Just for This Year

Chapter Twenty-One

Friday
October 11th

20 Days Before

Lila stared at the entrance of her high school with dread.

God, it was the last place she wanted to be.

She always found herself in a bit of a fog around the anniversary of her Dad's death. There were moments when the fog lifted, and she felt everything at once. And then there were moments where she felt absolutely numb. She wasn't sure how to control that. At the moment, she felt as if she was floating outside of her body as she locked her eyes on the school. It hardly felt like she was really there.

But she didn't want to worry her mother by saying any of this, Lorena had enough on her plate without Lila adding anything to it. Part of her wanted to text one of her siblings, but she didn't want to concern them either, it wasn't fair to put her problems on them. Sam had picked up that something seemed wrong, but she deflected it easily. Her issues were her own to work through.

It was the kind of day where if someone looked at her wrong, she would blow up. She didn't want to be like that. She didn't want to take out her issues on anybody. She always hated that she was like that. Being kind was something she valued, but lately it just felt like something was rotting inside of her. She felt bitter.

"What's with you?" a voice asked, making her turn around. Ashton stood there with a raised eyebrow, looking at her in question. He lazily walked up to stand next to her, following her gaze to look at the school.

"The usual— college applications, dead Dad, midterms," Lila chirped nonchalantly with a shrug.

Ashton snorted, coming to stand next to her. "Charming as ever, Alvarez."

She was taken aback momentarily. She figured he wouldn't stick around after she said that. Part of her was hoping it would make him leave her alone, and another part of her was glad it didn't. She let her eyes flicker over to him, taking in his relaxed figure. He continued to stand next to her with his eyes locked on the school, as if waiting for her to make the next move, as if she would dictate what they both did next.

But she made no move to speak or walk in towards the school. He seemed to pick up on her reluctance, and decided to ask, "You going in?"

Lila chewed at the inside of her mouth. "Not sure."

He nodded slowly but said nothing else. It was silent for a few moments before he asked, "Wanna ditch?"

Lila's head shot towards Ashton in surprise. She thought there was no chance he was serious, but his face was as stoic as ever. "You wanna ditch?"

He shrugged, unbothered. "We don't have a game this week and Coach gave us the day off from practice."

She was speechless for a few seconds, allowing for some silence so he could backpedal, but he didn't. "Where would we go?"

"My house?" Ashton asked, and Lila instantly narrowed her eyes at him in suspicion. "Not like that, all right? My sister is home sick today. My mom just texted me that she has to go into work and I lied and said I called the sitter, I'm leaving anyway."

Lila debated it for what felt like an hour. Her brain was racing trying to weigh the pros and cons of the situation. This wasn't something the two of them ever did. But it felt like something was shifting between them, and part of that scared Lila. She wasn't sure if she was ready to understand what this all meant. Her brain was telling her to decline the offer, to stop this before it went too far.

But then again, she really didn't want to go to school today.

Finally, she said, "Okay."

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.