Thin Line

6. It's bleeding

It had been a full three days since that memorable moment where I embarrassed myself in front of the two boys.

And every time I thought back to it, I'd feel the embarrassment rush through me all over again.

When I had nearly tripped, I had steadied myself and tried to walk straight ahead back to the main buildings. I did look back once though, which I regret because they were both still laughing.

The next day, Friday, I managed to dodge both of them the entire day.

Okay, that was a lie. I did everything I normally did, they were just nowhere to be found. I even made myself aware of my surroundings and kept my eyes open for them, but they just simply weren't there. A common occurrence, for the two.

On the weekend, Kian finally came back down. Next to him stood his fiancé, Ava, ring on her finger, big bright smile.

I wanted to like her, I tried really hard to like her for Kians sake. Kian and I were always fairly close, we barely hid anything from each other, and he was my only other sibling so I stuck by him a lot when we were growing up.

When we were younger, we'd always joke around about who we'd end up marrying and how we anticipated they be like. Maybe that's why I expected a whole different personality from Ava.

Mom and Ava clicked from the get-go, I was almost certain by the end of the weekend that mom was contemplating kicking me out and having Ava move in as her daughter. But no, that's not why I wasn't too fond of her.

There was no doubt about her physical beauty, she was like the human version of a pink rose. I just thought she was too nice. Hear me out, there's the nice that you appreciate and reciprocate, then there's the nice that's overwhelming. I felt like I was a dying grandmother next to her. She spoke with so much vibrancy and happiness, she had a constant smile plastered on her face, and she was very feminine. Nothing wrong with any of those, but I preferred limited conversation if it wasn't necessary, and a whole lot of less smiling.

I just could not for the life of me, match her energy. And that made me look like I was disinterested in her and the whole situation, but I wasn't.

"So, what do you think?" Kian nudged my arm, Ava and Mom had gone down to the grocery store, I think they were buying ingredients to make desserts.

"She's.. nice."

His face instantly dropped, "Nice? That's all you can give me?"

"She's nice and beautiful?"

His disappointment deepened, "No shit, Chanel. Give me your honest opinion, do you like her?"

I was going to pull the whole 'all that matters is if you like her' card that I used on mom the other night but, I didn't.

"Dude, she's too nice. Like I don't even know what she's on about half the time. How do you keep up with her?"

I didn't think he'd get angry, but I thought he'd be a bit offended. Instead, he laughed, "Yeah she is but I'm used to it and that's what I love most about her, that positivity. Think about it, our lives are going to be filled with so much happiness and passion all the time."

"Okay, first of all, I am not liking this" I flung my arm around in his direction "this Kian, it's cringe. And secondly, exactly! Think about it, so much happiness and passion, that already sounds draining."

Kian scoffed, "Go see a therapist."

After we settled down from our argument about whether there was such a thing as 'too much positivity', he delved into his future plans. He wanted to get engaged this year but married after they completed their degrees. An hour or two passed before Ava and mom walked in, which I was thankful for because I was over listening to Kian's big plans.