Nine Lives

Eighteen: Jack

My lungs burn in the frosty air, a brisk wind curling around me. It doesn't try to avoid me, go around, just blasts into me, knocking me off my feet. The wind's laughing, bellowing voice shudders, whistling through the trees. A hearty and cruel laugh.

I wrap my hand around Alice's. She looks at the ground, smiling. a warm smile, barely visable at her angle. The sides of her mouth turn up more on one side, I notice. It's a beautiful smile. Welcoming yet secretive, like she's sharing an inside joke with someone I can't see.

Shadow play out across the street, faint in the grey sunlight. Mine streaches in front of me, elongated. next to the shadow is another, shorter than my own. Black wisps of hair fly around, framing a dark, hidden face.

Alice shakes me from my gazing and squeezing on my hand. I look up at her, intense green eyes bore into me.

"Thank you Jack," says Alice, her voice full of genuine gratitude. Not a worshipping thank you, like Dahlia would do. Make any move just to get me to fall for her. Act like I'm a god. I don't want a girl like that, one who can't survive independantly. Who believes boys and popularity are the keys to happiness. Along with making others miserable in their conquest for a perfect life they can never achieve.

I jump from my thoughts, seeing Alice's patient face. "For what?"

"Offering me a chance to be like an ordinary girl."

I scoff, grinning. "Why would you ever wanna be ordinary?" She shrugs, staring back down at her feet. They walk in short quick motions--efficient, not rushed. My strides are longer, slower. Mostly because I'm so deep in thought and concentration that if I walk any faster, chances are I'll face-plant the street.

Shattering the still, serene silence, Alice says, "ordinary. Not ordinary. Normal. Average. I just want to fit in, have friends."

"You have . . . Friend," I offer.

"Friend." We continue walking for several minutes, not speaking, but thinking. I wonder if as many thoughts rumble around her brain as they do mine. I'm constantly thinking. Of course, no one suspects that, me being "Mr. Popular" or whatever. Nobody asked me if I wanted to be Mr. Popular, it just ended up that way. Mostly because Dahlia took a liking to me instantaneously.

Closing my eyes, I see darkness. Infinite spots of black and brown, patching my sight. They quickly open, not being able to take the stark, headache bringing dark.

I look over to Alice, her red-brown hair falls down her shoulders and back, covering her face from the side. A black beanie that I hadn't noticed before hands loosely on the back of her heads. She wears her normal, Sharpie-tattooed jeans. I've never really looked at her clothes in detail. Elegant, but not attention-drawing, very plain and simple. Mostly, she seems to wear white, black, and grey, with patches of color here and there.

She doesn't even try to be beautiful. There's just something in the way she walks, walks to the beat of her own drum. Not caring about what others think of her, but not not caring so much she looks like crap. Confidence, I see it run through her, reaching every square inch of her body.

"Alice," I say before I can stop myself. "Wanna come o'er to my house? I'm sure my Ma won't mind."

Her green eyes dart up to me through her hair. "Sure, why not? I'd love to read some of those stories you mentioned you wrote oh so often." The sarcasm in her voice, obvious.

"I do write, not lying 'bout that one. I do write a lot," I call as she walks ahead of me. "Had nothin' better to do before you showed up." Though her back is turned, I sense a slight grin, spreading across her face.

✯✯✯✯✯

I stand in front of the house, Alice by my side. It's an old house, blue outer walls, black shingled roof. The inside falls apart at the seams. It's hard to care for, especially with the little help from my mother, not that she can help it.

We walk inside, and inside, I'm horrified by the ruins I've left the place in. Magazines, pizza boxes, and socks litter the floor. The sink is flooding with dishes. Total disarray.

"Pardon the mess . . . I um . . . Have absolutely no legit excuse for this," I sigh, mentally punching myself. She gives me a smile. Small and sympathetic. "Let's just go to my room." By the time we reach the stairs, I've mentally knocked myself unconscious.

✯✯✯✯✯

The swooshing of flipping pages fills the room. Alice's delicate hands turning them with ease. She scans the words quickly, then moves on. I read over her shoulder, looking back on my old thoughts.

She flips through so fast, I momentarily feeler embarrassed, heat rising to my cheeks. Back then, when I wrote my first stories, they were really bad. Not very detailed. Boring.

Alice turns around, facing me with an expressionless face. "When did you write this?"

"Um, this summer I think," I respond, wondering what she thinks.

"It's beautiful actually," says Alice. I twist my face, does she mean it? Or is she just being nice? "Really, you use great language and have wonderful topics." She pauses, taking a deep breathe. "You said you just wrote this out of boredom?" I nod, smiling.

We send the remainder of the afternoon reading stories and talking. Mouths flying and hearts racing.