Crossover Crossroads (The Kell and Maille Story)

Let me teach you how to dump me

026: I'll teach you how to dump me

It was early, but Kell drove her to her house and they stayed in the car for a few minutes before getting out and Maille actually leaned back in after opening the door for herself, and said good night. Kell shrugged. He hopped the fence after she closed it behind her, and whirled her around to face him.

"This isn't how it's done." he said.

Maille's shoulders slumped in exasperation. "It is when you're feeling what I am."

"Nah. Come, come, come. Lay on the trampoline with me."

He had her hand, but she was skittish and jerked away. Kell flipped head over heels onto the tramp and lay there staring up at the clouding sky. He crooked a little finger at her. "Come and see. I will explain how it is done."

Maille flung her arms and forced herself to walk to the edge of the tramp. But she wasn't getting on. Kell rolled over and lay face down, very close to where she was. His dreads stood out everywhere, and for some reason, it made her smile. He was just plain silly.

She didn't know anyone like him, and that's why he was confusing her so. He didn't behave in any conventional fashion at all. Maybe that was the thing to rely on, that you couldn't count on any one reaction from him. But then her finger tingled again, as it had been the whole drive home and even as she opened the fence. She turned around. She needed to be alone for this one.

"Don't go." Came his voice.

"I-- need to be--- alone, Kell." she said.

"Come, come, come. Lay on the tramp with me."

Maille shook her head a little desperately. "I can't..."

Kell looked up at her, his beads lying flat on the tramp, like limp blades of grass. The sight again made Maille feel like laughing. This is nerves, she thought as her finger gave another strange tingle that made her heart do something funny too. She felt a shiver coming and tried not to show it, but she shuddered.

Kell smiled and reached out to grab a braid. "Maille, come, I will tell you how it's done."

''What? What is done?" she said wearily, tired for the moment of cryptic sayings.

He pulled the braid. "How you dump me."

"Dump you? I can't dump you." Her thought was that she didn't have him, how could she dump him? But her next thought was that he needed to explain what he meant by the 'next level'. She should at least understand what happened back there before she went to stew all night.

Kell pulled her braid again, and this time she rolled onto it, not touching him, in fact staying far away from him, but Kell simply kept her braid and bounced the tramp until she had slid toward him and they were laying side by side.