heartfelt thanks to hmonster4. she's my personal wonderwoman: author extraordinaire and patient, all-wise beta. thanks for letting me participate in the '30 days of Emmett'! you're so cool.
also much gratitude to Fluent in Sarcasm, ssarrahh1 and cocomama101 (yeah, I need a lot of hand-holding) for prereading, giving suggestions and comments!
"A little help please?"
The boy turns to the voice of the pretty blonde girl. He assesses the girl, sizing her up, and she's definitely very easy on the eyes. First glance reveals an impressive chest and long shiny blond hair, it's a pity that the desk is covering the rest of her. He's taken aback when he meets her blue eyes, flashing in annoyance.
With an arched eyebrow and huff-sigh, she gestures to the fallen pencil again. It's rolled near his foot and she's too lazy to get up and get it. He sheepishly smiles; flashing his dimples as he retrieves the pencil, presenting it to her like it's a diamond, both palms open and presenting it to her as if she was royalty.
She's not amused. She takes the pencil and cracks a sardonic half-smile to humour him.
"I'm Emmett, by the way," he says. She cringes and Emmett is afraid that he accidentally used his 'too loud' voice again.
"I'm not interested."
She writes a few sentences while Emmett stares, a little shocked and a lot curious. What a bitch.
There's a few beats of silence…
"Wait. Really? Emmett?" She says, her voice going a little high at the end. Emmett grins and shrugs. She lets out a little laugh and says something that resembles a 'that's unique' comment.
There's still something condescending in her voice and normally Emmett would go back to his physics homework, but it's kind of impossible. No one's ever not liked him – at least, not without a reason – and never this fast.
Using the kind of cool that only cocky determined boys can have, he whispers conspiratorially, "My parents were high."
The girl lets out a resigned sigh and gives up on solving the gravitational energy a rocket ship possesses.
"Really? Do share." Her voice is monotone with an edge of sarcasm, but Emmett notices that the pencil is flat on her desk and she's paying attention.
Oh, she's interested. If not in me, at least in my story.
"My mom was kind of a free spirit, ya know? Hippie, weed, tie-dye, the whole nine yards. Somehow she got 'Emmett' tattooed on her arm, and then decided that it was fate that her first born be named that."
"What if it had been a girl?"
"Well, lucky for her, fate also decided to give her a boy."
"Wow. That's actually… kinda funny."
"Yeah," Emmett nods, happy that this girl's engaging in conversation with him. She's super pretty and she's starting to talk…
"Too bad none of it's true, right?"
...and she's smart.
"Yeah," he admits, not perturbed at all that he was caught lying, "My parents are just weirdos." Emmett (still a name that takes some getting used to) is smiling happily.
She lets out a laugh-sigh-huff, and Emmett is amazed at how much she can communicate with one breath… amusement, a little disbelief, maybe some annoyance and then amusement again.
That's talent.
People around them start packing up, and they realize that study hall is over.
"What's your name?"
She starts to put her books and papers in her bag, and Emmett's shoulders sag in disappointment that she's ignoring him. The girl is quick and efficient, but as she leaves and brushes by Emmett, she tells him,
"Call me Rosalie."
Rosalie. Rosalie. The girl is still fresh in his mind, and Emmett's glad it's finally lunch. Maybe he could ask Alice about her. If anyone would know anything about the mysterious Rosalie, it'd be her.
He finds his lunch buddies at their regular lunch table, and is pleased to see that Jasper did indeed bring Alice along. Mike and Tyler are attempting to look cool while eating their lunch, because Jess and Angela are eating with them, but they're doing a poor job of hiding the horny.
He slides down beside Alice, and Jasper quirks a brow, because Em usually sits besides Tyler.
Great. Now it's awkward. Emmett was really uncharacteristically nervous. How would he broach the topic without it looking obvious? Or pathetic? Or desperate?
"So… Alice. How are you?"
Alice smiles inwardly. "Just spit it out, Em." Behind her, Jasper's immersed with the pace that the cafeteria line is moving, which, knowing Jasper, meant that he's listening intently to the conversation.
"Um. Do you know Rosalie?"
Alice's eyes are shining with glee, and impishly, quirking her eyebrow as she says, "Yes."
"Okay." Emmett narrows his eyes, knowing that Alice is purposely withholding any details. "What do you know about her?"
She shrugs, "She's kinda bad-ass awesome. She's wicked confident, but cool."
He refrains from gritting his teeth. "Anything else?"
"Not really. We're not close, Em. We're the type of friends that, if it's Monday… we ask each other how our weekend was, and if it's Friday – we ask what our plans are for the weekend. Then we complain about lack of sleep, creepy Mr. Banner and bad hair days."
Jasper intervenes, "Why the sudden interest, dude?"
Emmett's surprised, not knowing that anybody else was eavesdropping. He glances to the others at their table, pleased and relieved that they are in their own little world.
"I dunno. Just met her today in study hall and I'd never seen her before, so I was just wondering."
Alice replies, "Well, she just transferred here. But like I said, Rosalie's nice, but she's cool. As in, not warm cool."
Mike snorts. "Dude. Rosalie? People are right. She's frigid. I was trying to talk with her and she shot me down before I even said a word!"
"Yeah... I heard she has, like, a kid and stuff." Jess says, clearly annoyed that Mike was chatting up another girl.
Noticing all of the disbelieving looks around the table and Angela's disapproving one (she's never been one for idle gossip), Jessica persists, "It's true! I heard it from Rosalie herself!"
The flash of disappointment surprises Emmett and he's makes sure to morph back into an easy grin. "Cool beans."
Tyler and Mike look at Emmett with puzzlement on their faces. Normally he'd be all sad and shit that there was a hot chick not interested in him. But, Em still looked like his typical happy state.
Emmett notices the looks, because subtlety is not Tyler or Mike's forte. "I was just curious," and curses under his breath. In making sure there was no expression on his face, he made it too obvious that this girl was different. He quickly steers the conversation to the sucky blood type test they had to do in biology, a little paranoid-panicky about his weird reactions.
Every other day, Emmett and Rosalie talk in study hall.
At first, they're the kind of friends that complain about homework and sleep, eerily similar to the conversations that Alice described before. Later on that week, on Wednesday, they move on to music, in which Emmett learns that Rosalie has horrible taste.
She's all about overgrown boy bands like The Script, The Fray and OneRepublic and when he tries listening to them, he is shocked by how cheesy they are.
"No guy would actually say that."
"Maybe you can't." Emmett notices that Rosalie's eyes are vibrant and lovely when she was teasing him, "But, they can."
"Nah. Even if they actually felt that. They wouldn't say it. I mean, really? 'What am I supposed to do when the best part of me was always you/ What am I supposed to say when I'm all choked up and you're ok?' You might as well just cut off the man's balls."
Rosalie huffs, and they agree to disagree on the matter. Later though, Emmett realizes what Rose was talking about. He's beginning to enjoy the bands. They aren't half bad.
Emmett, however, following in the footsteps of his liberal feminist hippie mom (that part of the story was true), is all about female rockers like Florence and the Machine and Janis Joplin.
Rosalie is surprised at first, but makes an effort to not judge them by their appearance and listens with an open mind.
The next time they meet, it's a Friday, and they talk about movies. Emmett likes exploding things and horrors, while Rosalie loves indie stuff and Ellen Page.
"See ya Rosalie," he says as the bell rings, ending their discussion on the merits of movie-sex.
She leaves, strutting with class and sexiness, "Call me Rose."
It's the kind of dramatic exit that any girl would be proud of, and the kind that any guy would remember.
Emmett smiles. Rose. He likes that. He likes it a lot.
Now he and Rose are the kind of friends who make plans for the weekend.
The first Saturday, they go to the movies, and decide on a genre that is completely out of both of their comfort zones - 3D animation.
This is also when Rose starts calling him Em.
The second weekend, Rose manages to rope him into doing early Christmas shopping, and then Em manages to convince Rose to try greasy Chinese takeout noodles.
They're walking around the mall, in synchronized strides, and he notices Rose looking at the baby store with longing. Shit, so maybe she did actually have a kid, and that's a scary thought, that the girl he was crushing on had a baby at home.
"Um… do you want to go in?" He asks, and praying to god that his voice and his hand was steady while gesturing to the bright Baby Gap store. Knowing that Rose did, but was probably too shy to ever say so, he leads the way, "I mean, no big. I was curious anyway."
Em walks in, not expecting the… brightness. To say it was well-lit would be an understatement. And the colours! It looked like Easter with all the pastel-y colours. There was a winter set up, and he couldn't believe all the fucking options that little kids had!
It was so clean, so bright, so colourful and so… mini. While the store had displays covering the walls… the stuff was so tiny. Em goes to where Rose is, and she's holding a really tiny yarn shoe-slipper or something.
"Is that a keychain?"
Rose laughs, "No. It's a shoe, for babies!"
He looks at it in disbelief, especially since his finger was bigger than that damn thing.
"People… can actually wear that?"
He's so amazed and bemused that Rose feels so comfortable and with a new bout of confidence, she takes Em's hand into hers, and they walk around, with Emmett asking questions a mile a minute, and Rose answering them patiently with a smile.
"Wow," he says, amazed. They've looked at everything, and Em's still smug that they're holding hands. He won't ever admit it, of course, but looking at baby clothes with Rose was actually nice. Really nice.
"I know, right? Isn't everything just so adorable?" and Rose is gushing. Em never thought he'd see the day. Rose was all gushing and giddy. He smiled to himself. Even if he had to walk through numerous baby stores again, he'd do it if it made her this happy. "God, I can't wait to be a mom."
At this, Em perks up. "So… you're not a mom?"
He waits for a yes or no answer, but instead Rose, being a girl and wanting to be complex goes, "I just want to be a mother." She pauses, "Do you still want to be with me?"
"Yeah, of course." So… did she have a kid or not? That meant no, right? She wouldn't need to 'want' to be a mommy if she already was one. Right. Good.
Afterwards, Em drives Rose home, since Rose can't find her car key in the humongous purse of hers. They reach the house, but before she even takes off her seatbelt, Em leans over and kisses Rose on the cheek.
It is soft and sweet.
Rose smiles. Then kisses him back, on the mouth, hard but still sweet.
Soft gloss with chapped lips, and it's dynamite with sparks flying like it's the fourth of July. Unlike any other boy she's ever kissed, Em doesn't choke her or slobber on her. He's not imposing, but he's definitely participating. They make out in the driveway for at least five minutes and both are flushed and a little breathless when they part.
Feeling confident, Em decides to ask about the rumours running rampant in school.
"You know, you have this rep at school," he says, treading carefully. Rose's not the type to be offended easily, but still… she's a girl, so…
"Really?" There's a knowing, expectant smirk on her face, sexy coupled with twinkling eyes.
"Erm. Yeah. A whole bunch of crazy stuff. You're frigid, you have a baby…" he rattles them off quickly, wanting to know the answers but not wanting to face her wrath, "I just wanted to know. I mean, it just seems kinda outrageous for one chick to have all this… sh… tuff." Emmett didn't want to say shit, because he's learned that serious conversations don't have swearing in them.
"Well, do you believe them?" She's expecting the fast 'No!' that normal people would give, but Emmett has this concentrating look on his face, and Rose realizes that he's seriously thinking about it.
A smile and a tinge of a blush blossoms on Rose's face, pleased that Emmett's going to give her an honest response.
Emmett's mind is running 60 miles an hour. Does he believe them? No. The Rose that he knows and the Rose that others know is different. His Rose is warm and laughing and can't use chopsticks properly. And, she wants to be a mother, but she isn't one yet.
"No."
"Good," she says with a tone that implies finality.
This conversation is over.
"So… how'd they come about?"
Rose sighs. Never mind, this conversation was not over.
"Well, who do you think made those rumours up?" she asks, but there's something in her voice that catches Emmett's attention. Her expression is expectant, hinting at something… Jess' voice also comes to mind…"I heard it from Rosalie!"
"You?" he says, his voice is a mixture of confusion and surprise. "Why? I mean, no guy would want to come near you!" he halts, afraid that he's offended her.
Her voice is soft, "You did, Emmett." Her hand's on the handle and she gets out of the car. She walks away, her back to him. Em wants to see her pretty face again.
"Wait!" He calls out, and then he pauses when she does turn around. He has no idea what to say. "Um. Can I call you?"
Rose's voice is faint, but the sincerity and the vulnerability reach his ears all the same. She nods, the blonde hair shimmering with the action.
"Call me your girlfriend."
He smiles.
He will.
what kind of music do you like?