Charlotte
I sing along to my music as I climb out of my shower Saturday morning, getting ready for my only full day of work all week. Saturday's are my absolute favorite because I'm at work from eight until five and then I head on home where my parents never are. Saturday is my dad's bar night and my mom, as always, has to work late.
Sure, it may be a little lonely since I don't really talk to anyone all day, but at least I don't have to deal with teachers like Mr. Holland and irritating girls like Alexis' best friend Abigail who yesterday, forced me to vacate my spot in the cafeteria because she needed to have a spot for her boy of the week.
It took every ounce of me not to scream at her and demand why the hell I should move, but the principal had been right there and there was no way in hell I was getting another week long detention spree.
And besides, Ethan had been standing right behind Alexis the whole time, which made me feel just the slightest bit unnerved. So, like the spineless little jelly fish that I am, I grabbed my tray of food and moved to the table behind it.
Ethan had shot me an apologetic look afterwards, but I had just rolled my eyes in return. He can't apologise for something that he was never willing to stop in the first place.
Yesterday's episode has made me anxious about today just a bit because I know that Ethan is going to try and apologise for it and I really don't want to have to talk to him again. I just want to ignore that he even exists today.
Saturday's are my day and I just can't have him ruin them for me. I grab my towel from the hook by the shower and then slip it around my body. After towel drying my hair just a bit, I slip on some shorts and a semi-decent tshirt, knowing that I can't exactly go to work looking like I'm heading for the beach.
I eat breakfast and apply what little make up I actually do wear. I realise that I have about ten minutes to get to work, I grab my bag from by bedroom and then head on out of the front door.
I listen to music as I walk which makes the time go by so much faster and so much more peacefully.By the time I reach the book store I have to admit that I'm in a pretty decent mood. It's surprising too, when I see Ethan emerge from the stack of books and I don't want to wring his neck. Hm. Strange.
"Morning." He says with a friendly smile.
"Hey," I say in response, before grabbing my bag from off of my shoulder and then placing it behind the cash register.
I open the register and start to count the money like I do every Saturday morning, but am stopped when I hear Ethan say, "You don't have to do that, I already did."
Feeling as if some bit of my territory has been stepped on, I flinch away from the register and then look up. Ethan has moved closer towards the front counter so I'm a bit shocked at how close he is to me. I can even smell his cologne from where I'm standing. It smells really good, by the way.
Feeling some of my good mood draining, I ask him, "What time did you get here? You do know that the store doesn't even open for another thirty minutes, right?"
He nods, "Annie wanted me to fix the sink in the bathroom and it didn't take as long as I thought it would."
"Our own Handy Manny, awesome," I say sarcastically, dropping my eyes away from his face. I hate how good he looks this morning, how his dark hair seems to have grown just a bit since yesterday and how his hazel eyes seem to brighter than normal.
"Hey," He says, his voice tinged with irritation, "This is my job too now. I was just trying to help."
"Well stop," I snap at him, pushing the cash drawer back into the register maybe just a tad bit more forcefully than necessary. "Your help isn't needed."
"Then why did she hire me?" He asks. I realise that this is the first time that he's ever been mad at me since the falling out. Good. Maybe this means he won't talk to me anymore.
I roll my eyes, "She thinks it'll be 'healthy' for me, whatever the hell that means."
Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned that part, he's smart enough that he'll eventually realise what I'm hinting towards, but I honestly can't control my words around him sometimes.
He takes a step towards me and says softly, "Char, I..."
I cut him off by finally meeting his eyes and saying, "It's fine. Whatever."
I really don't want to hear what he has to say because I know how good the boy is with his words. He used to be able to calm me down by just saying a few things softly to me. I'm not going to let myself forgive him just because he knows how to talk his way out of things.
He runs his fingers through his hair, a move that used to give me the tingles. "No it's not okay, I'm sick of you always being mad at me and—"
I cut him off, "Well, how do you expect me to be, Ethan?! After what you did? I'm not going to bow down and kiss your feet like everyone else at that fucking school."
"I'm not stupid, okay?" He says, "But I'm trying to be nice." He mumbled.
"After two years of acting like I don't exist!" I remind him angrily. He's going to remember what he did if it kills me. He's not going to act like he never did that. If he thinks that merely being nice is going to make me forget how he treated me, then he's more insane than I originally thought.
He goes silent for a moment and I know that he didn't expect me to bring that up. I've been avoiding that for a while, but it had to be said here. Maybe I didn't want to seem pathetic for still holding a grudge over it, but I really don't even care anymore.
His silence is broken when he meets my eyes and says, "I know and I'm sorry."
I avert my eyes from his and then go to leave the front counter. I mutter a, "Whatever," under my breath as I pass him and then head on towards the pile of unsorted books in the back room.
This is starting to get far too emotional for my liking.
-
By around four-thirty the store starts to look darker than normal, almost gloomy, and when I peer back over my shoulder from where I'm ringing up some old lady who bought ten cookbooks, I see why.
The sky has transformed from the bright blue it was just minutes ago and now it's cluttered with huge grey clouds. Of course it would look like rain before I get off and have to walk home.
Resisting the urge to curse underneath my breath because of the customer, I turn back around and see that the old lady customer still hasn't gotten all of her money out. At the moment she's sifting through the coin part of her wallet, counting out loud to herself the exact change.
Honestly, I don't know why she can't just fork over a one-dollar bill and let me give her change like the rest of America. This is ridiculous. There are actually two more customers behind her who are slowly starting to grow agitated at how long she's taking.
When it feels like five minutes have passed and she doesn't even have half the change due counted up yet, I give her a sickly sweet smile and say, "I'll cover the change for you, no worries."
"Oh thank you," she gushes, quickly pouring the coins back into the little slot of her wallet. "I don't know why people my age hate this generation so much...you're so sweet."
I find it kind of funny that she's saying this while I'm mentally thinking about throwing those coins at her wrinkled old forehead, I just keep the fake smile plastered on my face and say, "Thank you ma'am. Have a nice day."
I then hand her the two bags filled with books she bought and silently thank God when she makes her sorry old ass out of the store.
"You know if you keep that expression on long enough, it'll get stuck like that," A low voice says in my ear, making me jump and make a small noise of surprise.
Fighting off the chills that his husky voice gave me, I whip my head around and see that Ethan has somehow or another managed to sneak up on me while I was attending to that woman.
Knowing that I can't exactly curse him out with all of the customers watching, I muster up the most pleasant voice possible in this situation and say to where only he can here, "Keep it up and I'm going to stick something down your throat, preferably sharp."
He just gives me a grin in response, a grin that does nothing but irritate the life out of me, and then walks away from the front counter and disappears into the book shelves.
Once I know that he's gone for good, I turn back to the customers and see that the next one is a group of two teenage girls and they're all drooling in Ethan's direction. Rolling my eyes I ask them loudly, "How can I help you?" and feel some kind of sick satisfaction when they all jump and blush in the realisation that they've been caught gawking.
When the next two groups of customers are gone, Ethan emerges from the book stacks and looks at me. Ignoring him, I pull out my phone and I see that it's getting close to five o'clock and that I should start getting stuff ready to leave.
As I'm slipping my phone back into my bag that I hear a loud rumble of thunder. Groaning to myself, I think of how I'm possibly going to get home without getting completely drenched. I glance over at the window, praying that maybe, just maybe, that rumble of thunder was just a really big truck passing through.
But when I see that it's raining so hard that I can't even see the shoe store across the street, I know that I'm fucked. I can either stay here or I can get pounded by the rain and possibly get struck by lightening.
Just great.
Ethan's voice breaks through my thoughts as he asks me, "You need a ride?"
I turn back to him and shake my head. There's no way in hell I can be in a car with him for the five minutes it takes to get to my house. Hell, it only took two minutes for us to be down each other's throats this morning. There's no escape in a car. We'd kill each other.
"No...thanks," I say.
He hitches an eyebrow up at me before nodding his head back towards the window, "You sure? It's a ten minute walk from here and it's pretty awful out there."
I throw another desparate glance outside, praying that the rain has miraculously stopped. It hasn't. The little tree in front of the store is pretty bunch bent completely over. There's no way I can walk it that.
Sighing in defeat, I turn back around and see that Ethan has a silly grin on his face because he knows that there's no way I can refuse a ride home in his car.
"Fine."