Persuaded

CHAPTER THREE

Chapter Three:

I froze.

My heart stopped the second he'd walked through the front door. The exact second. He looked unbelievable.

As earlier, his eyes briefly met mine before looking past me.

I still couldn't look away from him. Greg's here. In my house. He's here. In my house. He's here. Ack! Breathe.

Forcing a huge gulp of air through my lungs hurt worse than I thought it would. I choked. Then, with an involuntary jerk and spasm I began to cough. Loudly. If I was trying to get Greg's attention again, it worked. Still standing in the center of the entranceway, completely paralyzed by my own coughing fit—his mom and dad walked around me trying not to notice that I was hacking up my lungs three feet from them.

"Are you all right?" Greg's deep voice near my ear, caused me to gasp and cough some more.

"S-sure," I wheezed. "I'm, (cough, hack) f-fine (hack, cough), th-thanks!"

"Good grief, Amanda!" hissed Sydney in my other ear. "Go get some water, or something. You're completely freaking everyone out." She turned me around by the shoulders and steered me toward the kitchen. With a slight shove I was propelled into the adjoining room to find my way on my own, which was just fine with me. I wanted to be anywhere than where I was and the faster the better.

Except, I wasn't fast enough—just as I rounded the corner into the kitchen I heard Sydney laugh and introduce herself, "Well, hello. You're Gregory, right? Do you remember me?"

I'd know that laugh anywhere. It was her 'I think he's hot and he's mine' laugh. Sydney crushing on Gregory? My Greg? The guy she hated. Could this get any worse?

After I successfully gulped down two glasses of water I could hear Sydney and Gregory making their way into the kitchen area. He was talking.

"...I don't care. I've never seen your whole house before. What's your favorite place? Take me there first."

Sydney laughed that shrill laugh again. "Follow me."

Warily, I watched as they walked past, never once looking my way, through the kitchen and out the back door. For a moment I hesitated not sure what to do. Should I follow them? Or should I follow my parents?

I opted to do neither. Instead, I wandered into the dining room. On the table, surrounded by boxes, I found a couple of my stepmom's beauty magazines. With a shrug, I selected the most promising one, and took it to the library. There I plopped myself down on the overstuffed chair—the only seat in the study that didn't have a box on it—swiveled it around to face the wall and proceeded to read.

It was after the fifth dramatic artsy add I'd seen for purses that I overheard Sydney and Gregory again. It sounded like they were coming into the room. I sunk down lower in my chair and froze. Please don't find me.

"Wow, look at all the bookshelves. This really does hold a lot of books in here, doesn't it?" Gregory's voice caused my heart to thump. "Do you like to read?"

Anyone else would've missed the curious tone in his casual voice, but I didn't. Gregory wanted to know the answer to that question. I wondered what Sydney would reply.

She laughed. "Read? I wish. I never have time to read. No, the only one of us who has spare time is Amanda. She's always in here."