It's all just a mirage

Chapter 8-What about love?

Ariel’s POV

I rolled up my shirt sleeves and looked at the red marks at my wrist. Gently, I touched them with my other hand, feeling the rough new skin and dried up blood. It hadn’t surprised me that, no one knew about it. No one except Carson. I balled my hand into a fist.

“What are you doing?”

I jumped and put my arms behind my back, pushing my sleeve back down. “Nothing.”

Amelia stared at me for a good minute, just staring, trying to make me confess. I didn’t. She sighed and plopped herself on my bed, her strawberry blonde hair flying I the air as she went down. My hands were still behind my back.

“Your Uncle wanted me to ask if you wanted to come out with us. Would you like to?” she asked. Amelia turned so that she was lying on her back. I still didn’t understand what Uncle Jordy saw in her. I mean she was nice and pretty and all that happy, young shit. But she was still tip toeing around me.

“Ariel?”

She was staring at me now, her chin was resting in her hands and she was on her stomach. “Would you like to come?”

Staring into her green eyes, I already knew that she didn’t want me to go with them. And I didn’t want to go either. But I knew that if I said no to this, I would have to say yes to the next thing they wanted to invite me to.

“Okay” I said and she smiled at me.

“great, now let’s fix your hair and get you ready to go out.”

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It took Amelia almost an hour to do my hair and to do my makeup. She kept saying that I needed a haircut, which was true. My bangs almost touched the bridge of my nose, the lengths of each strand were all different and the black dye was starting to fade a bit.

“You look beautiful. Both of you” Uncle Jordy said and smiled. I smiled back. He looked surprised and so did I. It’s been a long time since the last time I actually smiled. And it actually felt kind of good.

“Okay, let’s go before they give our table away!” Amelia gently pushed us out the door and towards her car (apparently, dinner was her treat). Her car was a dark blue punch buggy.

“Punch buggy, no bunch backs” he lightly punched my arm and chuckled. An image of Tristan punching my arm flashed in front of my eyes. I bit my tongue.

The summer before, we used to go to the lake everyday and watch the cars that passed by. Every time we saw a punch buggy, we would hit each other. But I was never quick enough with my punches and Tristan knew how to make them hurt. By the end of that summer I had so many bruises that I could barely lift my arms.

“Real? You okay?”

I shook my head, making the memory disappear. “Yeah, I’m fine.” I got into the back seats of Amelia’s car and slammed the door shut. It’s been a long time since I thought about the past. Almost three weeks.

The car took flight, and I leaned forward, watching the lights flash by us. Even though I knew he didn't mean to, I didn't feel like going with them to the restaurant anymore. Amelia switched on the radio to a hip hop station. The first thing I heard was Brittney Spear's voice moaning through the speakers.

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Once we were seated in 'Lovely Dove' Amelia was like a hawk, her eyes were always searching around the room and watching for movements. Uncle Jordy cleared his throat, "Honey? Are you okay?"