Unpredictability of Love

Hair and Unrequited Love Go Hand-in-Hand

The next day, I woke up to a bumblebee under my head, buzzing away irritatingly and vibrating my head. Or maybe it was my phone. I raised my hand to push it away from my head, but it stopped vibrating, so I decided to spare my hand the effort and fell right back to sleep. Only, the damn phone started vibrating again, then stopped, then started, until I got annoyed with it and decided to answer it with my face still in the pillow and eyes closed shut.

"What?" I didn't even bother hiding my grogginess and annoyance at being woken up this early in the morning. The person on the other end had to have some nerve to call me so many times - people close to me knew that if I didn't pick up my phone the first time, there was a great chance that I wouldn't answer it even at the tenth or answer it in a very bad mood for being disturbed. Of course, this logic didn't apply to mom. Mom would expect me to answer a call even if I was in the middle of a hurricane, or Horry's lectures - not much difference between them, really.

A voice that sounded strangely familiar and pissed off even to my half-asleep brain spoke from the other end. "Emmaline! How fucking long does it take to answer a damn phone!?"

Now, I wasn't a saint, but the use of so much profanity in the morning kind of nearly rankled me - or maybe it was the volume of the voice and its aggression. "What?" was the only response I could think of, as I tried to place that voice somewhere in the number of people I knew in my crazy life.

"I've been waiting here for the past fucking hour! Why did you tell me to come if you were going to snore your way through school today?" This sounded so familiar, like something or someone I should know, for some or the other purpose, but couldn't remember because my sleepy brain refused to wake up and give me any hints. Before I could forget about the inconvenient disturbance and slip back into unconsciousness, the voice spoke again, "I'm giving you five minutes! You don't make it, you walk or crawl or slide your way to school! I don't give a shit!" The dial-tone signifying the end of the call rung loudly in my ear.

I nearly fell back asleep, but something about that threat kept me thinking for a few seconds, until my brain finally connected the dots. School. Ankle. Ethan. Shit.

I flung myself off the bed with the speed of Panicking-Emmaline-Wilson, or at the speed of Horry-Angry-At-Me, and landed painfully on the floor. "Ow!" Rubbing my poor butt, I hobbled across my messy room, pulling off my clothes, brushing my teeth, washing my face - all in one go.

Five minutes later, I stood outside the door, proudly holding everything I needed for school in my hand, and not a hair out of its place - or rather, in my case, all my wild, frizzy hair was out of its place because I hadn't had the time to pull it into its usual tight bun which made it behave properly for the whole day. I hadn't even noticed the clothes I'd worn, since I'd brought Jack (the jacket) along with me to cover up the pitiful state in which my clothes were. I had a bag in my hand, a bunch of books in the other, lunch money in my mouth, and both, my debit card and phone were either in the pocket of my loose pants, or had been flushed down the toilet in my carelessness.

I hopped down the street toward Ethan's car - which hadn't yet (thankfully) driven away - still in my wonderful state of disarray. It took some effort to get there, but finally when I did reach it, it was kind of worth it - not that I got a warm welcome from him (his eyes were the perfect imitation of a brewing storm, and his mouth was set in a straight line, and his all-black clothing didn't particularly help him look joyful) but I kind of smiled when I saw him.

"What the fuck is that?" he said the moment I'd reached his car, his eyes focused on my hair like it was something a radioactive alien had crapped on my head. Admittedly, the wind wasn't actually helping calm my wild hair, but there was no reason to react so much.