How I See Her

Chapter :7

>Kris<
Mom has been coming home really late these days and she looks even more tired. I wait for her till midnight and she always manages to give me a smile.

I blame myself for her struggles. If it wasn't for me , we wouldn't had to move, she wouldn't had to pay those bills, she wouldn't had to work till midnight.

I'm horrible.

I don't think I'll ever stop blaming myself for our situation. I look at my watch and it's 8:00 pm.

All the stress from the past few days has been itching me. I need a relief.
I promised mom that I'll never smoke again , but I really need something, to get my mind off things. I rumage through my drawer and find a lone cigarette.

I go outside towards somewhere secluded. In the night's breeze, the cigarette's smoke is dancing in little twirls as I hold it between my fingers.
I take a whiff but I haven't smoked in a while so I start coughing. I feel the smoke from the burning tobacco stinging my windpipe. I take a another whiff and set out to explore the neighborhood.

As I go forward , I hear a thumping sound which gets louder with each step I take. As I get nearer to sound I see where it's coming from.

The basketball court.

I stop in my tracks. My mind threatening me not to go any further. But my heart wants to move forward. In that battle of mind and heart, heart wins. It always wins.

I move nearer and nearer and see her. Her nimble body moving with the basketball. Amber is frail and thiner than what she normally looks like. Or maybe because I've seen her wearing lose clothing only. Now she's just wearing a tank top and shorts. She dunks the ball in the basket and jumps with happiness.

I drop my cigarette, crush it with my feet and then step towards the court .

Maybe she heard my footsteps because she turns around to face me.

"Are you sure you should be playing alone this late?", I say to her.

"Well I've been playing like this for a long time and nothing happened yet." , she shrugs and picks up her ball . "I think people view me as a guy and just ignore." , she lets out a light chuckle.

Well I think she is as much of a girl as any other girl around.

She positions herself and tries to do a 3 pointer. But the ball misses the basket . Her posture was wrong.

My hands were itching to show her the right way. "That's not how you do it. ", I pick the ball .

"Oh yeah? Show me then. ", she smirks.

I raise my arms but as so as I do, my hands start shaking really badly. I can't do it....... my body won't let me.

"Hey you're shaking really bad" , even Amber noticed under the dim street lights.

I give the ball to her. I was embarrassed after I confidently said that I'll show her .

"Are you scared of something?", she asks softly.

I didn't knew how to answer her so I remain quite. I'm glad she didn't asked me more.

At that moment , two cats come running down fighting and knocking down trash cans.

We both let out a scream and I grab whatever was infront of me , which was Amber.

I was holding on to her shoulders and I feel her teeth chattering a little too.

"That's why I'm a dog person . " she mutters under her breath slowly . Her shoulders felt really bony. But isn't that's how a girl is. I realize I've holding on to her for quite long and quickly let her go.