pulled into the school parking lot, she was holding her art kit in one hand and balancing two binders in the other. She smiles at me through the rolled up window, before opening the door and climbing in.

"You're welcome," I say sarcastically. "Let's go do something."

"What?" She turns to face me, bucking her seatbelt and setting down her things.

"I'm bored, it's only 4:30, we're in a car. Let's go do something."

"What exactly does that mean?" She asks me as soon as we make our way out of the student parking lot, which was behind the school.