There it was again. The inevitable beating of my heart and it was getting louder. I wish I knew what the cause was.
"Arielle? Arielle! Did you even hear a word I said?" Nicole asked, her hazel eyes burning into me.
"Huh? Oh yeah, what were you saying anyway?"
Tamara and Nicole exchanged a look, "We know what's going on."
"How can you know what's going on when I don’t even know?" I pulled my sleeves down as the lecture hall suddenly became ten degrees colder.
Tamara felt my forehead, her brown eyes brimming with concern and nothing less, "Are you sure you're okay?"
I glared at Leila who looked the opposite way pretending as if they weren't really asking me about my health. "I'm fine Mom, I promise. I ran to your locker yesterday, and you're asking me the day after if I'm okay?"
I slapped Leila's arm to see her wince slightly and lean towards the other side of her seat. Blowing my hair out of my face, I slumped in my seat, determined to figure out what was wrong with me.
***
There was only five minutes left on the clock, and my leg was bouncing up and down excitedly for some reason.
"Arielle, are you okay?"
"How many times are you guys going to ask me that in one day?" I rolled my eyes as we got up from the professor's dismissal.
On cue, K'naan's song Take a Minute blasted from my phone and I smiled knowing it was Tara calling to tell us she was here.
"I'm going to pick up Tara, wait in front of Timmy's okay?" The girls headed off in the direction of Tim Horton's while I began walking to the bus stop.
I pulled out my phone to check who texted and I walked right into someone else.
"Sorry, I wasn't paying attention!" Before I could walk back, they grabbed my hand and pulled me into a bone crushing hug. I immediately recognized who it was due to their cologne.
"Zeke, lemme go!" I pushed his abdomen with all my might. I could tell he'd been working and he could tell that I noticed too. He brushed his stomach as if there was something on it and smiled at me. God knows how much I missed his smile.
"Where are you off to? Can't say hi to an old friend?" He let out his hearty chuckle that I hated to admit I love.
"Last time I checked, we were far from being friends. See you later." I purposely brushed his shoulder, and heard him scowl in pain. A smile made its way to my face as I realized I had just caused him some harm.
In all honesty, I missed Zeke. Not because he was my ex-boyfriend, but because he was a great friend before we started dating. But then I started falling for his charm.
His midnight black hair that was ever so skillfully gelled back, the way his pale blue eyes twinkled every time he smiled with that flawless tanned skin of his, the way he goes out of his own way to tuck a strand of hair behind my ear; we were friends. But then we became more, and I hate to admit it was a great two years for me, but it was time I let him go.
All he ever did was hurt me, and it wasn’t even intentionally. He never could say I love you to me, and it took me literally a year and a half to figure out that he wasn’t saying it. I was so caught up with how in love with him I was; I never noticed the fact that he never said it back to me. He just had some sort of reason as to why he couldn’t say it, and he wouldn’t even tell me when we broke up. That's what crushed me. But that's a story for another day.
