Labyrinth of Dreams (old)

3: Lydia (Photo of Lydia)

“You can have it all. Just not all at once.” 

― Oprah Winfrey

Chapter 3

“Wait, stay there while I get my phone…” Lydia almost sang.

I quickly loosened myself from Anatolius’s grip and shifted aside. “Lydia…” daring her to disobey me, I stared at her as sternly as possible, slightly pouting my lips. Anatolius just laughed so carefreely as if what had happened between us was nothing but a friendly embrace or truthfully, he doing what was right by catching me. You probably can guess the possibility I preferred to trick myself into believing, but right now, I had a best friend to deal with.

“Jealous?” Anatolius teased, cocking his head to one side as he ruffled Lydia’s straight blonde hair cheekily. Lydia sent Anatolius death glares while roughly shrugging Anatoliu’s hand off, mumbling something under her breath. Anatolius simply chuckled and tickled Lydia’s sides instead.

Lydia and Anatolius were really close friends, which made Lydia really prone to Anatolius teasing. I hate to admit it, but Lydia and Anatolius had this love-hate relationship. Lydia swore it was platonic but the two were so cute sometimes I would not mind sacrificing to see them together. They transferred in at the same time a few months into the school term and they were the closest of friends. Sometimes, people even thought they were siblings since they had the same blue eyes. The distinct shade of hair colour would not actually make sense though. Siblings or not, at times like this, Lydia probably hated Anatolius to the core though we all knew it would not last long.

I watched Lydia stare at Anatolius threateningly. Calm down. I wanted to say, but I might offend Lydia. She was quite a temperamental person. If I were moody, she would be bipolar. And that was exactly how it is. Therefore, I just dumbly watched them go about their "Stare War".

The intensity in their gaze almost made the air still. Imagine us in a forest, with dust and leaves flying all over. This was the kind of gaze that stilled the surroundings, flying leaves and all that. This was the kind of gaze that made you feel so out of place. If there were a camera, it would be those scenes where the camera would zoom in on the both of them, blurring the irrelevant out, such as me.

Lydia usually had an intimidating vibe surrounding her. Clear contours lined her fair skin. While her eyebrows were not dark and thick like Anatolius’ and mine, hers arc slightly towards her pointed nose. That did not help with her intimidating vibe. Not everyone could feel at ease around her and right now, she just looked worse than ever. I could swear her clear blue eyes turned a navy shade so dark I doubt it was ever possible. They made one feel like he was staring into the deepest of dungeons, darkest of prisons. Beneath that dark film, there was a venomous purple fire, not really visible, but I could feel it. It was burning, burning wildly and furiously, and engulfing anything in its way.

Lydia could easily conduct a one-day workshop on how to look at people. Her eyes change a lot. They were the same pair of eyes, but she had her way of changing them that made her look like anything she wanted to. At least, that was how it was in my opinion. It was most likely just be a psychological effect, my brain messing with my mind. I meant, surely lights did not change all the time? Surely Anatolius was not that uneasy around me. Surely...That sounded so certain right?

Speaking of Lydia, she was completely unpredictable. Not that she could turn into a chimpanzee all of a moment, but she sure could look friendly one second and evil the next. Well, that made her sound really bad, didn it not?

There was no accurate way of saying it. But fundamentally, I could categorise her looks in 3 different groups:

1) Smirk – Those where her eyes seriously bore into you yet with a hint of humour. 2) Evil Grin - When a dark aura engulfs her and her eyes emit a deep purple hue. 3) Cute smile - Those when you can actually feel at ease around her.

Right now it would be a mix between a smirk and an evil grin, without the humour. And well, it was not that much of a grin. She was more like staring at you, hoping her stare could kill you, hoping you could just shut up.

I had better stop them before Lydia turn murderous. Not that she had ever done that but she was always changing, and highly unpredictable. Moreover, I could not take the freaky silence any longer. Add in the fact that I disliked being marked as irrelevant while these two stare at each other.

"Lydia..." I said, my voice hoarse and croaky. Probably due to the lack of talking, my throat was dry.

Lydia shifted her stare from Anatolius to me. She did so for five seconds and finally relented. She looked at me, defeated, and said "Is it that hard to keep a stare on you?" When I said not a word, she finally shrugged and beagn her teasing. "You know I could totally see you two from the audience area." I stared at her face blankly for a good second, not catching on to a word she said since her mood changed a little too quickly for my thoughts to keep up. Huh?

Then, the situation settled on me. My eyes were probably as big as the moon now, a cocktail of fear, panic and embarrassment.

"Sshhhh.. This will only be between us, ok?" I pleaded in a hushed tone. Shaking her head in a chiding manner, she clucked her tongue while motioning me for a practice. When I stayed rooted on my spot, she halted and murmured something to herself, as if scolding herself for something.

Frowning, I made a step towards her. She swallowed a silent, depressed giggle and glanced from Anatolius to me. 

"Do you think it's time?" Anatolius mouthed slightly.

A sad smile played on her lips, as if dreading for this moment to ever come. "Soon," she said, "but not yet..."

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I will try to update weekly. Anyway, tell me about your opinions about this chapter. It's a bit disorganised since I wrote part of it at home, in class, at home and in class again. So there goes my not so coherent work? I edited it so I hope it is better. I edited it about 4 times now :P

So, Read, Enjoy, Vote if you think I deserve it and.... COMMENT!! :3

renn <3