Unforgettable (OLD COPY DISCONTINUED)

Chapter 13

"So...uh, which one do you want to see?" Shawn asks as he side-eyes me.

I blink, realizing then that I've zoned out as I stifle a yawn. I could feel that my new medication had gone to work this morning, colors and sounds blurring together as I slogged through my classes like I normally did before I booked a taxi and headed over here for a movie with Shawn.

A few other people are milling about in the entryway to the Liberty Tree Mall theater, but their presence doesn't bother me as I ignore them. The only thing I do notice is that I'm hyperaware of Shawn's presence as we stand an awkward distance apart, not quite close enough to be considered a couple but not too far away to be seen as strangers.

I stub the toe of my tennis shoe against the tiled floor beneath me as I squint up at the electronic board that has movies and times lit up on it in amber letters and numbers. A tired looking cashier around my age uninterestedly picks at her fingernails on the other side of the glass wall of her booth as she waits for us to make a decision.

"I think that new comedy would be good to watch," I suggest, as the only alternative within the next hour is a horror movie that I don't care to see, not with my current nightmares.

"Sounds good," he murmurs as he pulls out his wallet.

"Oh, I can pay for mine," I assure him in a low voice as I pull out my own.

"Okay, we need two tickets for the comedy movie showing at four thirty," Shawn says as he steps up to the booth.

"That'll be ten sixty-eight a piece," the cashier reads off and I wonder for a moment why it's so cheap before I spot the ticket prices on a board mounted near the movie choices.

$10.68 for children twelve and under.

I resist the urge to scowl as I swipe the new credit card my parents had recently bestowed me, the money coming from what I had managed to save over the summer when I had volunteered to pet-sit for people who were going on vacation. The tickets print out and the cashier tears them off and passes them to us before Shawn walks to the glass doors for the lobby and opens one for me.

I thank him and step through into the black and white tiled lobby, the walls being painted an outrageous shade of mustard yellow as white support pillars hold up the vaulted ceiling. Rings of pink neon lights wrap around the tops of the pillars and I admire them as we walk through the busy lobby.

Shawn breaks away from me suddenly and grins over his shoulder as he motions for me to follow him over to the concessions hub.

"Come on, I'm buying," he offers.

The thought of food right now isn't the most appealing, my stomach already twisted with anxiety during the ride over here, but I follow him anyway. The buttery scent of popcorn fills the lobby as a machine pops in the background, the hollow noise soothing me as I dare to stand another inch closer to Shawn.

He's not a tall boy and it makes me all the more anxious that we're nearly eye-level with each other as he turns to look at me. His eyes remind me of the amber stones in the supply shop on campus as they shimmer under the overhead lights, several pools of darker brown spots gleaming like ink in his irises. I can just catch a whiff of juniper, the scent clean and fresh but not overpowering as I take a moment to appreciate it.

"Kara?"

"Hm?" I glance up at him to see that he's watching me, his right eye squinting slightly as I notice that there's a tiny freckle on his eyelid and above that, a white scar no wider than my fingernail.