Heartbeat

Five

Uh Oh. I messed up the order!! This is Chapter 5, from Jordan's POV! Then it's Chapter 6, from Emma's POV! Shucks... Anyway- here it is!

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JORDAN

I hadn’t seen Emma since last period yesterday when all I did throughout Calculus was stare at her. Miss Hadley talked for an hour straight and I don’t think I caught a single word of what she said. Not even when she told us about the test on Friday, which Sam had to tell me about after class was over and Emma was out of sight.

                Naturally Sam asked what was wrong and I tried to explain it in my own head, but when it didn’t make sense to me, I knew it wouldn’t make sense to anyone else, so I shrugged and told him how much I sucked at math. He laughed good naturedly and told me not to worry about it, that it was actually easy when you put your head to it.

                Except, sitting that close to Emma, I knew I’d never put my head to it. I had watched her for an hour, noting that when she smiled or laughed, it never did manage to reach her eyes. Damn Jessie for pointing that out to me. All I saw now when I looked at Emma was a sad girl pretending to be happy.

                I’d sat at my window last night, trying to work out what had made her like this, but I drew a blank and retreated down stairs for dinner. When I finally returned to my room I noticed the curtains of Emma’s window were drawn. And this morning when I woke she’d left before I had gotten to see her.

                Maybe she was getting annoyed with me staring at her all the time, but she was such an enigma that I couldn’t force myself to take my eyes off her. There was something about her that was pulling me to her, and I didn’t know what. What had changed in the last week that had suddenly got me all interested in Emma Lane?

                She avoided me in school, sitting on the other side of the English class to me, and further back so that I couldn’t see her. Even in Calculus she’d waited for me to sit first before she took a chair behind me.

                I hadn’t seen her throughout lunch, even though Zoe and Holly sat at their usual table. I almost had to fight the urge to go over and demand to know where Emma was. I knew I was gawping at them but I didn’t care, until Adam punched the top of my arm playfully.

                “Checking out Sam’s crush, are we?” He laughed like he’d just said the funniest thing in the world. “Holly would never go for someone like you, anyway. She’s way too much of a good girl. You’d probably have more luck with Zoe.”

                “Grow up, you idiot,” I punch Adam back before turning to Sam. Sam was the quietest of the three of us, and was more an observer than a participator. He was sensitive to what people felt and was often embarrassed by the fact that he was friends with Adam and me. But since that day I’d beaten Parker up for harassing Sam, he was stuck with my friendship. “Have you asked Holly out yet?”

                Sam shakes his head and looks to the ground, that shy smile of his sneaking out.