Light It Up | ✔ | #2

Chapter 10-

"How was your day?" Mr. Forkle asked. "Good?"

"You could say that." Sophie sidestepped the question easily, avoiding his gaze.

"Sophie...," he warned. "Don't make me read."

"I'll tell you later, if you want."

Mr. Forkle tapped the steering wheel. "I expect a very complicated explanation, just based off of what you're doing right now."

Sophie stopped mid-eyelash pull, her hand retreating quickly as she blushed. "Sorry, okay." She fluttered her lashes, itching to tug, but restraining herself. "Should I use big words, like, oh—I don't know—Keefe and trouble with a capital T?"

"Well, it's Keefe, not sure what you're going to expect here," he commented, his wrinkles sagging as he said the name. "Mr. Sencen has always been...quite the troublemaker, as we know."

"That's the thing," she replied quietly, "I don't think I do know him anymore."

"I was thinking you'd be ecstatic about the situation, if it ever did occur, you know. It just seemed like you would be the type to forgive easily."

"His explanation was awful, an excuse, I think." She rubbed her fingers against her temples. "Besides, it's not as if any of my friends had a 'more than friends' relationship with me, and then left for six freaking years."

"I suppose that is true."

...

Sophie finished her homework in ten minutes. It was so easy it was a joke, in her opinion.

She laid back onto her bed, taking out her phone. She stared wistfully at the screen, then unlocked it. Against her will, she tried something she hadn't done a long, long, while. "Show me Dex."

Instantly, the strawberry-blonde boy's face appeared, astonishment oozing from every pore. "Sophie?"

"Hey, Dex," she started. "I know we didn't really end on the right foot, but maybe we could try again?" Her shoulders sagged. "I need my best friend back."

"Yeah, of course." Dex stared at her. "Wow, it's been awhile, hasn't it?"

Only about...a week or so.

"How is everyone?"

"Well, we actually didn't end up breaking Fitz and Linh up. They're going steady. But there was some drama a while back." He hesitated. "Linh found out that he was using her and almost broke up with him. Apparently, Fitz actually, as he put it, 'fell in love with the most beautiful girl on earth'." Dex's face betrayed such disgust, she laughed.

"Impressive. That's quite a plot twist, isn't it?" She sighed. "Shame, we almost did prank them good, but then Keefe left and it was all a disaster."

"Yeah," Dex said. "How are you holding up, by the way?"

"Doing alright." Sophie debated whether to tell him that her ex-boyfriend was back. "Um, can I tell you something you won't repeat to anyone else?"

He gave her an eyebrow. "What do you think? Duh!"

"Well, about Keefe, he's actually alive..." She trailed off.

Dex's eyes narrowed, and he studied her face. "You met him?"

"He's been in the Forbidden Cities the entire time," Sophie admitted. "It was by coincidence that he landed in the same AIG school that I did."

"What's AIG?" He asked, then shook his head. "Never mind. That's not important. Just, why do you look so tired, then?"

"He wants to get back together with me."

"That's it?"

Sophie rolled her eyes in exasperation. "Also, he gave me some stupid excuse about the Neverseen being back and threatening to kill me if he didn't go with them."

His expression turned to disbelief. "Really? That's what he told you?" It turned thoughtful. "You know, you should actually consider the Neverseen thing, though."

She pursed her lips. "Do you really think so? I can't just forgive this, you know. Six years, Dex."

"I know, I know, I didn't say anything about forgiving him." Dex changed the subject. "How's your iPhone doing?"

"In tip-top condition, Dex."

"It's my workmanship, it should be," he scoffed.

"Whatever you say, Dex."

His face morphed into a pout. "Hey! Sophieee!"

"Whaaaaat?" She blinked at him, giving her puppy eyes. "I didn't do anything wrong now, did I?"

The two of them descended into giggles where they were.

Sophie muffled them with her pillow, taking a few deep breaths. "We're so immature."

"But we love ourselves anyway," Dex sang in a very, very off-tone key."

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Author's Note-

Hey! So, as my followers know, I am currently in the process of updating pretty much every one of my works. I though I would start with you guys, since I've gotten the most pleas for updates here.

But then, this work has also been lacking on votes for the amount of people reading. I've gotten 'update!' comments from so many readers I've had no idea liked the story, and am a bit confused at how many readers I have right now. For the amount of people I have seen commenting, and the amount of views on this that I see, there aren't many votes. Votes on my stories are what motivate me, guys. That and pleasing you all, continue for the fans and all that jazz.

But I don't know that I even have that many fans, because I can't tell. So do me a favor, and vote on the chapters that you think the writing was well done on. I don't need you to vote on whether you liked what went on, it prefer you vote on how well written the chapter was. If you liked it, please vote.

With that depressing stuff aside, I just wanted to say, we hit 1K, guys!!! Oh my god!!! Set A Torch hit 3.7K as well, so thank you for that too!

This is a chapter of celebration, now that I've gotten the chapter done. Happy Holidays to everyone!

Love,

Owl~!