Begin Again - A.I

twenty nine.

"So, you're just going to ignore me now?"

"El?"

"Oh, come on. We live in the same house."

"El!"

"This is childish, you know?"

I tune Ashton out, standing at the kitchen bench as I throw ingredients into the blender to make a smoothie. Ashton had been following me around like some lost puppy all morning. It was Saturday and Mum and Anne had gone to some market, leaving Ashton and I alone. I wasn't too bothered, because the kid could easily be ignored. Unfortunately he didn't see it the same way.

"Look, I'm sorry," Ashton continues. "Is that what you want me to say? Is that what you're waiting for?"

I chop up some strawberries and toss them into the blender, not saying a word.

I hear his deep sigh. It's kind of funny seeing how frustrated he is over all of this, considering it's his fault. But whatever, I didn't even care. 

"The guys all miss you." I have to hold in a snort. "And Luke's sorry, yeah? He really is. You want me to bring him over here? He can apologise. Right to your damn face. I'll punch him in his if he doesn't."

I add some mango, then chop up some banana.

"This isn't going to work. You can't just ... you can't just shut me out. How are we meant to live together and not once talk to each other?"

It was working absolutely fine for me so far. I slowly pour yoghurt into the blender, painfully slow. Just so he knows that I'm listening, but I don't care.

He sighs again.

"El, look. Can we just talk about-"

And then I turn the blender on and turn to look at him, my lips lifting up into a small smile. His words are cut off by the whirring of the blender and he just scowls at me, his eyebrows almost covering his eyes.

He tries to say something else, but I just point to the blender and shrug, and he throws his hands up in the air before storming out of the kitchen. 

I stop the blender, satisfied.

---------

Chelsea and her friends were the complete opposite to Ashton and his in the fact that they were more like me. And I wasn't sure if I liked that or not. Chelsea was like me, but the better version. She was the clarity, and I was the blur. I was Chelsea through a fishbowl. The girls made me feel like I was back in L.A, back at home. They talked about the same things I loved, did the same things I used to do, and they dressed like last season in L.A. It was good enough. But that was just the thing, it was all just good enough.

I couldn't help but feel out of place with them, like nothing personal, you're just not an original. Like no matter what I did, or who I was, it wouldn't change the fact that I just joined the group only days ago. I was clearly missing some sort of important connection that everybody else had. Chelsea was really the only one that talked to me, and I think that was just because I didn't argue with her. Or talk back, really. I think she liked looking at me and seeing me as some sort of mirror of herself. Like she was just talking to herself, and herself would just listen. 

Chelsea was only in one of my classes, and it was Gym. I wasn't sure if I was grateful or not, because she looked like a fitness model in her gym gear and when I stood beside her it was like forming the number ten. One tall, one round. She also excelled at anything that she did, and gym was no exception. But it did mean that I didn't have to hang around with Calum and Ashton anymore, and get balls thrown at my head. Although, I did still have to be careful about the latter.