The Silence Between Us

Embarrassing Moments x 1,000

Chapter 19:

"Is this really necessary?"

An hour later and with the added assistance of Clara who showed up per instruction of Mae, I was apparently ready. It felt like they caked makeup on my face.

"I'm the makeup wizard, Louisa. You look beautiful." Clara stated simply, almost as if daring me to argue with her.

I did argue with her though. "Don't you think he'll notice that suddenly, after he kisses me, that I'm wearing a lot of makeup? That I'm trying to look good for him?"

Mae was putting the straightener away that she used to flatten my usually wavy hair. "Well isn't that what you're doing?"

"Well...yeah. But only because you guys told me to."

"And for a good reason. You don't want to look like a hoodlum, do you? Not when we're trying to figure out whether or not he's attracted to you! We want to make it easy for him to kiss you again!" Mae said, a little too excitedly for my liking.

Clara snorted, causing both Mae and I to shut up our bantering and turn towards her. "What?" She said, laughing awkwardly. "I can already tell you that he's practically in love with you."

For the fifteenth time tonight, my mouth nearly hit the floor. "What?" I shouted, incredulously. "Even with the whole Rory situation?"

"Oh, come on." Clara said, most likely rolling her eyes. "You can't see him look at you the way Mae and I can. He looks like a cartoon character, the way his eyes sparkle like that whenever he lays eyes on you."

I pouted. "I didn't know eyes could actually sparkle."

"Believe me, Louisa. Not many people's do. But when Alex looks at you, you better believe his face lights up like it's Christmas morning. I'm surprised you didn't figure it out sooner. He's talked to you more than any of us. He trusts you more, I suppose."

"It's because I'm blind, you dummy. It's harder to sign to me." I stated the obvious.

Mae joined the conversation, backing Clara up. "Think about it though. The only way for you to communicate is for your guys' hands to touch. You've practically been holding hands this whole time! And when he isn't using your hand to sign to you, he's talking to you. I don't think you understand how hard it is for him to get even a word out. The fact that he's even making this much of an effort to talk to you is something. He would've given up a long time ago with anyone else other than you."

I rolled my eyes. I didn't want to keep talking about whether or not Alex liked me or didn't. I just wanted to get to my house before he did so that he wouldn't awkwardly be waiting on my front porch when I got back. And I was also excited to meet his younger brother, Lucas. I was done talking about the same thing we had been talking about for hours. I just wanted to get this over with.

Most importantly, I just wanted to find out why he kissed me. Was it just to get Rory away from me? Or did it mean something else? Something...deeper.

Per my request, Mae, Clara, and I all piled into Mae's car as she drove me to my house. I fussed over my makeup, complaining that it was way too much while they said the same things and told me that I looked great, yada yada yada. I was just participating in the useless chatter to keep me occupied while my thoughts were spinning round in my head, worrying about what was about to go down when Alex showed up.