Sunshine || Jai Brooks

chapter sixteen; a or b

"Where the hell were you?" Kristina threw her hands in the air, almost slapping her boyfriend's face in the progress. It didn't bother her enough to apologize – she wanted and needed to know the answer, before she could finally calm down. It seemed like she had been stressing for a while and had told the boys about it too. "You ran out of class right when the bell rang and I tried calling you back, but you didn't listen."

She dropped her schoolbag on the floor and kicked of her shoes, sighing dramatically. "I got a text from Chris he was parked at school and only had a few minutes time to force me to call for the internship. You know I get the nerves and would rather skip calling people I don't know-..."

"How did it go?"

She only shook her head and it made Kristina whine, burying her face in her hands. Her best friend knew what she was saying, without even using words and she was glad she did. It wasn't like that it went so bad and wasn't asked to come to do an interview, because she was next Monday. It was more that she could still hear herself stuttering and rambling to the person on the other end of the line and wanted to be alone for a long while. And top of that, she still had to write an essay for English she had hoped she could've done in English class. Now she had come here, right after school, instead of after dinner and she had to do that.

"Oh,  no. I'm sorry, Leen. Did you at least sound excited?"

"Well, the point is I'm not excited at all," she muttered, frowning. "I'm so scared, I think I'll die at the spot if I'm in that room with the freaking principle and the guidance counselor. I won't even be able to answer any questions at why I want this internship. Hell, I don't even know why. I told them I've always been interested in helping people."

"Well, that's true, right?"

"Yes, but I could've at least sound original-..." she ran a hand through her hair and shook her head once again. This time Kristina whined too. Aileen grabbed her bag and she wanted to turn around to walk out of the living room, towards the stairs, but she bumped against Jai. He pulled her against him, holding her and rubbing his hand up and down on her back. It felt like he had been standing there the whole time and when she finally decided to lean her head on his chest and smelled his scent, she sighed. "I sounded so stupid and so not how I am, and I just-...I'm just so-..."

"Don't be disappointed in yourself. You did your best, right?"

"Yes."

"Then that's more than enough."

"Maybe, but I just-...I just-...I think..." she groaned and glanced up at him. He looked back into her eyes as a smile appeared around his mouth. That – somehow – made her feel a little better. "At least I didn't sound cocky or overconfident. Nobody wants that."

"No, nobody wants that."

"Can be alone in your room, though?" she asked him, feeling him caress her cheek with his hand. He only nodded and kissed her forehead before letting her go. There seemed to be no need to explain him why and she liked that, smiling slightly as made her way past him and up the stairs.

As she closed the door behind her and sat down on his bed, she grabbed her laptop out of her schoolbag. She fired it up, putting in down in front of her and waited until she could see a blank document on the screen. Beside her was already lying one of her favorite Young Adult books – When you were mine  by Rebecca Serle – and some papers that would helped with writing an essay, and it suddenly looked like she had been doing this for hours. Which she wasn't, because she only now just started typing. 

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An hour later, making that four o'clock, she heard a knock on the door and she glanced up. She – apparently – had been to focused on her writing that she hadn't heard the door opening, and Jai had already been standing there for a minute. Embarrassed, Aileen giggled and shook her head. "I'm sorry. I was... ehm, busy. Should I stop? Is it annoying? I can get down and be social if that's-..."