The Missing Piece [Discontinued]

Chapter Twelve

            Bird sat down on his bed in his room, his head in his hands. He and Joy were at a dead end. They found all the pieces, they knew what they had to do, and Joy just told him about the Hastings’ Manor.

            Yet, they were all stuck. Stuck until Skittles would agree to help them. Bird could only hope that Skittles would believe them when they showed her the articles.

            “Adian?” Leann tapped on Bird’s half-way shut door, then came in.

            “Yeah?” he said, lifting his head up from his hands.

            “I just wanted to see how you were holding up,” Leann sat down next to him.

            “Fine, I guess,” Bird grimaced, trying to block out Jenna from his mind.

            “I know this must be hard. Especially since you don’t have anyone to… you know… tell.”

            “What?” Bird’s brow furrowed, “I can talk to you about how I’m feeling.”

            “No, I mean,” Leann stopped, then shook her head, “sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”

            “You meant no friends,” Bird realized. Leann shook her head again.

            “I didn’t mean it like that, I just meant…” Leann trailed off, not knowing how to explain.

            “It’s okay Mom,” Bird assured her, meaning it. “I’m holding up just fine.”

            “That’s good. Besides, aren’t you friends with that… um, what’s her name… Faye girl?” Leann asked, looking confused.

            “Faith,” Bird correct, deciding not to tell Leann about Skittles’ nickname, “and no, I’m not really friends with her.” All Leann knew about Bird and Skittles was that Bird went to her house the other day. Not that Skittles used to always be a huge pain to Bird, and is now a part of a huge quest going on.

            “Oh? Why not?” Leann asked, and Bird laughed: if only Leann knew how complicated things had been between them two.

            “I don’t know,” he replied, lying. Leann nodded, as if she understood, and then stood up.

            “Well, don’t forget about your homework, or whatever you have to do, okay?”

            “Alright,” Bird said, and Leann left his room. Bird wondered if he and Skittles would ever be friends. Was it even possible?

*****

            “Skittles!” Bird called to her the next day as he saw her on the way to his first class. Skittles turned around.

            “Yeah?” she called. Bird thought briefly to how, weeks ago, if he had called her name in school, how she would have turned around and challenged him. How she would’ve called him ‘Bird Brain’ or something. How she would have made fun of him. What had changed since then?

            “Er, I just wanted to know if we could like, meet at lunch or something. I need to talk to you,” Bird said, thinking of the newspaper article copies (which Joy had given to him) he had in his backpack that he needed to show Skittles.

            “Sissy boy!” she laughed, “you can’t tell me what to do or give me some kind of plan! But I’ll humor you this once: sure. I’ll meet you at lunch.”