stoic

Chapter 40

"Omg this is so good. Archie is so hot." Molly says, sipping her soda as we watched Riverdale. We were a few episodes in and it was 7pm and my parents were still not home. Tim was on another couch on his laptop doing college work.

Tim scoffs at Molly's statement before carrying on with his work. "So you're friends with Lindsay again?" Molly asks me as the episode finishes.

"Yeah, I can't hold a grudge forever. She may not be the nicest person in the world but I've known her for so long and she can't help it if her natural personality is just... bitch." I say taking a sip of my hot chocolate and Molly giggles. "Where's mom, Tim?"

"I'm not sure, she told me that she's away for the weekend." He shrugs, not looking up from his laptop, typing away.

"But it's Thursday?" I say. It was unlike my mom to go away on a Thursday - she loves her job too much to miss it. Apart from that one time she went away to that retreat with my cheating scumbag dad.

"You know what that means," Tim looks up from his screen and wiggles his eyebrows, "party here tomorrow."

"Ooo, a college party." Molly says excitedly.

"You can invite your friends." Tim tells me and I thank him.

"Lindsay," I catch up to her in the corridor and she smiles, "so there's a party tonight at my house. It's a college party so there's gonna be some hot guys there." I tell her and her eyes light up.

"I'll be there." She giggles as we get to our lockers. "So we really need some new people on the cheer team and I'd love it if you rejoined."

"I don't know..." I hesitate, looking through my locker for some gum.

"You can bring your friend Molly and um... um.... what's her name-"

"Ella." I raise an eyebrow as she clicks her fingers.

"That's it, Ella. You can bring them both."

"Well Molly isn't really a cheerleading type of girl. She's more artsy than anything else but i'll ask."

Lindsay smiles, "great, if you do decide to come. Locker room at lunch."

"Alright."

"No I am not cheerleading." Molly crosses her arms and leans back in her chair as the substitute teacher doses off to sleep at the front of the class.

"How about you?" I ask Ella, practically begging.

"But i've been making fun of the cheer bitches all these years. I'll be going against my moral code." Ella says.

I roll my eyes before sighing, "pleeeeaaase Ella. If you don't like it then you don't have to stay."

She thinks about it for a minute before narrowing her eyes at me, "fine. But you owe me."

"Whatever." I laugh just as the bell rings and the teacher at the front wakes up in fright making a few of us laugh quietly.

I pass Ella a cheerleading outfit before getting my old one out of the uniform closet. She inspects the skirt and top before shrugging and we go to get changed.

"You made it." Lindsay smiled brightly, passing pom poms to us. We thank her before she started telling people what to do.

We started the choreography and Ella was already better than me. I never knew that she could do the splits and when she did it the first time, my jaw practically dropped and she told me she used to do gymnastics.

"Okay so now we're going to do two lifts and me and Kenzie are going to do backflips off of the lifts."

"What?!" Cheryl and I said in sync.

"I thought I was going to be lifted!" Cheryl whined, narrowing her eyes at me. Her hands on her hips.

"You thought wrong." Lindsay spat back.

"No it's fine, you can be lifted. I don't mind." I tell Cheryl.

"No Kenz you're going to be lifted. Cheryl was just filling in for you." Lindsay narrowed her eyes at Cheryl as if she was warning her.

I mouthed a sorry at Cheryl who just mumbled a "whatever" before getting into position.

Ella and I decided not to get changed because we wanted to show the guys that we joined the cheerleading squad. We didn't have our last lessons with them so we'd have to show them at the end of the day.

"Where are we meeting them?" I ask Ella as we walk out of our last lesson.

"Outside of Axels locker." She told me.

As we approached Axel and Ryder, they were deep in a conversation before double looking at us and their eyes widened.

"Oh shit." Axel grinned falling back against the lockers, his eyes looking at Ella up and down who was blushing.

"Get over it." Ella rolled her eyes at him with the biggest smile plastered on her face before he wrapped his arms around her and started whispering things in her ear.

My gaze moved to Ryder who looked at me hungrily, his tongue darting out to wet his lips. "So you rejoined the cheer team huh?" He smirked, pulling my arm to close the gap between us, our bodies pressed up against each other.

"This is one way to make me feel lonely." Jeremiah came up to us and sighed. "It's hard being gay."

Ella chuckled, stepping away from Axel, "don't worry Jeremiah, you'll find someone."

I didn't realise the kiss Ryder left on my cheek until he lingered his lips there for a second and intertwined his fingers with mine. "Let's go." Ryder said to us all.

"Why are you being so sweet?" I ask Ryder with a smile while walking out of school. He smiles down at me as we get to his car.

"Because.." he pushes me gently up against his car, "i love you."

And in that moment I swear I felt the biggest wave of happiness wash over me and I must've looked like an insane person as I smiled widely up at him. My lips meeting his in a gentle but loving kiss.

"I love you too."