Alpha's Blue (BXB)

Chapter Three

After breakfast, I went back to my room after washing the dishes, leaving grandma and Marco in the kitchen. I could barely hear them start talking again as soon as I started ascending the stairs. I tried to understand what exactly they were talking about but I couldn't really understand. It didn't seem fair to eavesdrop - especially not when grandma was involved, so I just went back upstairs to my room to start studying. Exams were barely a month away and I still hadn't started studying.

An hour or two later, I heard grandma calling my name. I headed downstairs without any delay, honestly, I was more than happy to take a break from studying, my mind felt like it was about to explode from all of it.

Marco stood at the foot of the stairs, looking up as if waiting for me. I looked around but grandma was nowhere in sight.

"Hey, Blue." Marco waved at me when he saw me. I waved back and he continued. "I was wondering if you'd like to hang out sometime. If yes, can I have your number?" He rubbed the back of his head while asking that. It was no brainer that he felt awkward asking this, almost as if it was his first time.

I was no different. I'd no idea where it came from, we barely talked during breakfast this morning. But saying no seemed out of question. Grandma seemed to be close to him and if he was going to be around more often it'd be better to get used to him.

"Yeah, sure." I agreed, once I was standing beside him. He handed his phone over to me and I added in my details. "Done."

"Thanks." He smiled and waved at me before turning around and walking out of the door.

I locked the door after him. Locking the doors was one of the habits I had picked up while living away, I had never seen grandma locking the door before, not even during the nights. As far as I knew, no one in the town did. And so far, it had never been an issue for anyone living in the town.

Going back inside, I found grandma in the living room. She was sitting on her rocking chair, reading a book. A cup of tea was placed beside her on the table while she rocked her chair in slow motion.

"Does he come around often?" I sat down beside her on the couch.

"Hmm?" She asked looking up from the book. She removed and folded her glasses, placing it on the book in her lap. "Who? Marco?"

"Yeah."

"His broke his laptop a while ago. He's coming over every time he needs to use the laptop since then." Grandma answered while looking at me. "Why? You didn't like him?"

I shook my head immediately. I didn't even know him enough to like or dislike him. Plus, grandma looked pretty close to him. After all, they were talking about something they couldn't share with me. "It's not that. I, just, haven't seen him around before."

She unfolded her glasses in her lap, indicating that she was already done answering me. "He moved here recently." She placed her glasses back on her face and opened the book again. "Don't worry, he won't come over unless he needs to submit another assignment."

"It's not that. I don't really mind." I tried to explain but she was already lost in her book. Her eyes focused on the worn out pale pages.

She hummed in reply, turned the page of her book and started rocking her chair again.

I fell back into the couch with my head tilted upward. I sighed, looking at the white ceiling. "He can come over whenever he wants."

As expected, I received no reply. I decided to go back to studying a few minutes later. I sat down and opened my books again, but not before reminding Tay to go visit the doctor.

~~~

Marco visited almost every day after the day we were introduced. I know I told grandma that I didn't really care about it, but at this point it was like grandma had another grandson all of a sudden.

I couldn't bring myself to talk to grandma about it and so, I just chose to get used to him. His initiatives to talk to me first helped me with it. It was the end of the first week since I came back and by this point, I had learned two things.

One - grandma hadn't really said it out loud but I knew she enjoyed his company. It was almost like both of them were keeping a secret from me and maybe from the rest of the world too. They seemed to be smiling while talking about something every time I wasn't around, and stopped talking as soon as they noticed my presence.

Second - either Marco was obsessed with his older brother Nicolas and unintentionally mentioned him hundred times a day or he was doing it intentionally. But why would he do that intentionally, I had no idea. And he seemed and acted too normal to have some kind of obsession with his brother.

But so far, I felt like I knew more about his brother than I knew about him. And that was saying something given that I still hadn't met or seen his brother. Every time I asked about him, Marco told me that he worked out of town. I was starting to get genuinely curious about him now. I needed to know if he was as amazingly weird as Marco made him seem.

"White daisy is his favourite flower." Marco said, letting me know yet another random fact about the great brother of his.

Ugh. We weren't even talking about flowers. As usual, he randomly decided to bless me with his brother's likes and dislikes. As if I was supposed to care.

"They're beautiful." I replied with the first thing that came to my mind.

"Do you have any favourite flower?" He asked, looking up from the laptop's screen.

"Aren't they all beautiful?" I shrugged and placed another spoonful of porridge in my mouth.

He looked back at the screen before answering. "So are humans. Yet we don't fall in love with each and every one of them."

I coughed, hard. Covering my mouth with my hand, I coughed for a whole minute before I was able to talk again. "I wasn't expecting that. What am I supposed to answer to that?"

His shoulders rose and fell in an instant. "Your favourite flower and maybe your favourite type of human too?"

After taking a few sips of water and clearing my throat, I looked over at him in annoyance. "Yeah, because everyone is supposed to have one."

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You're beautiful. Thanks for reading!