Blue Money | Nick Robinson

Chapter Sixteen: Chaos

The calm before a storm is always the worst kind of calm.

You're happy, you're content but underneath that layer you know that something will happen soon to break the blissful cycle of calm.

I'm with Nick, so on the surface everything should be okay shouldn't it? We should hold hands and wander into the sunset? Everything should just magically be okay right? Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Just because you're with the person you love doesn't mean everything is going to suddenly fall into place like falling in love. The universe doesn't work like that and 11:11 is for chumps.

"Hey, babe."

I snap my attention back to real world. The dining hall is bustling. I'm standing in line with Nick and Eileen; Dawn is already saving seats for us at a table.

Christmas break ended too fast, I wasn't ready for all the superficial clads of burberry wearing teens to come back.

Nick and I had spent every single waking second being together since Our Proclamation Of Love to each other in the library and we had a LOT of alone time together and by that I mean sex in the library and playing the question game at the pond.

But now that everyone is getting back into swing of things I felt like I was already losing him.

And then there was the whole Layla Thing which I just didn't feel like thinking about at all.

"Baaaaabe?" Nick whines, tugging on the sleeve of my t-shirt.

"Yes honeybear dear darling angel, what do you need?" I smile up at him, leaning my head on his shoulder.

"I asked you what you were thinking about like 5 minutes ago, you've been staring off into space. should I be jealous of that wall over there?"

"Ha ha," I stand on my toes and kiss his cheek. I reach up and brush some hair out of his eyes as we step forward, the line moving. Nick scrunches his nose at me.

"Holy shit," Eileen practically shouts and smacks me on the arm.

"Ow, shit what?"

"Look," EIleen rapidly taps my arm and Nick's at the same time with both hands. I follow her gaze to the front of the dining hall. The rest of the room seems to turn with us or at least the few people around us.

It's Layla.

But also it's not.

Layla looks like a shell, an empty girl dressed in head to toe black and dark shadows beneath her soulless eyes and there's something off about her. The same power she was holding before seems to be gone. The state of her has destroyed and if I had to guess I would say she's been snorting too many drugs because it looks like it, even from a distance.

"Looks like the queen's fallen." Nick mutters.

I disagree. There's still something unsettling about her as if she knows everybody's secrets and she carries them right on her milky skin.

As if Layla knows I'm thinking about her, she looks over at me and chills dance all over my spine as she narrows her dark eyes at us. My hand reaches for Nick and I lace my fingers through his, heartbeat in my fingertips.

Layla looks furious, anger dripping from her blatantly. She whips her head around and leaves just as fast as she came in.

"That doesn't seem good," I think out loud. Nick squeezes my hand.

The line shuffles forward and I turn my head to where Layla just was. I'm expecting her to waltz back through the door but she doesn't and it feels like I swallowed a peach pit.