ROSE

41. Kiss

♡

"It's almost the week off. It's right after the midterms." I said, placing the books I took from the locker yesterday in my bag as Anthony sat back on the bar, drinking his coffee.

I was trying to keep my act up that nothing is going on to make sure that he doesn't know whatever is happening, maybe, just maybe I will find out on my own. The more the time goes on, the more I give up on finding who it is.

Rita told me a good idea to do. She told me to take Anthony's phone and search for the number that is sending me these messages and I knew that if I do that, I will find out who it is but the fear of being caught doing so, makes me just push it away. I wanted to find out but I wasn't doing anything to do so.

"Do you want to come with me to the cabin in the week off?" He asked me, walking closer to where I was. I put my jacket on and walked away to where my shoes were. I bit my lip. I don't know if I should go with him.

"I don't know if I can. I have work." I tried to find an excuse to not go.

"Take one week off. It won't change anything." He said.

"Why do you even want to go to the cabin now? It's freezing." I said.

"We go every year at the same time." He said.

"We as in who?"

"Me, Jace, kade, Beth, Steph and Jason." He told me. "You're added to the list this year." He smiled. I blinked. I thought he was telling me to go just the two of us not just invite me to something he does each year with his friends. That, for some reasons, made me want to go. Maybe it's Beth or Steph. But Steph is taken. I widen my eyes. Beth?

We left the apartment and I got in the car. He drove us to school and I walked to my class. I saw Dylan sitting in the middle of the class. I went to sit next to him.

"Hey." I said, smiling, putting my bag down.

"Bella," he smiled at me. "I thought you wouldn't come today. I didn't see you the morning so I thought you weren't going to come."

"I know I came later than usual but I still came."

"I'm going to leave in the middle of the class. My parents are coming to visit and stay with me until after the week off." He explained. "That just reminded me that I have to book a ticket soon." He rolled my eyes.

"What ticket?" I asked.

"I'm going to spend Christmas with my parents. What about you?" He asked me.

Christmas? I shook my head with a small smile. Last Christmas I spent it with my parents and this year I will spend it alone. I don't know what I will do or how I will spend it but I knew that it won't be as special to me as it was before. Christmas for me was family time, gift swapping, movies at night everyday of the week before Christmas till Christmas. Christmas for me was my parents taking a week off their jobs to spend it together. For me, it was waking up the day of Christmas to the smell of baked pancakes and cookies. Christmas for me was a day in church as we all sit and listen to the word of God.

I sighed and closed my eyes. "I won't do anything." I told him and right after, before he could say anything, the teacher walked in and started talking right away. I wasn't paying attention because all I could think about was memories with my parents. I've never seen two people love each other as much as my parents does and Christmas was one of the proofs. My mother would wake up early to make the pancakes and the cookies and then go wake up my father then come wake me up as I pretended to be sleeping. I was never sleeping. I was always too excited for Christmas to have any sleep the Christmas Eve. They'd kiss and wish each other a merry Christmas then turn to me, kiss me then wish me a merry Christmas too. We'd spend the whole day together then at night when we come back from wherever we were spending the day, we would open the gifts. I don't remember any Christmas that my parents don't buy each other or me gifts. I never didn't get gifts. Even if they were small, I was happy to have them.

"Bella," Dylan called me and cut the thoughts that kept rolling over and over in my head. "I'm leaving." He told me.

"I'll text you what we got." I smiled at him as he made his way out of the door. I tried to concentrate for the rest of the class without thinking about anything at all. I tried to take as much notes as I could.

I got a couple of notes that I was going to give Dylan for sure so as I walked out, I texted him telling him so. I was getting better at typing faster which made me proud of myself. I also sort of got used to the new phone. I liked how big it was in my hands. I smiled wanting to thank Anthony again.

I frowned a little for not finding him at my locker nor his and when I looked at my phone I didn't find any texts or calls from him. Maybe he isn't done yet. But again, he finishes today's class before I finish mine which is why he always calls me right when I text him I finished. But he didn't and didn't even answer my text.

The idea that he vanished came rushing in my brain again but why would he do that when I already know about his father? I tried to call him but he didn't answer. I decided to just wait for him. He will probably come by when he's done with whatever he was doing.

I opened my locker and placed my books down. I have a midterm tomorrow so I took its books. I need to ask Dylan what do I need to study because I missed a lot of that class.

Someone tapped my shoulder and I smiled. When I turned around, what I saw wasn't what I expected to see.

"What do you want?" I crossed my arms.

"Woah. Calm down." Cameron put his hands in defence. I rolled my eyes and waited for him to spell what he whatever to tell me then walk away and leave me alone. "I just came to ask if everything is okay with Anthony."

"It's none of your business." I yelled. I was angry at him since the last time he took pictures of me and Dylan to show to Anthony and made him believe that there was something between the two of us.

"It kind of is because he is my friend." He smirked and I wanted to slap it off his face. "I assume that you two are fighting since he's hooking up with Lindsay again."

I frowned. The longer the silence grow between us, the harder and louder my heart beats, the colder and weaker I get.

"What...are you saying?"

"I just told you what I'm saying." He giggled. "I think you'd like to see what he's doing next to the gym..."

Before he could say anything else, I started running to where the gym was. My weak feet hitting the ground, a definite purpose in each of my steps. The sound of my shoes in the silent corridors was methodical and repetitive, one foot after the other again and again. My heart started to pick a high speed, pumping to the rhythm of my footsteps. The only sound I was hearing was the sound of my own breathing. It felt like a really long path that I was taking but in reality, this whole running probably took two minutes. Everything was going in slow motion in front of me. Cameron's words kept repeating itself in my head which made me even weaker as I approached the gym.

"...since he's hooking up with Lindsay again." The echo of his voice kept hunting me as my eyes searched for the one I almost trusted. When my eyes landed on him, it got glued, scared to look anywhere else but when I looked in front of him, to see the same girl he introduced me to once, having her hands on his cheeks and her lips on his.

I stood there, watching them like an idiot for a couple of seconds, not sure of what to do. A part of me didn't want to believe it even if it was happening right in front of my eyes. Water filled my eyes and a huge mist came down in front of my view, blocking it from seeing them any further.

"Anthony!" I heard Cameron's voice yelled from behind me so I blinked for the mist to go away then felt my cheeks getting wet. Anthony pushed her away and looked our way. His angry eyes found Cameron first and when they turned to me, they got soft. We stared into each other's eyes for so long that I felt the present coming back to fill me. I gulped and turned to leave.

I felt a hand grabbing my upper arm and that was my maximum to stay calm. I yelled "let go of me" and hurried to leave. My eyes didn't blink once and my pace didn't slow down. I felt like a machine with no feelings, a zombie that was walking in a way with no purpose, no destination.

I felt my heart breaking and when I said that nothing could hurt me more than my parents's lost, I was lying. This hurts way more than I thought it would.

♡