Violet Rescue

Day 15. The Bubble.

This morning before I knocked on Tom's door, I found a note on it that said,

Violet, Left early this morning to talk to Mrs.Geller about Juilliard audition dance routine. XX Tom "XX? What the heck? What are we? Together or something?" I rip the note off and shove it in my pocket and text Kevin to come and walk with me to school. By the time I make it down the stairs Kevin is waiting in the lobby with someone. I couldn't see her face but it looked like, "Mya? You're back?" Mya came and gave me a hug, "Yeah girl. Jammin' in Spain with Grayson and Gregory was a great experience." "So they are back too?" I say as we start walking. "Yup, got in last night." I was a bit disappointed that none of them came to see me. We were friends.  We got to school and I was enlisted a partner in music mixing. We had to work together to create a soundtrack for a student work. Then it's lunch, best time of the day. We were all there today, Mya, myself, Tom, Greg, Grayson, and Kevin. "Oh, it's nice to meet you all." Tom said, then turned to me see I'm still meeting people everyday." "Yeah," I say. When we get to music theatre  one of our teachers announces that we are going on a field trip tonight if we can. "You have to come, unless you just can't in which you better have a good reason. Tonight at 6 I want to see all of you at the karaoke bar on 7th. Until tonight class dismissed." The thing about music theatre is that you wouldn't be getting the best education with just one teacher being just one gender, so we have two teachers. Miss and Mr.Wallace. The dynamic brother - sister duo. "Seriously? This is class today, singing at some bar? Okay." He turns to me. "So, where do you want to go?" Tom asks. I say, "Well we could go wait outside of European History class," I smile, "or..." I get up and grab my stuff and Tom's hand. I lead him out the door and jet down the stairs pulling him along. "Where are we going?" I shhh him. We get down to the lobby and instead of going to the front door I turn to Mrs.Hudson and say, "Nice to see you as always Mrs.Hudson." As I said it I'd been walking toward the back of the school. It, the school that is, used to be a hotel. It has tons of exits, including the one we use to escape. "What? What's going on?" Tom says and pulls my arm so hard that I turn hard into him. He seems irritated and confused. "Are you okay?" I ask him. He lets go from his tight grip and steps back to lean against the wall. He closes his eyes and breathes deeply through his nose and out his mouth. I step closer, "seriously Tom are you okay?" He mumbles, "yeah," he takes a breath, "yeah yeah I'm fine. So what are we doing?" "Well," I start, "my uncle is a sculptor and he just unveiled his new sculpture. Its interactive and you can rent it out for today. So I thought maybe we could do that some more touristy endeavors. and I wanted to show you some of my favorite places here. What do you think? You up for it?" "Yeah," he replies and smirks. "What do you mean a interactive sculpture though?" I reach my hand out, he takes it. "You'll see." I say and smile. "Okay the rules." I say still holding his hand and walking around the school down the alley and out to the sidewalk in front of the school. "Rules?" "Have you ever seen The Art of Getting By?" "No." He repiles while looking down at his shoes. "Well Rule 1. Skipping school is fun. Rule 2. skip rarly to perserve the specialness of it." We cross the street heading towards a Chinese food cart. "Rule 3. Do something  culturally rewarding to earn it back morally. Rule 4. Noodles." "Hey Miss New York!" The worker of the cart says and starts getting noodles in a container. I notice Tom tilt his head, "Tom this is Marco he lives down in Chinatown." "Hey kid." Marco says in his heavy New York accent. "Hey!" Marco hands us our noodles and I hand him a 50. "Thanks Miss New York, you tell your papa to come by and eat for lunch sometime, alright?" "Alright Marco. Catch you later." I start walking again and notice that Tom had stopped. "Hey? Tom?" I take his takeout container and  nudge him in the stomach. "Hey Tom? You okay?" "What?" He snaps out of it. "You just spaced out." "Oh, Sorry." He says. "Come on." We head down the street and head toward the mall. As we are entreing the mall Tom asks me, "So are the noodles for number 4 or are the something culturally rewarding?" I smile at him and reply, "Only in tough cases can noodles substitute for both. And for today's skipping they are just noodles." I pull him through the crowds of people. and to the middle of the mall near a giant glass bubble. There were bodyguards beside it. "Norm nice to see you!" "Nice to see you Miss Green. Would you like to use the globe today?" "Yes my friend!" Tom and I head inside and sit on the opposite side from the door. "I'd wait til you're up in the air to open you food, okay?" Norm says as he starts shutting the door. "Thanks Norm." I say and hand him $50. "It only takes $50 to ride in a bubble?" "Only $50 for the niece of the artist." I say. "Who in your family isn't successful?" Tom asks smiling while opening his food. "My aunt." I say, "she is just married to my uncle, well I guess that does make her successful." I wave to some people starring at us. "I love it up here," I say as I take a bit of noodles and chicken. "I like this strange little bubble. You can't hear anyone. That's strange here." "You can't hear anyone, but you still get the energy of New York, that's way I love it. You get to see all the stories."

"Stories?" Tom asked me, taking another bite. "The stories in the quiet of New York." I had closed my eyes when I said it and Tom was definitely starring at me, I could feel him. "How do you mean?" I opened and nodded toward this girly girl sitting on this bench. I took a bite. On the other of the bench was this guy that definitely looked like he worked at Hot Topic. I nodded at Tom who followed my stare to the couple who were inching their way together. "Wait? No way. No, no. No." "Yup." We both took another bite. "So who else can you tell the story of?" "Well the lady sitting by her self over there by the trees," I start then start to think maybe I sgouldnt mention her. I don't want to share all my bonds. And I knew this woman. She was marvelous. "She had cancer." "You can tell that? How do you know she didn't just shave her head because she wanted to? Or to support a friend?" Tom asked. "Trust me. She had cancer, she fought it. She won. She's a fighter. It's right there on her face. 'I've got this. You don't win cancer.'" "You can tell alot from just her face." He takes his last bite. "I had lunch with her last Wednesday." I say laughing. "Oh." He says. "Her name is Morgana, she goes by Morgan now. She told me she said that, the I've got this thing, she said she said it to herself before her first chemo treatment. Then she said it to every treatment after." I closed my eyes again, thinking about Morgan. Tom lend over and touched my cheek. "Violet, can I kiss you?" I start to say something then just nod, softly. He kisses me and like the first time he kissed me it's intense. Like all the colors around us are exploding and him and I are the only ones not getting painted. The music in the ball changes into the Ruby Sparks score song Ruby Sparks. We are still intertwined in a everlasting kiss when I pull away. "I love this song." I love this song? I LOVE THIS SONG?!?! Really? Is that what I said after a kiss like that? Tom laughed and said, "Me too." We noticed that there were some people standing beneath us and are clapping. A very like 'aww aren't they cute clap.' We wave at them and I see Morgan across the mall smiling at me and giving me a thumbs up. I smile like crazy back at her. "That was though an amazing kiss." "True, so?" So? SO? What am I supposed to do? Aren't guys the ones that make the moves? "I think we need to talk about what we are, don't you?" He finished. "Yeah." I say. "So do you even want to date?" "Well, I think it'd be a bit pointless to date if we are just going to separate colleges." Tom seemed very surprised, "You aren't going to Juilliard if you have the chance?" "Maybe. I haven't decided yet. When I was younger I kept hearing my parents talk about New York University, and how they went there. All of my 'aunts' and 'uncles' went there too. I have always dreamed of it. I was born on campus, at a midwifes house. I was named there." "What do you mean?" "Well I was named after the night I was born. My mother had violet hair then. By the time I was born it had ombred. You know like blond on top and only violet one the tips. My father said it was his favorite color and has been ever since. I was born at like 11:27 at night and my mom said that I had violet eyes at the time and they didn't turn green til I was 3 days old." He laughed at that, smiling he took my hand and started tracing the lines. It tickled. "My father said that it had been a violet night. And that's why they named Violet Night Green. I was born my mother's senior year of college and was the favorite of all her friends. I've been lucky. That school is just a part of me, it wasn't even until they realized that I could play that they started pushing me to go to Juilliard." I noticed that he was just holding my hand now. 

Listening to me and the music- which had changed, to the One Day score. "I love that you are so passionate about everything." He said with his eyes still closed. "I have never had a boyfriend and I don't feel now is a good time to start." I pull away. "What about dating but not tied?" Tom asks, opening his eyes and takes my hand again. "Friends with benefits?" I ask. "In a sense. Just kissing. When it's special enough?" "Yeah I'll agree with that." I say laughing and smiling. We stay in the ball looking at the different faces and waving when waved at. We talk some more. Then I push the button by the door and Norm and Kyle- the other guard,  that I don't know to well- lower us and help us out. "Thanks Norm." "You're welcome." "Tom will you go trash this stuff?" "Sure thing." After Tom leaves to throw our containers away, I ask Norm, "So how are the wife and kids? Two little ones now? 7 and 4 right?" Tom comes back. "You really are a little adult now aren't you?" He messes my hair up abit. "They are doing great." "I'm glad. You all should come for dinner some time soon. Friday sound good? I'll cook." I say and smile. Norm plants a kiss on the top of my head like when I was younger. "Sure kid." He says and smiles. "One of your 'uncles'?" "Yeah," I say. I take his hand and pull him from our spot and toward the exit. Next stop: karaoke.