insomnia | ricky + nini (ON HOLD)

04. avoiding

next day

nini was not looking forward to her first period class because it mean she had to face ricky. nini didn't want to talk about what went down last night in her first class of day, school in general. school and home life stayed away from each other as possible.

nini walked into the classroom to see ricky already by her desk. she walked towards her desk slowly.

"hi" she spoke

"hey" he smiled. "we're just working on the projects so we should get started." he already had his material out on the desk and began researching and the class period hasn't begun yet. nini was stunned, she was not expecting this but she was happy and relieved that she didn't have to talk about it.

"yeah. now we just have to find ways how they don't connect."

"i think there is always connection between verbal and non-verbal communication, the person just has to see it." he faced her. she did realize but ricky hasn't forgotten about what happened last night. but it was currently 7:30am and he knew from his own experience that talking about emotions and feelings wasn't great in the early morning. 

"but also some people might be really good at body language, kinda like acting. you can say you're not okay but if they don't say anything then their body language is gonna be just as normal." 

"that is very true. you must know well from theater."

"yeah, i do it on a daily basis." she said somewhat lying to ricky. she did do it on a daily basis but not with theater but with her moms.

they both continued to add the finishing touches to their presentation and notes for the rest of class.

bell rings

nini closed her computer, packed up her notes and put all of it into the backpack and so does ricky. nini was about to head out the door when ricky stops in front of her

"hi. can i help you?" nini asked

"hi. just wanted to let you know that i didn't forget about last night. we're gonna have a talk about that after school today. i'll see you at the cafe." ricky speaks to her and walked off. nini stood there for a second to compose her thoughts and push them to the back of her head so she can go off with the rest of the day.

~~

ricky is a complete different person the rest of the day compared to his first period class. none of his 'friends' where in that class or really any advance placement classes during the school day. psychology was something that interested ricky so he went for it when his counselor recommended he takes that class. 

ricky got the title of 'bad boy' at east high when he some upperclassman was making fun of his best friend big red during first semester of freshman year. he was only friends with big red and wasn't apart of the football team and had no interest of joining. once that fight happened and everyone at east high found out, he became the bad boy and the rest is history.

since then, he has been involved in many fights and arguments, none of them he was proud of, was getting lower grades (C's and D's), and the biggest one is that he was not happy at school anymore. the reputation he had was something he wasn't proud of and he thought junior year he was going to change that but hasn't made that change yet. he isn't sure if he want to make that change. things at home are already bad, he doesn't want that to happen at school.

the only thing in which he was just ricky was being with nini. nini had her questions about him but didn't treat him any different and made him feel normal. he knew he didn't have to turn into 'bad boy ricky' he could just be ricky and it made him very happy.

~~

3:00pm

nini shuts off her phone and sighs. she knew that she had to go now and couldn't go back also it was another chance to get the project done that was due in 3 days. she opened her phone to let her mom know where she will be.

nini was honestly getting sick and tired to being a disappointment for trying her best. she didn't understand why she had no say in her future.

only time will tell until she finds out the truth behind why mama c has in store for her.