It's Just Life

Balcony Fun

"I'm sorry, it wasn't anything important. Just a small... family emergency." I said and threw my phone on the ground next to his surfboard. Maybe little bit too harshly but at this point, I honestly didn't care.

I smiled to Ashton as bright as I could without looking like a maniac. I made sure that my eyes shone too. Fake smile doesn't reach the eyes.

I've always been an excellent liar, it's what I do best. When I was nine I almost got out of stealing a dvd from Macy's by saying that I was from Bulgaria and in my country you don't have to pay for anything if you're under 15. I wouldn't have been caught but the manager of the place was half-bulgarian. Dad had to pay 300$ to keep them from filing a police report of me. It took me years to figure out that we bribed the manager.

But this time something unusual happened. My smile didn't ease the frown on Ashton's face like it was suppose to. His eyebrows fell and the worried look just deepened, making shadows appear across his face.

"Are you okay? Did something happen?" He asked completely ignoring my smile. I felt stunned. What? Nobody has ever caught on to my lies so quickly. He has known me for a week. A week. This shouldn't be possible.

In the moment of suprise my expression fell a little letting the panic that I had banished from my face shine through. It took me a second to recover from the shock before I got my smile back and repeated my earlier words:

"It's really not that important, just some family stuff." The word "family" made a small sting of worry flash in my mind. Ashton stared at me closely, but after a while seemed to realize that he wouldn't get anymore information from me so he just shrugged and left it be.

To avoid further questions I started to rock my legs back and forth making the swing slowly rise. Ashton watched with a humorous expression before getting up from in front of me and going to the swing next to me. He started rocking his own feet.

"I'm faster!" I yelled at him, swinging my feet furiously back and forth.

"No you're not!" Ashton yelled back while picking up the speed. In mere seconds both of us were swinging as high as we could. I was laughing loudly while trying to make the swing go even higher. I heard him giggle, which seemed to lift the dead weight of dread inside me. It did not make it vanish, but it did lift it a bit. I knew, that at some point, that weight was going to come down and crush everything at its wake. But at this moment, I truly did not just care.

"If you try to go too high the swing can go around!" Ashton shouted, completely unaware of how his laugh was affecting me. He was trying to pick up the speed too.

"I know, that's what I'm trying to do!"

I whooped at the sky and tried to angle my body in the way where the swing-turn-around would be possible. The task turned out to be almost impossible so after ten minutes of trying we grudgingly left the swings.

As we lazily walked down the street Ashton asked me what I wanted to do next. I looked at him, not able to stop the surprise from showing on my face.
"You still want to do something with me?" I had thought that after the phone call he would have realised that I'm trouble and he definitely shouldn't be borthered with me. He had seen me shaken up, so as a nice person he had offered some company. And I had needed company, so I had let him stay. I hadn't really expected anything else from him. Even though the thought of not seeing him after today made a different kind of pinch go through my stomach. Not the kind that I want to feel again.

But Ashton being Ashton slowly scanned my face before saying:

"Of course, I'm your friend. Now where do you want to go next?" I smiled at him. A real smile this time. He must have noticed it too because he grinned back at me while taking my hand in his. I looked down at our joined hands and playfully swung them back and forth.