Promise & Me

Chapter 4

My heart dropped, and I took a step back. "What are you doing here?" I meant for my voice to come out strong, instead it came out weak and almost fragile sounding.

The blonde placed a hand on her hip, blocking out the girl that stood behind her. "I could ask you the same thing," she snapped as she looked me up and down, almost as if she were sizing me up.

Without breaking eye contact, I reached into my back pocket and produced my room key. Her eyes moved to the key that I now held in front of her face, and they narrowed into small slits. A small huff that was barely audible came out from her, and she turned around to face the smaller girl that was behind her.

"I'll catch up with you later, Melissa," and with that, she pushed past me and marched down the hall. Relief flooded through me, as I realized that the blonde wasn't my roommate.

The girl, Melissa, mumbled a goodbye before looking at me. I smiled a little awkwardly and looked back after the blonde, and I watched as she turned the corner before turning back around. "Hi, I'm..." My voice trailed off once I realized Melissa was no longer standing in front of me.

I ran a hand down my face, dragging down my eyelids in the process. After a moment of standing there motionlessly, I hesitantly made my way through the door and shut it behind me.

"Erica will cool down," Melissa stepped out of the closet to look at me. "She had a rough morning, so she isn't in the best mood today." She then closed the closet door and offered her hand to me. "I'm Melissa by the way."

Offering her a small smile, I shook her hand. "Aidan," I replied, as I began to feel relieved. It was good to know that the whole ordeal wasn't anything personal. "Did she tell you everything?" I asked, as I shifted my weight a little uncomfortably.

Melissa nodded before turning towards her bed and smoothing out the sheets. "It's no big deal," she assured me, while she sat down on the bed, only to wrinkle the blankets again. "Her family has lots of money, so she has plenty of jackets."

Unsure of how to reply to that, I only nodded. The fact that I ruined her jacket still made me feel horrible, especially since it looked more expensive than all of mine combined.

"Do you know how the riding schedule is going to work?" I asked, trying to change the subject.

Melissa only shrugged and kicked off her tennis shoes, and I winced at the loud thud of them hitting the wall. "We're all supposed to get an email by tonight," she said. "All I know is that nobody is allowed to ride today."

"That makes sense," I followed her lead and slipped my feet out of my flip flops. After placing them in a neat little pile, I sat on the edge of my bed and leaned back a little.

Melissa pulled out her phone and she was silent as her fingers tapped against the screen. "Do you want to go get something to eat?" She asked, not looking up from her phone.

It wasn't until she said something about food that I realized how hungry I was. At that moment my stomach decided to growl, and Melissa looking up at me with a knowing half smile. Without a word, the two of us stood up and slipped our shoes back on and made our way out of the dorm.

~

"So do you ride?" I looked over at Melissa, as we sat down on a bench in the courtyard with ice creams in hand.

"Yup," Melissa shoved a spoonful of her green ice cream into her mouth. "I mostly do dressage and cross country." I nodded to her, letting her know I was paying attention while I scooped around my styrofoam bowl for cookie dough. "My horse, Pixie, just adores dressage."

"What breed is she?" I looked up from my ice cream to watch people as they passes by. Most of the parents had thinned out by this point since it was starting to get late.

"Arabian," Melissa answered simply. "Do you want to go see her?"

As tempted as I was, I knew better. "I don't think right now is a good time," I answered truthfully. "You know, with everyone in there and the horses just getting settled in. They're probably a little stressed out right now."

Melissa pushed her ice cream around for a moment before letting out a sigh. "I guess you're right," she placed her bowl down on the bench between us. "I think I'm done."

Our phones suddenly went off at the same time, almost as if they were synchronized. We gave each other a confused look before I placed my ice cream down and grabbed my phone to read the message.

My eyes scanned over the email, skipping over everything that was useless information to me. After a minute of looking it through, I finally came across the schedule that I needed.

"They're going to get so backed up," Melissa put her phone away and shook her head. "What time are you supposed to get down there?"

"Um," I scrolled through the schedule, looking for where my last name fell. "Ten, right before the lunch break."

The way they had put the schedule together was probably the best way to do it, but there was no denying how backed up they were going to be. Last names A through E had to arrive in the indoor riding arena at eight o'clock, F through J had to be there at nine, and so forth. Meaning that I would have to be there at ten. No one was scheduled for eleven so the riding instructors could have a break.

"Early lunch," Melissa commented, drumming her fingers on the wooden seat. "I have to be there at eight o'clock."

Even though I heard her, I didn't respond as I read what was written below the schedule. "Looks like they don't want us riding tomorrow either," I said after reading. "So that'll be the day after tomorrow."

"It said something about all equestrians meeting in the indoor arena at twelve tomorrow," Melissa looked down at her ice cream and twirled the spoon around.

"Are you going to meet up with Erica?" I mentally crossed my fingers, hoping that she would say no.

Melissa shook her head. "No, she said she wanted to meet up with Shelby," she then picked up the remainder of her ice cream and dropped it into the garbage that sat right beside her. "We usually all hangout together, but she said she hadn't hung out alone with her in a while."

Following her lead, I stood up and walked around to throw away my ice cream, and Melissa stood up beside me. "So do you want to go together?" I shoved my hands into my front pockets and rocked back and forth on my heels.

Melissa gave me a crooked grin. "Well we are friends, so it would only make sense."

A small smile crept onto my lips. It felt good to have somebody that considered me a friend, especially after what happened earlier. I could already tell that we were going to get close, and I couldn't wait to see where our friendship would take us.

Okay, so I know this chapter is pretty short, but it has been WAY too long since my last update. I just haven't had the motivation or desire to write. But I'm back now, and hopefully I'll start updating again.

I feel like this chapter really sucked, and I'm just not proud of it. I had no idea where this paragraph was going, so I just sort of winged it. Even though I wrote this a long time ago, I have never edited it. I'm actually editing it as I'm writing it, and there is A LOT that I'm changing. The only thing that's not changing is the actual idea of the story. If I had actually wrote down an edit, then this would be updated so much faster, but I didn't do that. All I'm asking is for you guys to be patient. I know I probably lost all of my readers, but if any of you guys are still here from the very beginning, I would like to thank you. It really means a lot that you like my story that much.

Thank you so much,

Legendary_Xx