Find Her, Fix Him

6 | Lannister legacy continued

6 | Lannister legacy continued

~ KHAN~

"Cymbeline is a late Shakespeare play, in which he brings some of his most persistent ideas on to the stage. Cymbeline is the King of Britain, who marries an unpleasant woman with an arrogant son called Cloten. Cymbeline arranges the marriage of his beautiful daughter, Imogen, to Cloten but she defies him and marries the poor but worthy Posthumus Leonatus in secret-"

"Hold up, hold up." I hold up a hand for Lilo to stop reading from wikipedia, which we've gotten up on Anoushka's laptop. "Wait a second. This guy is trying to get his daughter to marry her stepbrother? This is low-key the Lannister legacy continued."

She smiles at me from where she's sitting, cross-legged, at the opposite end of my bed. By opposite, I literally mean that she saw me leaning against my headboard, and deliberately sat as far away from me as possible without falling off the mattress. Maybe Lilo is one of those people who gets freaked out when in a bedroom of the opposite sex. Either that, or she's still wary of me after the football mess-up.

I don't know how to explain football to her, so I didn't try. How can you explain that a sport where you kick a ball into a net is the only link you have to home? That football is a part of my life so crucial, like my lungs and heart, that it's a part of my Saturday that I don't even think of as different? It's just a part of me. I forgot to tell Lilo about it because it's such a solid part of my weekend, it didn't even occur to me that she would turn up at my house whilst I was there. Though I honestly don't know anyone else who would come over so early.

"It seems so," she says now, eyes travelling across the screen, "It also seems that she has a stalker or something, who hides in her room to try and seduce her. Oh, and the stepbrother that her Dad wants her to marry follows her to Rome and tries to...wow. Two stalkers, then."

"She must feel so flattered."

Lilo laughs, but it's a quiet sound, like she doesn't feel comfortable letting go around me. That's fair enough. We barely know eachother- and there's also the fact that our first proper encounter was when I was giving her money to buy food she couldn't afford. It suddenly comes back to me what Carrie said on the way home from the shops that day- she's such a weirdo. Lilo is different, I'll give her that. There doesn't seem to be anything wrong with her, yet she obviously isn't popular. I find myself wondering why. What is it about her that people don't like?

"Hey, how come I've never seen you around?" I ask, leaning back against my pillows and stretching out my arms.

A strange look comes over her face. "What do you mean?"

"Like, out. At parties and stuff. With people."

"Right." Her expression could almost be annoyed. "I guess I have better things to do."

"With your Dad?"

She blinks at me, body tensing. "What-"

"Because when you bumped into me outside, you said something about leaving your Dad at home. You said something like you're always with him. So I'm guessing you do lots of things together?"

"Oh. Right. Um...yeah, I guess." Lilo looks suddenly uncomfortable. She twists her fingers together in her lap, letting her hair fall forward and cover her face. "Yeah, we do. That's why I don't go out much- that, and the fact that your type of people really aren't my type of people."

I raise an eyebrow. "Your type of people?"

"Yeah. You wouldn't catch me spending my free time with someone like Caroline- or Aria. I'd rather stay at home, to be honest."