Human

Ch. 4 - Aria

It wasn't like she was a bad driver. She just happened to lose her sense of direction every now and then. It also didn't help that the mall had an underground parking lot, and navigating through the maze of concrete was nearly impossible. Every time she tried to navigate through the stupid lot, Aria could've sworn that she already saw that gray pillar twice.

"Hey. So, I met these guys—"

"Who?" Aria didn't let Mira finish the sentence.

"At that party, remember?"

"The family one?"

"Yeah." Mira continued, "So there's Nick and Adrian. Nick's cute and all, but he's got a girl."

"Damn."

"I know, right? Who would've guessed that the superstar athelete already has a girlfriend?" she said ever so sarcastically.

"So, what about the other guy?"

Mira replied, "Adrian? He's cute. He's got the whole green eyes and dark hair thing going for him, so he's nice to look at."

"Nice." Aria shook her head with a smile. "Did you talk to him?"

"How can I not?"

"I dunno. I mean, sometimes I feel like you'd get too shy or something."

She gave her a look while Aria finally found one of the ramps that led to the outside streets.

Finally the light!

"Hey, don't give me that face. I'm being honest."

"Well, I did talk to him." Mira sounded a little petulant. "And they're both cool."

"Like dateable cool or just cool?" She had to clarify.

"Ehhh, for me, it's a no. Just regular cool, you know?"

"That's tragic."

"You're telling me."

"I am." Aria then switched lanes as the car in front of them kept pressing their brake lights. "These idiots don't know how to drive, I swear."

"Jesus, you and your road rage."

"It's totally justified," Aria claimed as she kept an eye out for any more deviants.

"Uh huh," Mira said and then asked, "How did you pass your driver's test again?"

"With skill and agility."

"Haha, sure." Mira's voice dripped with sarcasm.

"Not my fault you didn't see the stop sign," Aria bit back. "How many times did you have to retake it again?"

"Just two!"

Aria simply snickered while her friend tried to explain how her tests were somehow rigged.

As Aria drove to Mira's house, she loathed the fact that the crazy university students were back in town—them and all their bad driving skills. Then again, she'd probably be in a similar boat next year.

Once they arrived at Mira's place, Aria couldn't believe that summer was essentially over. Monday was the official start of the new academic year—her last year.

Although she was pretty excited for her senior year, she wasn't excited for the new wave of students. For some reason, every year after hers seemed to harbor less and less mature students. Maybe it was because she was getting older, but she didn't want to deal with freshman running through the halls as if it were a playground.

Plus, she wasn't mentally prepared to deal with the other kids at the school—for example the "rich‑rich" kids, the ones who cried about not getting the right car on their sixteenth birthday or not having the perfect party to celebrate with their friends. Although she couldn't imagine dealing with those kids now, she could understand why they were like that.