Speak Now

Chapter 7: A canary in a cage

The sight of a well-dressed, grinning boy in my room is so bizarre that for a while I stare into the empty space behind him, the wooden bannisters gleaming under the sunlight streaming from the skylight.

"Hello?"
Tristan waves a hand in front of my face and I shake myself out of my reverie.

"What are you doing here?" I manage to ask, as I pull myself to my feet, and straighten my sweatshirt.
But Tristan walks past me further into my room.

He looks around at the canopied queen-sized bed, the bookshelves barring the walls, the open laptop on my work desk and the posters of boy bands on the portion of ceiling inclined over my bed.

"Well?" I force myself to ask, as my heart beats frantically like a canary wanting to break out of its cage. I try to suppress the nausea that accompanies my nervousness, but it remains like an uninvited guest in my throat, much like the boy in my room, who has so qualms about invading someone's personal quarters.

"This is your room?" He finally asks, and turns around to grin at me,"Is that a Sylvia Plath novel?"

I blush furiously as he points at the book lying on the bean bag besides the bookshelves. I break gaze with him and look down at my feet.

Why does this always happen to me?
I think miserably.

"Don't worry." Tristan winks,"I'll keep your....literary choices to myself."

My eyes widen,"It isn't mine!"

He cocks an eyebrow,  and it looks so incredibly hot, I turn away and hurry to pick up the book before closing it.

"It's mum's." I explain, a bit breathless,"She and I read here together."

He nods but doesn't stop smiling and then to my surprise he lies down on the bed, spread-eagled. His brown curls spread around his face like a halo.

"So" be begins,"You must be wondering why I have intruded on your niche."

Niche? I think, trying not to laugh.
Tristan notices and wiggles his eyebrows,"You do know what a niche is right?"

Smiling, I nod.

"A niche..." He starts,"is a role a particular species plays in the ecosystem. Or a place it occupies."

I wonder where he's going with this, and watch him lean his head to look me straight in the eyes,"You ARE wondering aren't you? Well I'm here because someone broke their promise."

"Because I didn't call you?"

"Precisely. And now as your punishment, I have sprung up. Like bees in a bush."

"That doesn't make sense." I state. His every word puzzles me, and I think him very strange to talk so...madly.

"A little bit of non sense never hurts anybody." He grins, and then sits up, using his elbows to pull himself up.

"Well, do you want to start the project or not?" I ask.

I'm already eager for this wild encounter to be over so I can get back to my old routine, without popular boys showing up at my house unannounced and making odd proclamations.

"For that we shall need a paper and a pencil." He ponders,"and a very good memory of all the elderly we happen to know."

I huff out a breath and pull out some white sheets from my desk drawer. Taking a pen from my pencil holder, I hand him the materials.

"Now what?" I ask. I can feel the exasperation in my voice but Tristan only grins wider and begins to scrawl on the paper, using his knee for support.