Not That Girl

Chapter 9

Thanks again for reading/voting/commenting! It really makes my day :) 

It's not the first night I've stayed up thinking about a boy, but it is the first time I considered that he might be thinking about me too. I've spent the last 3 hours lying in my bed with my mind flickering between his (still unaccepted) friend request and what he stopped himself from saying back in the car.

Brayden Erickson.

I've always wanted to believe in love at first sight but I've been cursed to the life of a pragmatist. There's never going to be that moment when two people lock eyes from different sides of the street. Or some guy, straight out of a JJ Bean catalog, falls in love with the way a girl's hair shines in the moonlight.

I just don't like the odds that a guy would look at me and instantly know that we're going to spend the rest of our lives together. I've been told I have a 'pretty decent' personality (by Warren) and hopefully that will make up for my sub-par looks. But how can a guy tell that by just looking at me?

It's always a perfect guy approaches a perfect girl because she looks perfect and then through a series of cutesy interactions he realizes she completes him emotionally as well. For me, I'm pretty sure it's going to be the other way around. A mediocre guy likes talking to a mediocre girl and he slowly learns to love the way her flat brown hair falls over her 'too broad to wear tank-tops' shoulders.

Maybe Brayden could be that guy. He's pretty mediocre. I mean, he's cute but not like 'shirtless model on the front of a romance novel' hot. His eyes are a nice greeny-blue but they're a little too close together. I hope our kids have his eyes instead of my boring brown ones.

Holy shit.

He literally just sent me a friend request and I'm planning the rest of our lives together.

Slow down, girl.

It wasn't a date. I mean sure, he bought me cream but Warren does that all the time. Right? But Warren has to do that because if he didn't, I'd jam my fist down his throat. Oh yeah, and the whole 'friendship' thing.

Hey! Maybe Brayden just wants to be friends. But then again, who would want to be friends with me?

The sound of Theo's door slamming is a welcome distraction from my thoughts. It's almost midnight and he's just getting home. Bea's closes at 7 so that's 8, 9, 10... 5 hours where he isn't accounted for. Where could he have gone? It's not like he has friends or anything.

He seems upset though, should I go see if he's okay? Maybe I should bring him ice cream! But that's all the way downstairs...

Nah, it's probably too late for ice cream anyway.

I walk as quietly as I can across the hallway, in case Theo's door-related outburst didn't already wake up Dad and Olivia.

I knock but there's no response so I go in anyway.

He's lying face down on his bed, on top of the covers. His shoes and jacket are still on.

"Go away, Agnes." His voice is muffled from being smushed into his pillow.

"How'd you know it was me?" I shut the door behind me and sit on the edge of his bed. He doesn't move.

"Dad doesn't care, Olivia's scared of me and Nova hasn't figured out how to work a door knob yet."

"Yeah, we're still working on that last one. It's crazy how much harder things are without thumbs."

He finally turns over and sits up, clearly not amused by my joke. He looks tired. There's bags under his eyes that look red from crying and trust me, I know post-sobfest gross face better than anyone. He got Mom's eyes: soft hazel that's almost green in the sunlight.

"What are you even doing here?" He looks to the door and nervously tugs up the collar of his flannel shirt.

"I thought you might want to talk."

He scoffs. "But we don't do that sort of thing."

"Well, maybe we could."

He doesn't respond and the silence surrounds us. His room is pretty tidy. His bed is, or was, made and his dirty clothes are all in the hamper. The most disheveled part of the room is the clothes we're wearing. I'm in my favourite sleep shirt: a several-sizes-too-big 'I love New York' shirt, and he looks like he got dressed in the dark. The buttons on his shirt are misaligned and he has missed at least one belt loop. Was he like that this morning?

"You missed dinner," I say. "Olivia made lasagna."

"Good for her."

"Why'd you get home so late?"

"I had things to take care of," he mutters.

"Like what?"

"Does it matter?" He flops back down onto his bed with a thud. "It's not like you care anyways."

"I do care." I turn to angle my body towards him but he rolls over and faces away.

"Can you just leave me alone?" His voice is breaking now.

I may not understand a lot of social cues, but this is one I know all too well. He wants to cry in private. I get up to leave and start heading towards the door.

"You should at least change before you go to bed."

He says nothing but starts to remove his jacket.

Once I'm in the hallway, I peek back into his room before shutting the door behind me.

"You know I love you, right?" I whisper through the crack.

He's unbuttoning his shirt when he turns around in surprise. He's only done a few buttons but it's enough for me to see the dark purple bruise just above his collar bone.

His eyes fill with shame when he sees what I'm looking at and turns back around.

I quickly shut the door and returned to my room.

Damn, Theo! What you up to, boy? Anyways, short chapter but that's all the plot required for this snippet. Maybe I'll try to stick to a regular upload schedule... 

AHAHA

April fools!